Notes from the Shadows of Cooperstown
Observations From Outside the Lines |
Carney's newest book,
Burying the Black Sox: How
Baseball's Cover-up of the
1919 World Series Fix Almost Succeeded, will be available soon.
Pre-order your copy today.
Click to subscribe to 1919BlackSox Yahoo Discussion Group
NOTES FROM THE SHADOWS OF COOPERSTOWN
Observations from Outside the Lines
By Two Finger Carney (carneya6@borg.com)
#299 JULY 10, 2003
ALL-STAR READING
By that title, I mean -- of course -- that this issue will be one that you can print out and read during this midsummer's All Star Game, during pitching changes, or those agonizing long at bats when somebody insists on fouling off twenty pitches, instead of waving at one to end the inning -- which, in the end, he does. If you think the quality of the issue is All Star, too, great.
I'll tell you what's in here: (1) "More from Milwaukee" -- a fresh look at the possibility that Eddie Cicotte played the 1919 Worlds Series to win (after the first batter); (2) A review of a book written after Arnold Rothstein's death -- by his wife (yes, she was his wife in 1919); (3) A guest book review of Ed Linn's Hitter (Ted Williams), by David Nevard; (4) Another report on the coverage of the Milwaukee trial by Frank G. Menke (thanx to David Fletcher); (5) And finally, chapter six from Dear Patrick, one of the best books never published.
Before letting you get to all that, two things.
First, I want to reply (as I sometimes do) to an editorial. In this case, to one by Craig Muder, my local paper's (The Utica Observer Dispatch) sports editor: "To Survive, National Pastime Should Stray from Tradition."
Craig is, like me, a Pirate fan. But he's from Ohio. Recently, he drove to the Buckeye State to get together with family, then drove to Pittsburgh for a game between the Bucs and the Cleveland Indians. I once drove from Cleveland to Pittsburgh and back, for a ball game -- but it was a World Series game, not interleague plague. That's not a mis-spelling, I still feel that way. Sorry, Craig. I love the DH, so I'm not stuck on tradition. I was just never sold, by MLB, that fans "demanded" I.P. -- they rigged a few polls -- or that it was, in the end, fair.
Now it is true that the Pirates have not been in a pennant race since the advent of I.P. -- but if they were, and wound up losing the division by one game, and I noticed that the team ahead of them played and beat up on (for example) the current Mets while the Pirates played and were swept by (for example) the current Yankees -- I'd complain. And I still recall, fondly, the suspense of teams, almost strangers to each other, squaring off in October. I won't go on. I see Craig's point, and we do agree that the DH is a good idea, for both leagues.
The second thing is, don't forget to watch for the Buck Weaver Rally (formerly protest) which will take place at the All Star Game in Chicago, July 15 (Monday). David Fletcher has put in a lot of work on this project, and will be flying in two of Buck's nieces (77 & 89 respectively) for the event. For more information, check out www.safeworksillinois.com (click on the Buck Weaver icon).
Buck's case for reinstatement has always been stronger than Shoeless Joe's, simply because Buck did not accept any money. (A letter to the Chicago Tribune, 2/16/69, from G. R. McLaughlin, claimed that Buck received $3,000 under his pillow before the Series, but he took it to his manager, as he suspected it was a bribe. McLaughlin claimed to be a close acquaintance of Buck's. There is no corroboration of this story, to my knowledge.) Of course, Buck's crime of silence was not declared a crime until well after he "committed" it, by refusing to report to his team what he knew had been discussed. Whether he had certain knowledge of the Fix being in, and who was going to play crooked, is doubtful. That he played to win seems pretty plain.
Does his name deserve to be cleared? In my view, yes. His "crime" was such a venial sin, compared to, for example, the cover-ups that baseball owners and commissioners routinely pulled off, before and after October 1919. His punishment never fit his "crime," a year-long suspension would have been more like it. Had that happened, Buck Weaver might have gone ahead and earned a bronze placque in Cooperstown -- he was moving in that direction. That is not really the issue today, however. The Rally is simply the latest litmus test on how willing baseball is to admit its old mistakes and right old wrongs. And this clearing of Buck's name seems more important, to me, than tacking on that missing RBI to Hack Wilson's 1930 record.
MORE FROM MILWAUKEE
In 1932, the Yankees sent me to play for the Buffalo Bisons under Ray Schalk, the old White Sox catcher. He was a feisty little Dutchman and regaled us with stories of his eighteen years in the big leagues. He caught every game of the 1919 World Series for the so-called Black Sox against the Cincinnati Reds and was emphatic that Shoeless Joe Jackson and Ed Cicotte gave their best all the way. I always believed that as the catcher for the team, he was in a position to know.
-- Bill Werber, Memories of a Ballplayer, page 9
The first time I read the above words of the former third-sacker, I was very puzzled. First, by the fact that Ray Schalk, who said so little about the 1919 Series, said anything at all to the team he managed in 1932. And then by what he said -- Cicotte played to win? I have stretched things to make a case that even Chick Gandil might have played to win -- but Cicotte? Didn't he serve up the 9-1 opener loss, tipping off the gambling community of America along the way by plunking the leadoff batter? Didn't he single-handedly toss away Game Four, his two "errors" giving the Reds all they needed in their 2-0 win? And didn't Cicotte confess to the grand jury, and later admit he did wrong?
So I tracked down Bill Werber -- he is a spry 95, and loves to talk baseball. When we spoke (after an exchange of letters), he repeated the story above, almost verbatim. His memories seemed clear, but I was still shaking my head in disbelief.
