Walter Johnson rated Rube Waddell the greatest pitcher he saw in a 1925 syndicated article. He listed Grover Cleveland Alexander, Christy Mathewson, and Ed Walsh as his next three.
Cy Young came next.
Johnson acknowledged he had not seen Young at his best, “His greatest three years were back in 1891 to 1893…Yet 15 years later I worked many games with the grand old veteran when he was still effective against the best batters in the American League.”
Johnson said like Young, he, “had to use more curves,” later in his career, and:
“His work was always smooth and pleasure to watch. He seldom did the sensational thing on the diamond. But one thing he did that will always live—he won 508 [sic, 511] victories.”
Cy Young
Next was Eddie Plank who Johnson said had “The best cross-fire I ever saw,” and “He was simply a wonder on doping out the other club.”
Johnson said during the 1924 World Series, “(Plank) told me some things about (Frank) Frisch and (Ross) Youngs that helped a lot.”
Johnson said Bender was “always deliberate when pithing, “wasted few balls,” and threw “an inside ball,” that “The leading batters in the league couldn’t solve.”
Chief Bender had, “a good curve and wonderful fastball. Added to these qualities he was smart as a whip.”
Chief Bender
Johnson said his temper was as much as a detriment as his intelligence was a benefit though:
“I’ve seen him throw a ball out of the park in a spell of anger.”
Johnson said umpire Tommy Connolly told a friend Bender was capable of throwing as hard as Johnson, “but he would only let himself out once or twice during a game. Usually in a tight place with men on bases and two strikes on the batter.”
Johnson’s final three were Mordecai Brown, Jack Chesbro, and Bill Donovan.
Brown, owing to the injury that cost him parts of two fingers and earned him his nickname, made it, “possible for him to get a peculiar hold on the ball that produced a deceiving curve.”
Mordecai Brown
He also rated Brown and Bender the two best fielding pitchers.
Chesbro, who served as a coach early in the season for Johnson’s World Series Champion Senators in 1924.
Johnson said of Chesbro, “I don’t believe he has ever outlived the sting of disappointment,” over missing out on a championship in 1904—Chesbro took the loss in two of the three straight games the Highlanders dropped to the Americans on October 8 and 10, giving Boston the pennant.
Johnson said he admired Wild Bill Donovan’s side arm fast ball but admired more the fact that he wore an “eternal smile.”
“He was peeved and Hughey Jennings, then Detroit’s manager, was walking by and tried to get him sore with a bit of joshing.
‘Hell, (Donovan) ain’t got nothing on the ball.’
“’No,’ was Hughey’s reply, ‘but he’s got a smile on his face.”’
Johnson said that smile, “made the batter feel there wasn’t any use trying.”
Just misses from Johnson’s ten were Smoky Joe Wood, Rube Marquard, Addie Joss, Urban Shocker, Babe Ruth, and Stan Coveleski.
Edward F. Ballinger of The Pittsburgh Post described Bill Byron thusly:
“(He) is looked upon among the players as the man who rendered more peculiar decisions than any other official in diamond history.”
Honus Wagner singled out Byron for rendering “the worst decision I ever saw.”
Wagner included the incident in his 1924 series of articles about his career for The North American Newspaper Alliance. He said he was stealing third in a game against the Giants:
“The catcher threw the ball into my feet making it impossible for Devlin—I think it was Devlin— [Note: It was Milt Stock] to pick it up. We both got in a tangle as I slid through a cloud of dust. The ball was bound under my arm where nobody could find it.”
Byron
While the Giants looked for the ball, Wagner headed towards the plate:
“About ten feet from home the ball dropped on the baseline. Now here’s where McGraw got in his fine work. He rushed up to umpire Byron, who had run down to third base to make the decision and told him I carried the ball to the bench in my hand.
“’If you don’t believe it, go to the bench and make them give it to you,’ he urged Byron.
“About this time McGraw’s attention was called to the ball lying on the base path.”
McGraw then told Byron, “That proves it. See! Wagner just rolled it out.”
Wagner said a confused Byron called him out for, “Carrying the ball to the bench with your hand.”
Wagner’s recollection was a bit faulty, in addition to forgetting who was playing third base. The incident happened on July 17, 1914, during the sixth inning of what would turn out to be a 21-inning 3 to 1 victory for the Giants. The game was, to that point, baseball’s longest game and both pitchers, Babe Adams and Rube Marquard pitched complete games.
As for the play, Wagner was not attempting to steal; he was advancing to third from first on a hit by Jim Viox and the throw came from center fielder Bob Bescher.
