Washington DC Baseball

GeoPoto · #1 05-20-2024, 04:49 AM

(Great piece Wayne! Thanks for posting.)

Player #169A: Emil J. "Dutch" Leonard. Knuckle-ball pitcher for the Washington Senators in 1938-1946. 191 wins and 45 saves in 20 MLB seasons. 5-time All Star. Pitched complete game to beat Yankees in 1st game of doubleheader, after which Lou Gehrig gave "luckiest man in the world" speech. In 1945, part of four-man rotation, made up by four knuckle-ball pitchers. Debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1933.

We will follow Leonard's SABR biography for a 3-part overview of his career in Washington -- Part 1: Dutch Leonard rode his knuckleball to a 20-year big league career, baffling batters, catchers, and umpires until he was 44 years old. As Jackie Robinson described Leonard�s knuckler, �It comes up, makes a face at you, then runs away.� . . .

. . . For the next two years (1935 and 1936) Leonard worked primarily in relief. He complained that the Dodgers� catchers wouldn�t call for his knuckleball, leaving him with an assortment of hittable pitches. He led the NL with eight saves in 1935, but nobody knew that because the statistic did not yet exist. His 2-9 record marked him as a failure. In 1936 he was used mostly as a mop-up man in games that were already lost. The club�s new catcher, Babe Phelps, was more hitter than catcher and wanted nothing to do with the knuckleball. He told manager Casey Stengel it was too hard to handle. Stengel barked, �Don�t you think it might be a little hard to hit, too?� Phelps led the Dodgers that season with a .367 batting average, so Stengel needed him more than he needed a mop-up reliever. Leonard was sent down to Atlanta in the Class A-1 Southern Association.

Joining the Crackers in June 1936, Leonard met his new catcher, Paul Richards, another washout from the majors. After getting a look at the knuckler, Richards told him, �You keep throwing it, and it�s my job to catch it.� Leonard said, �Richards was the first catcher I ever worked with who wasn�t too timid to call for my knuckleball.� Leonard went 13-3 with a 2.29 ERA, best in the league, and helped Atlanta win the pennant. . . .

. . . The Washington Senators drafted Leonard after the 1937 season, paying Atlanta $7,500 for a castoff who was approaching his 29th birthday. Washington owner Clark Griffith said he was confident his catcher, Rick Ferrell, could deal with the knuckleball. The pitch had always been an oddity since it was introduced early in the 20th century. Some pitchers used it occasionally as a change-up or surprise pitch, but few�notably Jesse Haines, Eddie Rommel, Fred Fitzsimmons, and Ted Lyons�had made it their trademark. The knuckler is hard to hit and hard to catch, but also hard to throw, since the pitcher has to deliver it with little or no spin. Even a slight breeze at the pitcher�s back can turn a knuckleball into a nothing ball. As Leonard said, �That knuckler can be either a pitcher�s meat or his poison depending on how it�s working.�

Leonard gripped the ball with the tips of his index and middle fingers. He said, �I just throw it straight forward like you�d flip a cigarette butt.� He threw with different arm angles, so the pitch moved up, down, or sideways. He stuck with the knuckler unless he fell behind in the count, when he had to rely on his sort-of fastball or slow curve. What distinguished Leonard from most of his tribe was his excellent control. Although he said he never knew exactly where the pitch was going, he usually walked no more than two batters per nine innings in his prime. But he realized he was balancing on the edge with every pitch: �The trouble with the knuckle ball is that the .250 hitters are just as apt to hit it safe as the .350 hitters. None of them will hit the knuckler if it�s breaking right and all of them will hit it if it isn�t breaking.�

Shortly after Leonard joined Washington in 1938, sportswriter Robert Ruark described him as �a fat bald man.� He was six feet tall and topped 200 pounds. In his first start he shut out the Athletics. On May 4 he faced Cleveland�s 19-year-old phenom, Bob Feller. The league�s fastest pitcher and its slowest matched zeroes for 10 innings. Feller was relieved, but Leonard kept knuckling until the Senators won in the 13th.

He had secured a regular starting job for the first time in his career. In 1939 he won 20, lost 8, for a sixth-place club that recorded only 65 victories. He was the Senators� first 20-game winner since their pennant season of 1933. He made the All-Star team in 1940, despite leading the league with 19 losses, then bounced back with 18 wins in �41, all the while with a losing club.

