Ten Cent Beer Night: The Wildest Night in Baseball History

Could you imagine in nineteen seventy four going to a baseball game at Cleveland Municipal Stadium with two dollars in your pocket to see them face off against the Texas Rangers, and you get not only a ticket, but you are able to get fifteen beers that night as well. That's what happened when on June fourth, nineteen seventy four, the Cleveland Indians put on a promotion offering beer for ten cents, which led to some wild hijinks and a riot at the end of the game that ruined their chance of the Indians coming back and they had to forfeit the game and led to policies getting changed into the sports world forever. Let's dive into the stories today on Daily Sports History. Let's go Welcome to Daily Sports History. A'm ethan rees your guide as you daily learn more about sports history, increasing your sports knowledge. So first let's set the stage. Let's go back to the nineteen seventies, especially in Cleveland, which was a city and a team in transition. Cleveland was a once booming industry but was faltering. The city had thrived on steel manufacturing and shipping, but now they're facing a downturn in the economy, and the population saw a steep fall in their income over the last decade. Even as the country's income rose per capita, it did not reflect what was going on in Cleveland, and the Indians were desperate to fill seats. And you have to remember back in the nineteen seventies, games may have been on TV, but they weren't generating revenue from television like they are today. And the Indians were led by kin As Promote, who took over in the nineteen seventy one season after eight one hundred and two lost season, and he brought stability and would incrementally improve the team, especially when they acquired Gaylord Perry in nineteen seventy two, a future Hall of Famer. However, by nineteen seventy four they seemed to be stalling out after being in first place in mid season. They would go on to finish seventy seven and eighty five and Ken would be out and they would bring in the very first black manager in Major League Baseball history in Frank Robinson, a Hall of Famer himself. And then there was the Texas Rangers, who were managed by Billy Martin, who became famous for being the manager of the Yankees like seven times. But he had a fiery personality, a gret style, and he really turned around the struggling Rangers. He quickly made a mark orchestrating some key trades, and Martin's teams played hard and they were a challenge for anyone they faced. Now before June fourth, nineteen seventy four, these teams had bad blood. On May twenty ninth, just six days before this ten cent beer night, the Indians and Rangers met in Arlington, and a hard slide by Ranger Lenny Randall into second baseman Jack Roheimer ignited tensions and a pitch thrown behind Randall when he was at the plate, leading to a dragged bunt and a collision between Randall and pitcher Milt Wilcox. Indians first baseman John Ellis punched Randall and both benches cleared and emptied into a full scale brawl, and the teams would be pelted by food and beer and angry Texas fans, although despite all this, no player was ejected and the Rangers would win the game. This would lead to one of the most iconic nights in baseball history. I see about a week later on June fourth, nineteen seventy four. The Cleveland Indians were hoping to increase their attendance on a weekday, which was a struggle to get fans to come out on a Tuesday night. So they offered ten cent beer night, which was a good deal as regularly it was sixty five cents for a beer about twelve ounces. Today that'd be about a little over four dollars, so it's a good deal. And the only restriction they had was a six beer per purchase limit. First of all, that's a crazy number limit because have you tried to carry six beers? Very difficult, And there was no cap on how many trips a fan could go to the beer stand. So what this meant is they could go as many times as they want, as drunk as they want, get their frings as drunk as they want. It was set up for failure, and when they originally started this, they were gonna sell a beer that had less alcohol content. Problem was, they sold out that pretty quickly and had to go to the regular content and made it even worse. But it worked. Overall, we were able to get over twenty five thousand fans, more than double they would get on a regular Tuesday night. But it's also estimated that they had over sixty thousand beers sold that night, which was roughly at least three beers for every person, at least probably more for certain people, less for say the kids that were there, and a ticket to go into the bleachers for or their cheap seats would only be fifty cents that day, So for a dollar you could get a ticket to the game and get five beers. Sounds like a great deal. And this really hit as a lot of people were having financial difficulties auto jobs, looking for work. There's college students that didn't have a whole lot of money, diehard fans just wanted a chance