Contemporaneous accounts in The Pittsburgh Press, The Dispatch, and The Post all said that when the ball fell from Wagner’s uniform, it was immediately picked up by Marquard who threw to third trying to retire Viox who was called safe, rather than Wagner’s version where McGraw called Byron’s attention to the ball.
McGraw, said The Press, came out on the field at that point, “and told Byron Wagner was out.” The umpire agreed and also sent Viox back to second The Post said:
“The Pirates gathered around the umpire and raised a hubbub. (Fred) Clarke read the riot act and was motioned off the lot by umpire Byron.”
Pittsburgh protested the game, but Byron’s ruling was upheld.
Fred Mitchell, manager of the Cubs, was also not a Byron fan, and told Billy Evans in 1920:
“He hasn’t improved much since the summer (1917) he gave a decision that cost me $100 and the game. We were playing in St. Louis and big Mule (Milt) Watson was on the rubber. Art Wilson was at the plate. Watson, as he started to pitch, stubbed his toe and in trying to hold back on the ball threw it wildly and hit Wilson in the back of the neck. Byron would not let him take his base, saying it was a slow ball. I protested and consequently was chased and later fined $100.”
Mitchell’s details of the September 3 game were all correct, except for the outcome of the game. The Cubs beat the Cardinals and Watson 6 to 5. Mitchell had also, “had a mix-up” with Byron the previous day, according to The Chicago Tribune, when the umpire had initially called Tom Long of St. Louis out on a play at the plate, “then called him safe, although (catcher Rowdy) Elliott held the ball.”
Cardinals owner John C. Jones held the same opinion Mitchell did off Byron. Earlier that same season, Byron made another questionable call on another play involving Tom Long. The Cardinals outfielder hit a ball off Eppa Rixey that appeared to be fair for a double. Byron, despite “the fact that a gap in the whitewash marked the spot,” where the ball hit called it foul.
Long was called out on strikes on the next pitch The Cardinals lost 3 to 2 to the Phillies.
So incensed was Jones at the umpire, whom The St. Louis Star called, “a good plumber’s helper but an inferior umpire,” that he wrote an open letter to fans that appeared in St. Louis papers. He told fans who were present, “The good of the game demands,” that they wire league president John Tener about “Byron’s judgment.”
Jones’ message resulted in bottles and other items being thrown at Byron the following day. Two fans were injured. Cardinal President Branch Rickey disavowed Jones’ comments:
“I strongly advised against it. In fact, both (manager) Miller Huggins and myself wired President Tener that the message did not officially express the club’s sentiments.”
Despite his comment that he did not support the club owners’ position, Rickey was more critical of the umpire in his telegram to Tener than Jones had been in his message to the fans:
“(His) attitude and manners generally were extremely antagonistic to the crowd…If Byron will keep his face to the filed and not parade about in front of the stands, he will have no trouble.”
The previous season, Byron “wrote” an article for The Pittsburgh Press. He said he became an umpire in 1896 only because he couldn’t find enough work in his “first love, steamfitting.” Over two decades he worked his way from the Michigan State League to the National League.
Before steamfitting and umpiring, Byron had briefly played minor league ball:
“As for myself, I am frank to admit that I was the worst ball player that ever broke into the Texas League. I managed to hold my job with the Dallas club for a while, but the race was too fast. It nearly ruined a good steamfitter. Afterward I played semi-professional ball occasionally in Michigan but gave up the game—and what was baseball’s loss was the plumbing trade’s game.”
After four seasons in the Michigan State League, he worked his way up to South Atlantic League, then the Virgina League, followed by International League and finally the Eastern League before his big-league career began.
He became well known—and versions of the story were told for the next two decades—for a call he made on August 31, 1909. In an Eastern League pitchers duel between the second place Newark Indians, with manager Joe McGinnity on the mound and Big Jeff Pfeffer pitching for the fourth place Toronto Maple Leafs.
The game was scoreless in the sixth inning with Newark batting:
The Detroit News said:
“Two were out and the batter (Joe Crisp) raised a high foul within the easy reach of both the Toronto catcher and third baseman.”
Toronto Third baseman Jimmy Frick and catcher Fred Mitchell both stopped when Newark “coacher” Benny Meyer yelled “I’ll take it.”
“The catcher backed away and the ball fell on the Dominion of Canada. Great glee broke out among the Newark contingent, who seemed apparently to conclude that the strategy of the coacher had won the batsman another chance to connect. But they reckoned without Mr. Byron.
“’Batter out!’ yelled the ump.”
