Dizzy Dean was manager Frisch’s obvious choice to start for St. Louis. The pitcher spent a charming morning at the home of Henry Ford and was in a fine humor. As he took a few swings in the cage before the game, a bat flew out of his hands and nearly hit a photographer on the head. “I can’t afford to cripple one of those boys,” he drawled. “They’re my best friends.”9
Cochrane’s lineup did not have any surprises. White was the leadoff hitter, playing center, followed by Cochrane, Gehringer, Greenberg, Goslin in left, Rogell, Owen, and Fox in right. He insisted there would be no more outfield platooning; Walker and Doljack would be reserves. “That’s the club that won the pennant and if the boys were good enough to do that, they’re good enough to win the World’s Series.”10
The start of the contest was delayed about 20 minutes to allow the bottlenecked throng to squeeze its way into the main entrance at Michigan and Trumbull. As a result, both starting pitchers had to warm up twice. The big news was that Cochrane, despite his earlier assertion that he would begin the Series with Rowe, instead went with Crowder, who had World Series experience. Perhaps Cochrane was taking a cue from Connie Mack, his former Athletics manager, who started the seldom-used, 35-year-old Howard Ehmke in Game One of the 1929 Series. Defying the naysayers, Ehmke fanned thirteen in a 3–1 Philadelphia win over the Cubs.
Crowder was no Ehmke on this day, but he pitched solidly. The problem was the Tigers’ infield; noticeably jittery, it made an error in the first, two in the second, and two more in the third. By that time, St. Louis had staked Dizzy Dean to a 3–0 lead. True to their reputation, the Cardinals exhibited smart, aggressive baserunning. In particular, Ernie Orsatti set the tone early when his hard slide into second knocked the ball out of Gehringer’s glove on a potential force play. The Tigers’ sloppy defense came as a surprise; as a team, Detroit had committed the fewest errors in the American League (156), and tied the Senators for the highest fielding percentage (.974). Pitching on only two days of rest, Dean’s command was not sharp in the early innings. The Tigers tried to capitalize by taking him deep in counts, but Dean grew stronger as the game went along.
It would be unfair to say that Cochrane’s decision to go with Crowder over Rowe had backfired. Crowder’s defense had simply let him down. Of the four tallies he was charged with, only Medwick’s homer in the fifth was earned. Behind 4–1 and needing baserunners, Cochrane was forced to pinch-hit for Crowder in the fifth inning. Firpo Marberry came on in relief in the sixth, but Dean, the first batter he faced, stroked a double, and St. Louis quickly plated four runs to break the game open. The final was Cardinals 8, Tigers 3. Greenberg hit the Tigers’ only home run, a solo shot in the eighth. With better defense, the day’s storyline may have been decidedly different. “The Tigers’ crack infield cracked wide open here this afternoon,” wrote the Detroit Times’ Bud Shaver, “kicking away whatever chance Alvin [General] Crowder had of beating the Cardinals’ pitching ace, Dizzy Dean.”11
This was St. Louis’s fifth trip to the World Series in nine years, while the Tigers had played like a gaggle of greenhorns. The Cardinals, Dean and Durocher in particular, hurled endless invective at the Detroit bench all game long. Greenberg’s religion made him a primary target. If the goal had been to rattle the Tigers, St. Louis was successful. Cochrane, while not pleased with the score, refused to second-guess his decision to go with Crowder. “It’s gone. Tomorrow’s another day.”12
Dean went the distance for the win, despite what he called his “lousy” pitching.13 He was not far off in his self-assessment. Laboring all afternoon, he fell behind in the count to 12 of the 36 batters he faced. In an era when starting pitchers expected to finish what they started, Dean threw 150 pitches by one count, “altogether too much for even a youthful arm,” said the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.14 That total included 34 called strikes, 41 swings and misses, 22 fouls, and 53 balls, hardly an efficient tally. He walked only two, suggesting the Tigers had been done in by their own impatience at the plate. Journalist Westbrook Pegler penned as wonderful a description of Dizzy on the mound as we are likely to find:
He was slinging the ball at the Tigers as though every man of them had done him some great personal wrong. You should see Brother Diz pitch one of his good ones sometime. He is big and full of bone and side-meat without a morsel of fat in his carcass and he can fling the ball so fast it seems to climb over itself in the rush. It takes sudden crazy shoots which are so sharp and wide that even the customers can see the breaks and it is plain that he gets a joyous emotional let-go when the ball obeys him well. He has a habit of tucking his glove under his right fin after each hitter has had his dose, to hitch up his pants with one hand and reach inside with the other and stuff his shirt-tail down. He throws so hard that the force of each pitch bows him low. The scarlet beak of his cap almost grazes the dust, his right leg comes up waving above his head and it always takes him some time to sort himself out for the next throw.