Then came Milwaukee. Eddie Cicotte did not appear at the 1924 Milwaukee trial, Joe Jackson suing the White Sox for back pay (see Notes #298), but he was deposed, twice, and his unabridged deposition is one of the documents that accompany the 1,696 pages of trial transcripts. In his deposition, he was asked about his grand jury statements, made in 1920. Here are some of my notes on Eddie Cicotte's depositions. References such as "(MT 1287)" tell what page of the transcripts the statements appear.
1. Deposed with his lawyer, Cassidy present. Refused to answer.
2. Asked if he told the grand jury in 1920 that he met in conference with 8 men in mid-September 1919 in NY (the second day the team was in NY).
3. Asked if plot originated with Cicotte, Gandil & McMullin(!)
4. In grand jury testimony: roomed with Felsch.
5. Game 4: I tried to win (!) (MT 1287) Q: Why?
A: Well, because I didn't care whether or not I got shot out there the next minute. I was going to win the ball game and the series. I didn't care for the money after that. I lost too many friends there at base-ball, friends that look up to me, and everything depended on it and I couldn't stand it.
6. "If Chicago had scored more runs [the Sox lost 2-0], would you have given up more?" (MT 1288) A: No. I would have given back the $10,000 with interest if Sox won the Series. [Williams & Jackson both were asked that Q, and both said they would have kept the money.]
7. (MT 1360) Cicotte to grand jury: "Well, I went into the first game and tried to walk Roth [Rath], and I hit him.
8. (MT 1363) Q: "You wanted him to get on base?"
A: "Yes. But after he passed, after he was on there, I don't know, I guess I tried too hard. I didn't care, they could have had my heart and soul; that is the way I felt about it after I had taken that money. I guess everybody is not perfect." (MT 1363) [Emphasis mine]
Cicotte had taken $10,000 as his pay for tossing the Series, before Game One -- he was the only player to insist on payment in advance, as far as we know. Eddie Cicotte also has emerged to me as the player with the keenest conscience -- if he had not confessed, the grand jury might have stalled where it was stuck and handed up no indictments. With Eddie's statements confirming the fix, they had the evidence they needed.
Many writers and historians are quick to assume that Joe Jackson and Lefty Williams were coached by Comiskey's lawyer, Austrian, to help the grand jury out by giving them something they could use against the gamblers. But Austrian advised all three players to sign waivers of immunity -- why couldn't he have coached Cicotte as well to admit he did not play to win? Besides, all three players later repudiated their grand jury statements. Why assume Eddie was alone in giving a version that was strictly his, and strictly "the truth"?
Cicotte's 1924 deposition opens the door for an alternate explanation, one that Victor Luhrs believed when he wrote The Great Baseball Mystery in 1966, three years after Asinof's Eight Men Out. Luhrs believed that -- as Ray Schalk told young Billy Werber in 1932 -- Cicotte played to win. But "he was in such bad mental shape as a result of his involvement that he was hardly fit to pitch the opener."
Luhrs makes two interesting points. In Game One, it is true that Cicotte got shelled. But in the fatal fourth inning, when Eddie was KO'd, he made a dazzling defensive play (but Risberg cost him a double play); and then Eddie again seemed to get the third out, but Greasy Neale's pop fly to short was not held by Risberg. No error, but Eddie really had gotten his man.
Regarding his Game Four goofs, Luhrs thinks Eddie made a good play to stop Duncan's hot grounder, when he could easily have let it pass, and his wild throw was an honest mistake; "his deflection of Jackson's throw to Schalk [a few plays later] was simply too glaring to have been crooked." It truly stood out as the worst play of the Series; Luhrs might have been right.
Luhrs believes Cicotte lied to the grand jury; remember his comments above, in 1924, about worrying about being shot. He was caught in a real bind: having taken $10,000, by 1920 he knew that it was impossible to "give it back with interest" -- the thugs with whom he had bargained were not nice guys. Like Jackson, he may have told the grand jury, and reporters later, a version of things that was prepared for the eyes or ears of gamblers.
Do I believe Cicotte played to win? I'd like to. It makes some sense. The Cincinnati Reds thought he pitched to win, as did the umpires, as did -- according to Bill Werber -- Ray Schalk. He was guilty, of course, of conspiring to throw the Series; it may have been his idea in the first place, and most sources have him a ringleader, with Gandil. He was making half of what he should have been making.
And half of what he was making in 1920. Would Comiskey have doubled his salary if he thought Eddie lost two games on purpose? More likely, he'd have told Eddie to retire a little early, that he would not be welcome back, as I suspect he told Gandil -- with whom he spoke the day after the Series ended (MT 371).
Asinof has portrayed Cicotte as motivated to go crooked by Comiskey's cheapness, symbolized by his denial of giving Eddie the chance to win a bonus by racking up 30 wins in 1917 (the book) or 1919 (the movie). But Eddie had the shots at 30. However, maybe Eddie was recalling a different bonus denied in 1917. At the Milwaukee trial, there was testimony by players that Comiskey promised his team that they would see at least $5,000 if they won the Series. They did, but their shares were only around $3,600 or so. So some of them claimed they were owed $1,500 by the team. This detail was part of the Milwaukee trial, and even though Collins, Schalk and Faber sent depositions denying the bonus, the jury voted 11-1 that there was a promise made. (Curiously, however -- maybe because the thing seemed fuzzy at best -- they awarded Jackson no bonus, only his back pay -- before their verdict was set aside.)
The story above illustrates how the Milwaukee trial material sheds new light on the events of October 1919, while at the same time making things more complex than they already were.
Because I know you are curious now if Lefty Williams also claimed he was playing to win, here are some snippets to think about until I get around to doing Lefty justice with his own article. Again, these are from depositions (he was deposed twice before the 1924 trial).