GeoPoto · #2 05-21-2024, 04:44 AM

Player #170A: John K. "Buddy" Lewis. Third baseman/right fielder for the Washington Senators in 1935-1941, 1945-1947, and 1949. 1,563 hits and 71 home runs in 11 MLB seasons. He played his entire career in Washington. 2-time All-Star. He had a career OBP of .368. His most productive season was 1938 as he posted an OBP of .354 with 122 runs scored and 91 RBIs in 724 plate appearances.

In the off-season (following the 1937 season), Lewis worked hard to receive a good contract from Griffith, who was quickly becoming Buddy's greatest fan. Though Griffith had his favorites, including former Washington great Walter Johnson, Lewis was near the top of the list. But the Nats' owner never let personal feelings interfere with contract negotiations, and he and Lewis haggled for a period prior to the 1938 tipoff. Finally, Lewis won out, securing a sizable raise.

In 1938, Lewis earned his first All-Star selection, joining New York's Red Rolfe as third basemen for the squad. The worst stretch of Lewis' career came in August of 1938, when his mysterious defensive problems were at their worst. During a four-game series against the New York Yankees, Lewis committed 8 errors, leading to 9 unearned runs. Washington Post columnist Shirley Povich noted that Lewis had committed 11 errors in 6 games against the Yankees in just over a week. But to his credit, Lewis did not let his defensive woes affect his hitting. His average still hovered near the .300 mark, and he batted in 91 runs from the #2 spot in the order, while crossing the plate 122 times.

In the first month of the 1939 season, Lewis suffered from an illness (diagnosed as a type of influenza known as "grippe") that knocked him out of the lineup for nearly two weeks. When he returned, he posted the highest batting mark of his career, hitting .319 with 49 extra-base hits, including a league-best 16 triples.

In spite of his fine offensive numbers, Lewis struggled in the field, often in spurts. In 1939 he made 7 errors in one week, on his way to 32 for the season. His fielding woes in 1938 had resulted in 47 errors and a terrible .912 mark with the glove. His miserable play at third was not lost on manager Bucky Harris, who often criticized Lewis' defensive work in the papers and the clubhouse. In 1940, Harris used the emergence of young infielders Jimmy Bloodworth and Jimmy Pofahl as the impetus to get Lewis out of his infield. Bloodworth moved into second base, Pofahl took over at short, and Travis moved from short to third. That pushed Buddy to right field, where Harris felt he could do far less damage with the leather.

GeoPoto · #3 05-22-2024, 03:45 AM

Player #139H: 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 8: Myer turned in another gaudy season at bat in 1938, with a line of .336/.454/.465, but he started only 117 games and was on the downslope at 34. When a wrist injury knocked him out of the lineup the next year, a 21-year-old rookie, Jimmy Bloodworth, staked his claim as the second baseman of the future.

In September 1940 Myer told Clark Griffith he was retiring to tend to his construction business in Mississippi. He had gotten a government contract to build army camps. Griffith persuaded him to play another year as a benchwarmer before he left the game for good.

GeoPoto · #4 05-23-2024, 04:00 AM

Player #88C: Alexander "Al" Schacht. Pitcher with the Washington Senators in 1919-1921. 14 wins and 3 saves in 3 MLB seasons. Was highly regarded as a third base coach in Washington (1924-1934) and Boston (1935-1936). Performed player mimicry and comedy routines with fellow Washington coach Nick Altrock earning the nickname of "The Clown Prince of Baseball". After leaving coaching he continued comedy but settled in as a restauranteur.

Al's SABR biography sums up his relationship with baseball and its fans: To say that Alexander Schacht was obsessed with baseball is to understate. He was possessed by it. Schacht was an undersized man with an oversized heart and love of baseball. It consumed him as he traveled from hamlet to hamlet trying to sell his wares as a pitcher. When he did finally make it to the big leagues, he hurt his arm and his playing days were over. But Schacht had something more than pitching ability. He had the talent to make people laugh. He did not have to speak a word; his actions portrayed what he was trying to convey. What he conveyed so pointedly is that there is a jester to put things in perspective. The jester points out that life is often absurd, so instead of letting it get us down, we should laugh at the absurdity in baseball or life. Schacht was the court jester, crying and laughing at the world of baseball and life.

