Baseball: Past and Present

For Eddie Stanky, one game back in Major League baseball as manager was enough to send him packing up for his native Alabama.

Oddly Stanky won his last game as a manager when his Texas Rangers, behind recently inducted Hall of Fame pitcher Bert Blyleven, bested the Orioles at Baltimore, 5-1 on July 22, 1977.

At mid-season, the Rangers summoned Stanky from the University of South Alabama to replace embattled Frank Luchessi. Nearly a decade had passed since the Chicago White Sox fired Stanky after a 34-45 1968 start. But immediately after his win over the Orioles, Stanky abruptly resigned and, citing homesickness, returned to his old Jaguars’ job where he eventually compiled a 488-193 record (.717).

Insiders reported however that Stanky, known during his playing days as “the Brat”, could not tolerate the “modern day” players’ attitudes. This, keep in mind, was 35 years ago! Imagine what Stanky’s tolerance level would be in 2011 with hammies, quads and pitch counts—maybe one inning?

Stanky’s on field skills were limited. According to Leo Durocher: “He can’t hit, can’t run, can’t field. He’s no nice guy… all the little SOB can do is win.” Durocher had Stanky pegged right. From 1947 to 1951, Stanky (.268 career BA) appeared in three World Series with three different National League champions, the Brooklyn Dodgers, Boston Braves, and New York Giants.

So determined to win was Stanky that he created two baseball plays that were quickly declared illegal.

Whenever Stanky was the third base runner, he stood several feet behind the bag in short left field. When a fly ball was hit, Stanky would time its arc, then take off running so he could step on third base just as the catch was made. That allowed Stanky to race home at full speed making it almost impossible to throw him out. This tactic was declared illegal following the season.

“The Brat” was also infamous for what became called “the Stanky maneuver”. From his second base position, Stanky would distract opposing batters by drifting behind the pitcher, then jumping up and down and waving his arms to distract opposing batters.

Stanky, who died at age 83, is a 1990 Mobile Sports Hall of Fame inductee.

Footnote about the 1977 Rangers: The team had four managers within a five day period: Luchessi, Stanky, interim manager Connie Ryan and Billy Hunter who made it to the end of the season.

Philadelphia Athletics/Philadelphia Phillies, Shibe Park: For much of the early 20th century, the Phillies played in celebrated hitters bandbox, the Baker Bowl. Players put up freakishly good numbers there, but the park was decrepit and roundly lambasted by the 1930s, and so in the middle of the 1938 season, the Phils moved in with their American League counterpart. The A’s left for Kansas City in the 1950s, though the Phillies stayed in what later became known as Connie Mack Stadium up to the end of the 1970 season.

New York Giants/New York Yankees, Polo Grounds: Old Yankee Stadium was known as the House that Ruth Built mainly because the popularity of their Herculean slugger was enough to get the Bronx Bombers out of a 10-year cohabitation that lasted from 1913 until 1922 with the Giants. In fact, prior to Ruth coming on the scene, the Yankees were something of a poor step child, subletting at the Polo Grounds after the lease ended at their original home, Hilltop Park. Hard to believe one of the richest sports franchises in the world was once like the derelict friend living out of a suitcase on a couch.

St. Louis Cardinals/St. Louis Browns, Sportsman’s Park: Another one that’s a little hard to believe in current times, the Cardinals were the poor tenant of the Browns when they moved in with them in 1920. Course, the Cardinals would be a World Series team by the end of the decade, and the Browns meanwhile would explore new depths of futility. But it wasn’t until 1953 that Browns owner Bill Veeck finally sold the park to the Cardinals for $800,000 and prepared to take his team to Baltimore where it became the Orioles.

New York Mets/New York Yankees, Shea Stadium: This one lasted for two years, 1974 and 1975, as old Yankee Stadium underwent a gutting and major series of modernizing renovations. It didn’t come easily for the Yankees, as the Mets had refused to sign off on the cohabitation for years but reneged after the city of New York agreed to renovate the Yankees home.