Lefty was asked if he recalled telling the grand jury that when he gave Jackson the money, he said "The gamblers just called it off." ... "Did you do anything intentional to throw the games?" (2nd depos, MT 840) A: "I did not; I was a little nervous, naturally, and there was three bases made by the shortstop." Later: "Well, I might have pitched harder if I wanted to." ... (MT 844) Denied intentionally losing Game 5. "I pitched as hard as I ever pitched a ball game in my life." Q: "Were you nervous because this [the Fix] was on your mind?" A: Naturally it did. He was sorry, wanted to be "out of it and not mixed up in it at all."
It looks to me like the evidence against Williams is stacked too high. Again, using Ray Schalk as a barometer, the catcher blew up at Williams during and after his games. If Lefty finally agreed to try to win -- and he might have, in order to get sent out to the mound for Game Eight -- there is also evidence that his and/or his wife's life was threatened, if he tried to win. Thus Lefty Williams entered the record book at gunpoint -- he is one of just two pitchers to lose three games in a World Series. And the only starter. The other tri-loser was Yankee reliever George Frazier, in 1981. Think he was trying to win?
THE BIG BANKROLL'S WIFE TELLS ALL
According to David Pietrusza's "An Arnold Rothstein Chronology" (see www.davidpietrusza.com/Rothstein-Chronology.html), Arnold married Carolyn Green at Saratoga Spring in 1909. He immediately borrowed her jewelry and pawned it. It would not be the first time. When Arnold borrowed money, he always paid it back. That's the way he grew up -- stealing cash from his father, but always replacing it before it was discovered missing.
I read some of Leo Katcher's The Big Bankroll sometime last fall or winter. Here's some of what I wrote about that book:
In The Big Bankroll, Leo Katcher paints a vivid picture of life in [the] underworld, as he traces the life and times of Arnold Rothstein. Katcher points out that without Rothstein, the fixing of the 1919 Series never would have or could have happened -- whether A.R. was backing it or not. The word (from a fake telegram) that Rothstein was in on the fix was a guarantee that it would happen, and it also meant that probably no one would be punished. Why? Because Rothstein had great lawyers, and the means to pay off any number of law enforcement personnel or judges.
Katcher concludes, by the way, that Rothstein really did judge the Series as too risky to fix -- too many players involved, too many others knowing what was going down. But in the end, knowing what he knew, Rothstein made "about $350,000" on the fix, even though A.R. always maintained it was less than $100,000. He carefully made very public bets on the White Sox, too, so he was covered.
There is another book that has eluded me so far, which is sometimes mentioned in connection with the Big Fix -- In the Reign of Rothstein, by Donald Henderson Clarke. Clarke wrote the intro for a little gem called Now I'll Tell (Vanguard Press, 1934), written by someone pretty close to A.R. -- his wife of eighteen years, Carolyn.
When I e-mailed the Saratoga Public Library a while back, looking for more info on Rothstein and his Casino -- The Brook opened in 1919 -- they told me they had three items. Eight Men Out; Katcher's book; and five pages from Now I'll Tell, which they had in the mail faster than I could tell them that I located the book through my local library.
Naturally, when I opened Now I'll Tell I fast-forwarded to Carolyn's take on the Big Fix of the 1919 Series. But I wound up reading the whole book, all 255 pages, and enjoyed it all. Carolyn was apparently out of the loop in many areas -- she does not mention many of the murders in Pietrusza's chronology, for example, and really plays down his involvement with drugs -- selling them, that is. In fact, she glosses over his rap sheet, but the stories she chooses to tell are fascinating, telling much about America as the twenties roared.
Carolyn has much to say about "The Great Mouthpiece," lawyer Bill Fallon, too. But for the record, Fallon represented Abe Attell in September 1920, when he and Rothstein landed in Chicago to mesmerize the grand jury. (Rothstein's lawyer was Hyman Turchin, according to the Milwaukee Trial transcripts.) Fallon helped others of Arnold's friends, too, including John McGraw. Arnold lived on Broadway, loved New York City. Pietrusza has him being the "middleman" for Charles A. Stoneham when he purchased the NY Giants in January 1919; he was regularly seen in the owner's box at the Polo Grounds, until Judge Landis finally put an end to this public display of the happy marriage between baseball and gambling.
Regarding A.R. and the Fix, Carolyn believes that her husband's record "indicated the soundness of my belief that he never took part in any undertaking outside the law in which other persons were concerned."
If, however, it were charged that Arnold had been sounded out on the subject of bribing baseball players, that he had declined to have a part in the transaction, but had used his inside knowledge that they were going to be bribed to make winning bets, I would believe it. As a matter of fact, I do believe it. I might go further than that and say I know it, except that I was not present at any such meetings, of course.
While Arnold's grand jury testimony vanished -- along with anything else said by others that might have incriminated him -- Arnold did go on record in another trial, which had nothing to do with baseball. In October, 1923, he made a "famous appearance" in court, when hearings were being conducted in regard to the bankruptcy of E.M. Fuller Co., in June, 1922, which cost the public around four million dollars.
A.R.'s name appeared on the firm's books in many transactions, and so he was called to the witness stand. A partner of Fuller had testified that Fuller lost $331,000 of the firm's money, betting with Rothstein. William A. Chadbourne, a lawyer for the creditors, ambushed Rothstein by bombarding him while he had the chance, with questions about the fixed World Series.
"This baseball thing has been a sore spot in my career," said A.R., who felt he had been vindicated by the Cook County grand jury when they failed to indict him. Chadbourne asked Rothstein if he knew Abe Attell, Sport Sullivan (he did), and then if he spoke to Boston lawyer William J. Kelly about representing the two, and A.R., in Chicago (he denied doing this). Rothstein said he made one bet with Fuller on the fixed Series -- "and Fuller won that." Chadbourne was relentless -- Carolyn's account reads as if she has a copy of the transcript handy, and takes up fourteen pages in her book.