McGinnity and “his entire team” came out on the field.:
Byron told the Newark manager:
“’He’s out on interference.’
“This set McGinnity fairly crazy and he frothed at the mouth, ‘But there wasn’t a man within 10 feet of Mitchell when he backed away,’ he screamed.
‘”He’s out on vocal interference; get into the field and finish the game.’ And Byron pulled his watch.”
Pfeffer and McGinnity both went the distance in a 13-inning game won by Toronto 1 to 0. McGinnity filed a protest with the league, but Byron’s decision was upheld.
Byron said the “secret of umpiring” was that “The umpire must keep his head and let the other man lose his.”
The umpire retired before the 1920 season saying he could make more money at his first love. Evans said of his seven seasons in the National League:
“Like the rest of the umpires, he had his faults. No umpire is infallible, so Bill made mistakes like the rest of us, but they were always honest mistakes.”
He said Byron “always looked trouble in the eye,” and “no gamer fellow” ever wore a mask.
Despite his contentious relationship with McGraw, Evans told a story about a game in New York. The previous day while making a ruling on a play involving fan interference, “the umpires were criticized” by reporters for their long deliberation. The following day:
“At an amusement park near the Polo Grounds, it was customary for an aviator to do a series of stunts. Usually the aviator paid the Polo Grounds a visit before landing. On this occasion, he flew unusually low over the grounds, so that it was easily possible to see him greet the big crowd with a wave of the hand. Evidently Bill Byron had given some thought of the criticism of the day previous unjustly heaped on the arbitrators for what was called a needless delay.
“Calling time and turning toward the New York bench, he addressed manager McGraw of the Giants thusly.
“If the ball hits the airplane, John, while it is flying over fair territory, it is good for two bases. If it lands in some part of the machine and stays there while flying over fait territory, the runners shall stop at the base last touched when such thing occurs. If the ball lands in some part of the machine while the machine is outside playing territory, it will be good for a home run. Play.”
Evans said McGraw “was shaking with laughter.
The press box was as well:
“Byron’s retort courteous to their slam had not gone over their heads.”
L. C. Davis of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch said of Byron’s retirement:
“It will always be a moot question whether Lord Byron was greater as a singer or an umpire. But whether singing or umpiring the fans agree that he displayed all the earmarks of a good plumber.”
Ernest Lanigan, writing in The Cleveland Leader in 1918 said:
“One way a team could be assured a victory in every stop on a trip, would be to lose its uniforms.”
Lanigan said it happened twice in the last four seasons:
“Last season, on their way East, the Saint Louis Cardinals lost their baggage and had to meet the Superbas in clothing for which Charles Hercules Ebbets had paid. The result was a 9 to 2 victory for Jack (manager Jack) Hendrick’s team.”
The Brooklyn Citizen described the June 1, 1918 game:
“The schedule called for a game between the Saint Louis Cardinals and the Robins. But if the fans were just going by the uniforms the players wore, then it was a combat between the HOME and the TRAVELING uniforms of the Brooklyn Baseball Club, for the Cardinals were arrayed in the traveling unies of the Robins.”
Fourteen trunks belonging to the Cardinals failed to make it from Pittsburgh with the team. The paper said the Cardinals did have to purchase shoes for the team from a local store:
“(Hendricks) had to order 15 pairs of new ones, which will set the club back $210.”
In a borrowed uniform and in new shoes, Red Ames allowed 10 hits, but just two runs, and the Cardinals chased Rube Marquard in the fifth inning—scoring six runs off the Brooklyn starter.
Red Ames
Lanigan said the previous time a team played in their opponents’ uniforms was 1915:
“The Saint Louis Browns reached Detroit minus uniforms and attired in Tiger togs they defeated the Junglemen, 1 to 0.”
Edward A. Batchelor of The Detroit Free Press said of the June 20th game:
“You see it was this way. The St. Louis club’s baggage went astray somewhere between Boston and Detroit and when the Browns arrived, they possessed nothing in the way of baseball equipment except the usual number of arms and legs. Some of them had heads, though this is not considered a requisite in big league ball anymore. They didn’t even have a manager, as Branch Rickey refused to come along. He won’t even look at Sunday ball.
“With true hospitality the Tigers took pity on the forlorn crew and outfitted them completely in the Detroit Road uniforms. They also loaned them gloves and shoes and otherwise contributed to their comfort and convenience.”
Dressed in Detroit uniforms, Batchelor said the Browns “forgot they are tail-enders and imagined they were really the Jungaleers.”
Carl Weilman pitched a four-hit shutout for the seventh place Browns.
