Washington DC Baseball

[GeoPoto]

Player #139E: Charles S. "Buddy" Myer. Second baseman with the Washington Senators in 1925-1927 and 1929-1941. 2,131 hits and 38 home runs in 17 MLB seasons. He had a career OBP of .389. 2-time All-Star. 1935 AL Batting champion. 1928 AL Stolen Base leader. His best season was 1935 for Washington as he posted a .440 OBP with 115 runs scored and 100 RBIs in 719 plate appearances. He was involved in one of baseball's most violent brawls when he was spiked and possibly racially derided by the Yankees' Ben Chapman.

We will follow Myer's SABR biography as we track his career -- Part 5: Bucky Harris returned for his second term as the Senators’ manager in 1935 and named Myer the team captain. Myer was having his usual .300 season when Harris moved him from leadoff to the third spot in the order in June. Around the same time, his friend Bill Werber of the Red Sox gave him a lighter bat. He took off on a 21-game hitting streak that boosted his average to .347, one point ahead of Cleveland left fielder Joe Vosmik for the league lead.

In the 1930s, and for decades afterward, a player’s batting average was his meal ticket. A batting championship was the pinnacle of achievement. Myer, Vosmik, and Philadelphia’s Jimmie Foxx vied for the lead down the stretch. Going into the final day, Vosmik stood at .349, Myer at .345, and Foxx at .343.

Vosmik’s name was missing from the lineup for the first game of Cleveland’s season-ending doubleheader against the St. Louis Browns. It’s not clear whether he decided to sit out to protect his lead or his manager, Steve O’Neill, made the decision. Myer calculated that he needed four hits in the last game against the Athletics to win the title. He got three in his first four at-bats: a bunt single, a single to center, and another to left. In his final plate appearance, in the eighth inning, the count ran to 3-and-2. Myer thought a walk would kill his chances. He reached for a wide pitch and fouled it off, then cracked a long double to left center. The 4-for-5 day (and 10 for his last 15) lifted his average to .349.

The news reached Cleveland late in the Indians’ first game. Vosmik hurried to the plate to pinch hit in the ninth but made an out. In the second game, he managed one single in three tries before darkness ended his season after six innings. The final averages: Myer .349026, Vosmik .348387, Foxx .345794.

By one account, Myer beat out 60 bunt hits during the season, a total impossible to verify. He was renowned as the game’s best drag bunter, who took advantage of the league’s slower first basemen. Opponents said the Washington groundskeepers sloped the foul lines inward so his bunts would stay fair, but Myer protested, “I got a lot of bunt base hits on the road, too.” He finished with 215 hits, one fewer than Vosmik, and walked 96 times for a .440 on-base percentage. He batted in 100 runs for the only time in his career. He also set a major league record (since broken) by turning 138 double plays, quite a feat for a man whose weak defense had once threatened his job. Vosmik, who led the league in hits, doubles, and triples, finished third and Myer fourth in the MVP voting.