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Three-time All-Star outfielder Joe Rudi was a key cog of the Oakland A's dynasty of the early 1970s that won five straight American League West Division titles from 1971 to '75 and three consecutive World's Championships from 1972 through '74. Signed by the Charles O. Finley's Kansas City Athletics as an amateur free agent in 1964, he was selected off of the waiver wire by the Cleveland Indians as a first-year waiver pick in 1965. The As got him back via a trade, and he made his major league debut, in a game against Cleveland, on April 11, 1967.
Rudi won three Gold Gloves for fielding excellence while playing left-field for the Oakland A's, a team that under manager Dick Williams (1971-73) and Alvin Dark (1967; 1974-75) won a reputation for their winning on the field and their disharmony off of it. He came in second in voting for the American League Most Valuable Player twice, in 1972 and '74, both years the A's won it all. With the advent of free agency, controversial owner Charlie O. tried to unload his potential free-agents for their maximum value, dealing Vida Blue to the New York Yankees and Rudi and Hall of Fame reliever Rollie Fingers to the Boston Red Sox. The deals were vetoed by Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, who had long been a nemesis of Finley.
At the end of the 1976, Rudi declared free agency and signed with owner Gene Autry's California Angels, where he was reunited (for one year) with his former A's manager, Dick Williams. However, Rudi was not the same player, in terms of production, but his team did manage to make win the AL West Division in 1979, though he only played in 90 games. In January 1981, he finally wound up on the Red Sox when Boston traded former MVP Fred Lynn and pitcher Steve Renko to the Angels for Rudi, Jim Dorsey and pitcher Frank Tanana. By this time, he was a utility player. He resigned with the Oakland A's as a free agent at the end of the year and played in 71 games for them in the 1982 season.
He finished his 16-year career with 1,468 hits good for a .264 batting average. That and his 179 home runs and 810 runs batted in will never get him into the Hall of Fame, but as a member of the World's Champion A's, one of the most colorful teams in baseball history and one of the great mini-dynasties, he has achieved his place in baseball immortality.