Carl Weilman
Lanigan said one had to go back to 1912 to find a team losing in borrowed uniforms:
“A game which a visiting team did not win when it was compelled to play in the home club’s regalia because of the non-arrival of its baggage took place at the hilltop, in New York on August 12 [sic, August 13]. The Tigers and their baggage parted company in Syracuse and Jennings’ men played in the Yanks’ road uniforms, being beaten 3 to 2.”
Batchelor said in The Free Press:
“A most peculiar combination of circumstances thwarted the well laid plans of Hughie Jennings and kept the fiery siren dumb on the bench in civilian clothes. Detroit’s baggage was misplaced somewhere in Syracuse where an exhibition game was played yesterday. Only the artful hospitality of manager (Harry) Wolverton saved the Jungaleers from forfeit. Wolverton lent the visitors his road uniforms. But had no shoes of guaranteed fit.
“Consequently, the entire invading squad had to go out and purchase new kicks. Winning ballgames in unbroken brogans is no nice business.”
Harry Wolverton
Batchelor said the bats loaned to the Tigers were “so full of holes that Jennings’ heavy artillery were able to collect a measly bundle of three hits”
The Tigers scored two runs in the first inning of New York starter Ray Fisher, who was ejected along with Wolverton for arguing a call at first base. Jack Warhop pitched 8 ½ innings in relief, giving up just two hits in the 3 to 2 victory.
More random quotes and observations that follow no theme or thread:
Cap Anson told The Chicago Daily News in 1904:
“I consider (Charles) Radbourn and John Clarkson the greatest pitchers I ever saw. Buck Ewing was just about the best catcher that ever wore a mask. He could catch, throw, bat and run and had a good head.”
Cap Anson
After Frank Baker hit home runs off Christy Mathewson and Rube Marquard in the 1911 World Series, he told The Philadelphia American:
“There seems to be much speculation as to what sort of balls were thrown me when I made my home runs…Well, I hit them and I know what they were. Matty threw me an inshoot, but what would have been an outshoot to a right handed batter, while the Rube threw a fast one between my shoulder and waist.
“Connie Mack told me when I went to the bat that I would not get a fast one, and he was right I set myself and looked them over against Mathewson and when he tossed me that curve and I saw her starting to break, I busted her, that’s all.”
Frank Baker
Thirty-four year old Bill Bernhard told The Cleveland News about seeing 38-year-old Cy Young in Hot Springs, Arkansas in spring of 1905:
“There is no use talking, there is only one Cy Young. When the rest of us pitchers report in the spring, we act as if those alleged deceiving arms of ours were made of glass and humor them accordingly. But not so with old Cy. The very first day that Cy reached Hot Springs, a week or so ago, he cut loose as if he had been pitching all winter. Great Scott, but he had speed to burn and the next day and the next it was just the same. And curve them? Well, you ought to have seen the old boy.”
Cy Young
In 1915, The Chicago Daily News noted that Charles Comiskey “isn’t given to boosting players very often,” but that Catcher Ray Schalk was an exception:
“Schalk shows more life than any other player I have ever seen. He is level headed and his thinking and natural ability stamp him as one of the greatest catchers in the world today, and he can claim equal distinction with the great and only Buck Ewing, considered in his day the peer of all backstops.
Ray Schalk
Dave Landreth was a baseball promoter from Bristol, Pennsylvania who had a brief foray into professional baseball when he served as director of the Baltimore Terrapins in the Federal League. He told a story to The Bristol Courier about Lew Richie—Richie was born in nearby Ambler, Pennsylvania, and pitched for Landreth in semi-pro leagues before making is pro debut in 1906 at age 22:
“Landreth hired Richie to pitch the morning game of a holiday twin bill for the county championship, and after winning and fanning 18 men, all for five dollars, Richie came back in the afternoon and insisted on hurling that game , too, for nothing.
“Somebody ‘kidded’ him about winning the morning game on a fluke, and Lew wanted to show them—and he did, winning that game as well.”
Lew Richie
Tim Donahue had a reputation for being tough during his eight seasons in the major leagues. The catcher told The Chicago Evening Post he had only encountered one man who made him back him down:
“I was never put down and out but once. It was when I was playing semi-professional ball too, and was quite a young lad. There was a big fellow named Sullivan on the other side and I tried to block him at the plate. He swung on my jaw and I thought a load of bricks had dropped on my head. I finally came to, but I didn’t block Sullivan any more. That’s the only time I would ever clear out.”
