The Retro Sheet
Official Publication of Retrosheet, Inc.
New Policy
For several years we have collectively kidded that the day would come when we ran out of game accounts to enter. Well, although we have not literally reached that point, we have essentially depleted our remaining pile of scoresheets. Only a few hundred remain and most of these are among the more difficult to read in our collection. In addition almost all of the remaining games are covered by only one scoresheet, making them harder to use and increasing the chances of mistakes. We have about two dozen volunteers working on these last scoresheets, most of whom are very experienced and comfortable in making the many delicate judgments that are necessary. However, we have reached the point where it is no longer feasible to break in new volunteers under these less than ideal conditions. It is also true that many potential new volunteers are not terribly interested in games from 1953 and earlier, the era for almost all of the scoresheets we have left. Therefore, Retrosheet is no longer looking for additional volunteers to enter games from scoresheets, although there are other ways in which volunteers can contribute.
We do still have a few thousand newspaper accounts on hand, many of which present a separate problem, namely that we do not have box scores to go with them. Without a box score, it is almost impossible to enter one of these newspaper accounts, since fielders are referred to by name, not position. To illustrate with a simple example, "a fly ball to Ruth" might be "7" or "9", depending on which park the Yankees were playing in. This problem can be solved by having the box score from The Sporting News or the New York Times. We would love to have help in making copies from either source (from microfilm), either as part of inputting activity or as a separate effort. Contact me (dwsmith@udel.edu) if you have the time to spend on it and I will steer you to the seasons we need help with. Your costs for photocopying and postage will be reimbursed, but of course we have to rely on the generous donation of a much more valuable commodity, your time. Finally, I note that there are still many thousands of newspaper accounts out there waiting to be copied, but this will usually entail the borrowing of microfilmed newspapers via Interlibrary Loan, which is not realistic for most people.
It seems that the good news never stops on this front. That is more important than ever, since we are getting very close to the bottom of the unprocessed games on hand. At our current rate, we have less than a year's worth of games to go.
The biggest addition to our holdings came in early December when Bill McClain, a long-time SABR member and lifetime Philadelphia fan, very graciously loaned his personal scorebooks covering the years 1950-1956. Bill, a retired high school principal, was contacted by David Stephan, who has helped us gather game accounts from many sources for a long time. Bill's scorebooks began when he was 11 and include games for both the Athletics and Phillies. His collection goes well past 1956, in fact all the way to the present, but 1956 is the most recent year for which we need any Philadelphia games. The scorebooks are fantastic, with detailed runner advancement, good marginal notes for unusual plays, and even uniform numbers. A small digression on this point: Bill attended the second game that Willie Mays ever played in the Major Leagues, which was May 26, 1951. Bill attended that game and has demonstrated that Willie wore number 14! His records from 1950 confirm that Mickey Mantle wore number 6 when he came up, which is not news. It is also pretty well known that Cliff Mapes wore number 7 at the time, but Bill showed that Bob Cerv also wore number 7 for the Yankees that year. Mapes also wore number 3 for the Yankees after Babe Ruth did, before the practice of retiring numbers began. Getting back to Philadelphia, I have written several times that the city of Brotherly Love is one of our toughest to cover. Bill has added hundreds of games to our collection that we needed from a very difficult era. Just one example: before we got Bill's scorebooks, we were missing 80 games for the 1950 Phillies. He had 48 of them, so we are now down to an entic-ingly short want list of 32 games for the Whiz Kids. Alas, it doesn't appear we will be able to gather them in time to make a 50th anniversary presentation for next year.
In Boston Bob Kistler continues to be a life saver in our other very difficult city. Since the last issue of TRS, Bob has sent hundreds of play by play accounts for both Boston teams for 1951 and 1950. These accounts, which are pristine and excellently detailed, come from newspapers which are only available at the Boston public library. Our heartiest thanks go to Bob for his continuous donation of a very large number of hours.
Bill McMahon, in Akron, Ohio, has continued to work on games for Chicago teams for the late 1930s. Bill's sources are Chicago newspapers, which he has photocopied and sent for inclusion in the Vault. The extent of the coverage was pretty variable from year to year, but Bill has been diligent in tracking down whatever he can, for which we owe him our appreciation.
Earlier this year I wrote about the "Texaco" scorebooks that we copied from Andy Moursund of the Georgetown Book Shop near Washington, D.C. Andy has recently sent photocopies from another of these books, along with a microfilm donation that is detailed below. Thanks to Andy for his generosity.
