ROLFE'S ONE SHORTCOMING
He Was A Yankee Perfectionist
"Once it was an exciting experience to watch Red Rolfe play third base for the New York Yankees. There may have been better third basemen than the solemn, studious New Englander but it is difficult to see how there could have been. The ball field was a laboratory to Rolfe. He could explain every move that was made and most of Red's were right. He could hit and run, bunt, slap the ball to every field and pull for the stands. It was a virtual impossibility to catch him flat-footed on a bunt when he was in the field and few opponents ever outsmarted him.
He played in a time when the Yankees terrorized the league and Red was their pennant-winning third baseman on six victorious teams during his nine active seasons. The last two of them were agony for Rolfe and he finally had to step out because a chronic colitis sapped his strength and made him a ball player forced to exist on a selective diet, while his teammates maintained themselves on steak. He might have gone on drawing a salary as a player but his sharpness as a performer was gone and he had been such a purist on the field that he could not abide mediocrity even in himself.
It is this same inability to accept anything but the best that made Rolfe a poor manager with the Detroit Tigers and consequently he was sacked, as Tommy Holmes, Rogers Hornsby and Eddie Sawyer were before him this season.
This had been the source of Red's difficulties in Detroit and explains the compulsion that forced him openly to criticize the ability of his players and nag them meanly for not being the kind of players they did not have it in them to be. It is at once the answer to Detroit's dissension this year and a reflection of the Tigers' cellar position under Rolfe which must have seared Rolfe's stomach with pain. It is explained and reflected in the quote of one Tiger, who said:
'He's just a damn Yankee perfectionist.' And another who said, 'DiMaggio, Gehrig, Rizzuto and Keller played at the Yankee Stadium, not in Briggs Stadium, but in his heart Red never left New York.'
There is an analogy to Frankie Frisch's thwarted managerial career and the reputation as a clown that Casey Stengel built for himself in his second division days at Brooklyn and Boston. Only, where Frisch and Rolfe could not change, Stengel realized the futility of trying to fill a size 10 shoe with a size four foot, shrugged and tried for a laugh, instead of insisting it had to be done the way John McGraw did it.
Like Frisch and Stengel, Mel Ott was one of McGraw's products and I vividly recall a conversation with Ottey in a dining car leaving Greenville, Miss., on the spring trip north in 1942.
I had broken in as a baseball writer for the Yankees, a team that did everything right. After several seasons marveling at the mastery of DiMag, Tommy Henrich, Joe Gordon, and the others, the office suggested I see how the other half lived. In the middle of spring training I switched to the Giants. Mickey Witek was the Giant's second baseman then. He was a sincere, bear-down mediocrity. It struck me the Giants couldn't open the season with a second baseman who could not pivot and throw properly on the double play. I said as much to Ott.
'I know what Witek can do and can not do,' replied Ott, 'but your trouble is you've been looking at Joe Gordon too long.'
It was not only I who suffered from this perfectionist view but also such as Joe McCarthy, who must be considered among the best managers, although he had a personality that led one to assume he was a constant sufferer from gastritis.
A disconsolate, lonely [sic] man with small grace for conversation, the whimsies or vagaries of life, Joe regarded it as a personal affront when things went badly with his ball club. He'd take refuge in insolence or insulting remarks. When World War II dried up the Yankee talent, Joe took a powder.
In 1946, before the war-returned Yankee veterans could untangle themselves and still played like ordinary mortals, defeat and dyspepsia got Joe down, the dugout became as clammy as the cold ground for Marse Joe's men and many a time he spent riding them viciously.
A murky day in Cleveland, which was to be McCarthy's last actually directing the Yankees, was one of the worst and it is revealing in the fate that befell Bill Zuber because of his manager's aversion to anything less than the best.
Zuber threw a home run ball that lost the game to the Indians in the ninth that day. Because of it, Bill became the last pitcher to be employed by McCarthy with the Yankees and the first to be fired by Joe when he joined the Boston Red Sox as their manager.
Rolfe grew up under McCarthy in baseball. The things he knows, McCarthy taught him. The apple rarely falls far from the bough."
-Milton Gross, condensed from the New York Post (Baseball Digest, September 1952)
"Between his last active year as the Yankees' third baseman (1942) and becoming manager of the Tigers in 1949, Red was baseball and basketball coach at Yale (1943-45), a Yankee coach (1946) and farm team director of the Tigers (1947-48).
In professional ball since 1931, when he graduated from Dartmouth, he was a Yankee nine years (1934-42). The Major League Team All-Star Third Baseman [Sporting News] in 1937-38-39, Red hit .300 (1935), .319 (1946), .311 (1938) and .329 (1939). He was tops at third base in fielding in 1935 and '36."
-1952 Topps No. 296
Monday, November 12, 2018
Thursday, November 1, 2018
1952 Yankee of the Past: Steve O'Neill
IT'D PUT FIGHTING LIFE IN HIM
"There was the famous evening when Cleveland's Larry Doby tried to steal home with the bases filled and Joe Page, of the New York Yankees, was well on his way to walking the hitter. Manager Steve O'Neill, coaching at third, took a terrific and unjustified booing.
'I never forget the way Steve looked that night,' said Lou Boudreau. 'Bill McKechnie and I made him sit between us on the bench for a few minutes after the game was over. Even then, when we went into the clubhouse, I asked George Susce to keep an eye on him. He was simply bursting to slug the first man who asked him why he sent Doby home. Believe it or not, I know a couple of fellows who did ask him. As if any coach in the game would do a trick like that.'
'I was in Dayton that night,' recalled [Ski] Melillo, 'but I heard the game by radio. I said to the guys who were with me: 'After that one, Steve O'Neill will never die. Just so somebody at his bedside, when it looks as if he's all washed up, remembers to whisper: 'Steve, did you tell Doby to steal home?' If I know Steve, he'll start swinging every time he hears that question.' "
-Ed McAuley in the Cleveland News (Baseball Digest, July 1952)
"There was the famous evening when Cleveland's Larry Doby tried to steal home with the bases filled and Joe Page, of the New York Yankees, was well on his way to walking the hitter. Manager Steve O'Neill, coaching at third, took a terrific and unjustified booing.
'I never forget the way Steve looked that night,' said Lou Boudreau. 'Bill McKechnie and I made him sit between us on the bench for a few minutes after the game was over. Even then, when we went into the clubhouse, I asked George Susce to keep an eye on him. He was simply bursting to slug the first man who asked him why he sent Doby home. Believe it or not, I know a couple of fellows who did ask him. As if any coach in the game would do a trick like that.'
'I was in Dayton that night,' recalled [Ski] Melillo, 'but I heard the game by radio. I said to the guys who were with me: 'After that one, Steve O'Neill will never die. Just so somebody at his bedside, when it looks as if he's all washed up, remembers to whisper: 'Steve, did you tell Doby to steal home?' If I know Steve, he'll start swinging every time he hears that question.' "
-Ed McAuley in the Cleveland News (Baseball Digest, July 1952)
Monday, October 29, 2018
1952 Yankee of the Past: Bucky Harris
HIP-NOTIZING THE YANKS
When Bucky Harris Pocketed a Victory
"Red Ruffing and Bucky Harris, the old antagonists, sat in the shade of the Tinker Field dugout in Orlando, Fla., this spring and started cutting up old touches, as friendly as you like. They reached back twenty-seven years for their first 'do you remember when ... '
'I'll remember that pitch long after I've forgotten all the million others I ever threw,' said Ruffing. 'That's the day I wanted to kill you, Bucky.'
