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Originally Posted by Exhibitman
So much rancor and misinformation too.
Would Koufax be revered as much for not pitching game 7 rather than game 1? The question misses the point. Koufax's stance on pitching wasn't situational, it was ethical. Which game he had to sit wouldn't have mattered once the ethical commitment to honor the holiday was made. Hank Greenberg dealt with the same thing a generation earlier.
As for naming stuff, well, Jewish tradition is not to name children after living people. That's why we don't 'do' Sr., Jr., III, etc. Naming stuff after living people is also a bit uncomfortable in traditional life.
As far as Clemente goes, the Dodgers did not purposely get rid of him. Their front office screwed up: Clemente was signed to a bonus contract that required him to be on the roster but the team sent him down to Montreal anyway to hide him, which exposed him to the draft and enabled the Pirates to snag him. The Pirates scouted him and decided to make him the first round pick in 1955.
The story about Jackie Robinson making roster decisions on Clemente is probably apocryphal. First of all, the starting line-up in the outfield for the Dodgers in 1954 was Robinson (LF), Snider (CF) and Furillo (RF). They didn't need Clemente. Where was Clemente going to play? Gilliam (another black guy) had displaced Robinson from 2nd to left. Was the team going to stick a rookie with no experience into center for Snider? Hardly. Furillo? Besides having a rifle arm, Furillo had just led the league in batting in 1953. He wasn't going anywhere either.
But let's delve deeper into the Dodgers racial composition and roster moves. Suggesting that the Dodgers got rid of Clemente to keep a white guy implies that the other outfield roster spots were reserved for white guys, which is not true. In 1954 the Dodgers called up Sandy Amoros as a backup outfielder: black, Cuban Sandy Amoros. Who'd been up briefly in 1952 and was a known commodity at Montreal. To suggest that the team that broke the race barrier and that actively sought out black talent would then decide to suppress that talent for racial reasons, then call up another black guy a few months later, is a fanciful suggestion. Race may have been a consideration as it usually was in any American decision in the era but it wasn't the overriding decision in Dodgers roster moves, as is obvious from the actual roster moves. The more likely explanation is the one that Clyde Sukeforth offered to historians: the team signed Clemente because he had such great potential, then tried to bury him in Montreal to get around the bonus rule and lost him.
Now, back to Koufax. The Dodgers had a better line-up on paper than the Yankees, except for one thing: pitching. It was pitching that had beaten the Dodgers every Series. The Yankees had the arms. Koufax had a left arm touched by God; that was apparent from the outset. Hell, he struck out 14 Reds in a game as a 19 year old in 1955. The Dodgers were 'arming' for the Yankees. Outfield was not the same level of urgency.
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I am sorry, but it is a well known story that I thought any serious baseball fan knew.
http://www.espn.com/blog/sweetspot/p...om-the-dodgers
Bavasi then wrote that while there was not a quota in effect, race was the factor in their decision to have Clemente play in Montreal rather than Brooklyn:
"[Dodgers owner] Walter O'Malley had two partners who were concerned about the number of minorities we would be bringing to the Dodgers. ... The concern had nothing to do with quotas, but the thought was too many minorities might be a problem with the white players. Not so, I said. Winning was the important thing. I agreed with the board that we should get a player's opinion and I would be guided by the player’s opinion. The board called in Jackie Robinson. Hell, now I felt great. Jackie was told the problem, and, after thinking about it awhile, he asked me who would be sent out if Clemente took one of the spots. I said George Shuba. Jackie agreed that Shuba would be the one to go. Then he said Shuba was not among the best players on the club, but he was the most popular. With that he shocked me by saying, and I quote: 'If I were the GM [general manager], I would not bring Clemente to the club and send Shuba or any other white player down. If I did this, I would be setting our program back."
These are the words of the general manager who signed Clemente and made the decisions on the roster. It is possible that he is inserting Jackie's name into the story to take the heat off of the owners and himself, but there can be no doubt that the Dodgers gave away Clemente because of his race.
The player that the Dodgers kept instead of Clemente was George Shuba who hit .254 with an OPS+ of 92 in 1953. In 1954 he hit .154 with an OPS+ of 43. He had 65 at bats in 1954 and 51 at bats in 1955 and then he was out of baseball. No one in their right mind who keep a player like that who was at the end of their career for a player the Dodger's scout graded as the best free agent player that he ever saw and graded A+ for arm and power and A in every other area. He was a complete player, but not ready for the majors.
Why wouldn't you put that player on your roster and gradually work him into the starting line up in a couple years? It is no different than Sandy Koufax who pitched 41 innings in 1955 and 58 innings in 1956. Sandy Amaros was brought up because he was ready to contribute, that had nothing to do with Clemente. Amaros was never a full time starter, the most games he ever played in a season was 119. By 1957 he was done with just 19 at bats for the Dodgers after that. Jackie Robinson split time between the outfield and 3rd base. He could have played only 3B at any time. His last season was 1956. Carl Furillo's last season as a full time starter was 1956. He played 119 and 122 games the next 2 seasons and then had 113 ABs after that. There was plenty of playing time available for Clemente by 1956 when as a full time starter he hit .311.
The Braves offered Clemente either 25K or 35K to sign. There is no doubt that they would have put him on their roster. There is no doubt that they would have drafted him if given the chance. The "hiding him in Montreal" story is pure fantasy. Maybe the Dodgers were telling themselves that, but no rational person would believe it. A player of his talent would absolutely be taken by another team in the rule 5 draft. A Pirates' scout told the Montreal manager during the 1954 season that he should be playing Clemente every at bat, but it didn't really matter because they would be drafting him with the #1 pick in the rule 5 draft.
The Dodgers absolutely gave Clemente away. They signed him because if they didn't, the Giants would have signed him. Clemente wanted to play in New York. The Giants offered him 4K so they could send him to the minors and keep him. I have no doubt that if Clemente knew what the Dodgers were doing, he would have signed with the Giants. After all, he turned down 25K or 35K from the Braves to sign for 10K with the Dodgers. You don't give away that much money in 1954, being a poor Latin player, unless location means more than money. By signing with the Dodgers, he guaranteed that he never would play in New York.
In the end, what the Dodgers did was good for baseball. Clemente went to the worst team in the league. A team that had an 8 season run of 5 8th place finishes and 3 7th place finishes. A team that he turned into a champion, winning 2 World Series. If the Dodgers had kept Clemente, they could have dominated baseball. Likewise, if he had signed with the Braves and played along side Aaron, the Braves could have dominated baseball. If the Dodgers has allowed him to sign with their hated rivals and play with Mays, the Giants could have dominated baseball. Their actions created a balanced league. However, there is no doubt that Clemente's race kept him off the Dodgers roster in 1954