He would come in with his battered top hat and ragged tails, blowing mightily on a tuba. Maybe he�d wield a catcher�s mitt that weighed twenty-five pounds into which one could fit an entire meal. In fact, this zany guy once ate a meal off home plate. Zany like the Ritz or Marx brothers, Schacht became the first Clown Prince of Baseball. Alexander Schacht or just plain Al was a smart buffoon. One wonders when clowns perform whether they are really happy or sad or both. Tragedy and comedy hang side by side in many theaters, and just a turn of the mouth can be sad or happy.

Al Schacht once said, �I came into this world very homely and haven�t changed a bit since.�

GeoPoto · #5 05-24-2024, 04:32 AM

Player #158D: Cecil H. Travis Part 4. Infielder for the Washington Senators in 1933-1941 and 1945-1947. 1,544 hits and 27 home runs over 12 MLB seasons. 3-time All-Star. One of two to get 5 hits in first game. Led American League in hits in 1941 despite DiMaggio's 56-game hit streak and Ted Williams hitting .406. His best season was 1941 as he posted a .410 OBP with 101 RBIs in 663 plate appearances. In the Army during 1942-45, he wound up a frostbite victim in the Battle of the Bulge and a Bronze Star recipient. His return to MLB after the war surgery was not the same.

The historic 1941 baseball season set the stage for Travis� most remarkable season in the majors. After experimenting that spring with a heavier bat, different grip, and a stance farther back in the batter�s box, the former opposite-field hitter emerged as a pull hitter with some pop. He went on to set career highs in batting average (.359), doubles (39), triples (19), home runs (7), RBIs (101), and runs scored (106). He also collected a career-best 218 hits, which led all of baseball that season-a surprising fact when considering that Joe DiMaggio staged a record 56-game hitting streak and Ted Williams hit .406 that same year. In the classic 1941 All-Star game in Detroit, Travis� take-out slide at second base in the ninth inning prevented a double play and kept the game alive, allowing Ted Williams to follow with his memorable game-winning home run.

GeoPoto · #6 05-25-2024, 04:29 AM

Player #122C: Samuel F. "Sam" West. Outfielder with the Washington Senators in 1927-1932 and 1938-1941. 1,838 hits and 75 home runs in 16 MLB seasons. 4-time All-Star. His career OBP was .371. In 1931 for Washington, he posted an OBP of .369 with 91 RBIs in 559 plate appearances. In 1934 for the St. Louis Browns he posted an OBP of .403 with 91 runs scored in 554 plate appearances. His last season was 1942 with the Chicago White Sox.

We go to Sam's SABR biography for a look at how his baseball career began: Sam West could not believe what he was hearing.

On this holiday in the early 1920s, Rule (Texas) High School was about to cap a day of festivities with a baseball game against Hutto High School. West, a student at Rule High, expected to be one of the starting outfielders but was informed by his coach that he would be viewing the game from the bench. Angry and unwilling to sit before the student body, West left the picnic and hurried into town to watch the Rule semipro baseball team play. That was when destiny came calling.

When West got to the ballpark, he found that there was a delay. The right fielder for the Rule nine was missing. West seized the opportunity by volunteering to fill in, and the Rule manager agreed to start the game with the raw schoolkid patrolling an outfield position.

Like a chapter out of the book of Frank Merriwell, West proved to be an asset instead of a liability, and soon enough he was installed as the team�s regular right fielder. But the pleasure of winning a starting job on the town�s team and pointing at the high-school coach each time he saw him, wasn�t enough for Sam West, who wanted to conquer bigger and better goals. . . .

. . . While playing for Rule, West was scouted and signed by Roswell, New Mexico, of the Class D Panhandle-Pecos Valley League, for 1923. At the age of 18, he batted .282 in 99 games. The next season he batted .271 for Sulphur Springs of the Class D East Texas League. He began the 1925 season with Monroe, Louisiana, of the Class D Cotton States League. After hitting .341 in 23 games, he was back in the East Texas League in July, this time with the Longview Cannibals, and on July 19 the Longview native hit for the cycle in the Cannibals� 9-5 win over Texarkana. He finished the season with a second tour of Sulphur Springs. The Cannibals finished the season with an eight-game winning streak and a 37-26 second-half record. West�s strong showing � he hit .325 in 81 East Texas League games � convinced a scout for the Birmingham Barons of the Southern Association that he was ready to play in the upper levels of the minor leagues. Playing the last month of the 1925 campaign for the Barons, West hit .265 in 24 games. In 1926 he burned up the league, and played so well that the caught the eye of the Washington Senators� super-scout, Joe Engel. Convinced that West would prove to be the center fielder of the future for Washington, Engel began to arrange for his purchase. His scouting report noted West to be a good hitter but, surprisingly, a poor fielder. Engel would have been surprised to know that this prospect would become one of the best defensive center fielders in major-league history.

