Baseball lifer & O's HOFer Rich Dauer, 72, dies

Rich Dauer, an Orioles Hall of Famer who spent his entire 10-year MLB career in Baltimore and was the starting second baseman on the 1983 World Series championship team, has died, the team announced Monday. He was 72.

Dauer was a career .257 hitter who played 1,140 games -- 948 of which came from 1978-84, as the Orioles were consistently among the top teams in the American League. He joined the O’s Hall of Fame in 2012, becoming the 12th member of the ‘83 championship team to be inducted.

• The Orioles Hall of Fame

Dauer also had an 18-year career as an MLB coach. He retired following the 2017 season, when he won a second World Series title as the Astros’ first-base coach.

“We send our deepest sympathies to the Dauer family as well as his many teammates and friends,” the Orioles said in a statement on social media.

Richard Fremont Dauer was born in San Bernardino, Calif., on July 27, 1952. He was a three-sport athlete at Colton (Calif.) High School, where he played football, basketball and baseball.

Upon graduation, Dauer went on to play baseball at San Bernardino Valley College. He was twice drafted by the A’s -- in the fifth round in 1971, then in the ninth round in ‘72 -- but he opted to return to school both times.

After getting selected by Cleveland in the first round of the secondary phase of the 1972 MLB Draft -- which was split into two parts at the time -- Dauer opted to transfer to the University of Southern California. He became a star for the Trojans, leading them in batting average in both the ‘73 and ‘74 seasons.

Dauer, an All-American at third base, helped lead USC to College World Series titles in both of his seasons at the school. He hit .376 with 26 home runs, 135 RBIs and 124 runs scored over 126 games for the Trojans.

In 1974, Dauer was selected by the Orioles with the No. 24 pick in the first round of the Draft. At the time, Baltimore was getting close to needing a new third baseman, as Hall of Famer Brooks Robinson’s career was winding down.

“I hope he is getting old. They are going to need a new third baseman soon, and I feel -- and hope -- I fit into their plans,” Dauer said then, according to an article by Mike Huber for SABR.

However, Dauer would go on to make only 243 of his 1,207 big league defensive appearances at third, spending most of his time at second, where he debuted and played 964 games.

It took some time for Dauer to find his footing in the Majors, though. He was called up by the O’s in 1976, then went 4-for-39 (.103) in 11 games that year.

Dauer became a solid big league player in the years that followed. Over eight seasons from 1977-84, he slashed .262/.314/.350 with 186 doubles, 41 homers and 355 RBIs in 1,044 games.

The Orioles twice reached the World Series during Dauer’s time with the team. They lost to the Pirates in seven games in 1979, but Dauer had a strong showing, going 5-for-17 (.294) with one double, one home run, one RBI and two runs scored.

In the 1983 Fall Classic, Dauer went 4-for-19 (.211) with one double, three RBIs and two runs scored as Baltimore defeated Philadelphia in five games to capture its third (and most recent) World Series championship.

After playing only 85 games in 1985, Dauer was let go by the Orioles and opted to retire.

Dauer’s playing legacy will also be remembered for his defensive prowess, as he finished with a .988 fielding percentage in 7,726 innings at second base. He set a pair of American League records in 1978, when he had a streak of 86 consecutive errorless games and 425 straight defensive chances without an error.

It didn’t take long for Dauer to come back to baseball once his playing days were over. He returned home to San Bernardino to coach in various independent leagues before becoming Cleveland’s third-base coach for the 1990 and ‘91 seasons.

Dauer later had stints as the Royals’ third-base coach (1997-2002), the Brewers’ bench coach (2003-05), the Rockies’ third-base coach (2009-12) and the Astros’ first-base coach (2015-17). He also served as Colorado’s Minor League infield coordinator from 2006-08, and he interviewed for Baltimore’s managerial opening in ‘03. (Lee Mazzilli became the Orioles’ manager instead heading into the ‘04 season.)

At Houston’s World Series parade in 2017, Dauer suffered an acute subdural hematoma as a result of a head injury, leading to emergency brain surgery. At the time, doctors said he had around a 3 percent chance of survival. Yet, he recovered and was throwing out a first pitch before an Astros game less than a year later.

In 2022, Dauer suffered a stroke and endured several more brain injuries. During that time, the baseball community rallied around Dauer, a lifer in the sport.

Not only should Dauer be remembered for his baseball skills, but also for being a family man. He married his wife, Chris, in 1975, shortly before the beginning of his MLB career. They went on to have three daughters -- Casey Lynn, Kelsey and Katie -- as Dauer spent a considerable portion of his early adult life in Baltimore.

“That’s where I became a man, that’s where I became a father and a good husband,” Dauer once said, per Huber for SABR. “The people I hung around in Baltimore taught me all that.”