Fernando Valenzuela’s Immediate MLB Success Gave Way to a Lasting Legacy

The Dodgers legend who died Tuesday became an instant phenomenon during his legendary 1981 campaign, creating lifelong baseball fans in Los Angeles, Latin America and beyond.

Valenzuela grew the game of baseball in Latin America, and specifically Mexico, like no one else. / Ron Vesely/Getty Images

In our hearts we like to hold the notion that baseball is a kid’s game. Fernando Valenzuela played it so well and with so much joy, he gladdened our hearts. He confirmed our deepest, most optimistic wishes for the game and those who play it.

Fernando had the shy smile of a child, the rounded body of a blue-collar worker and the left arm of a magician. He gazed heaven-ward mid-delivery, as if calling on angels, and threw a screwball that to a hitter was hell on earth.

Just saying the name puts a smile on your face. Fernando. No last name necessary. Like Babe, Willie, Jackie, Mickey and Sandy, Fernando became so familiar to us—in the true sense of the root word, familia—that he belongs in that small pantheon of ballplayers who are more beloved than they are admired. Few made greatness seem so approachable, so dang fun.

It is difficult to believe that he is gone at just 63 years old. Word among the Dodger organization during the team’s run to this World Series was that he was in failing health. Now he is gone just three days before the revival of the greatest World Series rivalry, Dodgers vs. Yankees, for the first time in 43 years—in a series and a season with Valenzuela’s name and elan all over it.

On Oct. 23, 1981, Valenzuela took the ball at Dodger Stadium against the Yankees with his team trailing in the series, two games to none. He was just 20 years old. The Dodgers gave him a 3–0 lead after their first turn at bat. New York came roaring back, scoring twice in the second and twice in the third. What happened next was one of the most remarkable and underappreciated pitching efforts the World Series has ever seen.

Valenzuela did not allow another run. The Dodgers gave him a 5–4 lead in the fifth and he made it stand up. Here is how he made it stand up: he dodged nine hits and seven walks. He faced 40 batters. Pitching on three days of rest, he threw 147 pitches, of which only on 13 of them did he get the Yankees to swing and miss.

For all the shutouts, Fernando Valenzuela’s most impressive performance might have been Game 3 of the 1981 World Series, when he gave up 9 hits and 7 walks as he gutted out a 147-pitch complete game victory. Pure heart. RIP to a legend. pic.twitter.com/TRu5A2Vs8W

— Richard Roeper (@RichardERoeper) October 23, 2024

In the eighth inning, Valenzuela allowed singles to Aurelio Rodríguez and Larry Milbourne. He had thrown 126 pitches. One run game, two on, no outs. Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda did not budge. He had no one better to bring in than the bull he had on the mound 126 pitches deep into the night. Valenzuela rewarded his faith by getting the next five batters: double play, groundout, groundout, flyball and—on the last of his 147 pitches—a swinging strikeout of Lou Piniella.

Nobody that young before or since won a World Series game with so many pitches—not even Babe Ruth himself, who threw 145 at age 21 in 1916.

In the 1981 postseason, Valenzuela made five starts in 17 days while piling up 40 2/3 innings. The entire Dodger rotation in 11 games this postseason has thrown 40 innings, less than Fernando did by himself.

Valenzuela delivered the first pitch of the 2022 MLB All-Star Game in Los Angeles. / Robert Hanashiro-Imagn Images

By that October, Valenzuela was approaching Ruthian status as a social and cultural icon. His out-of-nowhere story was a new version of the American dream that appealed to everyone. He was the seventh son of the 12 children of Avelino and Maria Valenzuela, who raised their family on a small farm on the west coast of Mexico. The Dodgers signed him out of the Mexican League in 1979 at 18. The next year he was in the big leagues.

In 1981, he defined the word phenomenon, and Lasorda rode that phenom. It began back on Opening Day, when an injured Jerry Reuss could not make the start and Lasorda tabbed Valenzuela, even though Fernando had thrown batting practice the previous day. He threw a shutout. 

And then another complete game, another shutout, another shutout, another shutout … eight straight complete game wins before he finally lost. 

By the middle of May, Valenzuela was 8–0 and a national fascination. Dodger Stadium swelled to capacity for his starts, especially with Mexican fans who until then had been indifferent to the team. His road starts were events, preceded by huge press conferences and attended by an additional 10,000 fans or so who had to see this magician in person.

His popularity was so enormous it had its own name: “Fernandomania.”

He was invited to the White House to meet the president. He started the All-Star Game. He won the World Series. He became the first pitcher to win the Rookie of the Year and Cy Young awards.

As the great Vin Scully once said, “I’ve seen great pitchers and cities who love players. But I have never seen anything like this. And I don’t think I will ever see it again.”

Valenzuela went on to win 173 games, the most among Mexican-born pitchers. He struck out five straight batters in the 1986 All-Star Game. He threw a no-hitter in 1990. He was the winning pitcher in the first MLB game played outside the U.S. and Canada, in Monterrey, Mexico, in 1996. He became a popular broadcaster for the Dodgers. The team retired his No. 34 in 2023. The Mexican League retired his number for all clubs.

Few players not in the Hall of Fame ever left a bigger mark on the game. His starts were social and cultural events, bringing together English- and Spanish-speaking fans.

Dodgers broadcaster Jaime Jarrin once said, “no other player in major league history created more new fans. Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Joe DiMaggio, even Babe Ruth did not. Fernando turned so many people from Mexico, Central America and South America into fans.”

Valenzuela once said, “It would be really great, if they remembered me as someone who always tried his best to always give them a good show, so that they could have fun with this beautiful game.”

On that wish, Valenzuela succeeded beautifully. His place in the game is almost mythic. Always beloved. Never forgotten.