Boo Ferriss poses with a photo from his playing days prior to recent induction ceremonies for the Boston Red Sox Hall of Fame.

BOSTON (MLB.COM) - Dave "Boo" Ferriss had the type of pitching smarts and stuff that could have made his career a long and fruitful one.

He didn't, as he put it, fire the ball past anyone, a la Bob Feller. Ferriss didn't even throw the ball with the same zip as his roommate and co-Red Sox ace Tex Hughson.

What he had was a nasty sinker and the type of location associated with winners. He knew how to mix it up.
 

There was one thing, aside from the high-octane heat, that Ferriss didn't have on his side. It was this thing called medical science.

It could have given Ferriss the one thing his definitive Major League Baseball profile lacked. That would be lasting power.

Consider how brilliantly the career of this right-hander from a half-century ago started. Ferriss followed his 21-10 rookie season by going 25-6 for the pennant-winning Sox of 1946. He added to that mastery by twirling a shutout against the Cardinals in Game 3 of the World Series.

Sure, Boston suffered a heartbreaking loss in Game 7, a game Ferriss started and took no decision. But he had years, maybe even another decade or so, to build his legacy.

It turns out Ferriss had peaked after just two years. In 1947, his right shoulder wound up in the breakdown lane and never recovered. In those days, there wasn't much in the way of fixing a bad arm. If time didn't heal it, not much else would. Tommy John surgery? There was no such thing.

Tommy John himself was still 16 years away from his Major League debut when Ferriss felt a burning sensation in his arm during a 1-0 shutout over the Indians in Cleveland.

"I tore up in that shoulder," Ferriss recalled last week in Boston, just hours before he was enshrined into the Red Sox Hall of Fame. "Today they could probably fix it. But they couldn't then and I kept on pitching for a while and had fair success until finally I had to go to the minors and tried to work my way back. I'm sorry my arm injury came along, but that's baseball. There was nothing I could do about that."

Yet there's so much that can be done about arm ailments in this generation.

"It's amazing what they can do now with that Tommy John surgery," Ferriss said. "They tried everything in the world with me but I burned my shoulder out in a game in Cleveland. I won the game, 1-0, in 1947. It was never the same after that. I lost my power. I lost my strength."

And he didn't throw a pitch in the Major Leagues after 1950. His last win came in 1948.

Fortunately for Ferriss, he had enough inner strength to re-define himself in baseball. His new pitch was to teach the game.

He became the Red Sox pitching coach from 1955-59 under manager Mike Higgins. And then, he discovered his true calling. Ferriss went back home and became the head coach at Delta State University in Cleveland, Miss.

A Mississippi man through and through, Ferriss was in his element at Delta State. So much so that he coached that program for 26 years before finally retiring in 1986.

Sixteen years later, his peace and happiness are not only exhibited all over his face, but through that warm southern accent.

Sure, his career was shortened by countless innings and wins, but that's far from his mind these days. He chooses to remember the fortune he did have.

Like, for example, playing with the late, great legend Ted Williams at his back.

"Ted, he was something else," said Ferriss, who was in Boston in July for the Fenway Park tribute for Williams, who died earlier this year. "He is one of the all-time greats in American sports. Just watching him swing that bat every day was something to behold. We enjoyed watching him, how he studied the game and analyzed the pitchers. He worked at it -- what a hard worker he was. We had no batting gloves back then and he'd get out there and swing away and hit with blood running out of his hands. He was ready for the game."

It wasn't until the Ferriss-Hughson combo came along that those great teams of Williams, Johnny Pesky, Dom DiMaggio and Bobby Doerr got to the World Series.

As it turned out, Hughson's arm also went bad after '46. Doerr always tells anyone who will listen that the Sox would have won far more pennants in that era if the two righties had held up.

But it wasn't to be. So Ferriss relishes all the good memories.

These days, he lives a leisurely existence in Mississippi. Ferriss will turn 81 in December, and could easily pass for five to 10 years younger.

The entrance into the Sox Hall of Fame is at or near the top of his list of personal achievements.

"It's just tremendous," Ferriss said. "I'm just so appreciative and grateful for it. The Red Sox have certainly been an important part of my life. They've certainly enriched my life with all the associations through the years. It's just a very special moment in my life and I'm very thankful."

Ian Browne is a reporter for MLB.com. He can be reached at Ian.Browne@mlb.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.