Fenway 1912

by Glenn Stout

  Once before, when their singing of "Tessie" had famously driven the Pittsburgh Pirates to distraction during the 1903 World's Series, the Rooters had received credit for turning the tide of the Series. Now, with a bit of an assist from Fenway Park, they nearly did so again, this time in the opposite direction.

  The Rooters, all accustomed to getting their way, piled into the narrow passageway no more than five or six feet wide at the base of the Duffy's Cliff bleachers, between the seats and the short fence that separated the stands from the field, the same low barrier Red Murray had tumbled over earlier in the Series. They first politely asked the fans in "their" seats to move. Then they insisted upon it. Then some, particularly those toward the back of the parade—where no one had much of a clue as to what was happening—chose to try to take the seats by force, but the interlopers held firm and emotions ran high.

  ROYAL ROOTERS AN ANGRY LOT BADLY USED AT BALL PARK, THEY FEEL

  The two groups tussled for a few moments, and every time someone lost his or her footing the Rooters in front and the fans in the stands all risked falling like dominoes. Finally the Rooters, uncomfortably squeezed into the narrow passageway, concluded that if they could not regain "their" seats, they would watch the game from where they were—crammed in behind the fence. As one press report noted, this left those already seated in the bleachers "in a fury." Only those at the very top of the stands could still sit in their seats and see over the heads of the Rooters. For the rest, unless they too stood, their view of the field was completely blocked. Soon everyone in the bleachers had to stand to see, and no one was very happy about it.

  Over the next few minutes the police, stationed at regular intervals along the fence, did what they could to keep watch over the situation. As the Globe's Lawrence McSweeney reported in the most complete account of the incident, "Every time one of the men in that jamming, shoving, punching crowd of 'standees'—standers because of necessity—leaned his head and shoulders over the fence he was shoved back by a policeman." And all the while, "the turbulent rooters, already incensed by the indignity of being deprived of seats ... [were] made more wrathful by the epithets hurled at them by those whose vision they hampered."

  Out on the field, as the players made their final preparations to play, they were oblivious to what was happening. All of Fenway Park was a teeming mass of people, and while it looked like there was some kind of disturbance going on in left field, there was nothing surprising about that. Scraps in the crowd were a regular occurrence anytime the stands were full.

  But just as Joe Wood walked to the mound to make his final warm-up tosses, the Red Sox prepared to take the field, and Billy Evans began to gather the combatants at home plate to go over the ground rules, someone in the mob of Rooters behind the fence—or, more likely, someone whose view was blocked by the mob of Rooters behind the fence—yelled out that the Rooters were going to be allowed to congregate in "seats of honor at the front of the grandstand."

  Then came the crushing blow—the call to "jump the fence!" It was, wrote McSweeney, "like the imbecile who cries 'fire' in a theatre."

  From all along the front of Duffy's Cliff, the Rooters, like rats escaping a burning ship, leapt over the fence out onto the field and began sprinting toward the grandstand. Others poured out through the little pie-shaped triangle. Then, as the police tried to block them and everyone pushed and shoved, the last twenty-five-foot section of fence just inside the left-field line "gave way before the pressing crowd and fell upon the field. Scores went with it, many being trampled upon as those behind them scrambled for a breathing space. A rush was begun...." In an instant hundreds of Rooters and members of their band, some carrying instruments now twisted and bent, raced across the field toward the promised land of the grandstand.

  The riot was on. Police chased the gatecrashers around the park, including four or five riding mounts, the hooves of their horses tearing up great chunks of Jerome Kelley's precious turf. Over the next few minutes, as the rest of the crowd roared at the unexpected spectacle, the players dodged the fans, and the fans sought refuge behind the players, the police slowly took control. Faced with being either trampled or beaten with batons, the Rooters slowly allowed themselves to be herded back toward left field. As they passed the third-base stands, supporters, seeing a line of policemen within their reach, were unable to resist the temptation. Wrote McSweeney, they "began a bombardment," pelting Boston's finest with "bags of peanuts, scorecards, canes and miscellaneous weapons and missiles."

