Washington DC Baseball

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Player #30: Case L. "Casey" Patten. Pitcher with the Washington Senators in 1901-1908. 101 wins and 4 saves in 8 MLB seasons. He had a career OBP of 3.36. His best season was 1906 with Washington as he posted a 19-16 record with a 2.17 ERA in 282.2 innings pitched. He finished his career in 1908 with the Boston Red Sox.

Patten's SABR biography lays out his time in Washington: Patten debuted with Manning’s Senators on May 4, 1901, pitching in relief of Win Mercer, who was up against Cy Young and some hot Boston batters. (James H. Manning owned the Kansas City Blues and went on to become one of the incorporators of the Washington Senators. A good part of the Washington team, including Patten, was built from Manning's Kansas City club.) Mercer let in seven runs in the first four innings, and Patten got the call. He struck out two and walked three and let in three more runs. It was a lopsided 10-2 win for Jimmy Collins and the Bostons.

(Despite that introduction,) Patten (had) a pretty good year on the mound. Though he was pitching for a sixth-place team which wound up with a 61-72 record, Patten was 18-10 with a 3.93 earned run average, the best pitcher on the staff. If not his best year, it was one of his two best. “I never saw a pitcher with a better curve,” said Kid Gleason at year’s end. (Washington Post, September 27, 1901.) Patten was often superb with the spitball. Over seven seasons with Washington, Patten averaged over 14 wins a year (though, it must be said, more than 17 losses). He played with Washington throughout his entire major-league career save for one game that he pitched for the Boston Red Sox in 1908.

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Player #31: Garland "Jake" Stahl. First baseman with the Washington Senators in 1904-1906 and manager 1905-1906. 894 hits and 31 home runs in 9 MLB seasons. 1912 World Series champion. 1910 AL HR leader. He debuted with the Boston Americans in 1903. His most productive season may have been 1910 with the Boston Red Sox as he posted a .334 OBP with 77 RBIs in 598 plate appearances. His last days as a player were with Boston in 1908-1910 and 1912-1913. He also managed Boston in 1912-1913.

Stahl's SABR biography covers his rise and fall as Washington's manager: During the winter of 1903-04, Boston shipped Jake to the floundering Washington franchise. Johnson (Ban Johnson was grateful for Stahl’s role in Boston’s successful 1903 season -- Boston’s World Series victory ensured the long-term viability of his new American League) was in charge of the team until suitable owners could be found and (he) converted Jake into a first baseman. He appeared in 142 games and finished the year with a .262 batting average, three home runs, and 50 RBIs. Even by Deadfall Era standards, these numbers were not exceptional, yet Stahl led the woeful (38-113) Nationals in all three categories.

In 1905, Johnson promoted Jake to manager. Having just turned 26 years old the day before the season began, he became the youngest player-manager in American League history. Employing the inclusive management style he used in college, Jake quickly won the support of the team’s veteran players. Coupled with a focused disciplinary approach emphasizing direct out-of-public-view communication with offenders, punctuated by demonstrations of potential physical force, Jake led the 1905 squad to 64-87 record.

For a short time early in the season, Jake even had the team in first place. When the team returned from a successful road trip, Washington gave the team a rousing parade and celebratory dinner. More importantly, Johnson found new owners for the shaky Washington franchise. Stahl had become, in the words of one observer, “popular with the players, and so well liked by the club owners that it has been officially announced that he can retain his present berth until he voluntarily resigns.”

In the offseason, Jake married his college sweetheart, the daughter of highly successful businessman Henry Weston Mahan. In 1906, however, things fell apart for Jake and the Nationals. Popular shortstop Joe Cassidy unexpectedly died of typhus at the beginning of the season and the team fell into a tailspin, finishing 55-95. The frustrated Washington owners replaced Jake as their manager during the 1906-1907 offseason.

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Player #32: J. William "Wee Willie" Sudhoff. Pitcher with the Washington Senators in 1906. 102 wins and 3 saves in 10 MLB seasons. He debuted with the St. Louis Browns in 1897-1898. His best season was 1903 with the St. Louis Browns as he posted a 21-15 record with a 2.27 ERA in 293.2 innings pitched.

Sudhoff's SABR biography covers his time in Washington: Blond-headed Wee Willie Sudhoff, although short in stature, was a solid, if mostly unspectacular, pitcher who spent all or parts of 10 seasons in the major leagues. He was the first Missouri-born player to appear for both the National League’s St. Louis Cardinals and the American League’s St. Louis Browns. The bulk of his career was spent on those two teams, but he also played for the woeful 1899 Cleveland Spiders and the 1906 Washington Senators. The diminutive right-hander relied primarily on curves and change of speed as he didn’t have particularly great pace on his fastball.

During the (1905-06) American League winter meetings, he was traded to the Washington Senators for left-handed starter Beany Jacobson. Sudhoff felt he still had something left. In an interview with the Post-Dispatch he confidently stated, “Why should I get out of the game so long as the public and the managers will stand for me? I’m still a young fellow.” The Washington Post was not as optimistic: “The Washington baseball club has traded Pitcher Jacobson for Pitcher Sudhoff, of the St. Louis Browns. Jacobson was a failure last season. Sudhoff was a great pitcher in his day but is believed to be going back.”

