Baseball | December 02, 2024
LOS ANGELES – Gail Henley, who was a member of USC baseball’s first ever National Championship squad in 1948, passed away at the age of 96 on Monday, Nov. 25 in La Verne, Calif.
Henley was an outfielder for the 1948 title team and went on to have an extensive career in professional baseball as a player and then coach.
Henley was born in Wichita, Kan., but grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from Inglewood High School before coming to USC. He starred as a right fielder for the 1948 squad and batted over .400 for the season. In only the second year of the College World Series, the Trojans defeated the Yale Bulldogs and their first baseman George Bush to claim the crown. While Henley’s teammates celebrated and traveled back to Southern California, Henley was on his way to Minneapolis. He had signed with the New York Giants’ area scout, Dutch Ruether, on a three-year Triple-A contract. Fresh from winning college baseball’s national championship, the 19-year-old was playing at the top level of the minor leagues.
Henley ended up making his Big-League debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1954 and appeared in 14 games that year. He played just that season in the Bigs after injuries derailed his career, but he transitioned into coaching and front office work as he was a manager and scout for 50 years. He ran teams in the Detroit Tigers’ minor league system from 1961–66. Then he joined the Los Angeles Dodgers as a scout based in Southern California, in addition to handling Rookie-level Dodger farm clubs for six seasons during the 1970’s and 1980’s. He later scouted for the Kansas City Royals, San Diego Padres and Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
Gail and his wife, Barbara, were married in 1956 and had two sons, William and Daniel, and a daughter, Patricia. William, an outfielder, played one season (1980) in the San Diego Padres farm system. Daniel, an infielder, was the captain of the last USC team coached by Rod Dedeaux, and was a teammate of Randy Johnson, Jack Del Rio, and Mark McGwire. A seventh-round draft choice of the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1986, Daniel spent six seasons in the minors, five in the Dodgers farm system and one with the Chicago White Sox organization. He played at the Triple-A level three of his six seasons.
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