  Rooter Johnny Keenan, megaphone in hand, slowly began taking control of his charges, doing what the authorities could not. "Now go back behind the fence," he called out. "The police are not to blame in this matter." It was McRoy who had wronged them, he said, and he would be taken care of later. "Remember," he thundered, "two wrongs don't make a right."

  Chastened, the crowd reluctantly began to fall back behind the fence once more, pulling it upright, albeit a little less straight and close than before. As they did, first Charlie Wagner and then Jake Stahl came out and implored the Rooters to stay in place. If they did not, as Wagner told them, "it means the game will be forfeited to New York, and if we don't get going right away, and if the crowd comes onto the field again, the umpires can declare the Giants the winner." It was true enough that Evans and his crew had that authority, but had they used it, what was still a somewhat comic riot of several hundred fans would surely have turned into a real one of many thousands. Still, the threat of a forfeit brought the Rooters back in line.

  Grumbling and cursing McAleer and McRoy, and watched over by a small army of police, the Rooters reluctantly took up residence behind the fence, and the fans in the bleachers, having no other choice, were forced to stand on their seats in order to see the game. But many would not remain on their feet—or even at Fenway Park—for long.

  The start of the game had been delayed perhaps ten minutes by the display when Billy Evans finally yelled out, "Play ball," and Joe Wood peered in and took the sign from Hick Cady as Josh Devore stepped in for the Giants. Game 7, at last, could begin.

  The next few minutes were among the worst moments in Red Sox history, and some of the worst moments in the life of Joe Wood. Perhaps it was the ten-minute delay while the Rooters threw a tantrum that left his arm cold, or the lingering effects of being punched in the jaw, or the consequence of punching someone else's jaw with his golden right hand, or perhaps the impact of being struck with a bat, or a sore arm from pitching too much, or a sore head and a thin wallet due to the result of game 6, or the cold wind that blew through the stands, or a brand-new white baseball, or just some great work by the Giants, or all of these together—or just plain dumb luck. But in the next five minutes, from atop the mound at Fenway Park, Smoky Joe Wood, the pride of the Boston Red Sox and the American League, the reigning King of Pitchers, the greatest in the game, 34-5 for the season, with two World's Series wins already under his belt, without any question whatsoever absolutely, positively, no doubt about it, completely, and utterly stank.

  It was over that fast. Wood, as Tim Murnane noted, was "cutting the ball over the heart of the plate from the jump," and his speed, as the Herald reported, was "lacking and his curve broke badly." In response, the Giants, swinging early and often, beat poor Joe Wood's brains in far more effectively than they had Buck O'Brien's or anyone else's all season long. Ralph McMillen, unable to resist the turn of phrase, wrote later that it was "Smokeless Joe that stepped out into the teeth of the tempest."

  Devore led off by taking a strike and Wood was ahead in the count 0-1. It would be the last time that day Boston was ahead on anything. Devore hit a dribbler on the next pitch. Wagner tried to field the ball one-handed, but the Boston shortstop lost it, and Devore made first. Swinging at the first pitch, Larry Doyle then singled to right-center over Yerkes's head.

  With two swift runners aboard, common sense and sound baseball strategy dictated that Wood pitch from the stretch. But if O'Brien's balk had been the mistake of a schoolboy,
Wood's mistake was that of someone who had not yet been to school at all.

  McGraw, determined to force the issue, called for the double steal, and Devore and Doyle gave the play away by feinting off each bag. Cady alerted Wood to the runners, and the Boston pitcher held the ball, and held it, then held it some more, and then, as Devore and Doyle danced off the bases again, Wood took a long, slow, full wind-up. Both men broke for the next base, and by the time Wood's pitch reached Cady each runner had arrived safely at his destination without sliding. Cady had no chance at either man and seemed so surprised that he dropped the ball anyway. Everyone was safe.

  What was Wood thinking? Stahl didn't know either. He yelled over to the bench, and Charley Hall ran out of the dugout and out toward the outfield with backup catcher Les Nunamaker to warm up. O'Brien, on the bench, must have found it hard to suppress a smile. Who was the bonehead now?