For Coach Clyde Milan, Harris filled in the details. 'I was managing Washington then, and trying to beat out New York for the pennant. Ruffing is pitching for Boston and we're tied up in extra innings and I'm going up there with two out and the bases full.
'I tell my fellows I couldn't hit Ruffing's stuff if I was swinging a park bench but I said if he throws one close to me, I'm going to get the ball game over even if I have to take it in the head.
'And that's what happened, almost. The pitch was just a little inside and I took it on the rump, forcing in the winning run. I was surprised when the umpire let me get away with it, but I guess he was anxious to get the ball game over.'
'No pitcher ever squawked more than I did, remember, Bucky?' said Ruffing. 'I wanted to pick up your bat and brain you before you got away from the plate. It would have been a strike if you hadn't jumped in the way of the pitch.'
That's when Ruffing learned a bit of baseball philosophy, he recalled. 'Steve O'Neill came up to me and said, 'Forget it, kid, that's baseball.' '
Harris, however, had a sequel to the episode that Ruffing never before had heard. 'You mean I never told you what happened after the game? Well, that was 1925, the year I was keeping company with Liz Sutherland, my bride-to-be. She was at the game that day and we were having dinner at her house with her father, the Senator from West Virginia.
'Liz wasn't much of a ball fan, but she knew I had a habit of getting hit by pitched balls and she said, 'Stanley, it looked to me as if you didn't try to get out of the way of that pitch.'
'Then the Senator, a wonderful gentleman, spoke up. 'Oh no, Elizabeth,' he said, 'Stanley wouldn't do anything unsportsmanlike as that.' '
Ruffing is now a troubleshooter for the Cleveland Indians, after a year as coach and after a year managing their Daytona Beach farm club. At Daytona, he was probably the only manager in Class D league history to drive a Cadillac, but that was understandable. When he had quit the Yankees, he had drawn more pay than any other pitcher in history.
'You kept winning ball games for eight years after you lost your stuff,' Harris said.
'That's right,' said Ruffing. 'I had to get cute. I had those fellows swinging at my motion. I gave'em the shoulder and all those fakes and threw everything at 'em but the ball, I guess.'
'The Yankees' Ed Lopat does it the same way,' said Harris. 'You sit on the bench and watch him pitch, and you can't wait for him to get up in the morning so you can start swinging at that junk he throws. Then when you get up to the plate you can't find anything good to hit at.'
'Hey, Bucky, how about the next time you faced me, in Boston, after you stole that game by getting hit in Washington?' Ruffing said.
'I remember, you threw the first pitch right at my head and I went down.'
'Yeah, Bill Carrigan was managing, and I didn't dare not to throw at you. It was a fifty dollar fine if you didn't dust a hitter off when he said to.'
'It's all right to take it out on a hitter who has hurt you,' said Harris, 'but I never could understand why they hold it against the next hitter, too.
'I was hitting behind Joe Judge against the Yankees one day, and Judge hit one right up in the seats off Bob Shawkey, and he throws the next four pitches at my head, just to get even with Joe Judge, he thinks.' "
-Shirley Povich, condensed from the Washington Post (Baseball Digest, March 1952)
"Bucky held down second base during most of his playing career. He was first a manager in 1924, when, as the 'boy wonder, ' he led the Senators to the American League pennant. In addition to the Senators, with whom he is back again for the third time, Bucky has piloted the Tigers, Red Sox, Phils and Yanks."
-1952 Bowman No. 158
When Bucky Harris Pocketed a Victory
"Red Ruffing and Bucky Harris, the old antagonists, sat in the shade of the Tinker Field dugout in Orlando, Fla., this spring and started cutting up old touches, as friendly as you like. They reached back twenty-seven years for their first 'do you remember when ... '
'I'll remember that pitch long after I've forgotten all the million others I ever threw,' said Ruffing. 'That's the day I wanted to kill you, Bucky.'
For Coach Clyde Milan, Harris filled in the details. 'I was managing Washington then, and trying to beat out New York for the pennant. Ruffing is pitching for Boston and we're tied up in extra innings and I'm going up there with two out and the bases full.
'I tell my fellows I couldn't hit Ruffing's stuff if I was swinging a park bench but I said if he throws one close to me, I'm going to get the ball game over even if I have to take it in the head.
'And that's what happened, almost. The pitch was just a little inside and I took it on the rump, forcing in the winning run. I was surprised when the umpire let me get away with it, but I guess he was anxious to get the ball game over.'
'No pitcher ever squawked more than I did, remember, Bucky?' said Ruffing. 'I wanted to pick up your bat and brain you before you got away from the plate. It would have been a strike if you hadn't jumped in the way of the pitch.'
That's when Ruffing learned a bit of baseball philosophy, he recalled. 'Steve O'Neill came up to me and said, 'Forget it, kid, that's baseball.' '
Harris, however, had a sequel to the episode that Ruffing never before had heard. 'You mean I never told you what happened after the game? Well, that was 1925, the year I was keeping company with Liz Sutherland, my bride-to-be. She was at the game that day and we were having dinner at her house with her father, the Senator from West Virginia.
'Liz wasn't much of a ball fan, but she knew I had a habit of getting hit by pitched balls and she said, 'Stanley, it looked to me as if you didn't try to get out of the way of that pitch.'
'Then the Senator, a wonderful gentleman, spoke up. 'Oh no, Elizabeth,' he said, 'Stanley wouldn't do anything unsportsmanlike as that.' '
Ruffing is now a troubleshooter for the Cleveland Indians, after a year as coach and after a year managing their Daytona Beach farm club. At Daytona, he was probably the only manager in Class D league history to drive a Cadillac, but that was understandable. When he had quit the Yankees, he had drawn more pay than any other pitcher in history.
'You kept winning ball games for eight years after you lost your stuff,' Harris said.
'That's right,' said Ruffing. 'I had to get cute. I had those fellows swinging at my motion. I gave'em the shoulder and all those fakes and threw everything at 'em but the ball, I guess.'
'The Yankees' Ed Lopat does it the same way,' said Harris. 'You sit on the bench and watch him pitch, and you can't wait for him to get up in the morning so you can start swinging at that junk he throws. Then when you get up to the plate you can't find anything good to hit at.'
'Hey, Bucky, how about the next time you faced me, in Boston, after you stole that game by getting hit in Washington?' Ruffing said.
'I remember, you threw the first pitch right at my head and I went down.'
'Yeah, Bill Carrigan was managing, and I didn't dare not to throw at you. It was a fifty dollar fine if you didn't dust a hitter off when he said to.'
'It's all right to take it out on a hitter who has hurt you,' said Harris, 'but I never could understand why they hold it against the next hitter, too.
'I was hitting behind Joe Judge against the Yankees one day, and Judge hit one right up in the seats off Bob Shawkey, and he throws the next four pitches at my head, just to get even with Joe Judge, he thinks.' "
-Shirley Povich, condensed from the Washington Post (Baseball Digest, March 1952)
"Bucky held down second base during most of his playing career. He was first a manager in 1924, when, as the 'boy wonder, ' he led the Senators to the American League pennant. In addition to the Senators, with whom he is back again for the third time, Bucky has piloted the Tigers, Red Sox, Phils and Yanks."