Retrosheet Board member Luke Kraemer is an active follower of events on eBay and has successfully bid on a number of scorebooks over the past year or so. He has also followed those acquisitions by making contacts with dealers from whom he has gathered even more. In a recent twist to eBay activity, Luke has been joined by Greg Beston in monitoring the site for scored programs. There are literally hundreds of these out there and it is a tedious job to sort through the listings to see what we need. Greg and Luke have contacted many sellers and persuaded them to send photocopies of the scorecards or electronic scans of them. In this way the seller can still make a profit by auctioning the original item. Our intrepid pair has had very good results and have sent several dozen new game accounts to the vault in the past few months. Our thanks to the Internet sleuths; may your mouse clicking finger never grow weary! By the way, Luke has changed his eBay login name to "Retrosheet", so if you see him bidding on an item that you think would help us, please don't compete with him and drive up the price! This intra-Retrosheet competition did happen once, but with minor finanical consequences.
Luke’s latest acquisition from eBay is two scorebooks kept by Hall of Famer Max Carey's wife. They cover the 1914 and 1915 Pirates' seasons. They arrived at Luke’s house recently and they look great! Keep up the good work, Luke.
The final type of acquisition concerns audio, or more rarely video, tapes of games. This is a separate story that is featured by itself elsewhere in this issue.
On the way to one of the most unproductive seasons of his career, Earl Torgeson of the Boston Braves certainly didn't keep his feelings bottled up in 1952. Perhaps his frustrations began at the Polo Grounds in May, when he was called upon as a pinch hitter in crucial situations in two straight games. On May 23, the Braves had already scored two runs in the ninth inning, and were trailing the Giants 5-3 when they sent Earl to pinch hit. Representing the tying run, Torgeson killed the rally by grounding into a 4-6-3 double play to end the game. However, it didn't take long for Earl to get a chance to redeem himself. The very next day, the Braves again scored two runs in the ninth to come to within one run of the Giants, who now led 5-4. With the tying run on first base, Torgeson pinch hit again. Once again, he ended the game by grounding into a 4-6-3 double play.
On July 1, the Giants were now visiting Braves Field, and Torgeson was in the starting lineup as the right fielder. During his first at bat in the bottom of the first inning, a running argument began between Torgeson and New York catcher Sal Yvars. Yvars kept complaining that Torgeson was hitting him with his backswing, while Earl complained that the catcher was crowding the hitters. After Torgeson singled to center, Yvars took the bat and pounded it on home plate, breaking it. It was not until the Giants were retired in the top of the second inning that Torgeson was informed of what Yvars had done. He then ran into the Giants dugout and punched Yvars in the eye, opening a wound, which would require three stitches. This led to a bench-clearing brawl and Torgeson was ejected for his role.
His temper did not seem to have quieted by July 18, when the Braves were in St. Louis. Already hitless in two at bats (one of them a double play), Torgeson took a called third strike to end the top of the eighth. When someone in the Braves dugout tossed him the infield warm-up ball, Torgeson (the first baseman that night) threw it completely over the grandstand at Sportsman's Park.
[On-line editor's note: there is a link on our home page to sign up for the RetroList]
This topic flows directly from the RetroList. Very recently there have been some posts on the list about taped accounts of games. There are some companies that sell these accounts and some individuals also have games they taped themselves. It became clear very quickly that there are a lot of them out there and that we therefore needed someone to keep track of just what was available. As was recently posted on the RetroList, John Matthew IV has agreed to be the archivist, for which we should all applaud him very loudly. John will have at least two major "duties" in this role. The first is the careful cataloguing of games that people tell us they have. The second is the coordinating of the work to get these games ready for incorporation into our data files. So far, all of the games offered are ones that Retrosheet has, but they contain details on pitch sequences and hit locations that we do not have. Some have volunteered to transcribe their tapes onto a Retrosheet scoresheet and others have volunteered to loan their tapes to someone else to do the scoring. It will be up to John to keep all this sorted out. Both the Retrolist and the Tape Archivist are examples of something that Retrosheet sorely needs, namely the decentralization of as many activities as possible away from the keeper of the vault. There are many aspects to our operation that must be done via Sunset Road, but we all benefit when there is help. Many thanks to Jay and John for taking steps in this important direction.
In addition to the Texaco scorebooks (see Acquisitions), Andy Moursund has made a very generous donation of microfilm to Retrosheet. The film contains issues of Sporting Life from the 1890s to the mid-1910s, making it a competitor of The Sporting News for those years. Those who have had the pleasure of viewing Sporting Life know what a tremendous resource it is. It is also less widely available than The Sporting News, so Andy's donation is extremely valuable. Retrosheet offers a very grateful thanks to Andy for helping us in this very tangible way. If anyone is ever in the Washington, D.C. area, drop in to see Andy at the Georgetown Book Shop in Bethesda, MD. It is a fine store and talking with Andy is always a pleasure.
