Yankee4Life

Carl Mays Carl Mays is best remembered for throwing the pitch that led to the death of Cleveland shortstop Ray Chapman in August of 1920. But he also had a career record of 207-126 and a 2.92 ERA over fifteen seasons, and remains one of the best pitchers not honored in the Hall of Fame. Throwing with a submarine motion so pronounced that he sometimes scraped his knuckles on the ground while delivering the ball, Mays looked “like a cross between an octopus and a bowler,” Baseball Magazine observed in 1918. “He shoots the ball in at the batter at such unexpected angles that his delivery is hard to find, generally, until along about 5 o’clock, when the hitters get accustomed to it — and when the game is about over.” Perhaps the most disliked player of his era, Mays was once described by F.C. Lane as “a strange, cynical figure” who “aroused more ill will, more positive resentment than any other ballplayer on record.” A noted headhunter even before the Chapman beaning, Mays refused to apologize for how he pitched. “Any pitcher who permits a hitter to dig in on him is asking for trouble,” he once said. “I never deliberately tried to hit anyone in my life. I throw close just to keep the hitters loose up there.” One teammate said Mays had the disposition of a man with a permanent toothache. Throughout his professional career, Mays had trouble making friends — even on his own teams. “When I first broke into baseball, I discovered that there seemed to be a feeling against me, even from the players on own team,” Mays said after a few years in the big leagues. “I always have wondered why I have encountered this antipathy from so many people wherever I have been. And I have never been able to explain it, even to myself.” In 1912, Mays signed with Boise, Idaho, in the Class D Western Tri-State League, for $90 a month; he finished the season 22-9 with a 2.08 ERA. He played the next season in Portland, Oregon, and in 1914 was drafted by the Providence Grays, a team the Detroit Tigers owned in the International League. During his stay with Providence, the Grays were sold to Red Sox owner Joe Lannin. Mays’s 24 victories led Providence to the 1914 IL pennant; in the final month of the season, he was ably assisted by Babe Ruth, who had made his debut in Boston that summer. The two young men were called up for the final week of the Red Sox’s season, but Mays did not appear in any games. Mays joined the Red Sox staff in 1915 and made his debut on April 15. During the Red Sox’s pennant-winning season, he was used mostly in relief, appearing in 38 games. He went 6-5, with a 2.60 ERA, and (though the statistic hadn’t been invented yet) led the league with seven saves. He did not appear in the World Series. Mays’s abrasive personality grated on opponents. In his rookie season, Mays often sparred with Detroit’s cantankerous outfielder Ty Cobb. In one game, after Mays threw high and inside on Cobb, the Tiger laid down a bunt along the first base line for the sole purpose of spiking Mays and cutting his leg. Though bitter rivals — the Red Sox and Tigers battled for the American League pennant that season — the men held a grudging respect for each other’s single-minded pursuit of victory. In 1916, Mays split his time between the rotation (24 starts) and bullpen (20 other appearances), winning 18 games and posting a 2.39 ERA. In that fall’s World Series against Brooklyn, Mays recorded a save in Game One — bailing out Ernie Shore by recording the final out with the bases loaded and the tying run on third — and was the losing pitcher in Game Three, the Red Sox’s only loss in the series. In 1917, Mays became a star. His 1.74 ERA was the third-lowest in the major leagues, and he ranked among the top five in the American League in fewest walks and hits allowed per nine innings, and lowest opponents’ batting average and on-base percentage. But Mays also hit a league-high 14 batters and earned a reputation as a headhunter that dogged him for the rest of his life. “Mays is a low-ball pitcher,” one opponent noted. “How does it happen that when he puts a ball on the inside it generally comes near the batter’s head?” Mays would often berate his fielders for making errors behind him. “I have been told I lack tact, which is probably true,” he said. “But that is no crime.” Late in his career, Mays praised another pitcher: “This fellow has no friends and doesn’t want any friends. That’s why he’s a great pitcher.” He could have easily been talking about himself. Yankees infielder Roger Peckinpaugh said Mays threw “ a very ‘heavy’ ball. It sinks and when you catch it, it feels heavy enough to almost go through your glove.” Horace Ford, who batted against Mays in the National League, said that hitting Mays’s fastball “was like hitting a chuck of lead. It would go clunk and you’d beat it into the ground.” Mays got an incredible amount of outs via ground balls, especially with the Red Sox. From 1916-18, he recorded 117, 118 and 122 assists, which remain the top three season totals in Red Sox history. In 1918, Mays, then 26 years old, was the ace of the Boston staff, winning 21 games with a 2.21 ERA. He tied Walter Johnson for the league lead with eight shutouts and tied Scott Perry for the lead with 30 complete games. He finished fifth in strikeouts and fifth in fewest hits allowed per nine innings. He also hit 11 batters, the second-highest total in the league. But things went downhill for Mays in 1919. While he was at spring training, his farm house in Missouri burned to the ground; he suspected arson. During a Decoration Day series in Philadelphia, when Athletics fans were pounding on the roof of the visitors’ dugout, Mays threw a baseball into the stands, hitting a fan in the head. He also ran into a lengthy streak of bad luck on the mound, as the slumping Red Sox gave him almost no run support. Over a 15-day period in June, Mays lost