Rothstein dodged questions about Sleepy Bill Burns, meetings with Attell and Sullivan to plot the Series conspiracy, Charles Stoneham was suspected of being a "dummy" partner with Fuller, and A.R. judged that Chadbourne was out to embarrass both himself and Stoneham (who was fully exonerated in the case later). Chadbourne insisted that the White Sox players had been promised $100,000 -- $20,000 after each game they tossed -- but charged after game one that they had been double-crossed. Rothstein was accused of having Fallon steal the grand jury minutes.
This book swirls with chorus girls (Carolyn had been an actress when she met Arnold), religion, horse-racing, and all sorts of casino gambling. Carolyn seems to have been treated a little like Babe Ruth's roommates -- a lot of the time, she had the house to herself, as Arnold roamed the streets of New York, collecting on loans, picking up information, always working.
Again, scanning Pietrusza's chronology, one wishes that Carolyn had written more about some of Rothstein's other contemporaries, Meyer Lansky, Lucky Luciano, Legs Diamond, Frank Costello, or Little Augie Orgen. Or some of the projects he bankrolled (prize fights, maybe some baseball games in 1923 -- Collyer's Eye made that accusation, and paid for it -- Broadway plays, and a little rum-running). But Carolyn never promised to tell all there was to tell -- just all of what she knew, and only what she could safely say, six years after her husband was gunned down at the Park Central Hotel. He died the next day, without squealing about who pulled the trigger.
GUEST BOOK REVIEW: HITTER
Hitter: The Life and Turmoils of Ted Williams, By Ed Linn
(New York: Harcourt Brace & Company 1993)
Reviewed by David Nevard (2002)
Ed Linn is a well known sportswriter who has co-authored entertaining books with Bill Veeck (Veeck as in Wreck) and Leo Durocher (Nice Guys Finish Last). Hitter is a biography from the viewpoint of a hardened sportswriter who followed Teddy Ballgame's career with a mixture of awe and revulsion. Ed Linn wrote Williams profiles in Sport magazine for a decade. Glenn Stout, in TW: A Portrait in Words and Pictures, writes "While Williams disliked the magazine, and no appreciation for Linn's psychological interpretations, perhaps no other writer held Williams in such esteem."
In the Introduction to another Williams book (Cramer's TW: Seasons of the Kid), Daniel Okrent writes:
The most famous piece ever written about Ted Williams is certainly John Updike's "Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu." A less well known (but equally compelling) Williams piece was written about the same event, by the journalist Ed Linn for Sport magazine. What Updike saw from his seat in the stands was a proud warrior; what Linn saw, in the clubhouse before and after the game, was a bitter, vindictive man beset by unspeakable demons.
The chapter on Ted's farewell game is included here, where he tells Linn, "I felt nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing." Williams always felt a particular distaste for Sport, going back to 1948 when the magazine printed an interview with Ted's mother. So it's not surprising that Williams did not discuss warm and fuzzy feelings with Sport's Ed Linn in 1960.
Linn details some of Ted's battles with the Boston press. Harold Kaese of the Boston Transcript wrote in 1940 that Ted was killing the team in the field, that he was jealous of Jimmie Foxx, and condemned him for "extreme selfishness, egoism, and lack of courage. Whatever it is, it probably traces to his upbringing. Can you imagine a kid, a nice kid, with a nimble brain not visiting his father and mother all of last winter." Other papers jumped on the story. Linn writes, "It was on that day that the carnivorous Boston sports press was born." Williams was sensitive about his family. He'd grown up poor, his parents' marriage had broken up, and his brother was stealing things he'd bought for his mother. Ted was furious at journalists delving into his private life, and never forgave them. Later in the 1940 season he told Austen Lake of the American that he wanted to be traded. "I don't like the town. I don't like the people, and the newspapermen have been on my back all year."
Ted is quoted as listing the Big Five bad apples of the Boston press, "Bill Cunningham (Herald), Austen Lake, Dave Egan (Record), Harold Kaese, Joe Cashman (Record). No, take Cashman out of there." For those keeping score, Kaese moved to the Globe from the fading Transcript, and Egan worked for the Globe before the Record. Not mentioned in this tirade was Hy Hurwitz, another Globe scribe, who earned Ted's enmity over a 1957 story in which Ted, thinking he was off the record, was critical of the Marines, various politicians, and the IRS. Then there was Mel Webb of the Globe, a "grouchy old bastard" who reportedly cost Ted the MVP award in 1947 by leaving him completely off the ballot. Linn says that Webb even bragged about it to other writers, saying "I don't like the sonofabitch, and I'll never vote for him." [But according to Glenn Stout, Webb didn't have an MVP vote that year, and it was a Midwestern writer who left Ted off the ballot.]
Williams wasn't a smoker or a drinker, but this book leaves the strong impression he was surrounded by drunks. (Besides the sportswriters, I mean.) Joe Cronin couldn't discipline Jimmie Foxx because Foxx had been out drinking with owner Tom Yawkey. Tom would send heavy drinkers a bottle of Old Forester as a reward for an especially good performance. Manager Joe McCarthy "would disappear for days on end and be found in some seedy hotel lying in his own bodily wastes." McCarthy was replaced by Steve O'Neill, who was GM Cronin's drinking buddy. Bucky Harris, who followed Cronin as GM, was Yawkey's drinking buddy, "a falling down drunk." There is a comical story of Harris trying to fire manager Mike Higgins, both of them drunk in a Washington bar. Clubhouse man Johnny Orlando, Ted's protector and closest friend on the club, was fired for drunken misdeeds before Ted's final season.