  Wagner waved his teammates in, playing to cut off the run at home, but Snodgrass swung at the next pitch and hit it to right field. Hooper raced in and tried to make a running catch at his knees but kicked the ball free. Devore and Doyle scored, and Snodgrass raced to second while Hooper retrieved the ball.

  On the next pitch Red Murray, blessedly, bunted, a sacrifice straight to Stahl, and Snodgrass made third as the first baseman beat Murray to the base. Then Merkle hit a completely ordinary pop-up to short left field.

  Duffy Lewis trotted in, looked up in the sky, and saw the ball go up and then, at the peak of its flight, become captured by the breeze, which sent it first this way and then that as he staggered and trotted and then ran beneath it, the ball finally dropping untouched for what Paul Shannon called "a ridiculous two-bagger." Then Lewis followed one bad play with another, making a poor throw, and Snodgrass scored as Merkle took second.

  "The game was lost," wrote Paul Shannon, "for Wood had shot his bolt." But while the game was done, the pitcher was not. Hall was warming up as fast as he could but not fast enough. Buck Herzog hit a quick comebacker that Wood grabbed with his bare hand and threw to third, catching Merkle in a rundown, but Herzog was able to make it all the way to second before Merkle was put out. Then Chief Meyers singled, and then so did Art Fletcher, and Fletcher made second when Harry Hooper tried and failed to gun down Meyers when he ran to third. Jeff Tesreau stepped up to bat, anxious to help his cause, and he also singled, bringing home Meyers and sending Fletcher to third. The pitcher then capped things off by executing a double steal, taking off and getting into a rundown long enough for Fletcher to dash across the plate with New York's sixth run before Tesreau was tagged out. The inning was over, and so was Wood's day.

  Accounts vary, but Wood threw somewhere between eleven and fifteen pitches, seven of which were knocked for base hits. Meanwhile nearly every Boston player who had touched the ball or tried to had made a mistake of one kind or another, allowing the Giants to run wild, one of the worst played innings in the history of the franchise. It made people wonder, and in the stands plenty did.

  Wood walked off the field, ashen-faced, to a smattering of boos and a handful of cheers, mostly from New Yorkers, but primarily to silence. Boston fans were stunned speechless. "A place at the right hand corner of the Red Sox bench was taken by a stooped, wilted figure [SWF]," wrote the correspondent for the New York World. "The SWF was Joe Wood." He sat, in Paul Shannon's words, with "black despair written on his face ... the Red Sox were a beaten team and looked it."

  ALL KNOCK WOOD AND GIANTS TIE WORLD'S SERIES

  The game was over, for as Ralph McMillen noted accurately, "whatever the Red Sox did thereafter was spasmodic and weak." But there were still several plays worth mentioning. Larry Gardner, in the second inning, and Larry Doyle, in the sixth, both hit home runs, the first two World's Series home runs in the history of Fenway Park, but neither ball cleared a fence on the fly. Each was hit to right field and merely bounced over the low fence. And in the ninth inning Tris Speaker turned in an unassisted double play, the first of his career and the first in World's Series history by an outfielder. With Artie Wilson on second, Art Fletcher hit a liner to Speaker, who caught it and then doubled up Wilson, who had raced to third, by running in and touching second base himself. But by then Wilson and the Giants just might have wanted to get the game over with.

  Jeff Tesreau was not dominant, but it didn't really matter, as the Red Sox fell, 11–4. By the end of the game only a smattering of fans were left in the stands, and the Red Sox left the field quickly, eager to forget about the game, while the Giants, knowing they had Mathewson ready, were already anxious for the final contest to begin.

  The only people who lingered inside Fenway Park were the Royal Rooters. They marched across the field and then into the street, stopping several times along the way to caucus before finally congregating in front of the Red Sox offices on Jersey Street. Each time they stopped Johnny Keenan would ask for "three cheers for Secretary Bob McRoy of Chicago," his voice dripping with sarcasm, and the crowd would respond with a chorus of boos. Then he would ask for three cheers for Giants owner John Brush, and the crowd would roar its approval, driven by the circumstances to cheer for the opposition. Their point made, the Rooters finally dispersed. Larry McSweeney noted after the game that "the Royal Rooters of 1912 are a thing of the past ... if any of them attend the final game, they will do so individually ... there will be no parade, flying of colors, singing of songs or cheers." Over the next few days the Rooters and McRoy would battle it out in the press, Honey Fitz calling for McRoy's ouster and a boycott of the final game. McRoy and McAleer would eventually offer an apology, but by then the damage was done. The bond between the new owner, who valued money more than people, and the Boston fan base was irrevocably broken.