three games by a combined score of 8-0. The last straw came on July 13, during a game against the White Sox. When Eddie Collins tried to steal second base, catcher Wally Schang’s throw hit Mays in the head. At the end of the inning, the pitcher stormed off the mound, left the team and headed back to Boston. Mays told sportswriter Burt Whitman that he needed to make a fresh start with another team. “I’m convinced that it will be impossible for me to preserve my confidence in myself as a ballplayer and stay with the Red Sox as the team is now handled,” he said. “The entire team is up in the air and things have gone from bad to worse. The team cannot win with me pitching so I am getting out. … Maybe there will be a trade or a sale of my services. I do not care where I go.” On July 30, the Red Sox traded Mays to the New York Yankees for Allan Russell, Bob McGraw, and $40,000 in cash. A fierce legal battle ensued, as enraged American League president Ban Johnson attempted to block the trade. Several days before Mays was dealt, Johnson had privately suspended Mays and issued a secret order to all eight American League clubs prohibiting them from acquiring the pitcher until his suspension had been served. Johnson feared that Mays’s actions could set a bad precedent for the league, by giving players the power to subvert the reserve clause and force trades simply by refusing to play for their clubs. “Baseball cannot tolerate such a breach of discipline,” Johnson said of Mays’s abandonment of the Red Sox. “It was up to the owners of the Boston club to suspend Carl Mays for breaking his contract and when they failed to do so, it is my duty as head of the American League to act.” The league’s owners fractured over the matter, with five franchises (Cleveland, Detroit, Washington, St. Louis and Philadelphia) siding with Johnson, while three (New York, Chicago and Boston) defied him. Because the three “Insurrectionist” clubs held control over the league’s five-man board of directors, Johnson was forced to back down from his stance on the issue, particularly after the three clubs began holding meetings with the National League to discuss the formation of a new 12-team circuit. Mays reported to New York, and the incident marked the first time in his long tenure as AL president that Ban Johnson had been outmaneuvered on a major issue. On August 16, 1920 — a dark, overcast day at the Polo Grounds — Mays hit Indians shortstop Ray Chapman in the temple with an inside fastball leading off the fifth inning. A loud crack resounded through the stadium, and Mays, thinking the pitch had hit Chapman’s bat, fielded the ball and threw it to first base. Chapman was helped off the field, but collapsed in the clubhouse; after a late-night operation on his fractured skull, he died early the following morning. As Chapman staggered off the field, Mays pointed out to the umpires a scuff mark on the baseball which he claimed had caused the pitch to sail inside. Later that day, Mays would also claim the ball was wet from the rain that had fallen earlier. A few hours after Mays was informed of Chapman’s death, he told a Manhattan District Attorney: “It was a little too close, and I saw Chapman duck his head in an effort to get out of the path of the ball. He was too late, however, and a second later he fell to the grounds. It was the most regrettable incident of my career, and I would give anything if I could undo what has happened.” Almost all other witnesses to the incident, however, reported that Chapman never moved an inch and probably never saw the ball. Sorrow over Chapman quickly turned to anger against Mays. Several teams, including the Red Sox, Tigers and Browns, sent petitions to league president Ban Johnson, demanding Mays be thrown out of baseball. Mays spent a week in seclusion, then returned to the mound on August 23. Yankee fans were supportive — a clearly nervous Mays defeated Detroit 10-0 at the Polo Grounds — but there was an increase in calls for a boycott of any game pitched by Mays. He made three starts in New York before his first appearance on the road, on September 3, in a relief stint at Fenway Park. He was greeted with a mixture of boos and cheers, but by the time he had pitched the second game of a doubleheader the following day, most of the crowd was on his side. He decided, however, to not accompany the Yankees on a road trip to Cleveland later that week. In the 1921 World Series against the Giants, Mays pitched three complete games without allowing a walk, but he was charged with two losses as the Yankees lost the series. According to sportswriter Fred Lieb, there were suspicions Mays may have lost those two games on purpose. In The Pitch That Killed, Mike Sowell details the concern among several writers and Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis after Mays’s meltdown in Game Four. Sowell also quotes Yankees co-owner Cap Huston as saying many years later that Mays and others (possibly Joe Bush) had deliberately lost World Series games in both 1921 and 1922. Lieb believed the unanswered questions about those series were what really kept Mays out of the Hall of Fame. The rumors also were a likely reason that, despite Mays’s 66 wins in three years, the Yankees tried to dump him before the 1923 season. That didn’t work, so manager Miller Huggins simply refused to use him. Mays appeared in only 23 games for the Yankees in 1923, and at the end of the season was sold to Cincinnati. He pitched for the Reds for five years — rebounding to a 20-9 record in 1924 — and ended his career in 1929 with the New York Giants. In a fifteen-year career with the Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Cincinnati Reds, and New York Giants, Mays compiled a 207–126 record with 29 shutouts, 862 strikeouts and a 2.92 earned run average when the league average was 3.48. He won twenty or more games five times.