We continue to work through the thicket of checking and editing our event files. John Jarvis did many hours of work on the 1977 NL and has now turned his attention to 1975. Jay Wigley is addressing the 1976 NL and Marc Stephenson is plowing through the 1974 National League after a great deal of work on the 1978 Senior Circuit. Wigley and Stephenson have been making use of the microfilm of the official NL daily totals we copied earlier this year, while Jarvis has been making comparisons to totals published in The Sporting News. Brian Westgate, who was a huge help in completing the 1974 and 1975 seasons for us with his taped game accounts, examined every Sporting News box score for the 1969 Pilots, discovering a number of discrepancies with our files. Jon Dunkle has used both The Sporting News and the official daily records to clean up the 1979 AL. Finally, Pete Palmer continues his selfless assistance in working on old AL seasons, specifically the Orioles. He is currently working on the 1958 season for the Birds. The final editing process is done by the Daves, Smith and Vincent, before the files are released.
Joe Dittmar discovered a wonderful game description in the Philadelphia Inquirer of 10/18/1911. An unidentified staff correspondent was describing the final moments of the eleventh inning of game three of the World Series. (This was the game that solidified Frank Baker's name change to "Home Run" Baker.) Thanks to Joe for this wonderful text. (Emphasis added by Joe.)
"Herzog doubled and Beals Becker, batty for Matty, cracked a sharp grounder to the peerless Eddie [Collins]. He foozled and Herzog dented home plate, while the emergency swatsmith perched on first, only to be nipped at second on an attempted purloin."
We had hoped to have the 1986 and 1987 data files on our web site during the World Series, but there was more work to be done than we realized, so the 1986 data didn't get there until November. The 1987 set is nearly ready and should be posted by the first of the year. Our next scheduled releases are 1988 and 1989, hopefully by opening day, 2000 and 1990, by the 2000 All-Star game. In addition, as the pre-1980 seasons reach an appropriate condition, they will be released as well. Careful readers will recall that it was planned for some of these seasons to be on the web by now. Well, the plans were sincere, but in the end it turns out they were unrealistic. The final preparation and release must go through the central location (me) and therefore they have to compete with lots of other items for my attention. Progress is being made and the plan has not altered. However, it is taking longer than was expected. Hopefully the next calendar year will see a lot of progress in this regard.
Retrosheet continues to be mentioned in various public forums, always in a positive way. Baseball Weekly routinely uses examples from our "strange and unusual plays", but only during the baseball season. During the 1999 postseason, the Bergen County (NJ) Record contacted Dave Smith for a list of the all-time leaders in postseason ERA. They published the list, with credit to Retrosheet, showing that Orlando Hernandez and Mariano Rivera are both in the top 10 of all pitchers with more than 30 postseason innings. Before anyone leaps to object that such a list is unfair to those who played before there were divisions, note that the leaders in World Series ERA are Harry Brecheen and Babe Ruth. Rob Neyer, who writes an on-line column for ESPN and is a Retrosheet volunteer (working on the 1924 season), wrote a column recently which analyzed the performance of Ivan Rodriguez in catching runners trying to steal. In particular Rob wanted to compare his results with those of Johnny Bench in 1972 and Roy Campanella in 1951. Those seasons were chosen because of their great offensive performances and Rob wanted to compare the whole package to that of Rodriguez. The article was very good and Rob gave proper credit to Retrosheet for the data he used. Portions of the data are worth repeating here, because they are so amazing:
SB allowed Runners CS Pct Thrown Out
Bench (1972) 22 30 58
Campanella (1951) 15 33 69
It is certainly true that runners attempted steals less often in those days, but
these are eye-popping numbers in light of modern success rates.
Retrosheet has done it again by finding another hidden ball trick. Bill Deane has been collecting information on this unusual play for some time now and we have found quite a few for Bill in our game accounts. This one occurred in the game of 8-21-1933 with the Red Sox visiting the Indians at Municipal Stadium and was discovered by David Vincent.
With one out in the bottom of the sixth inning, Earl Averill doubled to lf and continued to 3b when Smead Jolley’s throw to 2b was wild. Marty McManus deposited the ball in his glove and returned to his position at 3b. When Averill stepped off the bag, he was had.
Terry Simpkins found this wonderful account of a team batting out of order from the NY Times about the game of Brooklyn at Boston on 4-15-1931:
"The confusion in the batting order came after Boone had batted for Mattingly in the fifth, with the Robins on the short end of an 8-0 score. Boone went to right field in place of Herman and the announcement was officially made. But Boone, apparently repulsed by Herman, came back to the dugout for a conference. It was then announced that Cohen would play right field in place of Boone, which would have placed Cohen in the pitcher's spot in the batting order.
"Neither the team captains, the managers nor the players seemed aware of the mistake, however, so Cohen was allowed to bat in Herman's place. A conference at the plate before the start of the next inning among umpires and captains brought Cohen up again where he belonged and the game proceeded in some semblance of order."
