In 1963 there was a two-story residence that had been converted into a rooming house for Cal students at Bowditch and Haste—the northeast corner of what would soon become People’s Park. In 1963 a fellow named Andy Messersmith lived in an upstairs room and I shared a downstairs room with Larry Belcher. We were all undergraduates. Rooms rented for about $35 a month and tuition ran $76 a semester. I remember the Friday afternoon of November 22, 1963 when we learned of the JFK assassination. We were sitting in Larry’s and my room listening to the radio. It was either Andy or Larry who said, “So they found the guy who shot the President in a movie theater?” 

Sometimes Andy and Larry would talk about sports and Andy told us he played baseball. One weekend afternoon when we were sitting on the front porch we decided to arm-wrestle. Andy had a strong right arm and we struggled for a while and let it go as a tie. I think he was surprised that he couldn’t beat me. My father had been a physical fitness instructor during WW II and after the war had trained his sons well.

I never saw Andy much after that Fall semester. I remember him as a polite, quiet person with a very engaging smile, and was pleased to learn of his subsequent successes. In 1965 he earned All-American honors as a pitcher for the Cal Berkeley baseball team. His record of 195 strikeouts remains one of the school’s most formidable records. After leaving Cal, he went on to play in the Major Leagues for 12 years for the California Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers, Atlanta Braves, and New York Yankees. During his professional career he became one of the most respected and successful pitchers in baseball. He is also well known for the role he played in Baseball’s acceptance of free agency. His bargaining role in the 1975 Seitz Decision helped eliminate the reserve clause, which had given team owners the right to renew their players’ contracts at will. That legal decision ultimately gave Major League Baseball players freedom to shop themselves to other teams and ultimately negotiate dramatically higher salaries.