RED ROLFE
ROLFE IS A CALM ONEWorry Won't Get You Base Hits
"It was quiet in Red Rolfe's little office just off the visitor's clubhouse. Upstairs the big crowd was filing into Yankee Stadium and out on the field, the Detroit Tigers were taking batting practice. Now Red was sitting there with one of the big games of his managerial career less than an hour away and he was just as calm as if he were back in his native New Hampshire fishing.
'Why not?' he said when a guy asked him about it. 'You get used to these tough money games after you've been through them as a player, coach and manager for almost twenty years. Worrying never gets you anywhere. I found that out long ago when I was a Yankee and I've tried to remember it since I've been a manager.'
The old redhead paused to take a long gulp of milk which he considers his best defense against the stomach troubles that prematurely ended his career back in 1942 and which have cut his weight from his prime of 174 to the 150 he weighs today.
'You know,' he said, 'I wasn't sure I wanted the job when Billy Evans offered it to me. I was very happy in the job I had then as director of the Detroit farm system. I knew that it was pretty much a lifetime job and I wasn't at all sure I wanted to take on the occupational hazards that managing a ball club involves.
'But as a player I'd always dreamed of the day when I'd be a manager and, when I became a coach under Joe McCarthy in 1946, I had a fuzzy idea that some day the chance might come to manage my old team. But by a year ago last winter I'd long since forgotten about that. And when the chance came I wasn't sure that I wanted it. I had to think of my health and the long road trips.
'So, I asked Billy for a chance to think it over and went home. For three days I talked it over with my wife and finally I decided it represented too much of a challenge to turn down. Baseball to me is the most fascinating game in the world. Every day something new comes up for you to tackle and beat. That's why I love it and it's why I took the Tiger job. The manager faces the greatest challenge of all.'
That was two years ago and Red, with an almost complete overhaul job, had the revamped and remodeled Tigers clocking more time in first place this season than any of their competitors. They were the most improved team in the league and the big part of the credit must go to Red.
'A manager,' he said, 'is just as good as his ball players and when you have hustling, hungry guys like I have the job is easy. Of course, it's easy to hustle when you're at the top and the big money is up for grabs. But they hustled just as hard for me in 1949 when we finished fourth and were never really in the race.'
Red actually doesn't find managing as tough as he thought it would be. He's managed to gear himself so he doesn't take too many ball games home with him and he gets his share of sleep. He found that easier to do than he thought.
'I always had a vision of the manager pacing the floor at night after a tough ball game. But I've found now that it isn't hard to put most games out of your mind after they're over. I mean tough ones as well as easy ones. Just as long as you know in your heart that there was nothing you could have done that would have made a difference, you sleep all right.
'But there are some games you can't forget for days. One in 1949 at Cleveland is still as fresh in my mind as if it were yesterday. We had the Indians beaten going into the ninth, 7-2. Ted Gray was pitching for us and he'd pitched a heck of a ball game for the first eight innings.
'But then a couple of guys walked and another singled and I had to get Gray out of there and bring Dizzy Trout in. Well, then there's a hit that makes it 7-3, a walk that loads the bases and another that forces in a run and makes it 7-4. Then Trout gets a guy to pop up and then another easy out. Then it happens. Somebody hits a ball down the left-field line. Evers gets his glove on it but can't hold it and it gets away and before you know it the guy's over the plate with an inside-the-park home run and we're in the clubhouse beaten.
'I've thought about that one a thousand times. I keep telling myself there must have been something I could have done to change it. Those are the kind of games that get you. Luckily they don't happen often.'
Rolfe is a Joe McCarthy man and one of the great Yankees of McCarthy's day. He still finds it strange to look up in Yankee Stadium and see like guys like DiMag and Henrich on the other team. 'Then, too,' Red chuckled, 'I find it hard every now and then, when I come out of the dugout, not to start climbing the stairs to the old dressing room. I've done it so many times I have to force myself not do it now.
'Those were great teams, all right,' he added. 'The best? That's hard to say. It's tough to split'em out. But I'd say it was between the 1938 team and the one the next year. That last had Gehrig for only a couple of games but it had everything else as well as a rookie named Charlie Keller. It was rough.'"
-Arch Murray, condensed from the New York Post (Baseball Digest, November 1950)
JOE GORDON
"Joe is one of the game's greatest second basemen. He holds a number of fielding records for regular season and World Series play.
He broke into the majors with the Yankees in 1938. He was chosen the American League's Most Valuable Player in 1942. He was traded to Cleveland for the 1948 season and hit .251 in 148 games in '48.
Joe has a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Oregon."
-1950 Bowman No. 129
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