-1952 Bowman No. 158
Tuesday, October 23, 2018
1952 Yankee Scout of the Past: Joe Devine
DEVINE SPIRIT
"Paddy Cottrell, the new scout for the New York Yankees, was talking about 'Yankee spirit.'
'I had my most memorable lesson in Yankee spirit just before Joe Devine died,' Paddy recalled. 'I had been appointed assistant to Joe. A few days before he passed away he called me in. Despite his condition, he wanted me to take notes on the hitting style of Jim Rivera, the Seattle outfielder who had been bought in the last weeks of the season by the Chicago White Sox. Joe thought Rivera might be brought up and put into the lineup by the Sox, and would be dangerous for Yankee pitchers who were fighting for the pennant. As it happens, Rivera wasn't used, but I still have these notes he gave me. Joe Devine was thinking Yankee to the last."
-Art Rosenbaum in the San Francisco Chronicle (Baseball Digest, March1952)
"Paddy Cottrell, the new scout for the New York Yankees, was talking about 'Yankee spirit.'
'I had my most memorable lesson in Yankee spirit just before Joe Devine died,' Paddy recalled. 'I had been appointed assistant to Joe. A few days before he passed away he called me in. Despite his condition, he wanted me to take notes on the hitting style of Jim Rivera, the Seattle outfielder who had been bought in the last weeks of the season by the Chicago White Sox. Joe thought Rivera might be brought up and put into the lineup by the Sox, and would be dangerous for Yankee pitchers who were fighting for the pennant. As it happens, Rivera wasn't used, but I still have these notes he gave me. Joe Devine was thinking Yankee to the last."
-Art Rosenbaum in the San Francisco Chronicle (Baseball Digest, March1952)
Thursday, October 18, 2018
1952 Yankee of the Past: Hank Borowy
HANK LEARNED A WORD FOR IT
"Hank Borowy, voted the most valuable player in the Greater Newark Tournament while at Bloomfield High in 1935, earned as a reward a trip around the International League circuit as a guest of the Newark Bears.
'What did you learn on the trip?' Borowy, who was destined to become a star hurler for the New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs, was asked.
'I learned how to swear,' was his innocent reply."
-Paul Horowitz in the Newark News (Baseball Digest, September 1952)
"Hank Borowy, voted the most valuable player in the Greater Newark Tournament while at Bloomfield High in 1935, earned as a reward a trip around the International League circuit as a guest of the Newark Bears.
'What did you learn on the trip?' Borowy, who was destined to become a star hurler for the New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs, was asked.
'I learned how to swear,' was his innocent reply."
-Paul Horowitz in the Newark News (Baseball Digest, September 1952)
Monday, October 1, 2018
1952 Yankee of the Past: Lefty Gomez
GUY-DING SPIRIT
"There are more than statistics to the colorful career of Vernon (Lefty) Gomez. For instance, there's the story of the 'breaking in' of Red Rolfe, now manager of the Detroit Tigers, who came straight to the New York Yankees from Dartmouth. Gomez and his hurling mate, Red Ruffing, made a good team when it came to needling rookies, and both happened to be heroes in the eyes of Rolfe.
He gratefully heeded the pair when they volunteered advice that Manager Joe McCarthy liked spirit and 'holler' from his players. 'When I give you the sign,' Lefty kindly offered, 'give out with the old college yell. It'll make a hit with Joe.'
'EE-yah, atta boy,' Red yelled.
An inning later, a Yankee erred in the field. Again Lefty nudged Rolfe. The redhead imitated a Comanche on the warpath. When it happened the third time, McCarthy exploded.
'You crazy so-and-so,' he fumed. 'Get out of here and into your clothes. You make too much noise.' "
-Fred Russell in the Nashville Banner (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
THE GOINGS-ON OF GOMEZ
He Still Wins in the Big Laugh League
Almost a decade has elapsed since Vernon Louis (Lefty) Gomez pitched his last big league victory, but the anecdotes about him continue to pop up. Here are some more collector's items (Baseball Digest, March 1952):
"Dick Kryhoski, the St. Louis Browns' first baseman, tells of his apprenticeship in Binghamton, N.Y., under the tutelage of Lefty Gomez.
Gomez was coaching third base, Kryhoski was a base runner on first and Binghamton had another runner, a rookie, on second. On a hit to right field, everybody started at top speed.
The rookie rounded third, started for the plate, then paused to make sure he had correctly interpreted the coach's signal to keep going. He hesitated, glanced back at Gomez, wavered, saw a throw coming in, and slid back to third. At the same instant, Kryhoski, who had passed second at full stride, flung himself headlong in a beautiful slide and zoomed into third.
Gomez gazed morosely upon his two stalwarts occupying one base.
'Oh, what the hell,' he said resignedly. And he slid in to join them."
-Red Smith in the New York Herald-Tribune
"Another time Gomez tangled with another great southpaw of the American League, Lefty Grove. Grove shot three sizzling fast ones past the eccentric Yank hurler. Goofy didn't even see the pitches, but to the amazement of the umpire, he protested the third strike indignantly, insisting, 'The explosion of that one sounded low to me!' "
-Jack Strausberg, in the book 'Now I'll Tell One.'
"Gomez was pitching to Jimmie Foxx when the burly slugger was at his peak with the Philadelphia Athletics. Foxx was flexing his muscles and squeezing the sawdust out of his bat while Gomez shook off each sign catcher Bill Dickey gave. Dickey finally came out to the mound and demanded, 'Well, what do you want to throw?'
'Nothing,' admitted Goofy, with a shrug.
When Gomez first joined the New York Yankees he had a lot of trouble with his teeth. The club sent him to one of the best dentists in New York and paid the bills. But the dental work didn't improve his pitching and he was farmed to St. Paul.
A teammate, watching him pack, offered sympathy.
'Don't worry,' said Lefty. 'I'll be back. You don't think they'd turn me loose with $1,500 worth their teeth in my mouth, do you?' "
-Bob Wilson in the Knoxville News-Sentinel
"Signals didn't mean much when Gomez pitched. Bill Dickey was telling how he and Lefty worked signals out. 'It was simple,' said Dickey. 'I would hold my mitt on my knee. If I wanted a fastball, I'd cover my knee completely. If I exposed part of my knee, that would call for a curve. But it didn't make much difference. Lefty threw what he liked anyway.'
Dickey recalled a time when Lefty was getting hit hard.
'Lefty called me in for a confab. 'I think they're wise to our signals,' he said. 'Wise to our signals?' I replied. 'I don't know what you're going to throw. You don't know what you're going to throw. How do you figure they know?' ' "
-Bob Wilson in the Knoxville News-Sentinel
"Rosy Ryan, now Minneapolis general manager, recalls a Gomez episode of 1930. Rosy was pitching for Milwaukee and Gomez, who had been with the San Francisco Seals the year before, was pitching for St. Paul. When the Saints came to town he invited a couple of old acquaintances, Johnny Grabowski and Oscar Roettger, to accompany him to a lakeside place to dinner. John and Oscar brought Lefty along.
Said Ryan: 'We get out to the place and are enjoying the cold cuts and a couple of flagons of Milwaukee's finest prohibition product while waiting for the steaks, when we notice Gomez is missing. Then all of a sudden from the lake we hear a lot of whooping and splashing. The three of us rush over to the noise and there is Gomez thrashing about in the water.