For those millions of us who will never be a Major League Baseball player, the thought of maybe working in the front office for our favorite team might be a worthy substitute. Serving as a general manager would probably be the ultimate goal, (well owner if we won a few million.)  We all know we could do a better job than any of the 30 current GMs because we are all experts when it comes to talent evaluation and any of the other day to day distractions a GM has to face.

I’d take the job if I could have the month of July off.  The July 31 trade deadline would leave me exhausted, completely stressed out and mumbling to myself while walking down the street, scaring little children and stray dogs.  Especially this season.

With so many teams with a legitimate shot at the playoffs, the right trade can make your season a success, the wrong trade can put your team several years back and negate all the planning which went in to getting you this far.  With so many teams with a legitimate shot at the playoffs, fewer and fewer teams are willing to part with that high priced but valuable veteran player who in seasons past would already have a new address.  More and more teams are asking a king’s ransom for mediocre talent.

Is the poor showing by a previous star just a fluke or is it a sign of the inevitable lessening of skills all athletes go through?  What if I trade my star veteran who is having a down season and he lights up the league for someone else in August and September? Are the potential star minor leaguers I receive for him ever going to produce at the big league level?  Will the hometown fans call for a general revolt if I trade a household name despite the fact that he is clearly over the proverbial hill? What will happen to clubhouse chemistry?  Is this the right time to throw in the towel or should I go for broke?

Every fan is a baseball expert as the trading deadline grows near and the press have all the answers.  They don’t have to answer to the owner and their future with the team is not at risk.  They don’t have to think long term and they don’t have any personal loyalties to this player or that. They don’t know who is hurting but playing anyway and who is having personal, off the field issues. It all looks black and white to them.

You might have inherited a no trade contract or be dealing with a 10 and 5 player.  There might be a very beneficial deal in place but contract or location issues might not allow you to pull the trigger. Everyone will want to know why the deal wasn’t made but you can’t say publicly why you stood pat.

If the whole world knows you desperately want to trade a certain player, any leverage you may have had is out the window.  You know that every other team in baseball knows who you have and they can be like sharks who smell blood in the water.   Even with your best poker face, the opposition knows if you are desperate or not.  Those friendly winter meetings in the sun belt and let me get this round suddenly have turned ice cold.  This is cold stone bottom line business and there are no prisoners.

Of course, everyone else has the benefit of hindsight which is always 20-20. If the deal turns bad, they would never have made it.  If the deal saves the season and gets you in the playoffs, anyone could have made such an obvious move.

It ain’t no fun when the rabbit’s got the gun.

What he did: This was originally going to be a column about Derek Jeter. I was sent a copy of Derek Jeter: From the pages of The New York Times some months back, and I figured a review might be salient now since Jeter just collected his 3,000th hit. But after my post this week on former stars who returned to the minors, someone posted Deadball Era great Crawford’s PCL stats here, and I was struck by the similarities. Crawford left the majors at 37 with 2,961 his and went to the Pacific Coast League where he proceeded to dominate. In the current era, it seems unlikely he’d fall short of 3,000 hits.

Era he might have thrived in: When Crawford fell off in the majors, he fell off badly, hitting .173 in limited duty his final season, 1917. Thus, he’d need a current team where he could have a cushy position. I’m thinking a chance to serve as designated hitter for a club on the West Coast might extend Crawford’s career a bit better than the rigors of Deadball Era Detroit.

Why: Crawford’s PCL totals hint at what might have been had he not been shown the door in the majors. After hitting .292 in limited duty his first year there, 1918, with the Los Angeles Angels, Crawford batted .337 over his next three seasons. He also had 131 doubles and 49 triples in that span, not bad for a man who was 41 when he bowed out in 1921. It goes without saying that between the majors and his four years in the Coast League at the end, Crawford collected 3,742 hits. That has to be good for something.

