Willis Hudlin
George Willis Hudlin was born in Wagoner, Oklahoma, and was a Major League Baseball pitcher for, most notably, the Cleveland Indians from 1926 to 1940. Hudlin did not pitch more than 10 games with any other team, although he played with 3 others.
In 1940, Hudlin became one of the few players to compete on 4 different major league teams in the same year.
Hudlin's career statistics include a 158–156 record, with a 4.41 ERA. He had 677 strikeouts in 2613.1 career innings pitched.
Hudlin was the pitcher who gave up Babe Ruth's 500th home run.
Hudlin was a good hitting pitcher in his career, recording a.201 batting average with 76 runs, 5 home runs, 69 RBI and 52 bases on balls.
Hudlin's pitch selection included a well-known sinker, a fastball, curveball and a changeup. He occasionally threw sidearm or with an underhand "dip of the wrist", though he threw overhand most often.
After Hudlin finished playing in the majors, he was a manager for the minor league Little Rock Travelers and pitching coach for the Detroit Tigers under skippers Jack Tighe, Bill Norman and Jimmy Dykes.
Hudlin later became a scout for the New York Yankees where he even scouted his own son James Hudlin who was given a contract to play professionally, but was drafted to serve in the Vietnam War. James Hudlin's pitch selection was a knuckleball, slider, curveball, and sinker, as well as a two-seam fastball which topped out at.
Willis Hudlin was a member of the Army Air Forces during World War II as a flight instructor. He died in Little Rock, Arkansas, at the age of 96, and was interred in Hazelhurst Cemetery, Hazelhursrt, Copiah County, Mississippi.