Linn's book ends on a "hopeful" note: Ted Williams Day, May 12, 1991. This was when Ted's son John Henry came back into his life. John Henry, a senior at UMaine majoring in merchandising, formed a partnership with Brian Interland, called Grand Slam Marketing Inc. Linn quotes John Henry: "I want to take good care of Dad. I'm going to be watching him, making sure he's protected. He's too easy, too nice to everybody. I'm a buffer zone for him." The words sound eerie now. In the last phase of his life, Ted Williams became, to the outside world, more and more of a product, owned and aggressively marketed by his son.
* * * * *
MENKE RIDES WRITES AGAIN
In the last issue, Notes #298, I wrote about two articles by Frank G. Menke, written several months after the Milwaukee trial, for King Features Syndicate. The ones I read had appeared in The Sporting News in April 1924, billed as the first two in a four-part series. But I could not locate the other two.
Well, David Fletcher has tracked down one of them -- it was in The Sporting News, too, but the date is not known as I write this. The editor's note describes it as "the last of a series" without any reference to the articles which preceded it.
It appears that Menke's intention was to call attention to what had been suggested to the public when the scandal broke in 1920, bypassed when the players were put on trial in 1921, and then confirmed when Comiskey was deposed, then took the stand at the 1924 Milwaukee trial: he had engineered a cover-up, and it nearly worked. (The fact that Commy is in baseball's Hall of Fame is testimony that it did work, on at least one level.)
In this last article, Menke just ticks off point after point: Comiskey knew, two days after the 1919 Series ended, the names of seven players whose names were involved in the plot (McMullin's came to him later); he accused Gandil of being the ringleader, right after; he made no effort to obtain statements from any of the players, in October 1919, or later; he wrote to Jackson after the Series, mentioning his name was in the rumors, but never followed up on his invitation to Jackson to come to Chicago and clear things up; he saw Fullerton's "seven men will not return" article (October 10, 1919) but never discussed it with him (they met three weeks after the Series, about the same time Commy hired his crack detectives).
I will add here a note on Fullerton, whose Milwaukee testimony I read several times. He wrote his bombshell article from New York, December 19, 1919. Well, here are some of my notes:
3. Wrote to Commy 1/20/20 from NY. "Were you pursuing an investigation?" HF: No, was discouraged and quit on it. (MT1051) "Did Comiskey reply?" HF: Yes, and I started investigating again. Kept at it "Off and on for six or seven months" (MT 1052)
4. Did you write the 3 articles or any articles for the NY Evening World, stating that anyone interested in the [Fix] should find (Bill) Burns? HF: "No." But you mentioned Burns & others in the NYEW articles? HF: "Yes"
5, Did you consult with Comiskey before writing the 10/10/19 Herald & examiner article? (7 men out) "No, sir." (MT 1056) "I found gossip, not legal proof." (MT 1057)
12. HF gave his plan for a real investigation in his 12/19 article. Suggested Burns & others be interrogated by Judge Landis. "I urged the plan to appoint Landis at that time." He hoped Commy's investigators would follow up the leads.
NY EVE. WORLD "PLAN": HF exempts Commy from suspicion; suggests Landis interrogate Zork, Levi Bros, Eddie of Boston, Tim of des Moines, Attell, Burns, Pesch, Redmon. THEN, Monte Tennes of Chicago, and Rothstein. Commy's detectives, Gleason, Crusinberry, and Ed Wray of St Louis; HF himself [ask me, please!]; Schalk and Eddie Collins. [Commy never followed the plan; Ban Johnson did.]
13. Re the charges of 10/10 "7 will be missing", HF said "I wasn't convinced of it, no." You had no good foundation, only rumors? "Well, I considered it good enough to shoot at, yes." (MT 1091). "Good enough to make a good story for the newspapers, is that it?" HF: "Yes." (MT 1097) "I was convinced that they would not be there, guilty or not -- the talk was so strong that they would be out."
14. Cannon presses: If Burns had been taken to talk to Landis, "all of the facts" (the truth) would come out? "Yes" (MT 1097)
Menke's view is that the hiring of detectives by Comiskey, to "run down" the crookedness, was "merely a trick by which he could later show the public in case Ban Johnson's" investigation succeeded, that he, too, had tried to find out the truth. I believe Menke is relying here on lawyer Cannon's interpretation; I did not find Comiskey ever actually admitting that his detectives were for show.
What did come out at the Milwaukee trial about his investigation (by John R. Hunter, of "Hunter's Secret Services of Illinois" -- Austrian, Commy's lawyer, had used them many times before, but not for this sort of job) -- was that it was bogus. Hunter's full report, in a letter dated May 11, 1920, was virtually empty. What made this fact even more damaging to Comiskey, was that the letter contained Hunter's bill -- $3,820.71 -- not the $10-15,000 Commy had claimed to spend "running down" the truth.
Menke's article did contain a few glaring mistakes. Commy did not sign "ringleader" Gandil and permit him to play in 1920. He did send him a contract, but I am almost certain that that was for show, and that Commy and Chick agreed right after the Series that it was time to part company.
Menke also stated that the jury awarded Jackson the $1,500 bonus he claimed was his due in connection with a promise Commy made the team, for winning the 1917 World Series. In a pre-trial deposition, Commy had admitted knowledge of the bonus, according to Menke -- I did not read that full deposition. In any case, the jury believed Commy made and broke that promise, but did not award Jackson any money. The foreman explained that the case was strictly about breach of contract, and there was nothing in writing from 1917. The 11-1 vote for Jackson's credibility, versus Comiskey's and his secretary Grabiner's, is striking.
And that is about it. Menke's "expose" went mostly unnoticed. Nothing in Gropman, nothing in the best book I've seen that is all about the way the Fix was reported in history, Nathan's Saying It's So. Harold Seymour -- his notes directed me to Menke in the first place -- has Menke's name in his index, but not on page 309 of his text, were it is supposed to appear.
