"After three successive spring tryouts with the Yankees, Woody was one of the key players in the seven-man trade that sent him to the A's last year. He justified their confidence, rapping 37 extra-base hits, including 20 homers.
His troubles with grounders forced him to switch from shortstop to the outfield. Woody threw out 12 baserunners with his arm last year."
-1958 Topps No. 202
PITCHER'S FRIEND
A's Say Woody Held Cuts Off Six Runs A Week By Catches In Center Field
"Some three or four springs ago the Yankee camp at St. Pete was overstocked with shortstops as Casey Stengel began preparations for that inevitable day when Phil Rizzuto could no longer handle the assignment. With hands shoved in his back pockets, Ol' Case watched from the sidelines while various operatives scooped up scorching grounders in a fielding drill. Much in the fashion of a tourist guide, the Yankee skipper pointed out the sights.
'And this here feller,' he was saying, 'is a feller which has a treemenjous arm. He throws so good I might make him an outfielder.'
And on he rambled, never stopping to identify Woodson George Held. By last spring, however, the Ol' Perfessor had made up his mind.
'You start workin' in the outfield,' he said to Held. But Stengel was not the only one to observe the fly-catching potential of the then 25-year-old rookie. Held was learning his trade on the Denver farm when the big trade of Billy Martin was made with Kansas City. The Athletics demanded Held as part of the deal and the Bombers yielded.
'We couldn't even have gotten as high as seventh without him,' says Tom Gorman, the relief specialist. 'He was a friend of every pitcher on our staff. His catches cut off at least six runs a week.'
'I rate Held as the second best center fielder in the league,' says Harry Craft, his manager. 'Jimmy Piersall of the Red Sox has it on him by just a shade, but before this year is out Woody may be better than Jimmy.'
The development of this one-time Yankee farmhand has been a mite startling. Yet he has always been versatile. As a schoolboy he was an outfielder, signed a pro contract as a pitcher, became a shortstop, switched to third base and is now an outfielder for keeps.
How good is he? A grateful Gorman bobbed up with an example.
'I was pitching against Duke Maas of the Tigers,' said Tom. 'In the first inning there were two on and two out when Harvey Kuenn came to bat. He creamed one. Woody raced back to the wall and made as sensational a backhand catch is I ever saw. I thought he left his skin on the wall. That's how close he had to go.
'In the thirteenth inning- I'd left for a pinch hitter in the tenth- the Tigers were threatening again with one out. Jimmy Small was on second when the batter smashed one to center for a single. Small is fast, but Held fielded the ball so quickly that Small didn't dare go past third.
'Ray Boone got one with the fat part of his bat and shot a low line-drive to deep center. It looked like a certain hit. Woody came in to make a circus catch. Then he threw a strike to the plate and nailed Small trying to score from third. It was a double play and we won in the fourteenth.'
Nodding somewhat appreciatively at this graphic recital was Craft.
'Woody made a catch on Harry Simpson in the Yankee Stadium that was almost as good as the one Willie Mays pulled on Vic Wertz in the 1954 World Series. It was just to the right of the monuments, about 460 feet from the plate. It was beautiful.'
The Kansas Citys were in slumps more than they were out of them last season because the country cousins of the Yankees are a rather dreadful ball club. In fact, they'd be worse off if they hadn't made all the deals they did make with their rich relations. But their most dismal came when Held was invalided after a too abrupt visit with a wall in Washington. Without Woody, the A's had a solid week of defeats.
Russ Kemmerer, of all people, accidentally belted one deep. Woody raced back for the ball and got his glove on it with a backhand seizure. But he couldn't stop and his unprotected face smashed against the wall. He spun around and crumpled to the ground with the ball and glove in his lap. The ball trickled to the grass. Kemmerer, assuming the catch was completed, started to return to the dugout.
'Run, run!' hollered all the Washingtons. So the big pitcher got himself an inside-the-park home run, mainly because the Athletics were afraid to jostle the stricken hero and recover the ball.
'Will he be gun shy when he returns,' Craft asked himself. He had to wait more than a week for an answer. Woody ran boldly against the fence to rob a hitter of an extra-base hit. The question was answered.
Woody is a comparatively little guy, being five feet ten inches and 170 pounds. But he's solid, compact and generates power. After all, he did slam 20 homers last year.
The Athletics wish the Yankees would keep giving them players like Woodson George Held."
-Arthur Daley, New York Times (Baseball Digest, June 1958)
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