A Century of World Series
Selected high and low drama from fall classics throughout the past 100 years
Bygone baseball by C. Philip Francis – November 1, 2004
Part 2
Although Babe Ruth is best known for his 714 home runs with the New York Yankees, the lefthander also won 89 games while pitching for the Boston Red Sox from 1914 through 1919. Ruth’s first appearance in ten World Series occurred on October 9, 1916 when he pitched his greatest game beating the Brooklyn Robins (Dodgers) 2-1 in Game Two. Babe gave up an inside-the-park home run in the first inning, but after Boston tied it in the third both Ruth and Brooklyn’s Sherry Smith pitched a brilliant shutout game until the Sox scored in the 14th. Boston went on to take the Championship 4 games to 1.
As the 1918 baseball season began the country was now involved in World War I, and Secretary of War Newton Baker had ordered the regular schedule be ended by September 1. Many ballplayers enlisted in the service including Duffy Lewis, Ernie Shore, Herb Pennock, and Grover Cleveland Alexander, and it was the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs in the early fall series.
Boston’s Carl Mays and Babe Ruth each won two games as the Sox took the Championship 4 games to 2. Ruth’s WS record scoreless inning streak beginning in the 1916 series was stopped at 29.2 innings in Game 4.
And who would have thought that the Red Sox would not win another World Series for the next 86 years?
The 1919 Chicago White Sox was considered one of the great teams, and should have been highly favored in the Series against the Cincinnati Reds. By game time, however, the Reds were an 8-5 favorite, and gamblers from New York and Chicago were seen in hotel lobbies with hands full of money. Something was wrong.
Cincinnati did win the Championship 5 games to 3 in an expanded Series, but a year later eight members of the Chicago White Sox, now called “the Black Sox”, were indicted for throwing the Series - including Shoeless Joe Jackson. Although they were all acquitted, newly appointed commissioner of baseball Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis barred all eight players from ever playing major league baseball again.
The Cleveland Indians became the sentimental favorites in the 1920 Series with Brooklyn following the August death of their shortstop, Ray Chapman, who was struck on the head by a fastball thrown by Yankee pitcher, Carl Mays. In the unusual and improbable Game 5 won by the Indians 8-1, in the first inning Cleveland outfielder Elmer Smith hit the first postseason grand slam, the fans saw the first WS home run hit by a pitcher, Jim Bagby of the Indians, and the rare of rarest – an unassisted triple play by Cleveland second baseball, Bill Wambsganss, in the fifth inning.
Cleveland defeated the Brooklyn Dodgers 4 games to 2.
It was the New York Giants over the New York Yankees in the 1921 Series and again in 1922. Then in 1923 the “House that Ruth Built”, Yankee Stadium, opened up across the Harlem River from the Giants’ Polo Grounds. While the Yankees were taking the series this time 4-2, a Giant outfielder named Casey Stengel hit the first two ever WS home runs in the Yankee ball field, one an inside-the-park job, and would later lead the Yankees to 10 America League pennants and 7 WS titles.
Before spring training began in early 1924, 27-year-old Bucky Harris was surprisingly offered the manager’s position by Washington owner, Clark Griffith. Harris had been the Senators’ regular second baseman for the past four years, thought he was in the owner’s dog house at the time, and was the youngest player on the team that included Walter Johnson, Joe Judge, and Goose Goslin. Bucky quickly wired back, “I’LL TAKE THE JOB AND WIN WASHINGTON’S FIRST AMERICAN LEAGUE PENNANT.”
The baseball gods must have looked favorably down upon the Washington Senators that season because not only did player/manager Bucky Harris, now called “The Boy Wonder”, lead the Senators to the pennant, they won their only World Championship.
Washington met the New York Giants, and in Game 7 the Bucky’s team had scored in the bottom of the eighth to tie the game at 3-all. With two out Harris sent a screamer down third base that hit a pebble and bounced over the third baseman allowing two runs to score. The Senators scored in the bottom of the 12the inning giving Washington the World Championship. In 1925 Bucky Harris and his Washington made it two pennants in a row, but lost the Series to the Pittsburgh Pirates 4 games to 3.
Many consider the 1927 New York Yankees to be the greatest team of all time with hitters like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Earle Combs, Tony Lazzeri, and Mark Koenig, but by 1929 the Connie Mack of the Philadelphia A’s had put a team together that could match the Yankees. Mack had Jimmy Foxx, Al Simmons, and Mickey Cochrane who could now challenge the Yankees for the American League pennant.
Who is the smartest baseball manager? My vote goes to Connie Mack who managed the Philadelphia A’s for 53 years and won five World Championships. In 1929 Mack surprised the baseball world including his own team by naming forgotten and sore-armed Howard Ehmke as his opening game pitcher against the powerful Chicago Cubs.
The 35-year-old, tall, slim, right-hander was near the end of his 14-year career, had won only 7 games that season, and had not pitched for the past month. Thirty days before the season ended, Mack assigned Howard to scout the Cubs and study the Chicago sluggers - Kiki Cuyler, Hack Wilson, and Rogers Hornsby.
Just before the game began Mack finally announced that Ehmke would start Game 1 against Chicago’s ace hurler, Charlie Root. Ehmke struck out a record 13 batters as he threw a complete contest winning 3-1. He was soon out of baseball, and never won another ballgame.
In Game 3 the A’s overcame an 8-0 deficit by scoring 10 runs in the seventh inning, take the game 10-8, and the World Series 4 games to 1.
Part 3 will continue on November 15, 2004.