This was Alta Cohen’s debut and his only game in 1931. He played 29 in his career.
Contributions from Greg Beston, Bill Deane, Mike Grahek, Bob Kistler, Terry Simpkins and Wayne Townsend.
7-4-1906 CHN @ PIT - Pittsburgh's Lefty Leifield held the Cubs hitless through eight innings, while mound opponent Mordecai Brown gave up just one hit -- Leifield's -- in the same span. In the ninth, the Cubs strung together a single, sacrifice, error, and infield out to score the game's only run.
5-08-1912 NY1 @ SLN - In the 7th inning, with a man on 3B, Jeff Tesreau hit a roller to Wally Smith at short. Smith threw to 1B, but hit umpire Brick Owens in the head. Owens was knocked unconscious and his wife fainted in the grandstand. The runner was sent back to 3B and Tesreau was ordered to bat over again. Owens was helped from the field, but was back on the job the next day feeling alright except for a bump on the back of his head. No word on Mrs. Owens.
5-18-1923 WS1 @ CHA - In the 1st inning, after Goose Goslin is caught looking at a 3rd strike for the second out, Bucky Harris is cut down on a delayed double steal attempt that involved every member of the White Sox infield. POCSH(16343252)
6-6-1931 CLE @ NYA - With the Indians ahead, 7-4, in the top of 9th and threatening for more, Jim Weaver was pitching for Yanks against Eddie Morgan, who singled to cf. Joe Vosmik singled to lf with Morgan stopping at 2b. Willie Kamm then lined to Gehrig for a triple play: 3(B)3(1) 6(2)/LTP. The Yanks lose anyway, 7-5.
6-12-1931 NY1 @ PIT - In the top of the ninth inning the Giants led 7-2 and Spades Wood was pitching for Pittsburgh. Mel Ott walked to lead off the inning. After Travis Jackson and Johnny Vergez flied out, Hogan singled to left, Ott stopping at second. Pitcher Freddie Fitzsimmons struck out but the third strike was a WP and Ott scored from 2b, Hogan went from 1st to 3rd and Fitzsimmons went all the way to 2nd: K+WP.2-H; 1-3;B-2.
6-13-1931 NY1 @ PIT - The Giants led 1-0 in the fifth with Erv Brame pitching for Pittsburgh. Giants’ pitcher Clarence Mitchell singled to lead off the inning. After Ed Marshall sacrificed, Freddy Leach lined to Pittsburgh lf Adam Comorosky who ran in and touched second to complete an unassisted twin killing: 7(B)7(2)/LDP
6-26-1931 SLN @ BRO - With one out in the top of the third and the Redbirds down 10-3, Sloppy Thurston was pitching for the Robins. George Watkins singled and Jim Bottomly was thrown out by Dodger 2b Neal Finn. Watkins, thinking there were three outs, headed to his position in rf after reaching 2b. Thurston then had an easy pickoff: PO2(16)
7-7-1931 BRO @ PHI - In the bottom of third, Fred Brickell was on 1b with 2 out. Chuck Klein singled to rf and when Brickell slid into 3b he was somehow knocked out before touching the bag. Manager/3B coach Burt Shotton ran over and pulled Brickell's foot to the bag. The umpire called Brickell out because of coach's interference since the rules state that a coach may not assist a runner. S9/INT.1X3(5)
8-4-1933 BRO @ BSN (G2) - In the second inning Brooklyn shortstop Glenn Wright hit a liner back at pitcher Bob Smith. The ball cromed off Smith’s stomach back towards the plate and catcher Shanty Hogan threw out Wright. The play went 123. 8-5-1933 NY1 @ PHI (G1) - In the fifth inning, Johnny Vergez was on first with a single for New York. Gus Dugas was holding him on the bag when Gus Mancuso hit a liner towards Dugas in fould territory. Dugas snagged it to retire the batter while standing on the bag. When Vergez stepped off the bag he was doubled. 3(B)3(1)/LDP/FL
8-19-1933 NYA @ CHA - In the top of the fifth, Ben Chapman and Tony Lazzeri each singled, putting runners on 1b and 3b. After a Bill Dickey pop out, Frank Crosetti grounded to Luke Appling, who tossed to 2b for a force out. Hal Rhyne, who had entered the game as an injury replace-ment, dropped the throw with Chapman scoring. Red Ruffing grounded to Appling but his throw to Rhyne was late, filling the bases. Earle Combs also grounded to Appling for a force of Ruffing. Rhyne relayed the ball to Red Kress to complete the double play but Kress dropped the throw. On the play both Lazzeri and Crosetti scored. The inning mercifully ended when Joe Sewell flew out. Totals for the inning: 3 runs (1 earned), 2 hits, and 2 errors.
