Leonard Church (March 21, 1942 – April 22, 1988) was a

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

for the Chicago Cubs. A student at Lane Technical High School in Chicago, he was signed as a free agent by the Cubs in 1963. After spending four seasons in the minors, Church made his MLB debut on August 27, 1966, allowing one run in two innings of work in a 5-4 Cubs loss to Houston. On August 29 and 31, he came into both games in save situations and was the pitcher who surrendered the Cubs' lead, recording a blown save in each case. On August 31, Church surrendered a pinch-hit home run to Cincinnati's

Art Shamsky Arthur Louis Shamsky (nicknamed "Sham" and "Smasher"; born October 14, 1941) is an American former Major League Baseball player. He played right field, left field, and first base from 1965 to 1972 for the Cincinnati Reds, New York Mets, Chicago ...

, the first batter he faced, but prior pitcher

Curt Simmons Curtis Thomas Simmons (May 19, 1929 – December 13, 2022) was an American professional baseball left-handed pitcher, who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) from to and to . Along with right-hander Robin Roberts (a member of the Baseball H ...

was on the hook for the loss due to a player reaching on an error, followed by an intentional walk to the next batter. The Cubs blew a 5–0 lead in the process, losing 7–5. Church made one more appearance in his MLB career, relieving

Bill Hands William Alfred Hands, Jr. (May 6, 1940 – March 9, 2017) was an American professional baseball player who pitched in the major leagues from 1965 to 1975. His best season came in 1969 with the Chicago Cubs, when he won 20 games. Early life A n ...

on September 4 of the same season. He allowed four runs in two innings of work and was charged with the loss as the Cubs lost to Pittsburgh 8–5. For the 1966 season (and his MLB career), Church finished 0–1 with a 7.50 ERA. He played five more seasons in the minor leagues, mostly with the AAA Tacoma Cubs, before hanging up his spikes in 1971 at age 29. Church died of a heart attack in

Richardson, Texas Richardson is a city in Dallas and Collin counties in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 United States census, the city had a total population of 119,469. Richardson is an inner suburb of the city of Dallas. It is home to the University ...

on April 22, 1988.

References

Baseball-reference page

Minor league stats

Game log

August 31, 1966 box score
{{DEFAULTSORT:Church, Len 1942 births 1988 deaths Chicago Cubs players Major League Baseball pitchers Baseball players from Chicago St. Cloud Rox players Arizona Instructional League Cubs players Tacoma Cubs players San Antonio Missions players Dallas–Fort Worth Spurs players Wenatchee Chiefs players