The Washington paper proved to be correct. While Jacobson was average in a tail-end role (he pitched 155 innings, fifth of the six pitchers on the team), Sudhoff had nothing left. The sore-armed twirler started five games and relieved in four others but managed a total of just 19⅔ innings with a bloated 9.15 ERA. That was a far cry from the pitcher who completed 199 of his 239 major-league starts.

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The 1907 Washington Senators won 49 games, lost 102, and finished in eighth place in the American League. They were managed by Joe Cantillon and played home games at National Park. The 1907 season was noteworthy for the debut of a future hall-of-famer.

By the time Cantillon finally entered Walter Johnson in a game, on August 2, 1907, the city of Washington was rabid with baseball fever brought on by all the talk in the papers of this young man's fastball. More than 10,000 fans packed American League Park for the first game of a doubleheader against the Tigers, the best-hitting team in the league and the eventual pennant winners. These were the Tigers of Ty Cobb, then just 20 years old, the most ferocious of players who will likely forever remain baseball's all-time batting champion.

By all accounts, many fans were surprised by Johnson's sidearm delivery and sweeping underhand motion. He sure didn't move like a fastballer, and yet there was no doubt in the minds of the witnesses that day that his pitches were really moving. The record shows he gave up just six hits, three of which were bunts; two of these were by Cobb, who felt that bunting was the only counter to the incredible speed of Johnson's hard one. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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The 1908 Washington Senators won 67 games, lost 85, and finished in seventh place in the American League. They were managed by Joe Cantillon and played home games at National Park.

How Walter Johnson became a National Hero Part 1: The Senators were reasonably competitive in 1908; but for Walter Johnson, though, this was the season during which he became a national hero. First, however, he had to contend with an operation in late February for the removal of an abscess located behind his right ear. The operation was a serious one and his family had feared for his life. Johnson survived but was in considerable pain for several weeks afterward. He missed all of spring training as a result, and didn't join the club until June 6, nearly two months into the season. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.) We will return to this account of How Walter Johnson became a national hero in a subsequent episode. In the meantime,

Player #33A: Charles E. "Gabby" Street. "The Old Sarge". Catcher for the Washington Senators in 1908-1911. 312 hits and 2 home runs in 8 MLB seasons. Debuted with the Cincinnati Reds in 1904. Caught ball dropped from top of Washington Monument. Holds MLB record for longest gap between MLB games at 19 years -- 1912-1931. Managed the St. Louis Cardinals in 1929 and 1930-1933, including the 1931 World Series championship. Managed the St. Louis Browns in 1938.

(In 1908) The man who would become known as "Walter Johnson's catcher," Charles "Gabby" Street, also joined the Senators, his contract having been purchased from San Francisco of the Pacific Coast League. Street, who would manage the St. Louis Cardinals to a World Championship in 1931 (the same year he sent himself up to bat as he approached his 49th birthday), was just 25 when he joined Washington after having appeared in only 45 National League games. Nineteen hundred and eight and 1909 would be his two busiest seasons in the majors, but he would bat just .206 and .211, assuring himself of a more regular place "riding the pine" for another two seasons in Washington. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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The 1909 Washington Senators won 42 games, lost 110, and finished in eighth (last) place in the American League. They were managed by Joe Cantillon and played home games at National Park. The 1909 Senators still hold the Major League record for the most games lost in one month of a season, with 29 losses (and only 5 wins) in July.

(Both Germany Schaefer and Nick Altrock joined Washington in 1909. Though their comedic antics would not begin in earnest until 1912,) Comedy was indeed what the Washington ballclub was best at in 1909; it slipped to only 42 wins in 152 games. The highlight of the season was a scoreless, 18-inning tie with the Detroit Tigers on July 16. Ed Summers pitched the whole way for the Tigers, and he permitted just seven hits and one walk until, mercifully, the game was called because of darkness. The 1909 Nationals still hold records for fewest runs scored in a season (380) and the most times shutout in a season (29). They finished an unbelievable 56 games behind the first-place Tigers and 20 games out of seventh place. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

Clown Prince of Baseball: 1912 photograph of ballplayer turned comedy act, Nick Altrock, as he dances on the sidelines of a game in full uniform.

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How Walter Johnson became a National Hero (Part 2): We return to Deveaux's account of Walter Johnson's rise to national recognition: Johnson's record was 1-6 largely because of a lack of offensive support, when, on July 28, he struck out 15 Browns in St. Louis to earn a 2-1 win in 16 innings. With that game, in which Walter recorded his highest strikeout total to date, he undertook a string of 11 wins in 13 decisions. Then, over four glorious days in early September, the 21-year-old accomplished a feat not seen before or since.

The chain of events began innocently enough when on Friday, September 4, 1908, Johnson pitched a six-hit 3-0 shutout against Jack Chesbro and the New York Highlanders. On the following day, the New Yorkers' chagrin, not to mention surprise, can only be imagined when they saw Johnson warming up on the sidelines. It should be pointed out that in 1908, Big Ed Walsh of the White Sox led the league in games started with 49, the rough equivalent of a start every third game. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

We will pick this account up again soon, but in the meantime, the photograph by Thompson shows Walter Johnson swinging the bat c.1912-15. Walter was a good hitter for a pitcher at a time when pitchers were expected to be able to hit well enough to play the field and pinch hit to compensate for small rosters and frequent player injuries.

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