By the way, as sensational as Menke judged his articles to be, The Sporting News buried them amongst box scores and other features like "Caught on the Fly." This may indicate that TSN wanted to report baseball news, but not make it, and certainly it wanted the stench from the Big Fix to go away and stay away. The Milwaukee Trial, covered differently, spun differently, might have brought about a clamor for Comiskey's resignation. But Commy held on, through the new assault, and kept his franchise. It was tarnished, but still made a nice heirloom.
* * * * *
[In issue #294, I began running DEAR PATRICK: HOT STOVE DELIVERIES FROM A FATHER TO A SON, a book I started writing in 1989 and continued for a few years, till I set it aside. Some of DEAR PATRICK has found its way into NOTES before, but never the whole thing, beginning to end. Here is Chapter 6.]
CHAPTER 6
BROKEN HEARTS
December 18, 1989
Dear Patrick:
It's a special time of the year, this winter holiday time. No time to worry about the un-coming of baseball next April. Time for more warming memories and stories!
After the Pirates' giddy-heights second-place finish of '58, anything was possible. Such success permits optimism with real grounds, not just the fingers-crossed "we're going to do better" hoping. Surely 1959 would be the year that would see the Buccos end their thirty-one season long pennant-drought.
Over the winter, the Pirates had traded away their best power-hitter, Frank Thomas, a native Pittsburger who had smacked thirty homers and driven in over a hundred runs as a rookie, but in the five years since then had not developed into the Kiner that was needed. In return, from Cincinnati, they obtained third-sacker and ex-Marine Don Hoak; Smoky Burgess (a roundish but potent catcher that I was glad to see on our side -- I had seen him in action against the Bucs at Forbes on a day when the Reds were all fence-busting); and a left-handed pitcher, Harvey Haddix, who was known to be a Gold Glove fielder.
The burden to hit home runs now fell to a first-baseman named Dick Stuart. "Stu" was an endless source of controversy in our house. We all argued furiously over whether he was a huge plus or a huge minus for the team. I imagine that many families do it these days, over Darryl Strawberry and Jose Canseco.
Stu was often compared with another first-baseman, "Klu" -- likeable Ted Kluszewski, known for his power (three seasons with the Reds with over forty homers) and his bulging biceps that defied uniform sleeves. Klu was a Polish Canseco, without any of Jose's speed. Stu and Klu platooned in '58, and in '59, until Klu was sent to the White Sox. Another slugger packed off to Chicago! Then Stu competed with Rocky Nelson for our affection and loyalty. Rocky, besides having that superb nickname, had the appeal of the underdog, as he had starred in the minors but was in his seventh trial in the majors. He also had a batting stance that was eccentric and therefore fun to imitate.
The dinner table battle lines were clearly drawn, with my sister usually taking on my father, but I liked all of them, Stu and Klu and Don't Knock The Rock. (There was still another first-sacker, R.C. "Recking Crew" Stevens, in the minors. He had been my hero during April of 1958, when he got four hits in his first four major league at-bats: an Opening Day two-for-two after replacing Klu for defense, his second single beating the Braves in extras; a pinch HR a few days later; and the day after that, a second ninth-inning, game-winning HR -- I was there for that one, and can still see it clear the 406 mark at Forbes.) As the discussions carried on from day to day, week to week, as the season unwound, I could switch sides depending on who was going good. I wasn't fickle, I just platooned my allegiance.
Looking back, I can say that our dinnertime debates were wonderfully unencumbered by today's computerized statistics, that tell how each player does vs. right-handed and left-handed pitching, or at night, or with runners in scoring position, and so on. Box scores were simpler, and so was the daily listing of averages. So our hearts had to pay little heed to our heads -- and we loved it.
Yes, Stu hit tape-measure home runs. (It was a great image, men in white lab coats with clipboards, with a 500-foot long tape-measure, standing in a line from home plate to the point where the ball landed.)
Big Stu once poked one majestically over the batting cage in center at Forbes Field, something Kiner had never done, something no one had ever done before, except maybe Josh Gibson -- a black Babe Ruth who starred in Pittsburgh, playing in the old Negro Leagues. After that Stu dinger, it was hard to visit Forbes and keep your eyes from straying out to the 457 mark on the wall in center, hard to keep them from seeing an imaginary line traced by the ball that soared that distance.
But Stu struck out with alarming frequency. (But so did Ruth and Mantle, the argument went.) And everyone agreed on one thing: he was a terrible fielder, and truly deserved eventually winding up with one of baseball's most memorable nicknames, "Doctor Strangeglove" (after the popular movie of the mid-sixties, Dr. Strangelove). A Pirate first-baseman in the 70's, Al Oliver, was nicknamed "Scoops" -- Stu could've been "Oops!"
Stu had once hit sixty-six homers in a minor-league season -- so he was much ballyhooed as a rookie with Kiner potential. Well, Ralph broke in by leading the league seven straight years in homers; Stu led his first seven years, but in errors!
Stu had that quality that made ordinary partisans rabid. The crowd might sit quietly for a while, but when Stu was at bat, it was like Casey in Mudville. His errors and put-outs also drew extraordinary reactions. Stu was something.
When my father's birthday came around, I gave him three or four hurriedly-made cardboard "awards" -- one for being the biggest booster of Stu. My mother told me years later that my improvised gift (it no doubt included an award for being a great Dad) remained special to my father, and he saved it as long as he lived.
When my birthday came around, two months later, my father treated me to front-row box seats, ground level, for a Sunday double-header against the Phillies. During batting practice, I was able to snag a trophy, when a practice ball rolled our way, coming to a stop in front of our box -- not exactly as thrilling as catching a foul pop or a home run, but it made my day. And just like a broken-bat bloop hit during a game looks like a line drive in the box score, so would my ball command respect back in the neighborhood.
