Looking back at Bob Feller’s outstanding pitching career, one unresolved question keeps turning over in my mind.
In 1954, Feller was an integral part of the Cleveland Indians pitching staff. Anchored by Bob Lemon (23-7, 2.72) Early Wynn (23-11, 2.73), and Mike Garcia (19-8, 2.64), the Indians also had two spot starters that added depth to the rotation; Art Houtemann (13-7, 3.35) and Feller (13-3, 3.09)
Although the Indians coasted to the American League championship, their pitching failed in the World Series when the New York Giants swept them, 4-0. Feller did not throw a pitch.
Lemon started games one and four. In his 13.1 innings pitched, Lemon was rocked and ended up with a 6.75 ERA. Wynn, in game two, managed to pitch seven effective innings, allowing three earned runs, but took the loss. Garcia, the game three starter, was only marginally more effective than Lemon. Garcia allowed three earned runs in his five innings.
When manager Al Lopez called the bull pen, he logically summoned his two relief aces, the lefty righty combination of Don Mossi (6-1, 1.94) and Ray Narleski (3-3, 2.22) as well as well as Houtemann, Hal Newhouser (7-2, 2.51) and Garcia.
How it came to pass that Lopez, a Hall of Fame catcher and 1947 teammate of Feller, never saw the opportunity to put the seasoned veteran pitcher into a series game is a mystery, at least to me. A solid Feller post-season performance would have taken some of the sting out of his 1948 World Series disappointment.
Although the Indians beat the Boston Braves, 4-2, Feller was charged with both Indians’ losses. In the opener, Johnny Sain outdueled “Rapid Robert” in a 1-0 complete game heartbreaker.
Feller’s second start in game five was a nightmare.
His line: 6.1 IP, 7ER, 2 BB and 5 SO
For the series, Feller posted a 0-2 mark with a 5.02 ERA.
Lopez, who held the record for most games caught (1,918) until Bob Boone broke it in 1987, had a .587 winning percentage as a manager and was the only skipper from 1949-1959 to win an American League pennant besides Casey Stengel. In addition to winning with the 1954 Indians, Lopez also led the 1959 Chicago White Sox to first place.
If Lopez didn’t see a good spot for Feller during the 1954 World Series, who am I to challenge his judgment? All I’m saying is that it would have been nice.
It seems Lopez used Feller during the Series in much the way he did during the season, as a fifth starter. Wynn, Garcia, Lemon, and Houtteman all had more starts than Feller during the regular season. Seven of Feller’s 16 decisions (43%) came in double header games, but double headers accounted for only 24% of Cleveland’s games. In the days of the four-man rotation fifth starters got much of their work on double header days. While any manager in any era would be happy to have Wynn, Garcia, and Lemon as his team’s three starters going into the World Series, I agree that it is curious that the veteran (though only 35 year-old) Feller was relegated to the roles of fifth starter for the ’54 season and bench jockey for the Series.
He was 35 years old, I thing Art had a better chance to win game 4
What do you think?
Game 1 was still there for the taking late . His presence could’ve been the difference. A momentum game if there ever was one. They never recovered. Not just the pitching issues caused Cleveland to go belly up, their hitting (other than Wertz) was abysmal.
How they could have won this game. In the 8th inning the Indians had a leg-injured L. Doby on second base, and an even more impaired (from a running standpoint) A. Rosen on first base—with no outs when V. Wertz came to the plate. The Indians could have then replaced Doby as a pinch runner with their worst pitcher on the roster, Bob Hooper, and also have Art Houterman running for Al Rosen at first base. Then the plan was, if a fly ball was hit to centerfield over the head of Willie Mays, those runners would wait until either the ball hit the ground or until W. Mays caught it before either tagging up and running or immediately running. If they had tagged up after Mays made his amazing catch, B. Hooper (rather than Doby) could have easily scored from second, and A. Houterman (rather than Rosen) could have made it to 3rd—–given how far the ball was hit and Mays having thrown to the second base man, D, Williams, as opposed to the shortstop Alvin Dark. Dark would have had to throw home which would be too late to stop Hooper from scoring. Cleveland would then be ahead 3 to 2, with one runner on 3rd base with just one out. And the CI then would have had an opportunity for a good pinch hitter such as D. Mitchell, D. Pope, or Hank M. to get A.H. home. All that action and B. Lemon’s scoreless ninth would have given the Tribe Game one. In Game 2, the Indians could have taken a 2 to 0 lead by doing the following after Al Smith led off the game with a homerun. In the same inning, with 2 outs and A. Rosen on second base, replace him with a healthy H. Majeski at second base, have HM running on the two strike pitch that W. Westlake hit to center field with HM just beating the throw to home by W. Mays. Tribe up 2 zip, then always walking D. Rhodes intentionally when he faced a right handed pitcher in the Polo Grounds. That plus keeping NY catcher W. Westrum hitless and without a walk would have resulted in a 2 to 0 victory. Thus Clev. up 2 to zip and then heading home for game 3 in Cleveland, and thus having Feller, instead of B. Lemon, pitch game 4–which the Tribe would have probably won –given BF’s need to win at least one WS game in a storied career. Then even with a Game 3 loss, the CI only had to only win one of next 2 to take it all in ’54.
win for the Tribe.