It’s hard to say what Crawford’s PCL numbers might translate to in the modern game, since opinions vary on how that circuit compared to the big leagues. At its height, the PCL was next-best thing to the majors, a warm-weathered wonder world where lesser stars could sometimes earn higher salaries since the season approached 200 games and hitting was valued over defensive ability. I don’t know if Crawford could hit .360 at 39 in the majors, as he did in the PCL in 1919. But it doesn’t seem inconceivable that Wahoo Sam might play something like Bobby Abreu on the Angels. It wouldn’t inspire any children’s stories, but it’d probably be more than enough for 3,000 hits.

Admittedly, in some ways, Crawford might have less of a legacy today, at least among baseball history fans. Wahoo Sam makes a memorable appearance in The Glory of their Times, as author Lawrence Ritter had to go to great lengths to track him down at his home in Baywood Park, California (I lived one town over from Baywood Park my sophomore year of college. It’s a nice place, close to the Pacific Ocean, but really out in the middle of nowhere.) The modern game might not feature Crawford pontificating about the likes of 19th century atheist agnostic  (thanks, Bob) Robert Ingersoll. Then again, perhaps Crawford would bring that to the ESPN. That would be interesting to watch. When’s the last time baseball had a humanist?

Any player/Any era is a Thursday feature here that looks at how a player might have done in an era besides his own.

Others in this series: Albert Pujols, Babe Ruth, Bad News Rockies, Barry Bonds, Billy Martin, Bob Caruthers, Bob Feller, Bob Watson, Bobby Veach, Carl Mays, Charles Victory Faust, Denny McLain, Dom DiMaggio, Eddie Lopat, Frank Howard, Fritz Maisel, Gavvy Cravath, George Case, George Weiss, Harmon Killebrew, Harry Walker, Home Run Baker, Honus Wagner, Ichiro Suzuki, Jack Clark, Jackie Robinson, Jimmy Wynn, Joe DiMaggio, Joe Posnanski, Johnny Antonelli, Johnny Frederick, Josh Hamilton, Ken Griffey Jr., Lefty Grove, Lefty O’Doul, Major League (1989 film), Matty Alou, Michael Jordan, Monte Irvin, Nate Colbert, Paul Derringer, Pete Rose, Prince Fielder, Ralph Kiner, Rick Ankiel, Rickey Henderson, Roberto Clemente, Rogers Hornsby, Sam Thompson, Sandy Koufax, Satchel Paige, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Stan Musial, Ted Williams, The Meusel Brothers, Ty Cobb, Wally Bunker, Willie Mays

After returning to the Yankees in 1953 after two years in the U.S. Army, Ford dominated the American League.

For more than a decade the 5’10” 180-lb lefthander controlled games by mixing up his outstanding change up, curve and effective fastball. Ford had one of the league’s best pickoff moves and he was an excellent fielder.

By the time he retired, Ford had become known as “The Chairman of the Board,” not to be confused with the other chairman from nearby Hoboken.

Ford’s most prominent statistics are his consistently low ERAs and high winning percentages. In 11 of 16 seasons, he was under a 3.00 ERA and his worst was 3.24. His .690 winning percentage, higher than the Yankees’ team percentage for the same period, ranks first among modern pitchers with 200 or more wins. He allowed an average of only 10.94 base runners per nine innings and posted 45 career shutouts, including eight 1-0 victories.

During Ford’s 18-year career with the Yankees, the only team he played for, the Bronx Bombers won 11 pennants. He ranks first all-time in World Series wins (10), games and games started (22), innings pitched and strikeouts. In the 1960, ’61 and ’62 Series, Ford pitched 33- 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings, breaking Babe Ruth’s record of 29- 2/3.

Ford, 82, is a Baseball Assistance Team advisory board member. BAT is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to helping former Major League, Minor League, and Negro League players with financial or medical difficulties.

______________

“Double the fun” is a Friday feature here that looks at one notable doubleheader in baseball history each week.

To say that my hometown of Pittsburgh is in the grips of Pirates mania is the understatement of the season.

All of a sudden, fans are coming out of the woodwork. The question on everyone’s lips: “How about those Buccos?” As of Wednesday morning, the Pirates are in first place ½ game ahead of the Milwaukee Brewers.