8-19-1933 CHN @ NY1 - The Cubs’ starting lineup had Billy Herman and 2b and Babe Herman in rf. Babe is listed by his given name, Floyd. In the bottom of the sixth inning, a new pitcher comes in from the bullpen - Leroy Herrmann! There are only three players in the history of the major leagues with the last name “Herman” and two of them were teammates.
6-26-1951 PHA @ BOS - With one out in the top of the eighth inning, the A's had Joe Astroth on 1b and Ray Murray at the plate. Murray grounded out to shortstop Johnny Pesky, but Astroth took too big a turn around 2b, and was caught in a long rundown for a double play, with Ted Williams finally coming in from left field to get the put out. 63/DP.1X3(635427)
4-20-1952 BSN @ PHI (G1) - In the top of the third inning, the Braves had Sam Jethroe on 2b with one out. Jethroe stole third and kicked the ball out of Willie Jones' glove when he slid into the bag. The ball rolled to the wall, where it was picked up by a fan. The umpire called fan interference, and allowed Jethroe to score. The scorer gave Jethroe a steal of third, but no error was given on the play which was scored SB3.2-H(INT).
6-14-1952 CHN @ BSN - The Braves could do nothing to support Warren Spahn this day. Spahn took the Braves into extra innings with the score knotted 1-1 (made possible by Spahn's homer). He eventually lost 3-1 in a 15-inning complete game which saw him strike out 18 batters, tying the then single-game high of the century. The Braves had 4 hits in the entire game.
6-22-1952 SLN @ BSN (G2) - In the bottom of the first inning, the Braves’ Sid Gordon hit a two-run homer over the wall in lf. What Gordon didn't realize was that his homer won him a live 100-pound bear cub for being the first Brave to homer on "State of Maine Day". Gordon was somewhat stunned when the Maine delegation came to the door of the clubhouse after the game to present him with the animal. There is no record of what became of the animal.
7-27-1952 BOS @ SLA (G1) - The 100 degree heat took its toll on the players during the doubleheader. St. Louis pitcher Gene Bearden took a 4-1 lead into the bottom of the 6th inning, when he walked with one out. After an Al Zarilla fly out, Cass Michaels singled, and Bearden raced for third base. As he reached third, Bearden began to keel over from the heat and had to be held up by third base umpire Hank Soar. Bearden was forced to leave the game, although he did find the strength to make a pinch-hitting appearance in the second game.
7-27-1952 BOS @ SLA (G2) - Red Sox manager Lou Boudreau batted pitcher Willard Nixon 6th in the lineup (ahead of 1B Dick Gernert, C Sammy White, and SS Johnny Lipon). Nixon was coming off a .289 season in 1951, and would finish his career with a .242 batting average. Nixon went 1-4 with 2 RBI, and pitched his club to a 9-3 victory.
8-12-1952 PHA @ BOS - The A's took a 4-3 lead into the bottom of the 13th inning. With two out, George Kell of the Red Sox hit a fly ball down the left field line. Left fielder Gus Zernial went over near the stands to make the catch, but a fan knocked the ball out of his glove. The umpire called fan interference and the game was over.
6-19-57 CLE @ BOS - In his rookie season, Roger Maris was hit by a pitch only once, but chances are that HP didn't hurt as much as getting nailed by a return throw from a Red Sox catcher. The New York Times reported: "A rookie, Roger Maris, was struck near the left eye in the ninth inning when (catcher Sammy) White was returning a pitch to (Frank) Sullivan. The young Cleveland centerfielder was removed from the game for examination." Eddie Robinson finished Maris's AB by striking out. Maris was 0-for-3 up to that point in a 6-0 loss. Ouch!
Cliff Blau (with some assistance from David Vincent) discovered another batting out of order situation. The Yankees were at Fenway Park on 8-10-1934 and scored four runs in the first inning when they should have been shut out because they batted out of turn in the frame. With two out, both Ruth and Gehrig walked. Ben Chapman then singled to short to load the bases. Bill Dickey, who should have batted before Chapman, singled to center scoring two runs. After an errant throw on a pickoff attempt, two more runs scored on Tony Lazzeri’s single. The Yanks continued to bat in that order until the fifth when the Red Sox finally realized what was happening after another Dickey single.
On 5-14-1923 the Athletics were in Chicago. Third-string White Sox catcher Charlie "Slats" Dorman was rushed into his first game after injuries to starter Ray Schalk (collision at the plate in the 4th) and sub Roy Graham (foul tip on the hand in the 6th) forced them out of the game. He found himself catching future Hall-of-Famer, Red Faber.