'Grabby hollers, 'Blankety-blank, there's 150,000 bucks of Jake Ruppert's dough out there in that lake. If we lose him, nobody'll have a job. Let's get busy.'
'So we pull Lefty out and ask him what the deal is, and he just grins and says: 'Well, I came from the Seals, so I thought I ought to act like one.' ' "
-Bob Beebe in the Minneapolis Tribune
"Like everyone else, Joe DiMaggio used to get a laugh out of Lefty Gomez, the quick-witted pitching star when the two were teammates. Shortly after he joined the New York Yankees, DiMag was telling Gomez somewhat querulously:
'People are always coming up to me and asking where I get my power.'
'Listen, Joe,' advised Lefty. 'That's no cause for complaint. The time to get worried is when guys come up to you and ask you where your power WENT!' "
-Al Abrams in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Baseball Digest, April 1952)
MISSED TRAIN? NO STATION!
"Lefty Gomez dropped into Yankee Stadium and fell into reminiscing with his former teammate, Joe DiMaggio.
'I never missed a train,' insisted DiMaggio.
'I missed one,' Gomez admitted, 'and I believe it was the first year I was with the Yankees. We were leaving for Detroit and I went to the Pennsylvania Station instead of the Grand Central. By the time I discovered my mistake the train carrying the ball club was gone. When I finally reached Detroit, Joe McCarthy bawled me out something awful. He figured I stopped somewhere for a beer.
' 'How was I supposed to know there were two stations in New York?' I told him. 'We had only one station in my home town, Rodeo, California.' ' "
-Hy Goldberg in the Newark News (Baseball Digest, July 1952)
IN A JUG-ULAR VEIN
"Once during spring training the New York Yankees were scheduled for an exhibition game against a team whose first baseman was having alimony trouble with his former wife. Lefty Gomez was asked what he thought of the prospect that the first baseman might be in jail by the time the game started.
'Well,' he answered, 'it'll be an awful long throw for the shortstop.' "
-International News Service (Baseball Digest, October 1952)
THAT GOMEZ AGAIN
"Arky Vaughan, the former Pittsburgh Pirates star, was having one of his big years, and before the All-Star Game the American Leaguers, who were going over the best way to pitch to the National League batters, were deep in an argument as to the safest way to handle Arky. They had all sorts of opinions and were hot at it when Lefty Gomez, who hadn't been in on the conversation, spoke up.
'Why don't you stop wasting your time?' Lefty said. 'You've used up ten minutes trying to figure out something the National League hasn't been able to do in three months.' "
-Chester L. Smith in the Pittsburgh Press (Baseball Digest, October 1952)
"There are more than statistics to the colorful career of Vernon (Lefty) Gomez. For instance, there's the story of the 'breaking in' of Red Rolfe, now manager of the Detroit Tigers, who came straight to the New York Yankees from Dartmouth. Gomez and his hurling mate, Red Ruffing, made a good team when it came to needling rookies, and both happened to be heroes in the eyes of Rolfe.
He gratefully heeded the pair when they volunteered advice that Manager Joe McCarthy liked spirit and 'holler' from his players. 'When I give you the sign,' Lefty kindly offered, 'give out with the old college yell. It'll make a hit with Joe.'
'EE-yah, atta boy,' Red yelled.
An inning later, a Yankee erred in the field. Again Lefty nudged Rolfe. The redhead imitated a Comanche on the warpath. When it happened the third time, McCarthy exploded.
'You crazy so-and-so,' he fumed. 'Get out of here and into your clothes. You make too much noise.' "
-Fred Russell in the Nashville Banner (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
THE GOINGS-ON OF GOMEZ
He Still Wins in the Big Laugh League
Almost a decade has elapsed since Vernon Louis (Lefty) Gomez pitched his last big league victory, but the anecdotes about him continue to pop up. Here are some more collector's items (Baseball Digest, March 1952):
"Dick Kryhoski, the St. Louis Browns' first baseman, tells of his apprenticeship in Binghamton, N.Y., under the tutelage of Lefty Gomez.
Gomez was coaching third base, Kryhoski was a base runner on first and Binghamton had another runner, a rookie, on second. On a hit to right field, everybody started at top speed.
The rookie rounded third, started for the plate, then paused to make sure he had correctly interpreted the coach's signal to keep going. He hesitated, glanced back at Gomez, wavered, saw a throw coming in, and slid back to third. At the same instant, Kryhoski, who had passed second at full stride, flung himself headlong in a beautiful slide and zoomed into third.
Gomez gazed morosely upon his two stalwarts occupying one base.
'Oh, what the hell,' he said resignedly. And he slid in to join them."
-Red Smith in the New York Herald-Tribune
"Another time Gomez tangled with another great southpaw of the American League, Lefty Grove. Grove shot three sizzling fast ones past the eccentric Yank hurler. Goofy didn't even see the pitches, but to the amazement of the umpire, he protested the third strike indignantly, insisting, 'The explosion of that one sounded low to me!' "
-Jack Strausberg, in the book 'Now I'll Tell One.'
"Gomez was pitching to Jimmie Foxx when the burly slugger was at his peak with the Philadelphia Athletics. Foxx was flexing his muscles and squeezing the sawdust out of his bat while Gomez shook off each sign catcher Bill Dickey gave. Dickey finally came out to the mound and demanded, 'Well, what do you want to throw?'
'Nothing,' admitted Goofy, with a shrug.
When Gomez first joined the New York Yankees he had a lot of trouble with his teeth. The club sent him to one of the best dentists in New York and paid the bills. But the dental work didn't improve his pitching and he was farmed to St. Paul.
A teammate, watching him pack, offered sympathy.
'Don't worry,' said Lefty. 'I'll be back. You don't think they'd turn me loose with $1,500 worth their teeth in my mouth, do you?' "
-Bob Wilson in the Knoxville News-Sentinel
"Signals didn't mean much when Gomez pitched. Bill Dickey was telling how he and Lefty worked signals out. 'It was simple,' said Dickey. 'I would hold my mitt on my knee. If I wanted a fastball, I'd cover my knee completely. If I exposed part of my knee, that would call for a curve. But it didn't make much difference. Lefty threw what he liked anyway.'
Dickey recalled a time when Lefty was getting hit hard.
'Lefty called me in for a confab. 'I think they're wise to our signals,' he said. 'Wise to our signals?' I replied. 'I don't know what you're going to throw. You don't know what you're going to throw. How do you figure they know?' ' "
-Bob Wilson in the Knoxville News-Sentinel
"Rosy Ryan, now Minneapolis general manager, recalls a Gomez episode of 1930. Rosy was pitching for Milwaukee and Gomez, who had been with the San Francisco Seals the year before, was pitching for St. Paul. When the Saints came to town he invited a couple of old acquaintances, Johnny Grabowski and Oscar Roettger, to accompany him to a lakeside place to dinner. John and Oscar brought Lefty along.
Said Ryan: 'We get out to the place and are enjoying the cold cuts and a couple of flagons of Milwaukee's finest prohibition product while waiting for the steaks, when we notice Gomez is missing. Then all of a sudden from the lake we hear a lot of whooping and splashing. The three of us rush over to the noise and there is Gomez thrashing about in the water.