But Engel�s report about West�s good hitting was accurate. After the first week of July, he was hitting .340 and he was leading the league with 16 home runs and 90 runs.

GeoPoto · #7 05-26-2024, 04:31 AM

Deveaux on the 1940 season: The decade of the forties, destined to be the darkest of the century for major-league baseball, got off with the biggest kind of a bang. On April 16, 1940, 21-year-old "Rapid Robert" Feller of the Indians pitched a no-hitter on Opening Day, the first time this had ever happened. The command performance was given in 47-degree weather at Comiskey Park in Chicago. The final out registered when Feller induced Taft Wright to ground out.

The 29-year-old Wright had been a Washington Senator until recently, when he'd been traded to Chicago, with Pete Appleton, in exchange for a powerfully built 31-year-old outfielder named Gerald "Gee" Walker. Walker had slipped below .300 the previous season for the first time since 1933, but had slugged 13 homers, with 111 ribbies, as compared to just four homers for Taffy Wright. As for Appleton, he had not been an especially effective pitcher since 1936, and would not be again.

Gee Walker had hit as high as .353 in 1936, and had followed that up with .335 in '37. He had been immensely popular in Detroit before moving on to the White Sox prior to the 1938 campaign. While he often made up for his deficiencies with his bat, his frequent mental lapses when dealing with other phases of the game had earned him the unflattering nickname of "Ironhead." Once, he tried to steal a base while the batter was being walked intentionally. On another occasion, he was picked off base twice in the same inning.

At Detroit, Walker had been on the outs with manager Bucky Harris for two seasons because of something that happened in 1933. He had hit a line shot directly to the second baseman, who made a nifty stab on a hard skip. Walker, disgusted, flung his bat and headed for his defensive position. His playing time was curtailed after that. Then, during the 1934 World Series, while busy arguing with some of his enemies on the St. Louis Cardinals bench, he was picked off first base.

At Washington Gee Walker would not disappoint Bucky Harris, under whom he'd played for three years in Detroit; this time he produced 13-96-.294 numbers for the Senators on what was ironically the most anemic offense in the American League in 1940. Second baseman Jimmy Bloodworth was the only other player on the club to hit more than six homers. In terms of home run production, the Nats finished dead last in the league, by far, with their total of 52. They scored the fewest runs in the process.

By way of contrast, the Yankees, who would finish third, but a mere two games behind the pennant-winning Tigers, slugged 155 home runs. Clark Griffith raised a few eyebrows at the 1940 winter meetings of baseball's owners by sponsoring a motion prohibiting trades between the pennant winner and other clubs in the league. In actual fact, it had been years since the Yankees had obtained a player in a trade who had made a critical difference in a pennant race. When the Yankees wound up third, the whole no-trade notion was permanently scrapped. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux)

(This thread will now enjoy a pause.)

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
WTB: Washington-related baseball memorabilia	Runscott	Baseball Memorabilia B/S/T	4	05-23-2014 05:18 PM
WTB: Specific Claudell Washington, U.L. Washington, Garth Iorg and Johnny Grubb Cards	EGreenwood	1950 to 1959 Baseball cards- B/S/T	0	12-07-2012 10:27 PM
1920's washington senators baseball cap	bryson22	Baseball Memorabilia B/S/T	1	12-30-2010 09:21 PM
The Oregon-Washington Baseball League???	slidekellyslide	Net54baseball Sports (Primarily) Vintage Memorabilia Forum incl. Game Used	7	06-12-2009 07:55 PM
Baseball cabinet - Washington Senators?	Archive	Net54baseball Sports (Primarily) Vintage Memorabilia Forum incl. Game Used	1	06-18-2008 02:33 PM