Eighteen years of sub .500 baseball will do that to long suffering Pirates fans. We knew we had finally made it when the word reached us that ESPN will televise the Monday night August 18 game against the Atlanta Braves. And rumor has it that the Pirates will also be ESPN’s Sunday night game August 21 against division rivals Cincinnati.

Sports Illustrated and the veritable New York Times will send reporters to PNC Park this Saturday to cover the Pirates-St. Louis Cardinals’ game that may have the division lead at stake.

Everything the Pirates have touched this year has turned to gold. Consider Mike “Fort” McKenry, the ninth starting catcher the Pirates have employed this year. Picked up from the Boston Red Sox AAA Pawtucket franchise, McKenry has been solid defensively and clutch at the plate.

Or how about Alex Presley called up from Indianapolis when regular left fielder Jose Tabata went on the disabled list? As of Tuesday, Presley is hitting .352 from the lead off position and supplying plenty of speed on the bases.

Then there’s shortstop Chase d’Arnaud replacing the injured Ronnie Cedeno. d’Arnaud, a Pepperdine University star, is an upgrade from the erratic Cedeno.

Jeff Karstens defines good pitching. He throws strikes (two of every three pitches), mixes his speeds, works fast (about eight seconds in between pitches) and to use the old adage in reference to Mike Mussina and Tom Glavine, “makes a living on the black.”

Chief Bender: The Hall of Fame pitcher had his last full season in the big leagues in 1917 at 33 but pitched off and on in the minors until 1937. He won 67 games his first three years in the bushes, and, still in his mid-30s at that point, had offers from the majors. Tom Swift, author of Chief Bender’s Burden, wrote that Bender wasn’t interested since his $8,500 salary with New Haven in 1921 was likely better than what he could make in the bigs. Swift wrote:

The minor leagues during Bender’s time were much different than the organized, affiliated leagues in the decades that followed. For the most part, they were independent, and rosters often contained players who were of Major League caliber–or at least once were. Players, especially those with name recognition, could make a decent living kicking around for five or ten years in places such as Richmond and Erie.

Joe McGinnity: Officially, McGinnity earned his nickname Iron Man working in a foundry. It could also refer to how he won over 200 games in the minors after leaving the majors in 1908 at 37. He pitched 15 years in the bush circuit in all and was active as late as 1925, four years before his death.

Rube Waddell: After drinking himself out of the big leagues in 1910, Waddell went 20-17 with a 2.79 ERA for Minneapolis in 1911, helping the team to an American Association championship. He contracted pneumonia while helping fight a flood in the offseason, which led to tuberculosis. Waddell managed a 12-6 mark against a 2.86 ERA for Minneapolis in 1912, slipped to 3-9 for Fargo-Moorhead in 1913, and died the next April. Prior to Waddell’s death, his manager from Minneapolis, Joe Cantillon paid his way to a sanitarium in San Antonio so he could be closer to his family.

Nap Lajoie: Lajoie spent 21 Hall of Fame seasons in the majors and last played in the show in 1916 two weeks shy of turning 42, outstanding longevity for his era. But he wasn’t done, becoming player-manager for Toronto of the International League in 1917 and hitting a circuit-best .380 with 221 hits. He bowed out the following year with Indianapolis in the American Association where he hit .282 in another player-manager gig.

Three Finger Brown: Brown won 20 games six straight years, Juan Marichal for an earlier generation. He last pitched for the Chicago Cubs in 1916 at 39, though he played another decade between the minors and exhibitions. In 1919, he was 16-6 with a 2.88 ERA for Terre Haute, his hometown, of the Illinois-Indiana-Iowa League.

Joe Jackson: Following his lifetime ban from organized baseball in 1921 for his alleged role in fixing the 1919 World Series, Shoeless Joe played outlaw ball under an assumed name for another two decades, mostly in Georgia and South Carolina. Photos from those days can be seen here.

Joe Gordon: A lot of ex-big leaguers opted to wind out their careers in the Pacific Coast League in the days before the majors came west. Gordon didn’t look like an old show horse out to pasture his first year in the PCL in 1951, when the former New York Yankees second baseman hit 43 home runs with 136 RBI for the Sacramento Solons. He declined dramatically the following year, and that was essentially the end of his playing days.