9 out of 10, 79 seconds. Should have been ten.

4 out of 10, 50 seconds. One baseball question, one obvious answer and two guesses.

4 out of 10, 70 seconds. I got slammed today.

6 out of 10, 83 seconds. Thank God for those baseball questions.

6 out of 10, 62 seconds. I missed four in a row and then got the last three right.

10 out of 10, 50 seconds. When it says easy baseball questions I tend to do ok. Just watch what tomorrow brings me.😲

9 out of 10, 70 seconds. I'll take it. Tough questions.

10 out of 10, 43 seconds. This one was an easy one today.

4 out of 10, 41 seconds. Everyone is going to beat this! 😀

6 out of 10, 64 seconds. Considering the questions I did ok.

6 out of 10, 50 seconds. Thankfully they threw in some baseball questions this time.

6 out of 10, 66 seconds. i can't seem to string together two good days in a row.

10 out of 10, 46 seconds. A nice comeback.

3 out of 10, 85 seconds. Embarrassing! they had my number today.

Tony Lazzeri Day after day at Salt Lake City, Utah in 1925, Bill Essick, a scout for the New York Yankees, watched a young infielder named Tony Lazzeri. Essick reported to Ed Barrow, the Yankees’ business manager (general manager) that Lazzeri was hitting the ball exceptionally well, batting .355 and hitting 60 home runs. “But the air is thin out there,” Barrow told Essick. “The air may be thin but this player is solid,” Essick responded. Scouts from all the major leagues were watching Lazzeri. Most also felt that the altitude in Salt Lake City helped Lazzeri’s batting average. They were wary of signing him, knowing other recent players with impressive numbers playing in that altitude had not succeeded. But there was another reason the scouts shied away: Lazzeri was an epileptic. But this was in Lazzeri’s future. In 1922, 18-year-old Tony Lazzeri joined Salt Lake City as a utility infielder, playing third and first. He was paid $250 a month. Lazzeri, who threw right-handed and batted from the right side, had difficulty hitting a curve ball and started his professional career poorly, hitting only .192 in 45 games. In 1923 Lazzeri was sent to Peoria, Illinois, of the Three-I League for more experience. He had a good first month but was then benched while the manager tried out two other players at second. Lazzeri sat on the bench for three weeks until he was called on to pinch hit in the ninth inning of a game against Terre Haute. With two men on the bases and two runs behind, Lazzeri hit a home run that won the game. After that big hit, he became the regular second baseman on the club, playing in 135 games, hitting 14 home runs, and batting .248. Lazzeri rejoined Salt Lake City that fall. Returning to Salt Lake City in 1925, Lazzeri got his first real chance under the team’s new manager, Oscar Vitt. Lazzeri had a sensational season playing in 192 games (in those days the PCL played a 197-game schedule). He batted .355 with 252 hits, 52 doubles, 14 triples, 222 RBIs, and 60 home runs, the most ever hit in professional baseball. Lazzeri also scored 202 runs and stole 39 bases. The New York Yankees took an interest in the young slugger. At that time the Salt Lake City club had a working arrangement with the Chicago Cubs. Knowing that Lazzeri had epileptic episodes off the field, the Cubs were afraid to buy him. The Cincinnati Reds also passed him up, and Garry Hermann, owner of the Reds, wrote to Yankee owner Jacob Ruppert and told him why his club had not bought Lazzeri. Ed Barrow sent Ed Holly, another scout, to Salt Lake City to look at Lazzeri. Holly reported he was sensational. He also confirmed reports about Lazzeri’s medical disorder. Wanting to know more, Holly went on to San Francisco and looked into Lazzeri’s family history. Barrow, meanwhile, sent head scout Paul Krichell to Salt Lake City to watch Lazzeri. He also asked Bob Connery, president of the St. Paul Baseball Club of the American Association to see Lazzeri play. Barrow received good reports. Holly found that