'Grabby hollers, 'Blankety-blank, there's 150,000 bucks of Jake Ruppert's dough out there in that lake. If we lose him, nobody'll have a job. Let's get busy.'
'So we pull Lefty out and ask him what the deal is, and he just grins and says: 'Well, I came from the Seals, so I thought I ought to act like one.' ' "
-Bob Beebe in the Minneapolis Tribune
"Like everyone else, Joe DiMaggio used to get a laugh out of Lefty Gomez, the quick-witted pitching star when the two were teammates. Shortly after he joined the New York Yankees, DiMag was telling Gomez somewhat querulously:
'People are always coming up to me and asking where I get my power.'
'Listen, Joe,' advised Lefty. 'That's no cause for complaint. The time to get worried is when guys come up to you and ask you where your power WENT!' "
-Al Abrams in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Baseball Digest, April 1952)
MISSED TRAIN? NO STATION!
"Lefty Gomez dropped into Yankee Stadium and fell into reminiscing with his former teammate, Joe DiMaggio.
'I never missed a train,' insisted DiMaggio.
'I missed one,' Gomez admitted, 'and I believe it was the first year I was with the Yankees. We were leaving for Detroit and I went to the Pennsylvania Station instead of the Grand Central. By the time I discovered my mistake the train carrying the ball club was gone. When I finally reached Detroit, Joe McCarthy bawled me out something awful. He figured I stopped somewhere for a beer.
' 'How was I supposed to know there were two stations in New York?' I told him. 'We had only one station in my home town, Rodeo, California.' ' "
-Hy Goldberg in the Newark News (Baseball Digest, July 1952)
IN A JUG-ULAR VEIN
"Once during spring training the New York Yankees were scheduled for an exhibition game against a team whose first baseman was having alimony trouble with his former wife. Lefty Gomez was asked what he thought of the prospect that the first baseman might be in jail by the time the game started.
'Well,' he answered, 'it'll be an awful long throw for the shortstop.' "
-International News Service (Baseball Digest, October 1952)
THAT GOMEZ AGAIN
"Arky Vaughan, the former Pittsburgh Pirates star, was having one of his big years, and before the All-Star Game the American Leaguers, who were going over the best way to pitch to the National League batters, were deep in an argument as to the safest way to handle Arky. They had all sorts of opinions and were hot at it when Lefty Gomez, who hadn't been in on the conversation, spoke up.
'Why don't you stop wasting your time?' Lefty said. 'You've used up ten minutes trying to figure out something the National League hasn't been able to do in three months.' "
-Chester L. Smith in the Pittsburgh Press (Baseball Digest, October 1952)
Tuesday, September 18, 2018
1952 Yankee Coach of the Past: Chuck Dressen
AUTOPSY IN BROOKLYN
Dressen Explains Pitching Moves Involved In Bums' Death Struggle
"The Fourth Floor at 216 Montague St. houses the offices of Brooklyn's ill-starred Dodgers.
A year has passed since Branch Rickey cleaned out his desk in the famous old executive office which has been occupied in the past by such Dodger tycoons as Charles H. Ebbets, Stephen W. McKeever, Larry MacPhail and now by Walter F. O'Malley, Rickey's successor to the club's presidency. Externally the offices have been completely renovated. The tiny waiting room with its old lithograph of an early ball game in Hoboken has been expanded into a modernistic and roomy lounge. The color scheme is cool green instead of early Twentieth Century imitation walnut.
But it's still the Dodger headquarters and the human beings who work there still function within the mystic circle that makes Dodger baseball the oddest in the land.
At the switchboard sat Grace Therkildsen who has transmitted messages to and from Dodgerland these many years. 'I'm just getting out of it,' she sighed. 'It's been awful ... answering all those questions, why we didn't win after we had that thirteen and a half game lead, why Ralph Branca let Bobby Thomson hit that home run. I was stunned for days afterward.'
It is a fact no one associated with the Dodgers smiled for at least ten days after Leo Durocher's Giants snatched the 1951 National League pennant from the Dodgers' grasp at the zero hour on October 3. Even when the wassail was flowing fastest at the Giants' World Series headquarters Dodger partisans could be recognized at a glance. They sat soberly, deadpanned, morose, like close relatives at the wake of a rich uncle.
A couple weeks later, in his spacious office sat Emil J. Bavasi, the quiet, pale, personable young man who assumed the task of directing the Dodger varsity business management one year ago, following Rickey's departure for Pittsburgh. To all baseball, Bavasi is simply 'Buzzy,' a corruption of his last name and also a symbol of his friends' easy familiarity with a sincere, hard-working young man.
He had a pat answer for the general question: 'What happened to the Dodgers?' He said: 'We didn't lose it. They won it. Any team that wins thirty-nine of its last forty-seven games, like the Giants did, must win the pennant.'
But there was more to it, wasn't there? 'Sure there was. All right we did lose it. You can't blame the players. They tried with everything they had. You can't blame Chuck. He did everything he could. When the team began to slip in those last ten games, there was nothing we could do. You can't change horses in the middle of the steam. You can't trade Eddie Waitkus to the Dodgers for Gil Hodges, even if the Phillies would have traded Waitkus, because Hodges is a better first baseman anyhow. You can't bench Duke Snider. We used the best players available and they are still the best in baseball.'
Into the room came Chuck, Charlie Dressen, the little manager who has borne the brunt of criticism for the Dodger debacle. Charlie spent a difficult year as master of Ebbets Field and was on the newspapers' griddle even when his team sat atop the league. He had smiled bravely in public during the Series but now, in the privacy of Dodger headquarters, his face expressed his real feelings. He had been on the defensive, had been given little opportunity to reply- and he wanted to talk.
'It's like this,' he began. 'We lost the pennant in those last ten games. All we had to do was to win five of them, play at a .500 pace and we'd been in.
'I've been panned for not using Clem Labine until the playoff. He came to us from St. Paul with a bad ankle. I started him and he won four straight. I sent him into the first of the crucial ten games and he was knocked out in the first inning. He rested the next day and then I put him in the bullpen.
'Meantime I had to win. I decided to use only my best pitchers, Preacher Roe, Don Newcombe, Branca and Carl Erskine-'
Bavasi called to Allen Roth, the club statistician, who occupies an enjoining office. 'How many games did Roe, Newk, Ralph and Erskine win for us last season?'
'Seventy-one,' replied Roth.
'There you are,' said Buzzy. 'If four men win seventy-one games, you surely expect they'll take six out of any ten. They didn't.'
Getting down to specific games, there was that night contest in Philadelphia on September 28. The Dodgers led 3-0 in the sixth when the Phillies scored a run off Erskine. A walk and a homer tied the score in the eighth. Chuck had permitted Erskine to bat for himself at the top of the ninth. Why?
'Why take him out?' retorted the manager. 'There was no one on base.' He glanced at the floor. 'I don't know why I didn't take him out.' He leaned forward. 'Look here, this season was the same as that time I was with the Dodgers and we won the last eight games but the Cards kept winning and we lost the flag to them. It was the Giants' keeping winning that beat us, like the Cardinals in 1942.'
But the fact was that Erskine yielded a hit, a sacrifice and another hit in the Phillies' ninth, and the Dodgers lost, 4-3.
What happened to Clyde King, who won fourteen games, mainly in relief. Why wasn't he used more in the fatal stretch drive?