Pegler’s next words were eerily prescient, to a degree: “Brother Dizzy sums up as quite a pitcher at this writing, although another year or two may find him poor and forgotten with his arm squandered and his living gone.”15
Perhaps channeling Ring Lardner’s Jack Keefe character of literary fame, Iffy the Dopester complained that Dean was … well, fortunate. “This Dizzy Dean person is a lucky stiff. He didn’t have a thing but a fast ball, a change of pace and good control. And he was lucky in putting the ball just where he wanted to all through the game—nice and low, just above the old knee caps. The lucky stiff!”16
At the conclusion of the game, Branch Rickey wired to congratulate Dean and to invite him to a get-together the following night. Dizzy hurried off a reply: “Many, many thanks. This American League is a pushover. Breezed through today with nothing but my glove. Tell everybody hello. Henry Ford will be my guest in St. Louis on Friday. Cook a good meal for all of us—sandwiches and everything. Will Rogers and Joe E. Brown coming too. Thanks again. Dizzy Dean.”17
For Tigers fans, hope had given way to gloom. Wrote Jack Weeks of the Detroit News, “Corktown, thrust suddenly into the very center of the sporting world’s attention, lived through an aeon Wednesday afternoon, experiencing in a few hours joy, sorrow, triumph, defeat, hope and finally despair.”18
The night of his Game One victory, Dean made a radio appearance (sponsored by Grape-Nuts) in which he conversed across the continents with Rear Admiral Richard Byrd. Byrd at the time was manning a meteorological station in Antarctica. The Cardinals’ pitcher, at ease with princes and paupers, hailed the famous explorer with a “Howdy there Dick Byrd down at the South Pole!”19 Dean commenced to explaining to Byrd how he had won the game, even though he was not in his “usual shutout form.”20 The Tigers, he insisted, were not worthy competition. “I just staggered through without a thing on the ball. I’d be tickled to death if they’d let me pitch the second game. I’d have my stuff back and probably shut the Tigers out.”21
Game Two was pivotal; Detroit did not want to fall into such a deep hole heading into St. Louis. The 43,451 fans in attendance hoped Schoolboy Rowe could deliver in a big way. While he was warming up, Dean waltzed over to stand behind him and offer advice on how to pitch to the Cardinals. When Cochrane complained about Dizzy’s antics, the latter made his way to the Tigers’ dugout, picked up a couple of bats, and headed across the field to the visitors’ bench. “You fellows don’t know what bats are for, anyways,” Dean blurted.22
Rowe got off to a shaky start. The Cardinals mocked him from the dugout with a constant bark of “How’m I doin,’ Edna?” With one out in the second, St. Louis catcher Bill DeLancey hit a grounder that scooted past the pitcher. The ball then bounced off the shin of Gehringer, who made a valiant effort to come up with it behind second but was unable to make a play. On Rowe’s next pitch, Ernie Orsatti sent one high to left field between Goslin and the foul line. It kept carrying away from the Goose and landed in the corner for a run-scoring triple. Rowe bore down and got Durocher to pop out to
Greenberg at first, and right fielder Pete Fox caught Bill Hallahan’s low liner for the third out.
The next inning, Pepper Martin worked Rowe for a three-two count. Rather than walk the leadoff man, Rowe grooved one down the middle, and Martin banged it over second base for a single. Jack Rothrock bunted him over, and one out later, Medwick sent Rowe’s first pitch on a line to left. Goslin charged the ball on one hop as Martin rounded third; his throw was wide of the plate and Martin scored, with Medwick taking second. Up next was Ripper Collins, who stroked another single to left, but this time Goslin’s throw was on the money. Cochrane, blocking the plate, caught the ball with time to spare. Medwick’s hard slide sent Cochrane spinning, but the catcher held on to the ball, and umpire Bill Klem called the runner out. The two clutch plays by Goslin and Cochrane saved Rowe; instead of Detroit being down by three, the score remained 2–0. Cochrane sustained a spike wound, but he remained in the game.