Luke Easter: Some sluggers might quit after being cut at 38. Easter was just getting started, heading to the minors where he hit 231 home runs over the next 11 years. He had his best years with Buffalo of the International League, hitting 113 bombs from 1956 to 1958. In ’57 at age 42, Easter had 40 home runs, led the league in RBI, and became the first man to clear the center field scoreboard at Buffalo’s home park.

Rickey Henderson: One of my favorite baseball stories in recent years was Henderson taking to ESPN in 2003 to ask for another shot in the big leagues. As he was in the midst of hitting .339 for Newark of the Atlantic League, Henderson got his chance, signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers. He didn’t do much for them, and that was the end of his big league career after 25 seasons. All the same, Henderson played another two years in the independent leagues and said in 2009 at 50 that he was interested in coming back.

Jose Canseco: As of Sunday, the 47-year-old former Bash Brother was hitting .233 with two home runs and 17 RBI as player-manager for the Yuma Scorpions of the North American Baseball League. It can’t be helping his preseason aspirations, shared via Twitter, of returning to the majors for the first time since 2001 and leading the American League in home runs.

I became a Pittsburgh Pirates fan five years ago after my beloved Montreal Expos were moved to Washington.  Logically I suppose, I should have become a Nationals fan but there was seemingly little connection between them and my Expos anymore at that point.  If I was going to pick a new team to cheer for it couldn’t be a successful one as that would be front running in my book.   In 2006, my daughter moved to a town a mere one and a half hours from Pittsburgh.  My decision was a perfect combination of family ties and a poor baseball team.  Pittsburgh also had the most beautiful ballpark anywhere and some of the better play by play announcers.  Hey, the more reasons the better no matter how frivolous.  I became a Pirates fan.

I have been able to watch most of their games since then and I have suffered a sort of designed resignation.  The Pirates were so inept that even when they were victorious, it looked painful and sloppy. Last season, the second half was a total disaster especially away from PNC Park.  I wasn’t foolish enough to believe the typical winter optimism and promises from Pirates management as to the prospects for the 2011 season.   Sure there had been some positive signs during the 2010 season as players such as Andrew McCutchen, Neil Walker, and Pedro Alvarez  looked like they might live up to the hype surrounding them.   There was still the problem of no starting pitching and a too many Triple A or bench players being used in the role of everyday players.  With no significant offseason changes, how were the Pirates going to improve for 2011?   The problem was, they probably weren’t.

All of the above brings me to this week’s topic.  Here were are in the middle of July, a mere days after the all star break and the Pittsburgh Pirates are in first or within a game.  They have a record going into today of 48-44 and sit one game back of the division lead.  They were tied for first yesterday.  They could once more be tied for first after today.  Until recently, Pittsburgh had seven players on the DL.  Some, such as Ryan Doumit and Pedro Alvarez, have been on the DL for weeks.  They have major holes at catcher, first base, shortstop, third and right field.   They have been winning with minor leaguers, a starting staff which has played well above their abilities and a lights out closer in Joel Hanrahan.  The Pirates have little or no power.  Most of the players on the DL aren’t going to help the team much anyway.

My only explanation is the ponderence of artificial parity.  There are simply too many mediocre teams in major league baseball this season and the proposed introduction of two more playoff teams only exasperates the problem.  I’m not picking on the Pirates but they have no business contending for a playoff spot this late into the season.  They simply have far too many holes.  There are too many teams with too many holes.  This can make for exciting regular season games of course but these teams will be only cannon fodder for teams such as Philadelphia, Boston and the New York Yankees come playoff time.

It’s wonderful for the fans and gives them hope as evidenced by the sellout crowds recently at PNC Park  but it’s all smoke and mirrors.  Should this be the goal of major league baseball, a National Hockey League type of regular season?

The owners love it and Fox Sports will love it as the money will come flowing in from more and more franchises.   I just don’t like to see it.

