Dave Bristol – An Underrated Cincinnati Reds Manage
Today we’re going to hop in our time machines and take a look back at former Cincinnati Reds manager Dave Bristol. He managed the Reds from the middle of the 1966 season through the 1969 season.
Bristol managed the Reds after the short and miserable tenure of Don Heffner in 1966. At the time of his hiring, Bristol was a young, sharp baseball mastermind who had been in the Reds farm system as a manager.
He was just 33-years-old when he was hired. Jim Maloney won Bristol’s first game with an 8-3 victory; Vada Pinson was 4-for-5, Pete Rose 3-for-3 and Art Shamsky was 3-for-4 with a home run.
Bristol was an inside hire; he’d managed Reds farm teams for years and was known by most of the players. He took the Reds from the demise under Heffner to contenders. True enough, he also had good players to fill the lineup with – Bench, Rose, Perez, Cardenas, Helms, and May. But he had a thin pitching staff that featured Maloney and not much else.
Gary Nolan showed promise but got hurt. Tony Cloninger could eat innings but was known more for his hitting than his pitching. Milt Pappas would be gone after 1967, Mel Queen had one good season, and Bristol’s bullpen was led by Ted Abernathy and Billy McCool in ‘66. Jim Merritt had a good season for the Reds in both 1969 and 1970.