In the winter of 1918 Malcolm MacLean of The Chicago Evening Post wrote about the peculiar reactions of a few players to photographers:
“It may happen that a pitcher does a phenomenal streak of work and his photo should run. It may be the only one of him in stock that has been used time and again—so often, in fact, that it is all but worn out.
“Hence it is necessary for a photographer to snap said fellow’s photo on the ball field. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred this is a pipe. Yet there are exceptions.”
MacLean said he recalled a handful if examples of players refusing:
“In practically every case it was that uncanny thing known as ‘baseball superstition’ that made it difficult, almost impossible, to get them to pose.
“(Urban) Red Faber, of the White Sox, on two occasions (during the 1917 season) lost ball games after he had been snapped. So he announced his intention of refusing to pose again until the White Sox won the American League championship. Another member of the Sox, Charles (Swede) Risberg, joined him in the declaration. And they stuck to it.
Red Faber
“The day after the title was clinched both Faber and Risberg were among the easiest fellows on the squad to photograph. In their case it was ‘superstition’ and we don’t know they could be blamed. If a player keeps winning, only to have the streak smashed the day his photo is taken, well we have an idea we’d do the same thing.”
MacLean said during Rube Marquard’s 19-game winning streak the Giants’ pitcher refused to allow a Chicago photographer to take his picture. MacLean said he and a cameraman approached the pitcher on July 8, 1912:
“’Nothing doing,’ he said. ‘Come around any time you want after I’ve lost a game and you’re welcome to all you want.’ It so happened that Rube lost that day, Jimmy Lavender hanging the bee on him, and the following afternoon Rube posed and posed and posed.”
MacLean said Jim Thorpe was a particularly difficult subject to photograph when he began his major league career, but not due to superstition:
“When Thorpe first came to Chicago with the Giants, he was the most widely advertised athlete in the world. He was fresh from his triumphs in Sweden on the track field and from the gridiron at Carlisle.
“Many say he was so modest he hated to have his picture taken. At any rate, many a film and plate was wasted on him because he would turn his face away, throw up his arm in front of him, or do something also to ruin the exposure.”
Jim Thorpe
Another difficult member of the Giants was catcher John “Chief” Meyers, who MacLean said would brush past photographers, saying:
“’Aw, you’ve got all of me you want,’ It was decidedly exasperating, especially when publicity is what helps keep major leaguers in the majors.”
Two other oft-photographed pitchers had their own particular quirks.
MacLean said:
“It will surprise many to learn that Ed Walsh, of the White Sox…refused to pose on the day he was expected to pitch…Few men were snapped so frequently as Ed when he was in his prime, yet we venture to say no man ever got a photo of him—when Ed knew it—on the day he was to work.
“Eddie Plank, of the Athletics…was one of the easiest of all men to photograph, but it was exceedingly difficult to get a good one of him. The reason was he kept tossing stones at the camera or twisting up his face in some farcical fashion. And when other players were being taken Ed would throw peddles at them, trying to have them distort their faces.”
Idah McGlone Gibson was the most famous female journalist of the early 20th Century; in addition to publishing several books, she wrote for the syndicated Newspaper Enterprise Association, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Evening Herald, and The Toledo Blade.
Idah McGlone Gibson
She also interviewed New York Giants Manager John McGraw twice, five years apart.
Their first meeting took place in New York shortly before the end of the Giants’ pennant-winning 1912 season. McGlone told her readers:
“McGraw is surrounded by more ‘buffers’ to keep the public from him that Maude Adams (a notoriously press-shy actress), who is never interviewed, and that’s going some.
Gibson and McGraw in 1912
“Neither his telephone number nor his home address is obtainable unless you reach one of his close friends, and at the Polo Grounds. he is never on view until you have passed all the police force and plain-clothes men.”
McGlone said former Giant turned New York attorney, John Montgomery Ward provided her with an introduction to McGraw.
“It was after the game that I saw the Giants’ manager, well-groomed, well-dressed, well-mannered. McGraw was evidently at peace with himself and the world…He is the most serious ballplayer I ever talked to. He seldom smiles, and told me that he put one on to order when he had his picture taken with me.”
Gibson asked how McGraw thought the Giants would fare in the World Series against the Boston Red Sox:
“Of course, we are going into the game to win, not because of any glory attached to it, but because it is our business. However, I feel that I shall be able to live through the winter if we lose the world’s championship. I am not able to get up that high-water mark enthusiasm which exhilarates the fans to whom the game is a pleasure and not a business.”