The first batter fouled out to Dorman on a tough play near the stands, but the runner on 1B was able to advance to 2B after the catch (a prelude of things to come). Charlie got a single in his first ML plate appearance but in the final three innings, A's runners would mercilessly steal on him five times during a 9-0 rout. Dorman did manage an assist during a botched delayed steal of home [POCSH (2125)], however. But this game would be the only one he would ever get to play in the majors. In his 2nd (and final) AB he popped to SS to end the game.
This game saw Faber going the distance, yielding 8 unearned runs thanks to 5 errors, 3 of which were throwing errors by Faber. This prompted the local writer, Ray Garrison, to lament, "Faber continued to emulate the man from Borneo."
Clem Comly has input far more games than any other Retrosheet volunteer. In fact, some might suggest he needs to get out more! Clem is well-known as a National League inputter but he recently changed leagues. The file he sent to Retro-Central contained seven Negro National League games! Although we are not actively working on the Negro Leagues, Clem reacted to Dave Smith’s recent discovery that we are running out of scoresheets to input (see View from the Vault on page 1.) The games input come from Bruce Foster and include many fine players, among them Satchel Paige, Gene Benson, Cool Papa Bell and Buck Leonard. In one of the games, the opposing catchers were Josh Gibson and Roy Campanella! Wow!
by Herm Krabbenhoft
Baseball Quarterly Reviews
Copyright 1999
“My biggest regret is that I didn’t .300 for my career.”
Mickey Mantle uttered that lament after he had retired from the diamond game. The Mick finished his time in The Big Show in 1968 with 536 career home runs - the third highest total in major league history at that time. He also slugged the most World Series homers - 18, a record that probably will never be broken. Moreover, during his 18-year tenure in the Big Leagues he batted over .300 ten times (9 full seasons), topped with a .365 mark in 1957. The previous year Mantle won the triple crown with a .353 batting average, 52 round trippers, and 130 runs batted in. So, Mickey was able to maintain an end-of-the-season lifetime .300 batting average for much of his career - every year from 1956 through 1967. Yet, the three-time American League MVP eventually ended up with a lifetime batting average just a couple of points below .300. And that would be his biggest regret in baseball.
Mantle is not the only player who was not able to carry a .300 career batting average through to the end of his career. Since 1901, there have been more than 30 players, who during their careers had a lifetime .300 batting average with at least 1500 hits, but ultimately gave up their membership to the prestigious .300 hitters club. Nonetheless, eight of these emeritus members of the .300 hitters club, including Mantle, were eventually elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
In this article the pertinent details for the final loss of the.300 career batting averages by these 8 Hall of Famers are presented. To ensure that the player’s temporary lifetime .300 batting average reflects a significant portion of his career, a minimum of 1500 hits is required. Two classifications of a .300 batting average are considered:
George Kelly played in the majors from 1915 through 1931. Curiously, while he batted over .300 in each of 6 consecutive seasons (1921-1926), he never managed to own a bona fide .300 career batting average with at least 1500 hits. However, he was able to carry a record-book .300 late into the 1930 season after collecting his 1500 th hit in 1929. But on 9-16-1930 he was forever expelled from the .300 hitters fraternity. He went into that day’s contest with a .29951 career batting average - 1721 hits in 5746 at bats. In his first at bat he grounded out, thus dropping his lifetime batting average to .29946 and was never able to regain the necessary percentage points.
Gabby Hartnett batted .300 or higher in 6 seasons during his 20-year major league career (1922-1941). His highest single- season batting average was .354 in 1937. During the course of the 1938 campaign the player-manager of the Chicago Cubs both gained and gave up membership to the cherished .300 hitters club. The “homer in the gloamin” hero lost his true-blue .300 on his second at bat on 6-21-1938. After his first trip to the plate, Hartnett had 1723 hits in 5743 at bats, which yielded a .30002 batting average but dropped below with a grounder the next time up. On 8-14-1938, Hartnett lost his claim to even a fringe .300 batting mark. An out in his second plate appearance left him with a .29951 career batting average (1756 hits in 5863 at bats). In the 7 th stanza Hartnett lost his record-book .300 lifetime batting average.
Enos Slaughter batted .300 or higher in 8 campaigns and became a 1500-hit .300 hitters club member in 1950. On 9-23-1959, with his lifetime batting average at precisely .30000 (2383 for 7943), he was called on to pinch hit. He grounded out to second baseman Bill Mazeroski for the out that ended the 5 th inning and Slaughter’s tenure as an authentic .300 hitter. After two more pinch hitting outs, he finished his stellar major league career with a .29990 lifetime batting mark, which appears in the record books as .300. Even though Slaughter ended up with a fringe major league career .300, he still was a true-blue lifetime .300 hitter in the National League -- .30428 (2067 hits in 6793 at bats).
