by Marty Appel
Whit Wyatt beat Spud Chandler in game two, 3–2, ending the Yankees’ ten-game World Series winning streak. Game three, in Ebbets Field, was a 2–1 complete game win for Marius Russo, won in the eighth on singles by Rolfe, Henrich, DiMaggio, and Keller. (This was the first season in which DiMaggio-Keller-Henrich formed the regular outfield.)
Now game four. With two outs in the ninth, it was 4–3 Brooklyn, and they were one out from knotting the Series at 2–2.
Hugh Casey now faced Henrich. With a full count, he unleashed—a curve? A spitball? People have debated it since. Whatever it was, Henrich swung and missed, but made it to first on a passed ball by Mickey Owen.
“Five o’clock lightning.” You didn’t give the Yankees a fourth out, not these Yankees. DiMaggio singled, Keller doubled to score two, Dickey walked, and Gordon doubled to score Dickey. Suddenly it was 7–4 New York, and Murphy retired three straight to nail it down in the last of the ninth. The Yankees took a 3–1 Series lead.
“Hugh Casey didn’t even know how to throw a spitball,” said Durocher to his biographer, Ed Linn, in 1974. “Why should he? Casey had a natural sinker—that’s why he was a relief pitcher … [He] made a great pitch and then everything went wrong. Mickey Owen reached for the ball instead of shifting his feet as he should have, and the ball went off the end of his glove and rolled behind him. It didn’t roll that far, either. If there had been grass behind the plate, there is no question in my mind but that Henrich would have been thrown out at first base.”
Bonham beat Wyatt 3–1 the next day and the Yankees had their ninth world championship. Gordon hit .500 in the Series and walked seven times.
Although the teams played another game, the Owens play came to represent the end of the Series—and with it the end of the prewar era of major league baseball.
Two months after the World Series, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, and World War II began. Baseball had little choice but to support the war effort, try to stay vital, show pride when its stars went off to service, and hope that the game still existed as an important part of American culture whenever the war ended. Just holding its own would test its mettle. These were going to be rough years.
Chapter Eighteen
THE WAR DIVERTED EVERYONE’S attention for the next four years, and baseball was lucky to be able to continue. And so after a decade of the Great Depression, baseball was still unable to realize its full potential as an entertainment industry. Attendance and revenues would be flat for the better part of fifteen years, but still the Yankees found a way to succeed.
After dismissing Doc Painter as trainer after the ’41 Series and replacing him with Eddie Froelich of the White Sox, the Yanks managed to stay mainly intact in 1942, while players on other teams were getting called up and sent off to war.8
The Yanks lost only Henrich and Sturm to military duty in 1942, and Henrich not until August 31. Tommy played a final game on August 30 during which PA announcer Jack Lenz proclaimed, “Ladies and gentlemen, Tommy Henrich has been ordered to report for active duty with the Coast Guard. This is his last appearance in a Yankee uniform until the war is over.” A thunderous ovation followed, which Henrich called “one of the most touching salutes I’ve ever received.”
That took him out of the pennant race, but the Yankees were eight games up when he left.
Red Rolfe, thirty-three, became a part-time player after developing chronic ulcerative colitis and retired after the season. At the time, he was probably the best third baseman in the franchise’s history, a lifetime .289 hitter who played for six pennant winners in ten seasons. He would immediately go on to coach baseball and basketball at Yale, come back to coach for the Yankees in 1946, and then manage the Tigers for four seasons. Crosetti wound up playing a lot of third base next to Rizzuto.
Buddy Hassett, born in Manhattan, raised in the Bronx, and a semipro player in Brooklyn, had first been signed by the Yankees in 1936, then came back to play first base in Sturm’s absence after six National League seasons. His teammates loved to hear his beautiful tenor voice; he could have been a professional singer. He hit a credible .284 in his final year in the big leagues, and then went into the service.
The pitching leadership of Ruffing and Gomez was surpassed in ’42 by Bonham (21–5), Chandler (16–5), and Hank Borowy (15–4), with Atley Donald going 11–3. Gomez concluded his Yankee career with a 189–102 record. After the season he took a job at a GE plant in Lynn, Massachusetts.