to see a game for that just had a brawl a week earlier. There was a lot going on, and the atmosphere was a fun night at the beginning, which usually happens if you're having a party with alcohol. The beginning of the night's fun. It stwards the end of the night. I think it's a little crazy. The beginning of the night, there's a woman that runs on the field, flashes the crowd, kisses the umpire. Later there's a naked man that slides into second and then even later there's a father and son duo get onto the field and moon the crowd. And the problem they offered this night, and they doubled their capacity, but they did not double their security. So security was overwhelmed this night, not only the stuff that has happened on the field, but the stuff that's happened in the crowd they had to deal with. They just were not prepared. And problem was the game was starting to get heated as well as Cleveland's Leon Lee would hit a line drive during the game that hit pitcher Ferguson Jenkins right in the stomach. Now, Jenkins laid on the ground and fans chanted hit him, hit him again, hit him harder, and when Billy Martin came out to check on him and argue the call on the field, he would be pelted with beer, but he would antagonize the fans by blowing kisses to him. They get it worse, and as the game would drag on, fans continued to hurl beer cups, light fireworks. The air in the stadium was filled with a haze of marijuana smoke, and there was nothing they could do to stop it. It was just overwhelming, like a stampede. As strong as you are, you cannot stop at Stampede. This year number overtakes you. And the problem was Cleveland was losing most of the game and that antagonized the fans. They were hoping to see a Cleveland win. But in the ninth inning they began to rally back and would end up tying the game in the bottom of the ninth five to five, and they had two runners on base with a chance to win. Then a fan rushed the field trying to steal the Rangers outfielders baseball cap, and he obviously was not letting him do that, and it led to the Rangers and Billy Martin actually storming the field with bats in hand to try to help their fellow teammates. Seeing fans began to storm the field and they weren't just wielding bats. Some of them had knives changed makeshift weapons. The players on both teams, along with the umpires, were forced to defend themselves as chaops erupted. Cleveland pitcher Tom Hineldorf was hit in the head with a metal folding chair. The umpire Nester Black, suffered cuts on his hands. Rangers outfielder Mike Hargrove was struck in the head with a beer bottle. The lasted for over fifteen minutes, and there was over two hundred fans on the field and the chaos was not dying down. As we said, security was not prepared for this night. They were not ready, and so the umpires called the game and forfeited in favor of the Texas Rangers, which was the first forfeit in over four years, and police were called and would arrive on the scene onto the field. Both teams would retreat into the dugout, into the team's locker rooms and locking the doors behind them while the crowd wrecked havoc on the field, tearing it up, stealing bases, fighting amongst themselves. The right would last for over fifteen minutes, and when police arrived, they only rested nine people of what's estimated to be over two hundred. But it was a different time, and Jesus are those nine people were probably Texas fans. We don't know. Those details are not aware of us. But both teams had to wait hours for this all to get cleaned up before they could leave the stadium for safety. This led to stricter alcohol rules for Major League Baseball and has bled over into other sports as well. They would institute limits on alcohol beverages that fans can make at one purchase, increase security for promotional nights, and they would eventually go on to change the containers as cans would not be served anymore, only plastic cups. But they would take time for all these things to be implemented to what we see today. But even today, the Cleveland Guardians still have a two dollars beer night, which is roughly equivalent to what it was back in the ten cent beer night, but this is much more regulated. You can only buy two beers per person at a time, served in a cup to prevent them from being thrown, and fans seen throwing anything, no matter what it is, onto the field will be immediately ejected from the stadium. So these rules and stricter regulations make it safer not only for players on the field, but also well for fans. A lot of these fans got injured in hurt by other fans. When chaos ensues, you don't care who it is, you don't care who you're going after, and you end up in bad situations, and that's exactly what happened in this one. But the question is was this night the best sports promotion value wise in sports history. With one dollar you can get a ticket and five beers seems hard to beat. For me, I want to thank you for listening to Today's Daily Sports History. 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