38 days until opening day gets us to #38 on the jersey countdown. Korey Lee presently wears #38 for the good guys.
Hal Brown originated the jersey in 1963, and Hall of Famer Robin Roberts sported it in 1965 and 1966. The first long-time wearer of it was Tom Griffin, who put it on his back from 1969-1976.Griffin was a a sometimes starter, sometimes reliever who went 45-60 with the Stros. His best season was 1974 when he celebrated my birth by going 14-10 with a 3.54 ERA. The guy walked a crazy number of batters, with a lifetime WHIP of 1.456.
After that, the number went to Floyd Bannister, who the Astros took with the #1 pick of the 1976 Amateur draft. Bannister was the Astros' first-ever overall #1 pick. Bannister pitched just 7 games in the minors in 1976 before the Astros brought him up to debut at age 22 in 1977. He went 11-18 with a 4.38 ERA and just like that, they gave up on him and traded him to the Mariners for Craig Reynolds, who was 25, and coming off a really great season with Seattle where he hit .292, was an All-Star, Bannister wound up having two 16-win seasons with the White Sox down the road.
Tim Tolman wore #38 for 3 years in the 80s, and then the dark times came. John McMullen said, why pay Nolan Ryan a lot of money when I can give it to Jim Clancy instead? Clancy wore #38 for 2-1/2 god-awful seasons from 1989-1991. He went 7-14 with a 5.08 ERA in 1989 while Nolan was off going 16-10 with 301 strikeouts. The next year, Clancy was 2-8 as the team had to send him to the bullpen. His ERA was 6.51 that year. After he started the 1991 season 0-3 but with a 2.78 ERA and 5 saves, the Astros sent him to the suddenly-contending Braves for a case of Schlitz beer and three dozen bags of pretzels. In just about every photo I can find, he's laughing. I guess I'd be laughing too if I got paid $2.5 million to pitch horribly.
I have a very fond memory of going to an Astros-Pirates game with my parents in May of 1989 - Clancy starting vs. the Pirates. The game was 1-1 after an inning, but they had to pause in the top of the second when some of the lights of the Dome went out. An error on Alex Trevino let a run score, but then Clancy gave up three more hits in a row, prompting my Dad, for reasons still unknown, to suddenly stand up in our mezzanine level seats and scream, "Hey Clancy, YOU FUQING SUCK!" to the delight of myself and most of the rest of the section and to my mom's extreme horror. Clancy got pulled after 1-1/3 innings. giving up 6 runs en route to 17-5 loss.
Not a lot of guys have wanted to wear #38 since then. Sean Bergman had it for a couple of years. Ezequiel Astacio had in 2005-2006 and Joe Smith wore it from 2018-2021.
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