 After missing the first two weeks, he was eased back with pinch-hitting duty and play at first and third base.He finally started catching regularly again in late May and was hitting fairly well, when the 1981 Major League Baseball strike canceled two months of the season starting in mid-June.Play resumed in mid-August and Stearns finished with a respectable .271 average, but his run production dropped quite a bit from 1980 and he had only 14 extra base hits all season.