She also asked McGraw about the biggest source of gossip surrounding his ballclub; the relationship between Rube Marquard, his 26-game winning pitcher and vaudeville star Shirley Kellogg—during August and September several newspapers published erroneous reports from Marquard’s mother that the couple had married:
“’Indeed, I don’t know whether he is married or not,’ he answered suavely, but his brown eyes narrowed and his lips came together firmly. ‘You know I have nothing to do with the private lives of my men.’
“Marquard’s name and love affairs, however, did not bring a rosy glow to the manager’s face, and I imagine McGraw has helped make the course of true love run a little crooked, as ‘the Rube’ has lost the jump to his fast ball since his reported marriage.”
Rube Marquard
McGraw touted his other pitchers, telling Gibson that the greatest pitching performance “he had ever seen was in training camp last spring” when Jeff Tesreau and Al Demaree faced each other for 12 scoreless innings in an intersquad game in Texas.
Despite her fondness for McGraw, Gibson told her readers they “may trust a women’s intuition” and correctly predicted the Red Sox would win the World Series.
Gibson met McGraw five years later during a September series in Cincinnati, with the Giants on their way to another National League pennant. She said:
“I hope I have changed as little as he has in that time.
“His hair, the Irish hair that turns white early, has grown just a bit more optimistic—that is all.
“’Twenty-nine years is a long time to be in the game,’ he said as his eyes wandered over the field—‘longer than most of those boys can count their entire lives.’”
Gibson asked about temperamental players:
“In my nearly three decades of baseball I have learned one thing thoroughly—a good ballplayer must be temperamental, just as an artist, a musician, or a writer must have temperament.”
Gibson asked how he makes “a man’s temperament,” benefit the team:
“’By ignoring it,’ he answered. ‘I must make every man think he has no temperament, even while making him use that most desirable quality in a ballplayer to its fullest capacity.’”
McGraw refused to say which player on the team was the most temperamental, but offered to tell who was the least. Gibson said:
“’Yes, Mathewson is always to be depended upon. When he knows a thing is to be done he just does it. Some men play best when a team is winning and some play best when spurred by defeat. A baseball manager must not only be a good picker, but he must study each man individually and handle all differently.’
“’At the end of a season with a winning team you have to be more than ever on your guard. Every man is a bundle of nerves, drawn taut. At this time every little prejudice, every little idiosyncrasy, every little vein of superstition is laid bare and raw. You get to know your men better then than at any other time during the season.’”
McGraw and Mathewson
Gibson asked if the best ballplayers came from a particular nationality. McGraw said:
“’I cannot answer that. I think perhaps the Irish are the quickest thinkers and the readiest to take a fighting chance, but I would not like a team made up entirely of Irish. You must have temperaments like the German to ballast the Irish. Truly I think a winning ball team must be a melting pot of all nationalities. This year there are more Germans among the Giants than any other nationality and they are just as temperamental as any other but they don’t show it in just the same way.’”
Gibson did not make a prediction about the World Series as she had done five years before; McGraw’s temperamental Giants were beaten four games to two by the Chicago White Sox.
An advertisement for Hanley’s Peerless Ale, from the James Hanley Brewing Company in Providence, Rhode Island, which appeared on the eve of the 1912 World Series:
“If Jake Stahls McGraw
Wood Collins Marquard
and Hall Crand-all over
Mathewson?
Or was Tesreau Bedient?
The answer is
Drink.”
Jake Stahl’s Boston Red Sox defeated John McGraw and the New York Giants four games to three in an eight-game series that included an 11-inning 2-2 tie in game two.
Hugh Bedient was 1-0 for Boston with a 0.50 ERA in 18 innings
Jeff Tesreau 1-2 with a 3.13 ERA in 23 innings for the Giants
As the New York Giants were cruising to the National League Pennant in 1912—they won by 10 games and were never in second place after May 20—New York’s catcher John “Chief” Meyers provided fans with a look at life with the Giants.
Chief Meyers
The article was written for The Associated Press—most likely by Jim McBeth of The New York American, who acted most often as Meyers’ ghostwriter:
“After the last ball of the game is fielded and the crowd begins to pour out of the park and the players disappear into the clubhouse—what then?
“The fans read in their papers next morning: ‘New York at Pittsburgh’ or ‘New York at Boston,’ or something like that. And until the bulletin boards begin to put up the score, inning by inning, in the afternoon, they know little of nothing about the men they have been watching and cheering.
“What have ballplayers been doing in the meantime?”
Meyers explained life on the road:
“Well, suppose we’ve just finished a game on the Polo Grounds. Our schedule calls for a battle with the Pirates in their home park. Of course, the first thing is to get there, and we get there in easier and better fashion than any other sort of a traveler.