The next day, Dad and I showed up on the front sports page of the Press, in a picture showing the Phil third-baseman grabbing a pop-up near where we sat. I still have the clipping, but would remember the day without it. The souvenir ball is long gone, of course, sacrificed in its turn to the insatiable Lost Ball forest gods of the Tennis Court.
Stu's homers were not enough in '59. The Buccaneers finished eight games out of first again, but this time in fourth place -- they were going in the wrong direction! (Klu finished the year in the World Series with the Chisox.)
Another slugger that got our attention that summer, at least for a night, was Cleveland's Rocky Colavito. My family was in the "cellar" (our nickname for our basement game room) when news came in via the Pirate game that we were watching on TV, that Colavito had hit three home runs, and the game was still in progress. My father took this as a cue to start fiddling with our set to see if we could bring in Cleveland -- he loved that challenge. He must have sensed the chance to see history made. That night, he was successful, and we all watched and cheered the original Rocky IV. I'm sure that the reception was awful, fuzzy shades of gray, but my memory has fine-tuned the event so that today, I recall it in sharp colors.
The Pirates' season was not entirely without its moments, either. The Pirates' ace reliever ElRoy Face, had a winning streak of seventeen games, and twenty-some without a loss, counting a few from the end of '58, and finished the season at 18-1.
But baseball teaches us to be wary of measuring a person's
value strictly by the numbers. Because Roy Face had better seasons, with less impressive stats. Some of those wins were games where he was not effective in stopping the opponents from rallying to tie or go ahead. (He saved just ten games.) The Pirates just seemed to rally themselves when Fireman Face was in the game, and a phrase was coined to cover that: "the luck of ElRoy."
I think several of his games were salvaged by late-inning, heroic homers by Stu, who had twenty-seven that year, to Rocky Nelson's six.
By the way, Face threw a pitch that no one else seemed to be able to master, called a "fork-ball". Today, most people give him credit for being a pioneer of the "split-finger fast ball" that has been terrorizing batters over recent years. Kids all over Pittsburgh tried to throw fork-balls, but large hands were necessary. Try as I might, I could never throw that pitch with anything remotely close to speed or control.
One Pirate game stands out above all others from 1959, and for those who can recall it, it is simply referred to as "The Game." It was played in Milwaukee, on May 26, an ordinary Tuesday evening.
Charles Dickens would have described it as the best of games, and the worst of games. A TV promo might say it brimmed with the agony of victory and the thrill of defeat.
I started listening to The Game while I finished my homework. The Pirates faced Lew Burdette, the Braves' fidgety righty, who was off to a good start that year at 7-2. Burdette, known for throwing strikes and spitters, had been the Series MVP in 1957 with three wins over the Yankees, and he had come back and won twenty in '58. Now his Braves were in first place again, the Pirates in a third-place tie, three and a half back. The visitors got plenty of hits off Burdette that night. But they couldn't score. Chance after chance was missed. All night long, the Pirates were futile.
On the mound for the Bucs was Harvey "the Kitten" Haddix. (Why "Kitten"? Because he resembled a St Louis hurler of the '40s and early '50s nicknamed The Cat, Harry Brecheen.) As a rookie with the Cardinals seven seasons earlier, Haddix had won twenty with a 3.03 ERA -- which is good -- but he'd been sliding since then, and had bounced to the Phils, and then the Reds, before they let him go. He'd become about as average a pitcher as there was. Going into The Game, he was 3-2.
But on this night, facing the Braves' star-studded line-up, Haddix was anything but average. In their first thirty-seven games the Braves were batting .290 as a team, so maybe they were due to cool off some. But the Wisconsin nine was unable to get anyone on base. Don't jinx the pitcher, but HEY! -- Harvey had a perfect game going! Into the seventh inning, then the eighth, and then the ninth -- pressure a-building on every pitch, the crowd, with Haddix now, reacting to every swing. The Braves went down, one-two-three. Holding your breath? One-two-three. Now, in the ninth: One! Hang on.... Two!! One more ... one more .... THREE!!!
He did it! I didn't realize at the time how rare the feat was; I don't think anyone did. But here's how special it was: since the genesis of baseball records in 1876, no-hitters of nine or more innings happened less than once a year. Kind of makes you wonder about Nolan Ryan, doesn't it! Of all of the no-hitters before Haddix', just six were perfect games (no runners allowed on base) -- the last one in the National League was in 1880 -- a frequency of about four per league every century!
The tension was sweet and terrible. I remember a comic strip where Dagwood's wife Blondie strolls by while he's cemented to a baseball game on TV, and asks how it's going. He tells her there's a no-hitter in progress; she says something like, "Oh my -- what a dull game," and moves on. Of course, there is no such thing as a "dull game" for the initiated fan -- and the no-hitter is absolutely electrifying.
I was reluctantly in bed (school tomorrow) as the game went into extra innings. I believe there were five radios on in our house, all tuned to KDKA and Bob Prince -- one in my parents' bedroom; three in the attic, where Sue, Mick and I slept; and my grandmother Good's.
Grandma Good, known to everyone as G.G., grew up Nellie Ohlegher in Pittsburgh's Mount Washington area -- remember riding the Fort Duquesne Incline, a mountain-climbing trolley there a few visits back? Her interest in baseball peaked, I think, when a kid from the South Side named Bob Purkey made it to the majors as a pitcher with the Pirates in the mid-fifties. (Playing ball for the city where you grew up has to be having the best of all possible worlds!) Or maybe back in '09, when she was a teen on the verge of marriage, as Honus Wagner, the bow-legged Flying Dutchman, made all German-Americans like Geege proud by leading the Bucs to a flag and a World Series win over Ty Cobb's Tigers.