'We used him when we needed him,' said Buzzy. 'He failed in that last game against the Phillies.'
And Branca? What happened to him? Why were Roe and Newcombe worked overtime while Ralph sat on the sidelines? 'He lost to Boston on the twenty-fifth- they scored six runs in the first inning.'
Mention of Ralph Branca's name immediately brought to mind the historic ninth-inning homer by Bobby Thomson in the final playoff game. 'Branca didn't lose to the Giants for three years,' said Buzzy. Chuck chimed in with: 'He held the Giants to five hits in the first playoff game, although two of them were homers by Thomson and Monte Irvin.'
'What's Ralph's record against the Giants?' called Buzzy.
'It's 14-10,' replied Statistician Roth.
'But at the beginning of the season ... ?'
'It was 12-6. '
'And two of his four losses were in the playoffs,' said Chuck.
'Take that 12-6 record,' Buzzy persisted. 'That's a two to one advantage, isn't it? Well, say Branca had a 66 per cent chance to win a game in the playoffs. That's what we figured.'
Getting to cases, why use Branca, a fast ball pitcher, in relief against Thomson who hits fastballs, after Newcombe weakened in that fatal ninth? The score was Brooklyn 4, New York 2, with two Giants on. Wouldn't a curve ball hurler have been the better choice as relief?
'Ralph throws a great curve,' said Chuck. 'His first pitch to Thomson was perfect- it broke in and was unhittable. The second got away from him, and Thomson pickled it.'
Perhaps a dispy-do slowballer, King, might have got Thomson out?
Chuck Dressen looked wistfully through the window overlooking Court Street. He did not reply.
'I give all the credit in the world to Leo Durocher and the Giants,' said Buzzy Bavasi.
Well, the pennant race is history now, along with the Battle of Waterloo. How about next season?
'We'd make a deal for a pitcher,' said Buzzy, 'if we could, but I don't think it's possible. The team is still the best in baseball, even if it lost out this year. You can trace some of our trouble to injuries ... Newcome and Branca came up with bad arms, Pee Wee Reese and Jackie Robinson got hurt. But look up and down that lineup- where can you find better? At first, at the pivot, at third, in the outfield, catchers, pitchers? You can't.
'We could use another pitcher- who can't? No, we don't need another second-string catcher. Rube Walker could be first string for at least three clubs in the league- he's slow but he can hit and receive with the best. And show me another second-stringer as strong.
'We may look at our three best minor league catchers, Steve Lembo and Dick Teed, who were with St. Paul, and Charlie Thompson, who was with Mobile.
'We are not going to sell our best minor league prospects. The club sold eight players two years because it needed the money- financial troubles make you do things you don't want to do. We could have used Chico Carrasquel and Irv Noren. Carrasquel would have been the finest infield replacement in the game. And Noren, there's a great ball player, would have been our left fielder.
'We had a great minor league season. We had twenty clubs. Six won pennants. Seventeen were in the playoffs. We must have some valuable material there, and when the teams gather next spring we'll decide which boys should be advanced.
'Yes,' concluded Buzzy, 'the team's morale will not be affected by that licking. They don't feel sorry for themselves and we in the front office don't feel sorry for our selves. The Giants proved they were the better team ... in 1951.
'But I personally feel sorry for the folks in Brooklyn ... not the box holders who come to the game to spend an hour or two in the open air and cheer their favorites, but for the little guys who save up a few dollars and go to a game now and then. They took it hard.'
Buzzy Bavasi and Chuck Dressen sat silently thinking. A clock ticked. Faintly through the open window came the thin sound of chimes ringing noon in the tower of Borough Hall.
They were taking it hard, too."
-Charles Dexter, Baseball Digest, January 1952
SAME SITUATION, SAME STRATEGY
What Blew for Dressen Worked for Stengel
"Manager Chuck Dressen of the Brooklyn Dodgers had to make a decision. He made it and the New York Giants won the National League pennant.
They're still second-guessing Dressen because he told his pitcher to throw to Bobby Thomson in the ninth inning with the Giants trailing 4-2, one out, runners on third and second, and with first base wide open.
What Thomson did to that strategy has gone into the records as one of the greatest thrills in diamond history. He belted the ball into the stands for the three-run homer that gave the Giants a 5-4 triumph and shoved them into the 1951 World Series.
And the die-hard Brooklyn fans made Manager Dressen the goat for not walking Thomson to set up a game-ending double play.
The incident has such a parallel that it is difficult to believe. Yet, Casey Stengel of the New York Yankees had to make exactly the same decision. He took the identical course that was followed by Dressen. Now he is the manager of a World Series champion for the third time in his first three years with the club- a record.
It recurred exactly one week from the day from the final Giant-Dodgers playoff. The Yankees led the Giants this time. The score was the same, 4-2. The Giants already had scored one run in the ninth inning just as they had in the playoff thriller.
There were runners on second and third, just as there had been before. And the batter was the same Bobby Thomson, the string-bean Giant third baseman who had hit the dramatic home run that put the Giants into the Series.
Again first base was wide open. Again there was only one out. Once more there was the opportunity to walk the dangerous Thomson and take a chance that the next batter would hit into a double play made easier by the choice of a force play at any base.
But Stengel followed the same route which had made Dressen a defeated manager with horns. He ordered southpaw Bob Kuzava to pitch to Thomson. He did and Bobby's best was a fly ball for the second out.
One run scored after the catch but when Hank Bauer made his falling-down snare of pinch hitter Sal Yvars' sinking liner, the Series was ended and Stengel was the champion again while the second-guessers continued to take pot shots at Dressen."
by Lyall Smith, condensed from the Detroit Free Press (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
DRESSEN PUT WINNER ON FIVE TIMES IN '51 AND WON EACH TIME!
"Charlie Dressen, the despondent Brooklyn manager, was kicking himself long after the final out of the historic third game of the National League playoff for playing the game by the book. With first base open in the ninth inning, he did not have the Giants' Bobby Thomson intentionally passed with the winning run.
'I thought of it,' admitted the Brooklyn manager.
'Why I wouldn't think of it? I passed the winning run five times during the season and won every time. I passed Stan Musial three times with the winning run, with a left-handed hitter following him, because he is a solid .350 hitter and the other guy wasn't.'
Then why didn't he pass Thomson, Dressen was asked. For once the breezy bantam did not have a ready answer. He just shrugged.
Finally, he said, 'The next guy could have hit a home run, too.'
Scheduled to follow Thomson was Willie Mays, the Giants' gifted rookie who, although not impressive in the playoffs or in the World Series that followed, is certainly capable of hitting a home run.
He also might have hit a long double, scoring the fleet Thomson from first. He might have singled, putting Thomson on third with only one out.
Or Mays might have hit into a double play, as he had in the seventh inning, ending the game and giving the Dodgers the pennant instead of the horrors.
'Never walk the winning run- unless you have a Ruth, Greenberg or Musial hitting, and even then you ought to think three times,' say baseball tacticians.
But a Ruth, Greenberg or Musial was not hitting. It was only Thomson.
The real reason why Dressen did not purposely pass Thomson with the winning run, then, was that he underrated the Giants' third baseman. Thomson hit .383 during the forty-seven-game streak in which the Giants won thirty-nine games to steal the pennant. Nobody except his closest relatives thinks he is that kind of hitter.
