New Orleanian, longtime baseball star Rusty Staub dies at 73

Daniel Joseph “Rusty” Staub, the native New Orleanian who played in the major leagues from his teens into his 40s, died early Thursday of multiple organ failure, three days shy of what would have been his 74th birthday.

Staub had dealt with multiple health issues in recent years, including a heart attack on a transcontinental flight in 2015. He was hospitalized in Florida eight weeks ago because of pneumonia, dehydration and an infection.

Staub, who grew up in Gentilly, starred at Bunny Friend Playground and led Jesuit High School to a national championship in American Legion baseball in 1960 and a state championship in prep for the Blue Jays the following spring, signed a six-figure deal with the expansion Houston Colt .45s (now Astros) after graduating from Jesuit. He made his big-league debut on April 9, 1963, a week after his 19th birthday.

He would go on to play 23 seasons and 2,951 career games (13th-most in Major League Baseball history) in the majors with the Colts/Astros, Montreal Expos, New York Mets, Detroit Tigers and Texas Rangers, batting .279 in his career with 2,716 hits, including 499 doubles and 292 home runs. Staub led the National League in doubles in 1967 with 44. His career hit total is topped only by Hall of Famer Mel Ott among players born in Louisiana.

“Certainly for guys who grew up in the ’60s and ’70s, Rusty was the one constant for (baseball fans) in the city when you opened up the box scores each and every day,” said Jesuit athletic director David Moreau, who coached the Blue Jays from 1984-2005. “As Hap Glaudi would report the scores, he would tell you ‘the Astros won 3-2 and Rusty Staub went 2-for-3.’

“He carried himself with class and played with class throughout his entire career. When he became a pinch hitter par excellence, most people in baseball know that is very difficult to do, to have one at-bat often with the game on the line. He was a guy that people depended on at the end of the game, often in the clutch.”

Staub, known during his playing days as much for his red hair as his left-handed swing, is the only player in major league history to have 500 or more hits with four different franchises and one of only four players in the sport’s history – along with Ty Cobb, Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield – to hit home runs before their 20th birthday and after their 40th birthday.

A six-time all-star, Staub was most beloved in Montreal, where he was the franchise’s first star and was nicknamed “Le Grand Orange” by a Canadian sportswriter, and in New York, where he played for the Mets’ 1973 World Series team – he hit four home runs that postseason despite playing much of it with a separated shoulder – and returned to close out his career as one of the game’s best pinch hitters.

“I can still remember him in that ’73 Series almost having to throw under-handed,” Moreau said. “For a guy to lead the National League in doubles (in 1967) over the likes of Clemente, Cepeda, Aaron, Mays and McCovey says a lot.”

In his post-playing career, Staub was best known for his philantrophy, dividing his efforts between his restaurant business and the Rusty Staub Foundation, which in 1986 established the New York Police and Fire Widows and Children’s Benefit Fund. The foundation has provided more than 9 million meals to the hungry at food pantries in New York, and the fund donated more than $11 million to New York-area families in the years following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Locally, he offered his time to St. Michael’s Special School on a regular basis.

Staub also took part in New Orleans’ most famous tradition, Mardi Gras. He was the first-ever grand marshal of the Krewe of Endymion – the parade’s inaugural theme was “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” – and was a regular rider, usually unmasked, on the title float of the Krewe of Bacchus.

One of 10 major leaguers to graduate from Jesuit, Staub’s No. 10 was retired by the Expos. He is a member of the Mets Hall of Fame, in addition to the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, where he was a 1989 inductee, the Allstate Sugar Bowl’s Greater New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame and the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame.

Of the 12 players who have played more career games in the majors, only Pete Rose and Omar Visquel are not enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame. “I am certain at some point,” original Expos general manager Jim Fanning said in 2012, “the Veterans Committee will vote in this man.”

In 1991, Staub was named Jesuit’s Alumnus of the Year. Staub’s hat and glove from the 1973 World Series is on display at Jesuit at the Hall of Honors. He played both basketball and baseball for the Blue Jays.

Since 1977, Jesuit has presented the Rusty Staub Award annually to the senior baseball letterman “manifesting outstanding sportsmanship, leadership and spirit for the season.” The first recipient was Mike Riley, and the list of winners since has included the likes of Steve Riley (1980), Andy Galy (1984), Rick Chanove (1989), Brian Gibbs (1990), Jude Voltz (1996), Kelly Comarda (2000) and Barry Butera Jr. (2006).

Jesuit will play Archbishop Rummel at 5:45 p.m. Thursday at John Ryan Stadium – a game relocated from Kirsch-Rooney Stadium because of inclement weather. The school will honor Staub prior to the game with a moment of silence.

Staub’s brother and high school teammate, Chuck, still resides in the New Orleans area.