On the mound for the Cardinals was 31-year-old portsider William Anthony “Wild Bill” Hallahan. He threw hard, but had led the league in walks three times, befitting his nickname. Pitching in his fourth World Series with the Cardinals, he was three years removed from a 19-win season. Hallahan struggled in 1934, with only eight victories and a 4.26 earned run average. He pitched great down the stretch run, however, and Frisch valued his experience. Hallahan cruised through the first three innings, when controversy reared its head in the bottom of the fourth.
Goslin led off the frame by grounding out. Rogell lifted a high fly to center field, which, on a normal afternoon, would have been a sure out. But Orsatti was fighting the strong wind blowing in all day from the east. Misjudging the ball, he dove for it at the last second, but it dropped for a double. Orsatti’s sunglasses shattered when his head banged into the turf; his eyes were spared damage from the flying bits of glass, but he sustained a cut just above his left cheek. Marv Owen then grounded to second, with Rogell scampering over to third. That left it up to Fox, who was hitless so far in the Series. The right-handed batter pulled a hard drive down the line, which third-base umpire Brick Owens called fair. While the ball rolled around in the corner, Rogell raced home, with Fox making it to second.
The Cardinals swarmed around Owens, arguing long and loudly that it was a foul ball. The call stood, however, and Rowe struck out to end the inning. It settled into a pitchers’ duel from then on. The Cardinals could do nothing against Rowe. Detroit’s best chance to tie it came in the sixth, when leadoff batter Rogell reached second on a throwing error, but he never scored.
With the Tigers down 2–1 in the bottom of the ninth, Fox opened with a single to right. It was only the fifth hit off Hallahan, who appeared to be tiring. Cochrane faced his most critical decision of the Series so far, if not of the entire season. Rowe was due to bat next. Should the manager yank his starter and send up a pinch-hitter? Rowe, of course, was a great hitter, but had not been able to do anything against Hallahan all afternoon. To take him out of the game at this point was a big risk, given the way he was pitching. Cochrane sent him up to the plate but took the bat out of his hands, calling for a bunt. Schoolboy laid down a beauty; Hallahan fielded it and threw to first for the sure out. Fox stood on second, the tying run.
The next scheduled batter was Jo-Jo White, who also was hitless off Hallahan, but this time Cochrane was not going to take any chances. He sent up pinch-hitter Gee Walker, who promptly popped one up between first base and home plate, near the line. In a classic case of “I–Got-It-You-Take-It,” catcher DeLancey and first baseman Collins let the ball drop in fair territory between them, while Walker, racing down the line, made it to first. The ball took one bounce, however, and landed in foul territory; Walker had to return to the batter’s box to continue the at-bat.
Hallahan was incensed with DeLancey and Collins, and showed it. After the game, Collins claimed he had lost the ball when some fan flashed a mirror in his eyes. The perpetrator, he argued, was sitting in a third-floor window of a garage beyond right field, across Trumbull Avenue. Collins was not the only witness to the flashing: Charles Navin, the Tigers’ secretary (and nephew of Frank), vouched that “all during the last four innings the fellow was at work with that mirror. I spoke to several persons about it. It’s a dirty shame that anyone would do a thing like that.”23 Whoever it was, he was an equal-opportunity flasher; Cochrane attested that he had gotten it in the eyes a few times himself.
Blessed with new life, Walker roped a single to center, and Fox flew home with the tying run. That was all for Hallahan, who was still peeved at the turn of events. He gave way to lefty Bill Walker, the former New York Giants star. A lengthy confab at the mound ensued between Frisch, Walker, and his infielders. Quite possibly, they discussed Gee Walker at first and his history of base-running blunders. Whatever the case, Walker the pitcher kept a close eye on Walker the runner. After the usual cat-and-mouse, Gee Walker bolted for second before Bill Walker had started his windup. The pitcher tossed the ball to Collins at first, a rundown resulted, and Frisch easily put the tag on Walker. Among the collective groans at Navin Field, none was more doleful than Cochrane’s, who saw the entire play unfold from the vantage of the batter’s box. Cochrane fanned for the third out, and when the Tigers trotted to their positions to start the tenth, Gee Walker was nowhere to be seen. Frank Doljack, he of the .233 batting average, had unceremoniously replaced him in center field.