What he did: One of my favorite forgotten greats of yesteryear, Bobby Veach might have been a Hall of Famer in another era. In a 14-season career that spanned 1912 through 1925, Veach hit.310 lifetime with 2,063 hits, and he may be known most for being one of Ty Cobb’s supporting bats on the Detroit Tigers of the ’10s and early ’20s. Playing the majority of his best years in the Deadball Era, Veach hit just 64 home runs in his career, though his three American League RBI titles hint what he could have done in a time where home run hitters ruled baseball.

Era he might have thrived in: Veach was a diminutive left-handed batter standing just 5’11” at 160 pounds, though his SABR bio notes he “swung the bat like a powerful slugger, down at the end of the handle, and with similar results.” Mel Ott was a similarly built lefty, and like Ott, perhaps Veach could have excelled in a ballpark with a short right field fence during the offensive heyday of the 1930s. This leaves the Polo Grounds in New York or the Baker Bowl in Philadelphia. In either place, I’m guessing Veach’s career high of 16 home runs in 1921 might be double if not triple.

Why: Some eras and ballparks make Hall of Famers, others make it more difficult. Veach didn’t have an impossible task in his own time, as fellow Deadball outfielder Tris Speaker successfully transitioned to the Live Ball Era. And I suppose one could argue the best possible role for Veach was being Cobb’s teammate. Still, I can’t help but wonder how much better Veach’s stats would be if his career had started even 10 years later.

New York in the 1930s was a veritable factory of future Hall of Famers, both for the offensive juggernaut in the Polo Grounds and the fact that decades later, former Giant Frankie Frisch pushed for the enshrinement of many of his former teammates while he ran the Veterans Committee. The Baker Bowl meanwhile produced at least one player who wouldn’t have been a Hall of Famer elsewhere, Chuck Klein who hit .395 lifetime there and maybe .280 away. Then there’s Lefty O’Doul who doesn’t have a spot in Cooperstown but put up gaudy numbers in both parks (as well as another hitter’s cove, Ebbets Field) and almost hit .400 in Philly.

Granted, even with loftier statistics, I’ll concede Veach might have been operating with the same skill set. After all, looking at the numbers of the 1999 Colorado Rockies doesn’t lead me to believe Dante Bichette is anything more than a mediocre hitter with a dream job. A different era wouldn’t make Veach a better player, per se. But then the Veterans Committee has been notorious historically for not dealing in context, and sometimes, better stats regardless of their era have been enough for a plaque. It’s one reason guys like High Pockets Kelly are in Cooperstown and others like Bill Dahlen, another Deadball great, are not.

As it stands, Veach received exactly one vote in 1937, died in 1945, and I’m guessing that except among the baseball research community, he’s long since forgotten.

Any player/Any era is a Thursday feature here that looks at how a player might have done in an era besides his own.

Others in this series: Albert Pujols, Babe Ruth, Bad News Rockies, Barry Bonds, Billy Martin, Bob Caruthers, Bob Feller, Bob Watson, Carl Mays, Charles Victory Faust, Denny McLain, Dom DiMaggio, Eddie Lopat, Frank Howard, Fritz Maisel, Gavvy Cravath, George Case, George Weiss, Harmon Killebrew, Harry Walker, Home Run Baker, Honus Wagner, Ichiro Suzuki, Jack Clark, Jackie Robinson, Jimmy Wynn, Joe DiMaggio, Joe Posnanski, Johnny Antonelli, Johnny Frederick, Josh Hamilton, Ken Griffey Jr., Lefty Grove, Lefty O’Doul, Major League (1989 film), Matty Alou, Michael Jordan, Monte Irvin, Nate Colbert, Paul Derringer, Pete Rose, Prince Fielder, Ralph Kiner, Rick Ankiel, Rickey Henderson, Roberto Clemente, Rogers Hornsby, Sam Thompson, Sandy Koufax, Satchel Paige, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Stan Musial, Ted Williams, The Meusel Brothers, Ty Cobb, Wally Bunker, Willie Mays