Carol Garner, wife of the late former Astros manager Phil Garner, and their daughter Bethany acknowledge the crowd during Saturday's Astros Hall of Fame ceremony at Daikin Park. (Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle)
The man who managed the Houston Astros to their first World Series appearance officially joined their franchise Hall of Fame on Saturday. Phil Garner, the tough former infielder and manager, was inducted posthumously by the team with which he spent more than a decade of a long baseball career. "Phil learned about this honor not long before he passed," said Garner's wife, Carol. "And he wasn't smiling much in those days. But for that, he did." Garner and former catcher and broadcaster Alan Ashby entered the Astros' Hall of Fame prior to their game against the Mariners at Daikin Park. They joined the 22 other inductees who played for the club, while Ashby joins four others who were broadcasters. Garner, who died in April at age 76 after a battle with pancreatic cancer, played seven seasons of a 16-year major-league career with Houston and later managed the Astros for parts of four seasons. But his ties to the franchise and city transcended both tenures. "He'd been a big leaguer - playing, coaching or managing - for 33 years, he had a World Series ring from Pittsburgh. But this honor reached him differently," Carol Garner said in a press conference. "Because Houston was never just a stop for us. Yes, he played managed and coached in other places. But we made Houston our home and have been here a long time." Drafted by the A's in 1971 from the University of Tennessee, Garner made an All-Star team with the A's and two with the Pirates and won the 1979 World Series with Pittsburgh. He was traded in August 1981 to the Astros, where he played until June 1987, marking his longest stop with one team. After short playing stints with the Dodgers and Giants, Garner served as a coach with the Astros before embarking on his managerial career. He managed the Brewers (1992-99) and Tigers (2000-02) and was hired by the Astros midseason in 2004 after the team fired Jimy Williams. Houston finished 48-26 under Garner to reach the postseason and win a playoff series for the first time. In 2005, the Astros started 15-30 but recovered to make the playoffs as a wild card and win the National League pennant, falling to the White Sox in the World Series. One out from securing the pennant at home in Game 5 of that year's NLCS, the Astros suffered a loss as Albert Pujols hit a three-run home run off Brad Lidge. It sent the series back to St. Louis, where Houston beat the Cardinals in Game 6. "That was the first pennant in the history of this franchise, and it was Phil," Carol Garner said. "He never stayed down long. He never once let anyone around him stay down." Nicknamed "Scrap Iron" as a player, Garner was a teammate for his full Astros tenure with Ashby, who spent 11 of his 17 major-league seasons as a catcher with Houston. Ashby ranks first or second among catchers in Astros history in categories including games played, home runs, hits and runs scored.
Former Astros catcher and broadcaster Alan Ashby joined ex-teammate Phil Garner in the franchise's Hall of Fame. (Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle)
Ashby, 75, hit the first postseason walk-off home run in Astros history, in Game 1 of the division series against the Dodgers. Following his playing career, Ashby served as a radio analyst on Astros broadcasts from 1998 to 2006 and as a television broadcaster from 2013-16. "To spend almost 11 seasons here as a player was really beyond belief," Ashby said Saturday. He recalled receiving a call on the day he was traded to the Astros, before the 1979 season, from then-infielder Enos Cabell. "Enos welcomed me to the team and he said, ‘We're really anxious to have you here and get going and we think that we've got something,'" Ashby said. "And we started to have something. It was fun to see something start to build." To that point, the Astros had never made a postseason. They reached their first in 1980, then returned in 1981 and '86. Ashby hit a go-ahead home run in a Game 4 win in the 1986 NLCS, which the Astros lost to the New York Mets. He also caught three no-hitters with Houston, thrown by Ken Forsch, Mike Scott and Nolan Ryan, the latter Ryan's record-breaking fifth career no-hitter. "It's a great honor to be in this group at all," Ashby said. "But what a guy to be able to be inducted with, Phil Garner, who I played with, respected, loved. You work together the way we worked - and I'm talking about all the players - and you learn to love and respect each other." Subscribe There’s more to Houston with the Chronicle. Subscribe today for just 25¢. This article originally published at Late Phil Garner, Alan Ashby inducted into Houston Astros Hall of Fame. ' A great honor'.