Jim Northrup (baseball)
American baseball player
James Thomas Northrup (November 24, 1939 – June 8, 2011), nicknamed "the Silver Fox" due to his prematurely graying hair, was an American Major League Baseball outfielder and left-handed batter who played for the Detroit Tigers (1964–74), Montreal Expos (1974) and Baltimore Orioles (1974–75).
Career overview
Northrup was a good outfielder who played significant percentages of his time in all three outfield positions. Northrup's versatility allowed then-manager Mayo Smith to make him the Tigers' center fielder in the 1968 World Series, as Smith famously moved regular center fielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop to replace the weak-hitting Ray Oyler.
A streak hitter and catalyst for Detroit during the 1960s, Northrup was a power hitter who had good strike-zone judgment and a short, quick stroke. In the field, he had a decent arm, a quick release and good accuracy.
Northrup is best remembered for his contributions to the 1968 Detroit Tigers World Series Championship team. Northrup led the 1968 Tigers in hits and RBIs, hit five grand slams, broke up three no-hitters, and had the game-winning triple off Bob Gibson in Game 7 of the 1968 World Series.
In his 12-year major league career Northrup batted .267 (1254-for-4692), with 153 home runs, 610 RBIs, 603 runs, 218 doubles, 42 triples, 39 stolen bases and 449 bases on balls in 1392 games. Defensively, he recorded a .981 fielding percentage playing at all three outfield positions and first base. In 12 postseason games, he batted .286 (12-for-42) with 4 runs, 1 triple, 2 home runs, 9 RBI and 3 walks.
“Jim Northrup (baseball)” enters the record as american baseball player. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Northrup, baseball and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6197206. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1939, 2011, 1964 and 1974.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jim Northrup (baseball)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.