Lefty, with his signature high leg kick, went out with an 11–2 win at Philadelphia on August 14 and never pitched again, save for one appearance for the Senators in ’43. He would remain a fixture in baseball long after his retirement, first as a manager in the Yankee system (where he gave Eddie Ford the nickname “Whitey”), then as a representative of Rawlings sporting goods. He always thanked Johnny Murphy for saving so many of his wins, and said, “The secret to my success is clean living and a fast outfield!” “I’m the guy who made DiMaggio famous,” he would tell audiences, adding, “I’d rather be lucky than good!”
Tiny Bonham was 79–50 in seven seasons and a two-time All-Star with the Yankees. He was traded to the Pirates in 1947 and gave Pittsburgh three solid seasons before being sidelined by an appendix attack in September of ’49. During surgery he was found to have intestinal cancer and died a week later. He was only thirty-six.
DiMaggio, booed even at home after a wartime spring holdout, had an off year in ’42, hitting .305/21/114.
A rookie, twenty-five-year-old Johnny Lindell, who was the Minor League Player of the Year in ’41, made 23 appearances on the mound with a decent 3.76 ERA, but the following year moved to the outfield, a rare conversion that harkened back to Babe Ruth’s switch. McCarthy simply felt that the USC product, a Bill Essick signing, lacked big-league stuff, but saw his potential as an everyday player. Joe’s instincts were good: Lindell, a handsome six foot four and 217 pounds, was a solid outfielder for seven seasons with the Yanks and a fan favorite as well. He led the league in total bases in 1944 when he hit .300/18/103. (Lindell would finish his career in 1953 as a pitcher, going 6–17 for the Pirates and Phillies.)
The Yankees, as well as other teams, had to deal with the possibility of an air raid during a game. Air-raid wardens were always present. Bulletins were placed throughout the park to instruct fans to “sit tight, follow the green line or the red line,” and to know where barrels of water, pails of sand, and fire extinguishers were. Fifteen thousand fans could be protected from bombs under the grandstand. No one would be permitted to leave in the event of a raid. SEE SCORECARD FOR ALERT INSTRUCTIONS, it said on the facing of the mezzanine. (It would seem to make the five-cent purchase worthwhile.)
The threat also led to one of the game’s most curious rules: In the event of an air raid or a bomb attack, whichever team led after five innings would be declared the winner.
Fortunately, there was no need to redefine “Bronx Bombers” over the coming years.
Prior to a home game on April 29, across the street from the Bronx County Courthouse at the Grand Concourse, a road divider was named Lou Gehrig Plaza, with Eleanor Gehrig, Lou’s parents, McCarthy, Dickey, and several teammates on hand to dedicate the plaque. Eleanor was dressed as an ambulance driver; she was in the process of working with the city to develop a fleet of Lou Gehrig ambulances with the number 4 painted on their sides. (The plaza was upgraded in 2009.)
Additionally, Pride of the Yankees was released during the season, starring Gary Cooper as Lou (a terrific casting decision), Teresa Wright as Eleanor, and Babe Ruth, Mark Koenig, Bill Dickey, and Bob Meusel as themselves. The movie, directed by Sam Wood and based on a Gehrig biography by Paul Gallico, was extremely well received and garnered eleven Oscar nominations. Many would watch the film over and over as the years passed, always moved by the presentation of Cooper/Gehrig’s farewell speech and his slow walk toward the dugout for the last time. It was one of those cultural events in America that took baseball to the mainstream, and in the process made a ho
usehold name of Gehrig and greatly increased interest in ALS.
For Teresa Wright, making only her third film in a twenty-eight-feature-film career, it was just another contract assignment, and she admitted to not being much of a fan. But in her later years she became an avid supporter, and was lovingly introduced at games and at the Yogi Berra Museum in the 2000s.
On August 21, Babe Ruth donned a Yankee uniform (with NY on the jersey, for the first time), and took to the field for the first time since his playing days. He was taking practice swings for a war bonds exhibition in which he would bat against Walter Johnson. Of the current team, he knew only the coach Earle Combs. He called him Kid.
