As Conigliaro was leaving the dugout for the on-deck circle, a fan threw a smoke bomb near Angels left fielder Rick Reichardt, causing a delay of about 10 minutes.

“Just before he made his first pitch, I wondered if the delay had caused his arm to stiffen,” Conigliaro said in a first-person account published by Sports Illustrated in June 1970. “It was the last thought I had before he hit me. The ball came sailing right toward my chin. Normally a hitter can jerk his head back a fraction and the ball will buzz by. But this pitch seemed to follow me in.”

On the first pitch of Conigliaro’s at-bat in the fourth, a Hamilton fastball connected with the former’s face, striking him just below the left temple. Buck Rodgers, the catcher for the Angels, was the player closest to the scene and later described what he saw in that moment:

Buck Rodgers, the Angels catcher, looked down.

“He was bleeding from the ear, the mouth, the nose,” Rodgers, now California’s manager, said during an Angels road trip to Boston three months ago.

“And I didn’t want to look any more. I told Jack, `Get out of here, get away.’ Jack came up to the plate; he was concerned. But I pushed him back. I said, `Jack, you don’t want to see this.’ ”

Rico Petrocelli, the on-deck hitter, crouched beside Conigliaro and whispered, “You’re going to be OK, it’s going to be fine,” over and over again. By then, Conigliaro’s face was horribly swollen and the 31,027 fans had grown so quiet, Petrocelli’s whispers could be heard several feet away.

“It was like a morgue,” Rodgers said.

His eye swollen shut and his cheekbone shattered, Conigliaro was rushed to the hospital for treatment. It wasn’t known at the time just how serious the long-term consequences of the injury would be. In the coming weeks, he was told he’d suffered permanent damage to his eye, which included a blind spot in the center of his eye. Initially told that it was dangerous for him to ever play again, Conigliaro’s vision improved just enough in 1968 for him to start working out. To get around the blind spot, he adjusted by looking slightly away from the pitch and seeing the ball through his peripheral vision.

Conigliaro was able to return to the Red Sox in 1969, and his .255/.321/.427 line with 20 homers, while clearly far below his previous standards, was enough for him to be named Comeback Player of the Year. The next season was even better as he hit .266/.324/.498 with 36 home runs, but his headaches increased due to the eye strain. In a trade that was considered shocking at the time, Conigliaro was dealt to the Angels after the 1970 season as the key piece in a six-player swap. His brother Billy was not shy when he later told reporters why he thought Tony was traded:

When he heard the news that Tony had left the Angels, Billy Conigliaro exploded in the Red Sox clubhouse, telling reporters that the reason for the trade to California in the first place had been Carl Yastrzemski, that Yaz had all the influence on the ballclub. “Tony was traded because of one guy – over there,” he charged, indicating Yastrzemski. Yaz “got rid of Pesky, Ken Harrelson, and Tony. I know I’m next. Yaz and Reggie [Smith] are being babied, and the club better do something about it.”

California indeed proved to be a poor fit for the outfielder. He suffered a series of other injuries and felt that his teammates were mocking him: