page_title: Andy Hansen
section_title: 1953: Last major league year
hierarchical_section_title: Andy Hansen / Philadelphia / 1953: Last major league year
caption_attribution_description: English: Jack Lohrke of the Philadelphia Phillies
context_page_description: Andrew Viggo Hansen, Jr., nicknamed "Swede", was a right-handed pitcher in Major League Baseball. In a nine-season career, he played for the New York Giants and the Philadelphia Phillies. Hansen was officially listed as standing 6 feet 3 inches and weighing 185 pounds. He was nicknamed Swede despite being of Danish ancestry, according to The Sporting News' Baseball Register.
  A two-sport star in high school, Hansen rose quickly through the Giants' minor league system and made his major league debut at age 19. He played for the Giants until 1946, when he voluntarily retired due to a family illness and then served in the United States Army. He returned to baseball in 1947 and earned a career-best five wins in 1948. After a contract holdout in 1949, Hansen's bullpen workload increased in 1950, leading to an elbow injury and the Giants sending him to the Phillies in the Rule 5 draft.
  Hansen worked nearly exclusively from the bullpen after being an occasional starting pitcher with New York.
context_section_description: Hansen's first game of the 1953 season resulted in his first loss; in a 14–12 contest against the Pirates, he allowed four runs—one earned—in the fifth frame, the only inning he pitched. His next appearance resulted in his first save of the year, coming against Pittsburgh on April 25, and he pitched in his final April game three days later against St. Louis. Hansen's first appearance in May came against the newly relocated Milwaukee Braves, late of Boston, when he allowed a walk and two hits, one a home run, in a single inning. He threw a scoreless frame against Brooklyn on May 10, and a perfect ​¹⁄₃ on May 12 to earn his second save. He allowed two runs against Milwaukee on May 18, but both were unearned, lowering his ERA to a season-low 2.25; three runs in his next appearance, however, raised his average to its highest point since the year's first game. His last game in May was against Pittsburgh: ​²⁄₃ of an inning with one unearned run allowed.
  Hansen opened June with a doubleheader, pitching in both games and allowing no runs; he gave up a hit in the first game and walked a batter in the second, striking out one batter in each contest. He pitched the ninth inning in both games, earning his third save of the year in the nightcap. He gave up two runs to the Braves in his next appearance, allowing a home run and an RBI single in three innings. On June 9, he again allowed two runs, this time to the Cubs; the two home runs given up resulted in his first blown save of the season. After a perfect inning against Cincinnati on June 12, he made his first scoreless appearance against Milwaukee in the season; he allowed two hits in ​¹⁄₃ of an inning but neither runner scored. On June 17, he faced the Braves again, this time pitching three scoreless innings and allowing two singles and a double. Waiting ten days until his next appearance, Hansen took the mound for two scoreless innings against St. Louis, and earned a hold on June 30 against Brooklyn after Konstanty blew a save. In his first July game, he pitched ​3 ¹⁄₃ innings, allowing two runs on three hits and walking three batters. Two days later, he pitched five scoreless innings within both halves of a doubleheader against his former team, the Giants; he walked one batter in each game and struck out three hitters in the second. After an 11-day hiatus, he returned to the hill in an 11–0 loss to the Reds, allowing an unearned run on three hits in relief of Konstanty. One-and-two-thirds scoreless innings against the Cubs on July 21 was his final scoreless outing of the month, followed by a single run allowed to the Braves on July 27 and two runs given up to the Reds three days later.
  On August 3, Hansen entered in the second inning of a contest against the Reds after Konstanty and Thornton Kipper allowed 7 runs in ​1 ²⁄₃ innings against the Reds; he pitched ​4 ¹⁄₃ frames and allowed 1 run. On August 17, he made his first start in three years, absorbing the loss as the Phillies were shut out, 6–0. His final two August games came on back-to-back days: the second half of a doubleheader on August 30 (1 walk and 1 strikeout in ​2 ²⁄₃ scoreless innings); and the first half of a twinbill on August 31 (one run allowed on one walk and two hits in a single inning). He made one September appearance, allowing two runs without recording an out; for the year, he finished with an 0–2 record and three saves with a 4.03 ERA. After the conclusion of the season, Hansen was traded with Jack Lohrke and $70,000 ($669,000 today) to  Pittsburgh in exchange for Murry Dickson.
  In 270 games, Hansen posted only a .102 batting average (12-for-118) with only 3 RBI. He was excellent defensively, recording a .989 fielding percentage with only two errors in 179 total chances. He handled his first 162 chances in the majors successfully   until he committed his first error in his final appearance in the 1952 season.
caption: Jack "Lucky" Lohrke and Hansen were traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates after the 1953 season.
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2011:04:09 22:03:11", "Image ExifOffset": "164", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "302", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6277", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "245", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "392"}