“We have two private Pullman cars of our own, always, and they are our traveling home We assemble at the railroad station—sometimes forty strong—and just pile aboard and make ourselves comfortable.
“In the first place, I might mention the make-up of our party. We carry twenty-five players, as many as the rules allow; John McGraw, the manager; Wilbert Robinson, coach and assistant manager; the club secretary and his assistant; Dr. Finley the club physician; Ed Mackall, the club trainer; Dick Hennessy, our kid mascot, and as many as ten or twelve newspaper writers especially towards the end of a close race.”
The 1912 Giants
As for accommodations:
“If he is a regular he takes possession of a seat which indicates that his berth when it is made up will be a ‘lower.’ That’s an absolute rule. Nothing but the cream for the first string players.
“As soon as the train pulls out the boys go to their favorite amusements—card playing, reading, ‘fanning.’ Don’t think a player finishes a game when he sheds his spangles. He doesn’t. Many a game is played all over again as soon as the boys get together.
“There’s a little quartet of us who are pinochle fans—(James ‘Doc’) Crandall, (Art) Fletcher, (David ‘Beals’) Becker and myself—a fine lot of Dutchmen we are. We’re the ‘tightwads’ of the club because we don’t risk as much as a nickel on our games.
“There was a time when there was tall gambling by the players on trains while traveling from one town to another. I’ve seen as much as $6,000 or $7000 on the table in a poker game. But that’s past; the player of today holds on to his money, and, besides, he knows that high betting causes ill feeling between friends and heavy losses get a man’s mind off his playing. The Giants play a little poker, of course, but it’s only a 25-cent limit game, where a man in hard luck may lose as much as $4 or $5 in a session.
“Occasionally you’ll hear a little singing. Some of the boys have really good voices. Others fancy themselves as vocalists, anyhow. Larry Doyle, for instance…Leon Ames gets up sometimes and gives us his specialty. He recites Kipling’s poem, ‘On the Road to Mandalay,‘ (with an affected speech impediment). That always gets a laugh. The younger, smaller players buzz around Big Jeff Tesreau like a flock of mosquitoes attacking an elephant, giving him a good-natured kidding until he sweeps his big arms and chases them. “
Big Jeff Tesreau
Meyers said the Giants were “like one big family—a lively, noisy bunch of pals.” He said a player occasionally “gets a grouch and sits off by himself,” but:
“I never saw a group of men in any business so genuinely attached to each other…Occasionally some stranger tries to horn into our cars but he quickly finds he isn’t wanted.”
The Giants, he said, drew crowds at the ballpark and at their hotel:
“There’s nothing tight about us when we travel. We’re an attraction and we know it, and that helps box office receipts. People always want to see this club that’s got Matty and a real Indian, and sometimes (the previous season) Charley Faust or a Bugs Raymond as an added attraction. So we don’t keep our light under any bushel.
“We’re always pretty well sized up in our hotel in a strange city. We can hear people say ‘So they are the Giants eh?’ The native can always spot me because of my Indian appearance, so I’m usually the one they make for.
“’Say, Chief, which is Matty?’ they ask. ‘Which one is Johnny McGraw?’ ‘Who’s going to pitch today, Chief?’ The other boys give me the laugh because I’m the goat for all questioners. The fans don’t recognize the other players.”
Meyers said most of the Giants were not great dressers, ‘content with two changes of costume.” The exceptions were Rube Marquard: “He travels with a steamer trunk and sometimes has six or eight suits with him,” as well as Josh Devore and Art Wilson.
Meyers said every player shared one fashion statement:
“Everybody…sports a diamond. That seems to be the badge of big-league class. As soon as a ballplayer gets out of the ‘bushes’ and into the big show the first thing he does is buy a spark. Some of the boys have half a dozen. “
Meyers also insisted that drinking was not a problem among the modern players:
“One thing we hear from strangers most frequently is ‘Have a drink, old man let’s drink one for good luck in today’s game.’ That invitation is invariably refused. Few of the boys drink anything at all, and those who do take a glass of beer occasionally do it among themselves always. The present day player differs greatly from the old timer, who mixed with everyone.
“Pleasant strangers, with sensible questions, we don’t mind, but they are in the minority t the butters-in who simply want to tell their friends they are associates of ballplayers.”
Meyers said he and his teammates were also very popular with deaf fans, many of whom began following the Giants when Luther “Dummy” Taylor (1900-01, 1902-08) pitched for the club:
“(N)ow they’re friends of all of us. Most of the Giants learned the finger talk from Taylor.”
He said Mathewson, Doyle and Fred Snodgrass were all very conversant in sign language and “are the idols of” many deaf fans.