As Thomson himself said during the post-game delirium, 'If I'd been a good hitter, I never would have hit it. It was a bad pitch.'
'Nobody talks about passing a winning run until something happens,' said Dressen bitterly. Managers play it both ways, of course, with good and bad results.
In the 1947 World Series at Brooklyn [when Dressen was a Yankee coach], Bucky Harris of the New York Yankees purposely passed winning run, and Cookie Lavagetto, now a Dodgers' coach, promptly doubled it home for a 3-2 win to ruin Bill Bevens' no-hitter."
by Harold Kaese, condensed from the Boston Globe (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
"During most of Charlie's playing career, which began in 1919, he held down third base. He hit the majors with Cincinnati in 1925. With them from 1925-30 and for a few games in 1931, he played briefly for the Giants in 1933.
Charlie has managed the Reds and coached the Dodgers and Yankees. He has been the Dodgers' pilot since 1951."
-1952 Bowman No. 188
"Though they lost the pennant to the Giants in 1951, Chuck's Dodger team won more ball games (97) than any Dodger team since 1942.
He started his playing career with Moline in 1919 and finished with the Giants in 1933. Chuck managed Nashville from 1932-34 and in 1938, Cincinnati from the end of '34 through 1937 and Oakland in 1949 and '50. He was on the Dodger coaching staff from 1939-46 and the Yankee staff in 1947 and '48."
1952 Topps No. 377
Dressen Explains Pitching Moves Involved In Bums' Death Struggle
"The Fourth Floor at 216 Montague St. houses the offices of Brooklyn's ill-starred Dodgers.
A year has passed since Branch Rickey cleaned out his desk in the famous old executive office which has been occupied in the past by such Dodger tycoons as Charles H. Ebbets, Stephen W. McKeever, Larry MacPhail and now by Walter F. O'Malley, Rickey's successor to the club's presidency. Externally the offices have been completely renovated. The tiny waiting room with its old lithograph of an early ball game in Hoboken has been expanded into a modernistic and roomy lounge. The color scheme is cool green instead of early Twentieth Century imitation walnut.
But it's still the Dodger headquarters and the human beings who work there still function within the mystic circle that makes Dodger baseball the oddest in the land.
At the switchboard sat Grace Therkildsen who has transmitted messages to and from Dodgerland these many years. 'I'm just getting out of it,' she sighed. 'It's been awful ... answering all those questions, why we didn't win after we had that thirteen and a half game lead, why Ralph Branca let Bobby Thomson hit that home run. I was stunned for days afterward.'
It is a fact no one associated with the Dodgers smiled for at least ten days after Leo Durocher's Giants snatched the 1951 National League pennant from the Dodgers' grasp at the zero hour on October 3. Even when the wassail was flowing fastest at the Giants' World Series headquarters Dodger partisans could be recognized at a glance. They sat soberly, deadpanned, morose, like close relatives at the wake of a rich uncle.
A couple weeks later, in his spacious office sat Emil J. Bavasi, the quiet, pale, personable young man who assumed the task of directing the Dodger varsity business management one year ago, following Rickey's departure for Pittsburgh. To all baseball, Bavasi is simply 'Buzzy,' a corruption of his last name and also a symbol of his friends' easy familiarity with a sincere, hard-working young man.
He had a pat answer for the general question: 'What happened to the Dodgers?' He said: 'We didn't lose it. They won it. Any team that wins thirty-nine of its last forty-seven games, like the Giants did, must win the pennant.'
But there was more to it, wasn't there? 'Sure there was. All right we did lose it. You can't blame the players. They tried with everything they had. You can't blame Chuck. He did everything he could. When the team began to slip in those last ten games, there was nothing we could do. You can't change horses in the middle of the steam. You can't trade Eddie Waitkus to the Dodgers for Gil Hodges, even if the Phillies would have traded Waitkus, because Hodges is a better first baseman anyhow. You can't bench Duke Snider. We used the best players available and they are still the best in baseball.'
Into the room came Chuck, Charlie Dressen, the little manager who has borne the brunt of criticism for the Dodger debacle. Charlie spent a difficult year as master of Ebbets Field and was on the newspapers' griddle even when his team sat atop the league. He had smiled bravely in public during the Series but now, in the privacy of Dodger headquarters, his face expressed his real feelings. He had been on the defensive, had been given little opportunity to reply- and he wanted to talk.
'It's like this,' he began. 'We lost the pennant in those last ten games. All we had to do was to win five of them, play at a .500 pace and we'd been in.
'I've been panned for not using Clem Labine until the playoff. He came to us from St. Paul with a bad ankle. I started him and he won four straight. I sent him into the first of the crucial ten games and he was knocked out in the first inning. He rested the next day and then I put him in the bullpen.
'Meantime I had to win. I decided to use only my best pitchers, Preacher Roe, Don Newcombe, Branca and Carl Erskine-'
Bavasi called to Allen Roth, the club statistician, who occupies an enjoining office. 'How many games did Roe, Newk, Ralph and Erskine win for us last season?'
'Seventy-one,' replied Roth.
'There you are,' said Buzzy. 'If four men win seventy-one games, you surely expect they'll take six out of any ten. They didn't.'
Getting down to specific games, there was that night contest in Philadelphia on September 28. The Dodgers led 3-0 in the sixth when the Phillies scored a run off Erskine. A walk and a homer tied the score in the eighth. Chuck had permitted Erskine to bat for himself at the top of the ninth. Why?
'Why take him out?' retorted the manager. 'There was no one on base.' He glanced at the floor. 'I don't know why I didn't take him out.' He leaned forward. 'Look here, this season was the same as that time I was with the Dodgers and we won the last eight games but the Cards kept winning and we lost the flag to them. It was the Giants' keeping winning that beat us, like the Cardinals in 1942.'
But the fact was that Erskine yielded a hit, a sacrifice and another hit in the Phillies' ninth, and the Dodgers lost, 4-3.
What happened to Clyde King, who won fourteen games, mainly in relief. Why wasn't he used more in the fatal stretch drive?
'We used him when we needed him,' said Buzzy. 'He failed in that last game against the Phillies.'
And Branca? What happened to him? Why were Roe and Newcombe worked overtime while Ralph sat on the sidelines? 'He lost to Boston on the twenty-fifth- they scored six runs in the first inning.'
Mention of Ralph Branca's name immediately brought to mind the historic ninth-inning homer by Bobby Thomson in the final playoff game. 'Branca didn't lose to the Giants for three years,' said Buzzy. Chuck chimed in with: 'He held the Giants to five hits in the first playoff game, although two of them were homers by Thomson and Monte Irvin.'
'What's Ralph's record against the Giants?' called Buzzy.
'It's 14-10,' replied Statistician Roth.
'But at the beginning of the season ... ?'
'It was 12-6. '
'And two of his four losses were in the playoffs,' said Chuck.
'Take that 12-6 record,' Buzzy persisted. 'That's a two to one advantage, isn't it? Well, say Branca had a 66 per cent chance to win a game in the playoffs. That's what we figured.'
Getting to cases, why use Branca, a fast ball pitcher, in relief against Thomson who hits fastballs, after Newcombe weakened in that fatal ninth? The score was Brooklyn 4, New York 2, with two Giants on. Wouldn't a curve ball hurler have been the better choice as relief?
'Ralph throws a great curve,' said Chuck. 'His first pitch to Thomson was perfect- it broke in and was unhittable. The second got away from him, and Thomson pickled it.'