Now forty-seven, Ruth suited up again on the twenty-third before 69,136 fans to bat against fifty-four-year-old Walter Johnson. On Johnson’s fifth pitch, Babe gave the fans what they wanted, a drive into the lower right-field stands. On the seventeenth and final pitch from Johnson, he hit one into the upper deck in right for the first time, and although the ball curved foul, he circled the bases, waved his cap, and saluted the crowd. Ruth and Johnson walked off together to a terrific ovation. The game raised some $80,000 for the army-navy relief fund. That would be Babe’s last trip around the bases at the House That Ruth Built.
IN A SHOCKING vote at year’s end, Joe Gordon, who had delivered a fine .322/18/103 season, beat out Triple Crown winner Ted Williams (.356/36/137) for MVP honors. A year after hitting .406 and losing to DiMaggio, this time Williams lost to Gordon by twenty-one points. The vote was hotly debated for months and was the most controversial since the Baseball Writers’ Association began polling in ’31. With Williams also leading the league in runs, walks, and slugging percentage, it seemed clear that a lot of the voting writers simply did not like Teddy Ballgame. Gordon, as some pointed out, only led in strikeouts, grounding into double plays, and errors.
Gordon described himself as “floored” by the award. “It’s an honor I’ve always had ambitions to win, like any other ball player, but I never thought it would come this season,” he said.
In his autobiography, Williams wrote, “The voting tends to go to the team that wins, which is right. But I have to think the reason I didn’t get more consideration was because of the trouble I had with the draft.”
He did spend much of 1942 trying to overturn his 1-A classification, which won him few fans among the press or the public.
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THE YANKEES WERE in first place from May on, and won by nine games. They now prepared to face the Cardinals for the first time since 1926. They had managed to avoid playing the Gashouse Gang, the great Cardinal teams of the ’30s, but now faced a young team largely with players in their twenties, including Stan Musial, twenty-one. The Yankees, winners of eight straight World Series showdowns and 24–4 in Series games under McCarthy, were the heavy favorites.
The Series opened in St. Louis with Ruffing beating Mort Cooper, holding the Cards hitless until Terry Moore singled with two out in the eighth. But that was the high point for the Yanks. The Cardinals proceeded to win four in a row, with the finale a 4–2 victory, Johnny Beazley over Ruffing, who had been 7–1 in World Series play going into the game. Rizzuto, in his final game before going off to the navy, hit a first-inning home run, and the score was 2–2 in the ninth when Whitey Kurowski homered with a man on, just inside the left-field foul pole.
In the last of the ninth, the Yanks got two men on, but soon-to-be MVP Gordon was picked off second to end the rally.
To lose like that, in Yankee Stadium, on a pickoff, was a devastating blow.
EVERYTHING FELT DIFFERENT about 1943, starting with traveling secretary Mark Roth missing his first spring training in thirty-five years due to illness. Rex Weyant, Winnie’s brother, assumed his duties and supervised the move to an abbreviated version of spring training at Asbury Park High School in New Jersey. Commissioner Landis had ordered limited travel, and thus the annual spring trek to St. Petersburg was on hold. (The Yankees trained in Atlantic City in 1944 and 1945.) The team headquartered at the Albion Hotel and played only one exhibition game on the high school grounds, against their Newark club. The fans who braved the chilly weather to see the Yankees work out didn’t see DiMaggio, Rizzuto, Selkirk, Hassett, and Ruffing, who went into the service, but guys like Bud Metheny, Bill Zuber, Marv Breuer, Tommy Byrne, Tuck Stainback, and Oscar Grimes. A lot of glamour was missing, and there were a lot of holes for McCarthy to fill.
Ruffing, thirty-eight, a nineteen-year veteran who had lost four toes before embarking on his baseball career, was a surprise inductee, but he was chosen for non-combative duty and worked at an aircraft factory.
DiMaggio’s entry into the army was particularly noted, especially since he could have sought an exemption as married with a son. There was a lot of confusion over his departure, and it seemed to catch Barrow by surprise. Pictures of Joe being sworn in ran in every newspaper in the country.
