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Fourth Class Of New Orleans Professional Baseball HOF To Be Inducted Saturday

May 8, 2008 - Pacific Coast League (PCL1)
New Orleans Baby Cakes News Release


Metairie, LA - At the Zephyrs game vs. the Sacramento RiverCats on Saturday, the fourth class of the New Orleans Professional Baseball Hall of Fame will be inducted throughout the game. The Class of 2008 includes Gene Freese, Joe Martina, Eddie Morgan, Mel Rue and Joe Slusarski. The inductees will be honored on the field during the game, and plaques will be presented to Freese, Rue and the families of Martina, Morgan and Slusarski between innings.

A native of Wheeling, West Virginia, Gene Freese broke in with Burlington-Graham in 1953 before moving up to the New Orleans Pelicans in 1954. He hit .332 with 16 home runs and 98 RBIs for the Pelicans, earning another promotion - this time to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Freese enjoyed a career in Major League Baseball for 12 seasons, playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates, the St. Louis Cardinals, the Philadelphia Phillies, the Chicago White Sox, the Cincinnati Reds and the Houston Astros. He compiled a career .254 batting average with 115 home runs in 1,115 games, and ranks among the all-time leaders in major league baseball with 9 pinch-hit home runs, including two consecutive homers in April of 1959.

Freese returned to New Orleans after baseball and enjoyed a long business career in his adopted hometown.

"Oyster" Joe Martina was born in New Orleans in 1889. A pitcher, he won 133 games in seven years with the New Orleans Pelicans en route to a minor league mark of 349-277. Martina made his major league debut in 1924 with the Washington Senators. He went 6-8 on the season and threw a single inning in Game Three of the 1924 World Series against the New York Giants, which the Senators captured in seven games.

Martina returned to New Orleans for another four seasons, helping the Pels win two pennants, and finished as the winningest pitcher in the history of the Pelicans with 133 wins and 79 losses.

Martina retired from professional baseball after the 1935 season and became a salesman for the American Brewery Company in New Orleans, where he died at the age of 72 in 1962.

A native of Cairo, Illinois, Eddie Morgan attended Tulane University from 1923 through 1926 where he was a standout athlete in track, football and baseball.

Morgan starred on the New Orleans Pelicans in 1927, batting .354 in his rookie campaign and earning a call-up to the Cleveland Indians. He made his major league debut on April 11, 1928 and posted a .313 batting average in his rookie season. Morgan broke out during the 1930 and 1931 seasons, batting .349 and .350 and hitting 26 and 11 homers respectively.

Morgan was drafted by the Boston Red Sox from the Pelicans in the 1933 Rule 5 draft and was later purchased by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1934. However, Morgan elected to return once again to his hometown New Orleans Pelicans for the 1935 and 1936 seasons. He retired from professional baseball after the 1936 season and remained in New Orleans until his death in 1980.

A New Orleans native, Mel Rue got his start in professional baseball in 1943 with Olean in the PONY League, and then moved up to the New Orleans Pelicans in 1944. He played at total of 597 games at shortstop and 69 games at second base for the Pelicans during six seasons from 1944 through 1947.

While he was known for his solid defense, Rue was also a fair hitter, posting a .255 batting average during his career with the Pelicans.

Rue played another five seasons with teams in Memphis, Indianapolis, Charleston, Reading, Macon, and Lincoln. After 12 seasons in professional baseball Rue retired after the 1954 campaign. In two seasons at the University of New Orleans, pitcher Joe Slusarski compiled a record of 26 - 7. In his senior year he established school records for innings pitched (160) and strikeouts (146).

Slusarski was drafted in the 2nd round of the 1988 amateur draft and made his major league debut on April 11, 1991 as a member of the Oakland Athletics where he played for three seasons. He also served with the Milwaukee Brewers, the Atlanta Braves and the Houston Astros during his seven-year major league career.

Joe was also a member of the New Orleans Zephyrs in 1995 and 1996 and again in 1998 through 2001. He posted a career 3.48 ERA in 188 games with the Zephyrs and was a member of the Zephyrs Triple-A World Series championship squad in 1998.

The New Orleans Professional Baseball Hall of Fame was founded by the New Orleans Zephyrs with the induction of the first class at the Evening With the Zephyrs on January 27, 2005. Class members are selected by a panel that includes Zephyrs officials and New Orleans Baseball Historians. The panel uses the following criteria for its choices: entrants must have been a citizen of the greater New Orleans area through birth or re-location, have had outstanding baseball achievement as a player, coach or administrator that has brought recognition to the Greater New Orleans area, and be of good character and reputation.

www.zephyrsbaseball.com

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