Duke Snider reached the .300 plateau in 7 different seasons during his 18-year major league career (1947-1964). In 1957, Snider joined the 1500-hit .300 hitters club and would be a member of that distinguished organization for six years. On 4-21-1963, Snider had a .30001 career batting average (2002 hits in 6673 at bats) going into the first game of a twin bill. In his first trip to the plate, Duke managed to hit a little flyball back to the mound which permanently expelled Snider from the bona fide .300 hitters fraternity. On 5-24-1963, Snider had his final fling at a fringe .300. After going 0-for-2 in his first two at bats, his career average stood at .29951 (2019 for 6741). In his third time in the batter’s box, the result was the ol’ “three strikes and yer out!” And so was Duke’s record-book .300.
Mickey Mantle entered the 1968 season with a career total of 2312 hits in 7667 at bats, which afforded him a .302 lifetime batting average. On 7-5-1968, Mantle was retired in his first at bat, thus leaving the switch hitter’s lifetime batting average at exactly .30000 (2361 hits in 7870 at bats. Mantle struck out the second time up and never again saw a true-blue .300 lifetime batting average. On 7-28-1968, the Mick lost his last grasp of a fringe .300 by striking out, thereby dropping his career average below the record-book .300.
Orlando Cepeda topped the coveted .300 mark 8 times in his first 9 full seasons. After joining the 1500-hit .300 club in 1967, Cha Cha endured two very mediocre campaigns which dropped his career batting average below the prestigious .300 level. However, he managed to regain temporary admission to the club on 8-9-1970 by singling in his first at bat to elevate his batting average from .29994 to .30004 (2034 hits in 6779 at bats). Unfortunately, his return to .300 glory was short as he was retired the next two times up. By the end of the season, the Baby Bull’s lifetime average had “plummeted” to .29929 - not even a toenail .300. Nonetheless, Cepeda was able to regain at least a fringe .300 average in the 1971 campaign. After a 1-for-2 performance on 5-27-1971, his career average was .29952 (2126 for 7098). He pinch hit the next night but fouled out and gave up his last grasp of a record book .300 career batting average.
Frank Robinson’s career batting average stood at .302 - 2555 hits in 8468 at bats - at the end of the 1971 season. His last day as a bona fide lifetime .300 hitter was 9-13-1972. Going into that day’s contest, his average was precisely .30000 (2637 for 8790). In the fifth inning he was called on to pinch hit and popped an infield fly and thus said “Bye-Bye .300.” Nonetheless, Frank was able to maintain a record book .300 average at the end of the 1972 season - .29977 (2641 for 8810). On 5-24-1973 he gave up his record book .300. Going into that day’s game, his career batting average was at .29952 (2673 for 8925). He hit a flyball to center field that was the final end of Robinson’s membership to the coveted .300 hitters club.
Al Kaline was a bona fide .300 hitter for 11 seasons after collecting his 1500th hit, topping the .300 mark 9 times during his 22-year career in the Big Leagues. At the conclusion of the 1972 campaign, his career batting average stood at .301 - 2782 hits in 9248 at bats. Kaline’s last day with a bona fide .300 career batting average was on 6-8- 1973. After collecting one hit in his first three at bats, his average was .30002 (2807 for 9356). The end result of his fourth trip to the plate was a foul flyout and the redcution of his lifetime batting average to .29999. The end of his fringe .300 came on 9-23-1973. After Al had been retired in his first at bat, his career batting average stood at .29951 (2860 for 9549). In his second at bat, Kaline struck out. Now, even his record book .300 was gone - forever.
Concluding Remarks
Over a quarter of a century has passed since Kaline surrendered his career .300 batting average. Eight former players have also given up a career .300 batting average during the intervening 26 years. While none has received enough support (as of yet) to gain admission to the Hall of Fame, one or two may eventually make it to Cooperstown. Finally, there are a few currently active players who have also seen the demise of their career .300 batting averages - such as Tim Raines, Barry Larkin, Rafael Palmiero, and Ken Griffey Jr. It will be interesting to see if any of them can regain member-ship to the prestigious .300 hitters club.
Many of the specific plate appearances quoted in this article came from the files of Retrosheet. Thanks to Dave Smith for his able assistance in tracking down the data and to the organization for its wonderful work.
We have found two more! For the complete list:
9-1-1945 BRO @ NY1 - Giant Joe Medwick was hit on the elbow by a pitch and left the game for treatment. With both teams out of the race, Dodgers manager Leo Durocher agreed to allow Medwick to reenter the game if Durocher could pick the pinch runner for him. He selected slow-footed Gus Mancuso, who was promptly erased on a ground ball double play.
7-24-1934 NYA @ SLA - Tony Lazzeri left the game in the bottom of the first due to something in his eye and Don Heffner took his place in the field. Lazzeri then batted in his regular turn in the top of the second and stayed in the game.