Crosetti, thirty-two, took over his old spot at short and Lindell took over in center. A rookie, Billy Johnson, was given third base. A pickup from the Phillies, Nick Etten was handed first. Dickey, at thirty-six, split the catching with Rollie Helmsley and batted .351. Metheny replaced Henrich in right. Patchwork? Sure. But every team had to deal with it. This team didn’t hit much—Dickey was the only .300 hitter. But muscular Charlie Keller (who hated his nickname “King Kong”) belted 31 homers. Etten drove in 107 runs. Gordon fell to .249, and Crosetti, suspended the first thirty days for shoving umpire Bill Summers in the ’42 World Series, struggled and was often spelled by rookie infielder George “Snuffy” Stirnweiss, up from the champion Newark Bears.
Etten, twenty-four, out of Villanova, had played two seasons for the Athletics and two for the Phillies (then called the Blue Jays) before the Yankees sent them two journeymen and $10,000 to obtain his contract. “Christmas came early this year,” he told his wife when informed of the trade. He would give the Yankees four seasons, leading the league in homers one year and RBI another, making him one of the team’s better wartime players. He had an odd batting stance, almost completely facing the pitcher, which he said made it possible for him to follow the pitch with both eyes. He was certainly a good find for the Yankees during these fill-in years. He was classified 3-A in the draft (married with a child, like DiMaggio), which made him a “safe” acquisition.
Johnson, twenty-four, who was born in Montclair, New Jersey, on the same day Ted Williams was born in San Diego, had toiled in the Yankees’ minor league system since he was seventeen, always hitting around .300 or better but never getting “the call.” In ’42 he hit .290 at Newark and was ready. He played every game for the ’43 Yankees, hit .280 with 94 RBI (a new club record for third basemen), and fielded his position well. He finished fourth in MVP voting, a fine rookie accomplishment. But then he too would be off to the military for the next two years. He then returned to play the position regularly for five stellar years, four of them pennant winners.
Snuffy Stirnweiss, also twenty-four, was so named for his fondness for chewing tobacco. The son of a New York City policeman, he stood just five foot eight but played college football at North Carolina and was drafted as a halfback by the NFL’s Chicago Cardinals. Born in Manhattan, raised in the East Bronx, and a graduate of Fordham Prep, he signed with the Yanks in 1940 and moved quickly through the farm system. Snuffy’s draft status seemed secure; he had a wife and a mother to support, and his brother was in the service. He was never called.
The only real tune-up after training in Asbury Park was a three-way doubleheader at Yankee Stadium on April 14, with the Dodgers beating the Yanks in the opener and then the Giants in the second game before 35,301. The proceeds, some $75,000 including radio rights, went to the Civil Defense Volunteer Office.
Attendance fell to 645,006 for the season, the lowest it would ever be at Yankee Stadium, and naturally there was concern about the future of both the game and the country. Drawing nine thousand fans, on average, to a stadium that could hold seventy thousand was dist
ressing. Any thoughts of selling the team were surely on hold now, its postwar value uncertain.
The Yanks were in first place all season and won their fourteenth pennant by thirteen and a half games, winning ninety-eight—seventeen with what are now called walk-off hits. With no Ruffing or Gomez to anchor the staff for the first time since 1929, Spud Chandler stepped up and delivered a 20–4 season with a club-record 1.64 ERA at age thirty-five, sparkling enough to earn himself the MVP Award, the only Yankee pitcher ever to accomplish the feat. He held opponents to a .215 batting average and was 10–2 both at home and on the road. He was only the fourth pitcher in AL history (with Johnson, Grove, and Gomez) to lead the league in both won-lost percentage and ERA.
At the All-Star Game that year, McCarthy, criticized in ’42 for naming nine Yankees to the team (six starters), decided to select six Yankees but to sit them all. He still won 5–3, with not a Yankee in the box score.
The Yankees were delighted that the Cardinals repeated in the National League—a chance to avenge the 1942 embarrassment. With wartime travel restrictions in place, the first three games were in New York, with the next four scheduled for St. Louis. Chandler won the opener, but Barrow was taken to the hospital that day with a heart attack. Robust and vital, baseball people had to be reminded that “Cousin Egbert” was in fact seventy-five years old. But he would recover and return to work in eight weeks.
Bonham lost game two to Mort Cooper, an emotional game in that Mort and his brother Walker, his catcher, had lost their father to a heart attack that very morning. The Cooper brothers chose to play on in his memory, and the nation cheered their win.
Borowy won the third game, aided by a bases-loaded triple from Johnson, to send the teams to Missouri with the Yanks up 2–1.