Fred Snodgrass
Meyers frequented art museums on the road. As for his teammates: billiards for most, chess or checkers for Mathewson during the day, and the theatre at night, he said, were the “favorite pastimes” of the Giants.
No matter the activity after a road game, he said: “Everybody must be in bed” by 11:30 pm. “That’s one of McGraw’s rules, and the boys are on their honor to obey it.”
Meyers drew one conclusion from the lifestyle of the modern ballplayer. He and his brethren were “(A) trifle better off, both physically and morally, than the average young man.”
Kinsella credited a career minor league player and manager for his discovery of Doyle, who he sold to the New York Giants in July of 1907. After Doyle hit .310 in 1911, a syndicated Newspaper Enterprise Association told the story of how he acquired Doyle after the 1906 season from the Mattoon Canaries of the Kitty League, having never seen him play:
“Mattoon was in need of a pitcher and appealed to President Dick Kinsella of the Springfield Three-Eye League team for aid…Kinsella saw a chance to make a bargain when Mattoon hoisted the distress sign and struck one. ‘I’ll let you have a pitcher for the pick of your team at the end of the season,’ Kinsella told the Mattoon people. His offer was accepted and pitcher (John) Jokerst was sent to the Kitty League team by Springfield.
“Doyle didn’t do well with Mattoon (.225 in 91 games) that season. Kinsella had not even considered him in deciding what player to pick. He had almost made up his mind to take a veteran pitcher.”
Fate intervened when Kinsella mentioned the Mattoon deal to Frank Belt, manager of the Kitty League’s Jacksonville Jacks. Belt asked Kinsella if he had ever seen Doyle:
“’No,’ answered Kinsella.
‘”Well, don’t pick anyone until you do, and then pick him. He’s the coming ballplayer of that club. He hasn’t looked good in the box scores, but he’s ‘there’ any way you take him. He’ll bring you more money inside of a year than you ever got for a player.”
Larry Doyle
Sight unseen, Kinsella took Belt’s advice. Doyle played third base and hit .290 in 66 games for Kinsella’s Springfield Senators. He became the subject of a bidding war with the Giants winning out over the Detroit Tigers and Washington Senators for his services on July 16.
Kinsella was paid a then-record $4500 for Doyle—a record eclipsed the following year when Kinsella sold Rube Marquard to the Giants for $11,000.
The $4500 check to Kinsella for the sale of Doyle
According to The Springfield Journal Kinsella sent Doyle off to New York with just one piece of advice:
“There’s one thing you mustn’t do when you get to New York. You must quit sliding to bases on your head. If you don’t, they will think you’re from the brush.”
Doyle was moved to second base, hit .290 over a 14-year big league career, and presumably took Kinsella’s advice about sliding head first.
“Money will not buy a pennant winner;” so said William George “Billy” Murphy, the sports editor of The St. Louis Star. In 1914, he set out to select a team that not even “John D. Rockefeller… (With) all his wealth could buy a club that would win a World’s championship from the one we have picked…The Billion Dollar Team.”
Murphy said:
“You fans of towns that have never won a flag, how would you feel to wake up some morning and find that Dame Fortune had so arranged matters that this club had suddenly been picked to represent your fair city.”
Behind the plate he acknowledged “There are many who would doubtless pick (John) Chief Meyers…but considering the Indian’s slowness of foot and propensity for clogging up the bases and stealing when the bags are full, we must remark we cannot see the “Chief” for a minute with Jimmy Archer, who, although not so good a hitter, is faster, a quicker thinker, greater fielder and better pegger.”
“There will hardly be a dissenting vote cast against Walter Johnson. Unquestionably he is the greatest of all the pitchers.
“(Charles Chief) Bender and (Christy) Mathewson are also great—great when they should show class—in championship games. Every nerve, every fiber of their brains, every muscle necessary to their craft, is at its best when big games are being fought.
“Wonderful as they are, we must pick Johnson, who also has class and is game to the core.”
“At second base, Eddie Collins in the potentate. Johnny Evers, Larry Doyle, and Larry Lajoie occupy seats in the second sackers’ hall of fame, but Collins rules over the roost.”
“At short, notwithstanding his age, the palm goes to Hans Wagner. Taken all in all he is still the greatest man at the position in the game. He can do everything and does it better than any of his contemporaries. When will we look upon his like again?”
“In right field we have Joe Jackson, the young Southerner with the Cleveland club. He is one of the greatest batsmen in the game today and is a fielder and base runner of unusual ability.”
Baseball History Daily 