During the 1950s, the Cincinnati Reds changed their name, at least informally, to the Redlegs in response to the very negative political connotations of "Red" at the time. One of the more interesting and humorous parts of this name business was pointed out by Andy Moursund who sent some photocopies of The Sporting News from 1949. It was common place in those days, and still is to a lesser extent, to use cartoon caricatures of the various teams: the Dodgers were always shown as bums, the Braves as Indian warriors, the Pirates as buccaneers with an eye patch, etc. The picture below was scanned from the photocopy that Andy sent and shows that the political sense of the Cincinnati team nickname came about well before the public furor and Congressional hearings.
NY World-Telegram, 8-22-1933 - A ridiculous commentary on the umpire situation in the majors was recited the other day when no fewer than four managers were under suspension. Max Carey, Bill McKechnie, Lew Fonseca and Donie Bush, representing one-quarter of the big league leadership and about $80,000 in salaries, had to remain off the field because of run-ins with umpires. Surely there is something radically wrong with that picture. It still is true that in more than fifty years of major league baseball not one thousand fans have paid to see umpires work.
The other day an umpire called Dixie Walker of the Yankees out for having been hit by a batted ball. If Dixie really had been struck he would have suffered a broken ankle but the ball did not come close to him. When Art Fletcher protested the umpire admitted that he had not seen the ball hit Walker. “But I heard it.” Thus we have come to umpiring by hearing rather than sight.
by Ted Turocy
As we continue our march back in time, we've always realized as an organization that there will come a point where we'll be working with years for which obtaining some fraction of accounts will be at best extremely difficult. One suggestion which was posed in The Retro Sheet a while back is to augment our file format with a "boxscore" entry for games for which we do not have a full account. I liked this suggestion, however, it seems to me that we could do more. My experience so far is that we can gather a lot of information about most games -- much more than just a boxscore would provide -- but not quite enough information that we could call it a complete account, without having to have lots of MPs or #s just to make things balance out.
The current file format and tools allow us to represent these situations informally (via the # and comment mechanism); however, we don't really have a great way to say something like "we have innings 1-3 and 6-7 of this game, plus we know that Schulte doubled home the winning run in the 8th". Yet, for a good bit of baseball history, that might be as good as it gets.
I've indicated to our Grand Poobah that I'd be interested in coordinating some brainstorming along these lines. What I thought would be a cool project would be to try to pick a year -- or probably a particular month or two from a year, which would be more manageable as a pilot project -- and focus on trying to put together as good a picture of all the games played in that period, focusing on formally noting what sources were used and where they differed, and attempting to reconcile our findings against the official daily totals. From this experience, I would hope to be able to determine what extensions to our file format would be most appropriate for representing our knowledge for eventual distribution.
I would suggest either 1910 or 1911, since those are the years for which we have a good start already to work from, though other years could work too (e.g., 1914 or 1915, since we now have some scorebooks from those years :) In some ways, this project is particularly dry even for Retrosheet, in that we could be looking to piece together a handful of bones from brief newspaper accounts; on the other hand, I know there are at least a few people here who are really good at stuff like that. Finally, I think that producing some type of finished product for this era would have legitimate research usefulness in its own right, incomplete though it may be; I've been working on some studies (which I've ad-vertised for a while now but haven't really finished) of baserunning in 1910 and 1911 compared to the modern game, and even with the incomplete data some stark differences emerge quickly.
Please contact me if you are interested at arbiter@nwu.edu
“A forty-piece band was out, together with a large crowd to celebrate Sisler day, as he was presented with his diploma for being the most valuable player of 1923.
Two army blimps circled around the field just before the game, and two balls were thrown from one of the blimps. Babe Ruth caught one and Ken Williams the other ball. Babe almost returned one to the boys in the blimp, it was so low. Twenty-four thousand persons were in the stands."
Bison Slugger Rapp, Pinned by German Fire, Vowed He’d Learn to Hit Lefties If Spared (8-28-1946)
Beazley’s Arm Treated Through Beak, Nerve-ends in Nose Helped to Relax Muscles (7-2-1947)
Jackie Helps Crackers Crack Crowd Record (4-20-1949)
Dodgers Waltzing to Easiest Flag in Brooklyn’s Big League History (8-22-1951)
Here is the report on group activity since the last issue of TRS. The smallest number of games entered in a single week during this period was 42 and the highest was 163.
Total Games in Computer (All Years before 1984) 59,297 Games Entered since last Report 1,439 Days since last Report (9/2/99 to 12/14/99) 103 Games Entered per Week (14 weeks, 5 days) 97.8 Games Entered per Day (The Fisher Index) 14.0Assistance provided by Shelley and Tim Vincent
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