no other members of his family were affected and that Lazzeri’s insurance company was willing to increase his policy. Connery reported that Lazzeri was great. Krichell also told Barrow that the stories about Lazzeri’s episodes, or fits as they were known, occurred only off the field. “As long as he doesn’t take fits between three and six in the afternoon, that’s good enough for me,” said Barrow. As it turned out, Lazzeri’s epilepsy never affected him on the playing field. The public never knew he had the disorder. Ed Barrow purchased Lazzeri’s contract from Salt Lake City in the fall of 1925 for players Frank Zoeller and Mack Hillis and $50,000, a considerable amount of money at that time. Subsequently, Lazzeri signed a contract with the Yankees for $5,000 on March 30, 1926, and reported to Spring Training at St. Petersburg, Florida. Lazzeri was 22 years old. Although Lazzeri played shortstop at Salt Lake City, Yankee manager Miller Huggins wanted him at second base. Huggins worked with him on switching positions and taught him to make the double play. Meanwhile, Huggins played another highly prized rookie, Mark Koenig, at short. With two rookies in the infield, the sportswriters felt that the Yankees could not contend for the pennant in 1926. They predicted that the team would finish the season in the second division for the second straight year. But Koenig and Lazzeri played well together in the field and helped the Yankees win the pennant that season. Lazzeri played in all 155 games in 1926, hitting .275, with 162 hits, 28 doubles, 14 triples, 18 home runs, and 114 runs batted in. Lazzeri’s home run total (18) was third in the league behind Babe Ruth (47) and Al Simmons of the Athletics (19). Lazzeri’s runs-batted-in mark (114) tied George Burns of the Indians for second place behind Ruth (146). As a rookie, he also stole 16 bases, sixth best in the league. The Strikeout: The 1926 World Series saw the Yankees play the St. Louis Cardinals. With the series tied at two games apiece, Herb Pennock and Bill Sherdel found themselves in a mound duel in St. Louis. With the score tied at two in the tenth, Lazzeri’s sacrifice fly gave the Yankees a 3 to 2 lead, which Pennock held in the bottom of the tenth. The victory gave the Yankees a 3 to 2 lead in the series. After returning to New York for Game Six, Grover Cleveland Alexander won his second game and tied the series at three games apiece, setting the stage for the seventh and final game. The Cardinals led by a score of 3 to 2 in the seventh inning of the deciding game of the ’26 World Series. In the home half of that frame, however, the Yankees loaded the bases against St. Louis starter Jesse Haines. The knuckle-balling Haines, whose 13-4 win-loss record helped the Cards capture their first franchise pennant, had already shut out the Yanks in Game Three of the Series; that would not happen again to the Yankees for sixteen years. What happened next is the stuff of history, legend, folklore, and fake lore. Cardinal second baseman-manager Rogers Hornsby, after a long conference with Haines and his infielders, summoned Grover Cleveland Alexander from the bullpen. Alex had beaten the Yankees the day before to even up the Series and had celebrated afterward. Depending on the account one chooses to believe, Alexander had been dozing or fast asleep in the bullpen, was still drunk or hung over or stone cold sober. Whatever his physical and mental state, Alexander had nowhere to put Lazzeri when he got down to business. Lazzeri took the first two pitches, a ball followed by a strike. He teed off on the third pitch and sent a shot down the left field line into the seats — ten feet foul. Alex followed up with one of his infamous low-and-away curves. Lazzeri swung and missed by at least eight inches. Alexander stopped the Yankees in the eighth, surrendered a two-out walk to Babe Ruth in the ninth. Ruth ended the Series being thrown out trying to steal second, and the legend was