José Manuel Morales Hernández (born December 30, 1944) is a former designated hitter in Major League Baseball who played for five different teams between and . Listed at 5' 11", 187 lb., Morales batted and threw right-handed. Early career Morales was born to a door-to-door shoe salesman in the United States Virgin Islands. He "joked" in 1977 to the Orlando Sentinel that he had "18 half brothers and sisters." The Des Moines Tribune reported, however, that he was raised in poverty as one of 15 children of a shoemaker. Morales started playing sandlot baseball in his homeland before signing his first professional contract to play in Puerto Rico in late 1963. The San Francisco Giants signed Morales in 1963. He spent two seasons in Class-A (1964–65) and three more at Double-A (1966–68). The Oakland Athletics obtained him from the Giants in the 1968 minor league draft, and though Morales finally advanced to Triple-A, he remained with the Iowa Oaks of the American Association from 1969 to 1971. Then he played on loan to Tidewater, the Mets' Triple-A affiliate, in 1972. Finally, he reached the majors in 1973 with the Athletics, playing for them during part of the season before joining the Montreal Expos (1973–77), Minnesota Twins (1978–80), Baltimore Orioles (1981–82) and Los Angeles Dodgers (1982–84). Morales spent nine seasons in the minor leagues before turning into one of the premier pinch-hitters in major league history. One main problem held up his advance: as a catcher, he was a defensive liability, leading four different minor leagues in errors. Indeed, during his majors career, he appeared in the field in only 104 of his 733 total games, and he never collected more than 242 at-bats during a regular season. He is often referred as "a catcher by trade" (30 games), though first base was his most frequent defensive position in the majors (67) and eventually at left field (7). He played much more at DH (265 games) than at any fielding position. In 1975, Morales enjoyed his first solid season, batting .301 in 93 games with Montreal. For the first of four times, he led the majors pinch-hitters with 15 hits in 51 at-bats (.294). Then, in 1976 he posted a career-high .316 (50-for-158) as he went on to set his pinch-hit single-season record of 25, breaking the previous mark of 24 established by Dave Philley in 1961 and tied by Vic