Gehringer reached on an error to lead off the bottom of the tenth. Two outs later, he stole second, but was stranded when Owen lined out to center. The Cardinals, whose bats had been stymied, finally managed a hit off Rowe when Pepper Martin hit a one-out double in the 11th. Before the hit, Schoolboy had retired 22 consecutive batters, but now he would have to reach back for something extra with the game, and perhaps the Series, on the line. He struck out Rothrock and induced Frisch to hit a grounder to second. The game remained deadlocked.
With one out in the bottom of the 12th, Walker suddenly could not find the strike zone, issuing free passes to Gehringer and Greenberg. The crowd was ready to explode with anticipation. Goslin, the battle-tested veteran brought to Detroit for moments just like this, came to the plate. He took a mighty cut, roping one into center field; Gehringer galloped home, and the Tigers won the thrilling affair. Rowe, who went the distance, could not have pitched any better. He seemingly grew stronger with each passing inning: Of his seven strikeouts, five came in the final four frames. He did not walk a batter all afternoon. It was, in the opinion of Bud Shaver, “one of the grimmest mound struggles in the history of the World Series.”24
For St. Louis, the loss stung. They stormed off the field and into the visitor’s locker room, which Frisch barred from reporters until his men had finished violently throwing their equipment around in anger. “It was just a tough one to lose,” he spat afterward. “And you can’t take anything away from Schoolboy Rowe, he pitched a great game. Our defense was not what it should have been.”25 Hallahan was particularly bitter. “Ain’t that brutal. There you have a game won, and what happens. But there’s nothing you can do about it now. It’s just baseball, I guess.”26
It was a stark contrast to the Detroit clubhouse, which was full of backslapping and whoops of joy after the hard-fought victory. “So we couldn’t beat them, eh?” asked a jubilant Rowe. “Well, we did, didn’t we? For the first few innings, I felt there was something funny inside of me. I didn’t feel right. Mind you, I wasn’t scared. I’ve never been scared in my life. But after I got over that third inning, I had every confidence that we would win.”27 Rowe admitted to pitching the entire game with a sore arm. Still, he added, nothing would have kept him from the mound that day.
Goose Goslin (right) shows Mickey Cochrane the bat that drove in the winning run in the 12th inning of Game Two of the 1934 World Series (courtesy Ernie Harwell Sports Collection, Detroit Public Library).
“Rowe’s exhibition in the last nine,” wrote Herman Wecke in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “was one of the finest exhibited in the World S
eries in many years.”28 Sportswriter Alan Gould lent further perspective: “Lynwood [Schoolboy] Rowe stands today alongside the pitching giants of World Series history, towering as mightily and casting as big a shadow now across the chances of the St. Louis Cardinals as Jerome [Dizzy] Dean did in his jungletown debut two days ago.”29 Paul Gallico summed up the moment: “This fellow named Lynwood Rowe and nicknamed Schoolboy took that pitching hill as a boy, and, unless I miss my guess, he walked off it a man.”30
Immediately after the game, both teams made their way down to Union Station on Fort Street. Awaiting them were six gleaming trains designated “Tigers Special,” “Cardinals Special,” “Rooters’ Special,” “Sportswriters’ Special,” “Chamber of Commerce Special,” and “Coach Passengers.” Thousands of gleeful, exuberant well-wishers packed the platform to see off their heroes. At precisely eight p.m., the “Cardinals’ Special” was the first of the cars to roll down the tracks, heading southwest to St. Louis for a highly anticipated Game Three.
With the Cardinals’ Paul Dean facing off against Tommy Bridges, the 34,000-plus at Sportsman’s Park anticipated a close pitching duel. It was a picture-perfect afternoon for baseball, shirtsleeve weather in the parlance of the day. Paul Dean pitched even better than his big brother had two days earlier. Setting the tone in the first inning, Daffy buzzed Cochrane with an inside fastball that sent the Tigers’ catcher sprawling in the dust. If it was a purpose pitch, it did the trick: Detroit’s batters looked tight throughout. The Cardinals struck immediately in the first, on a leadoff triple off the bat of Pepper Martin and a sacrifice fly by Rothrock. At the plate, Dean helped his own cause with a sacrifice fly in the second to make the score 2–0.
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