born. Nineteen twenty-seven was a historic year for the Yankees. Known as Murderers’ Row, the ’27 Yankees became a legend. Paced by the long-ball heroics of Ruth (60 home runs, 164 RBIs, .356 batting average) and Gehrig (47 home runs, 175 RBIs, .373), the Yankees won 110 and lost 44, winning the American League pennant by 19 games. Recovering from the Series to have an outstanding season, Lazzeri was a major contributor on that historic club with 18 home runs (third in the American League behind Ruth and Gehrig), 102 RBIs, and a batting average of .309. He was also the anchor of the infield. In addition to playing second base, Lazzeri also filled in at shortstop and third base due to the occasional injuries to Joe Dugan and Mark Koenig. Popular with his teammates and respected by his opponents, Lazzeri was a leader, cool under pressure, quick thinking, and considered by many as one of the smartest men in the game. Even Miller Huggins acknowledged him to be the brains of the Yankee infield. Lazzeri took charge when events called for steady nerves. Lazzeri was an excellent fielder, and for a smaller man compared to the likes of Ruth, Gehrig, and Meusel, he could hit the ball exceptionally far. He also had the knack of hitting with men on base, becoming one of the best “clutch” hitters in baseball. Beloved by the Italian community, the New York Times even compared him to Christopher Columbus at a time when Lazzeri was playing shortstop. “He didn’t discover America,” wrote the Times, “but Columbus never went behind third for an overthrow to cut-off the tying run in the ninth inning.” Lazzeri played second base for the Yankees through 1937. He batted a career-high .354 in 1929 and hit two home runs in the 1932 World Series, one a grand slam. (In 1932, the Baseball Writers Association named him the best second baseman in the game.) The next year, Lazzeri played in the first All-Star Game. On May 24, 1936, Lazzeri set an American League single-game record with eleven RBIs by hitting a triple and three home runs (two of the home runs were with the bases filled) in Shibe Park. That same month, he set records for most home runs in three consecutive games (6) and four consecutive games (7). After his conditional release by the Yankees on October 17, 1937, Lazzeri signed with the Chicago Cubs as a player-coach. Lazzeri played for the Chicago Cubs in 1938 and appeared in the fall classic against the Yankees. He finished his major league career with the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants in 1939. Despite an outstanding career with the Yankees, the strikeout against Alexander in the 1926 World Series was never to be forgotten. Baseball fans talked about it for years. Lazzeri was always reminded of it. While Lazzeri was still an active ballplayer, Grover Cleveland Alexander went into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1938. His plaque read: He won the 1926 world championship for the Cardinals by striking out Lazzeri with the bases full in the final crisis. For his part, Lazzeri had the distinction of being the only player to have his name on a bronze plaque while not being a member of the Hall of Fame. A look back at his career with the Yankees showed that Tony Lazzeri helped the Yankees capture six American League pennants and five World Championships. During his twelve years with the Yankees, Lazzeri batted .293 with 1784 hits, 327 doubles, 115 triples, 169 home runs, and 1157 RBIs.

10 out of 10, 60 seconds. Can't get too excited because these were easy ones today.

8 out of 10, 39 seconds. Decent ones today and I agree with Laroquece - soccer is not my thing and never will be.

6 out of 10, 72 seconds. I guessed on a few.

4 out of 10, 57 seconds. Guessing blind today and it showed!

4 out of 10, 74 seconds. Oh what a day. I usually do good on difficult baseball questions but not today.

10 out of 10, 43 seconds. With these questions everyone should do very well today just like Laroquece and myself.