Perhaps a dispy-do slowballer, King, might have got Thomson out?
Chuck Dressen looked wistfully through the window overlooking Court Street. He did not reply.
'I give all the credit in the world to Leo Durocher and the Giants,' said Buzzy Bavasi.
Well, the pennant race is history now, along with the Battle of Waterloo. How about next season?
'We'd make a deal for a pitcher,' said Buzzy, 'if we could, but I don't think it's possible. The team is still the best in baseball, even if it lost out this year. You can trace some of our trouble to injuries ... Newcome and Branca came up with bad arms, Pee Wee Reese and Jackie Robinson got hurt. But look up and down that lineup- where can you find better? At first, at the pivot, at third, in the outfield, catchers, pitchers? You can't.
'We could use another pitcher- who can't? No, we don't need another second-string catcher. Rube Walker could be first string for at least three clubs in the league- he's slow but he can hit and receive with the best. And show me another second-stringer as strong.
'We may look at our three best minor league catchers, Steve Lembo and Dick Teed, who were with St. Paul, and Charlie Thompson, who was with Mobile.
'We are not going to sell our best minor league prospects. The club sold eight players two years because it needed the money- financial troubles make you do things you don't want to do. We could have used Chico Carrasquel and Irv Noren. Carrasquel would have been the finest infield replacement in the game. And Noren, there's a great ball player, would have been our left fielder.
'We had a great minor league season. We had twenty clubs. Six won pennants. Seventeen were in the playoffs. We must have some valuable material there, and when the teams gather next spring we'll decide which boys should be advanced.
'Yes,' concluded Buzzy, 'the team's morale will not be affected by that licking. They don't feel sorry for themselves and we in the front office don't feel sorry for our selves. The Giants proved they were the better team ... in 1951.
'But I personally feel sorry for the folks in Brooklyn ... not the box holders who come to the game to spend an hour or two in the open air and cheer their favorites, but for the little guys who save up a few dollars and go to a game now and then. They took it hard.'
Buzzy Bavasi and Chuck Dressen sat silently thinking. A clock ticked. Faintly through the open window came the thin sound of chimes ringing noon in the tower of Borough Hall.
They were taking it hard, too."
-Charles Dexter, Baseball Digest, January 1952
SAME SITUATION, SAME STRATEGY
What Blew for Dressen Worked for Stengel
"Manager Chuck Dressen of the Brooklyn Dodgers had to make a decision. He made it and the New York Giants won the National League pennant.
They're still second-guessing Dressen because he told his pitcher to throw to Bobby Thomson in the ninth inning with the Giants trailing 4-2, one out, runners on third and second, and with first base wide open.
What Thomson did to that strategy has gone into the records as one of the greatest thrills in diamond history. He belted the ball into the stands for the three-run homer that gave the Giants a 5-4 triumph and shoved them into the 1951 World Series.
And the die-hard Brooklyn fans made Manager Dressen the goat for not walking Thomson to set up a game-ending double play.
The incident has such a parallel that it is difficult to believe. Yet, Casey Stengel of the New York Yankees had to make exactly the same decision. He took the identical course that was followed by Dressen. Now he is the manager of a World Series champion for the third time in his first three years with the club- a record.
It recurred exactly one week from the day from the final Giant-Dodgers playoff. The Yankees led the Giants this time. The score was the same, 4-2. The Giants already had scored one run in the ninth inning just as they had in the playoff thriller.
There were runners on second and third, just as there had been before. And the batter was the same Bobby Thomson, the string-bean Giant third baseman who had hit the dramatic home run that put the Giants into the Series.
Again first base was wide open. Again there was only one out. Once more there was the opportunity to walk the dangerous Thomson and take a chance that the next batter would hit into a double play made easier by the choice of a force play at any base.
But Stengel followed the same route which had made Dressen a defeated manager with horns. He ordered southpaw Bob Kuzava to pitch to Thomson. He did and Bobby's best was a fly ball for the second out.
One run scored after the catch but when Hank Bauer made his falling-down snare of pinch hitter Sal Yvars' sinking liner, the Series was ended and Stengel was the champion again while the second-guessers continued to take pot shots at Dressen."
by Lyall Smith, condensed from the Detroit Free Press (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
DRESSEN PUT WINNER ON FIVE TIMES IN '51 AND WON EACH TIME!
"Charlie Dressen, the despondent Brooklyn manager, was kicking himself long after the final out of the historic third game of the National League playoff for playing the game by the book. With first base open in the ninth inning, he did not have the Giants' Bobby Thomson intentionally passed with the winning run.
'I thought of it,' admitted the Brooklyn manager.
'Why I wouldn't think of it? I passed the winning run five times during the season and won every time. I passed Stan Musial three times with the winning run, with a left-handed hitter following him, because he is a solid .350 hitter and the other guy wasn't.'
Then why didn't he pass Thomson, Dressen was asked. For once the breezy bantam did not have a ready answer. He just shrugged.
Finally, he said, 'The next guy could have hit a home run, too.'
Scheduled to follow Thomson was Willie Mays, the Giants' gifted rookie who, although not impressive in the playoffs or in the World Series that followed, is certainly capable of hitting a home run.
He also might have hit a long double, scoring the fleet Thomson from first. He might have singled, putting Thomson on third with only one out.
Or Mays might have hit into a double play, as he had in the seventh inning, ending the game and giving the Dodgers the pennant instead of the horrors.
'Never walk the winning run- unless you have a Ruth, Greenberg or Musial hitting, and even then you ought to think three times,' say baseball tacticians.
But a Ruth, Greenberg or Musial was not hitting. It was only Thomson.
The real reason why Dressen did not purposely pass Thomson with the winning run, then, was that he underrated the Giants' third baseman. Thomson hit .383 during the forty-seven-game streak in which the Giants won thirty-nine games to steal the pennant. Nobody except his closest relatives thinks he is that kind of hitter.
As Thomson himself said during the post-game delirium, 'If I'd been a good hitter, I never would have hit it. It was a bad pitch.'
'Nobody talks about passing a winning run until something happens,' said Dressen bitterly. Managers play it both ways, of course, with good and bad results.
In the 1947 World Series at Brooklyn [when Dressen was a Yankee coach], Bucky Harris of the New York Yankees purposely passed winning run, and Cookie Lavagetto, now a Dodgers' coach, promptly doubled it home for a 3-2 win to ruin Bill Bevens' no-hitter."
by Harold Kaese, condensed from the Boston Globe (Baseball Digest, January 1952)
"During most of Charlie's playing career, which began in 1919, he held down third base. He hit the majors with Cincinnati in 1925. With them from 1925-30 and for a few games in 1931, he played briefly for the Giants in 1933.
Charlie has managed the Reds and coached the Dodgers and Yankees. He has been the Dodgers' pilot since 1951."
-1952 Bowman No. 188
"Though they lost the pennant to the Giants in 1951, Chuck's Dodger team won more ball games (97) than any Dodger team since 1942.
He started his playing career with Moline in 1919 and finished with the Giants in 1933. Chuck managed Nashville from 1932-34 and in 1938, Cincinnati from the end of '34 through 1937 and Oakland in 1949 and '50. He was on the Dodger coaching staff from 1939-46 and the Yankee staff in 1947 and '48."
1952 Topps No. 377
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