You bet her radio was on that night.
In one of the extra innings, Stu pinch-hit, and smashed one high and deep to center. Countless fingers all across Pittsburgh crossed in unison, I'm sure. But a strong wind was blowing in -- a storm had been threatening to happen since about the fifth inning -- and Stu's towering drive was caught at the wall. Rats!
There's something very unfair about having to take any no-hit game beyond the regulation nine innings, and something totally wrong about having to be perfect -- indefinitely -- in order to win. It does, of course, make history. Before Haddix, only ten pitchers ever had that opportunity; seven yielded a hit in inning number ten, one in the eleventh; twice, the opposition was held hitless for ten full innings. None were forced to pitch longer than ten.
The 33-year-old southpaw had been perfect longer than anybody had ever been before (or since) when he got the first batter out in the tenth. After retiring the leadoff hitter in the eleventh, he owned the longest no-hitter. Every next pitch defied the law of averages, of probability, and of logic.
Talk about 0-fers! The countdown was on. Thirty straight outs. After the eleventh, thirty-three. After twelve, the magic number was thirty-six and counting.
But Haddix and the Pirates had no win in sight. Lew Burdette was out number thirty-six -- he was not about to leave the game, and not giving an inch -- and he blanked the Pirates one more time in the top of the thirteenth. You just don't see many complete games any more, let alone an iron-man marathon duel; they were more common in the early years of this century. And the Pirates' "iron-man" (or better, Man of Steel) on this occasion stood five-feet-nine and weighed all of 155 pounds!
The first Brave up in the bottom of the inning smacked one to third base, and Don Hoak, normally a sure-handed guardian of the hot corner, fielded it cleanly -- then threw wild to first, an error. But despite the boot, the no-hitter was still intact.
(For just that moment, the Kitten shared something with his nick-namesake: Harry Brecheen came within one batter of a perfect game eleven years earlier -- and he lost it on a bouncer to third!)
The next batter, Eddie Mathews, a Hall of Fame long-distance slugger who came into the game leading the majors with fourteen homers, sacrifice-bunted successfully -- the Braves were playing for one run. Hank Aaron, the majors' leading hitter, was walked intentionally, setting up the double-play, with a slow Joe Adcock on deck. But Adcock didn't cooperate -- he hit a long drive to left-center, that just cleared the fence, despite the gusting wind. I was stunned -- in a moment, all was lost: the no-hitter, the game -- the season? That's just how it felt.
The
n confusion: Aaron apparently didn't see where the ball landed, and headed for the dugout after touching second base, thinking the game was over when the runner ahead of him scored. Adcock passed Aaron -- a no-no in baseball, nullifying the home run. My heart stopped. Would the run count? The hit? As the Milwaukee coaches directed the runners to retrace their steps, the umpires agreed that at least one run counted, and the Braves had won, so there was no joy in Pittsburgh that night.
I buried my face in my pillow, and cried.
Say it ain't so, Gunner.
The Post-Gazette sports page the next day was the front page. (The bold headline was something like "Haddix Retires 36, Loses 2-0" -- the score was adjusted to 1-0 later. The lone Braves' hit was ruled a double.) Harvey, talking to reporters after The Game, said nothing bitter, and nothing as extraordinary as what he had just done. Made a bad pitch to Adcock, maybe should've walked him, threw a high slider. Just another game, folks. And a loss -- not good for the club.
As luck would have it, someone from my father's company had been in Milwaukee and at The Game, that night. And he or she gave my father the ticket stub, for me. Needless to say, I kept it for many years, and it always reminded me that in a sense, I had been at that game, too. I didn't just listen to the radio.
I'd had a taste of baseball's capacity for taking its fans on emotional roller-coaster rides, building up hopes, then dashing them away, over and again, and all in a single game!
Which was over, by the way, in less than three hours!
Not every game is so tense, of course -- who could stand it, if they were! Of all the games before or since, Harvey alone was perfect for more than nine innings. Harvey alone held the enemy batters hitless for more than ten. Just once in the history of baseball. Like a visit from Halley's Comet, but with the next appearance in doubt.
My family was among a huge turnout at Forbes Field when Haddix next pitched, against St. Louis. There was a ceremony before the game, and a special trophy was presented to the fellow from a farm town in neighboring Ohio -- a sterling silver tea service, I think, with twelve goblets, one for each perfect inning. The first Cardinal hitter singled, but Harvey pitched a complete game 3-0 victory. We fans had turned out to say Thank You for an unforgettable experience. Harvey said, You're Welcome, by pitching with all his heart, which must have been more broken than anyone else's.
"Winning is better than losing" was the quote next morning. Haddix finished the season with twelve wins and twelve losses, as average as ever, and never won that many again. The Pirates were shut out in four of his losses.
Lew Burdette won 21 games as the Braves finished in a tie for first, then lost to the Dodgers in a playoff series. The next season, he came within a pitch of throwing a perfect game himself, his no-hitter marred by just one hit batsman.
Every year since 1959, when May 26 has rolled around, I've remembered Harvey's game, and I guess that I always will. Let's hope I do the same with my wedding anniversary, which is two days later! (May 28 is also memorable as the date of Dale Long's record-setting homer in '56 -- but don't tell your mother that!)
As I think back now to The Game, I wonder if it would be quite so memorable, had Haddix been absolutely perfect that night? If he'd have pitched twelve or thirteen flawless innings, and won? I remember my tears, and my grudging acceptance of the cruelty of fate. Would the ecstasy of a win have given me a memory as powerful, or as rich to ponder? Somehow, I doubt it.