  The talk in the taverns that night around Boston was bitter. The fans, who had been rabid beyond belief just over a week before, were now tired of the whole mess. Word of the fights and rumors of a fix—talk the disgruntled Rooters now helped propagate—coupled with Wood's dismal performance, suddenly let all the air out of the balloon. The World's Series of 1912 was crashing to earth. Nobody gave a damn anymore.

  There was no great rush for tickets overnight or even the next morning, which was colder than the day before, just as windy, and cloudy with no accompanying moments of sunshine. Summer was most certainly over. The fans who did come to Fenway Park were dressed for winter. Those who wanted reserved seats were told to bring their rain check from game 7 to prove themselves worthy, but few did. On this day, if a person had the cash for the face value price of a ticket, he or she could sit anywhere in the park. By game time the bleachers and pavilion and other nonreserved sections were barely half full, if that, and even fewer fans were seated in the grandstand. The official attendance was only 17,034. Not until the final game of the 1918 World's Series—also played in Boston, at Fenway Park, under circumstances that left the fans bitter—would a World's Series game be seen by so few people.

  The Giants, behind Mathewson, were sure of victory. The Red Sox, with Bedient available to pitch, just didn't want to be embarrassed and hoped the youngster could keep it close. They were playing not so much for each other now—that hope was gone—but for themselves and the simple glory that comes with a good effort. Each man on the team knew that, no matter how he felt about the man next to him, either on the field or on the bench, the difference between winning and losing the final game was worth more than $1,000, maybe more. That payout, and a man's reputation, were still worth playing for.

  Without the Rooters in the crowd, there was little drama before the game, and apart from some noisemakers used by a few fans that made an odd clacking sound, it was nearly silent at the start. Fenway Park, for the first time, did not look new anymore. The day was dark, and it felt more like the last game of the season played by two clubs far out of the race than the culmination of the last eight-game World's Series in history.

  Then, remarkably, a pretty good baseball game took place. Hugh Bedient and Christy Mathewson set the tone, for while some others mig
ht have thought the Series was over, neither pitcher took anything for granted. The Red Sox might have been coming apart at the seams, but Bedient had stayed out of the fray and was playing for pride. Mathewson, as always, was beyond reproach.

  The Giants wanted to pull the same pranks on Bedient that they had on O'Brien and Wood, but Bedient refused to cooperate. He was not perfect, but in the first two innings no Giants reached base until two were out, and then Bedient stiffened. And despite his relative lack of experience, Bedient was better than either Wood or O'Brien at holding runners on base.

  The game was scoreless until the third. Devore worked a leadoff walk, and this time the Giants showed just how valuable a base on balls could be as the outfielder moved to second and then third on two ground balls. Red Murray then lifted a foul off first that should have been out number three, but this time Fenway took the out away—the new box seats put in place for the Series left the pop-up just out of Stahl's reach. Murray then doubled to put the Giants ahead, 1–0.

  They threatened again in the fourth, only this time Fenway Park provided Bedient with an enormous assist. Leading off, Herzog hit the ball hard to left, and the ball skipped into the same pie-shaped enclosure that had delivered Hooper's triple in game 5, the hit that had turned the tide for Boston and eventually delivered a victory to Bedient.

  This time, even though the ball was hit by a Giant, it helped Boston. For as soon as the ball skipped into the wedge, Bill Klem, again manning the left-field line, waved his arms over his head and called the ball dead. After the earlier hit, the umpires had met and decided that it was unfair to allow the ball to rattle around an enclosure where an outfielder did not have a play while the runner raced around the bases unimpeded. If it happened again, they decided, the hit would be a ground-rule double.