Why Branca? Assessing Dressen's Options

Ralph Branca passed away at the age of 90 on the day before Thanksgiving. It was a singular moment in time—he was called in by Brooklyn manager Charlie Dressen to protect a two-run lead in the bottom of the ninth in the third and deciding game of a playoff to determine the National League pennant-winner in 1951, needing just two outs to get the Dodgers to another World Series against the Yankees—but Branca's pitch to Bobby Thomson resulting in the "Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" home run was one of those iconic moments in baseball history that make baseball junkies thankful for the historical heritage of America's National Pastime. As the victim of Thomson's home run—a victim perhaps twice over because of revelations that later surfaced about the Giants' using a powerful spyglass to steal opposing catchers' signs from their center field clubhouse at the Polo Grounds—Branca fairly asked, Why me? In fact, Dressen probably felt he had no other choice.

Why Branca? Assessing Dressen's Options

Taking a 4-1 lead into the last of the 9th, three outs away from the pennant, Dodgers manager Charlie Dressen needed Don Newcombe to go the distance, exhausted as he was from having now faced 87 batters in 22⅔ innings in three games over five days just to keep Brooklyn's hopes alive for the pennant. The reason why was because the underlying reality, which Dressen surely knew, was that the Dodgers no longer had a bullpen worthy of the name. But after a pair of singles and a double made the score 4-2 with the tying runs in scoring position, only one out, and Bobby Thomson coming to bat, Dressen knew Big Newk could go no further.

He needed just two outs. But who was he gonna call?

Clyde King, who Yankee fans of a certain age remember as one in a long line of managers George Steinbrenner hired and fired in the 1980s, had been the ace of the Dodgers pen . . . until throwing 23⅔ innings in 11 games in 27 days from July 26 to August 22 took such a toll on his arm that he was never the same again—as in, really, never. At the time, King was 14-5 with 5 saves and a 3.36 ERA in 38 games out of the bullpen. He appeared in only 10 games the rest of the way in 1951, pitching just 14⅓ innings, and had a 10.67 earned run average, then pitched 58 more games and had an ugly 5.16 ERA the next two years before leaving his big league pitching career behind. So . . . no King to come save the day.

Dressen had 27-year-old Bud Podbielan available. While King's absence caused Dressen to virtually demand complete-games in games that could be won from his starting pitchers, it was Podbielan who pitched the most innings in relief for the Dodgers in their hectic month of September to hold back the surging Giants. Podbielan was the winning pitcher in relief of Newcombe's intrepid 5⅔ innings of relief in the 14-inning season-finale against the Phillies that set up the playoff for the pennant. 

But Podbielan had pitched in only 54 big-league games in parts of three seasons, rarely in the high-stakes situation he was thrust into in that game against Philadelphia. Given his relative inexperience, it is highly unlikely Dressen even considered him in a game of this magnitude, the very pennant at stake with just two more outs needed.

Dressen also almost certainly did not consider either Johnny Schmitz or Phil Haugstad. Schmitz had given up four runs in four innings in his previous appearance and was a southpaw, against whom the right-handed Thomson so far in his career was batting .385 with 10 hits, including a pair of doubles and a homer. And in 1951, Thomson was 2-for-2 against Schmitz. The right-handed Haugstad was awful in September, giving up 9 runs in 7 innings, including a homer to Mr. Thomson.

With Clem Labine having pitched a complete-game victory the day before to keep the Dodgers' hope alive, Dressen was left with only three possible options from his core of starting pitchers. Preacher Roe, his 22-3 record on the season notwithstanding, was not in the mix because recent arm problems had made him ineffectual. That left Ralph Branca and Carl Erskine, both warming up in the bullpen, getting ready for this moment.

Why Branca? Dressen has been criticized for calling on Branca because Bobby Thomson treated him like a batting-practice pitcher in 1951. For the year, Thomson was 4-for-12 against Branca, including two home runs since the beginning of September. The second of those was the difference in the Giants' victory—and Branca's loss—in the first playoff game. And Branca in general had not pitched well of late. After starting the season 12-5 with a 2.60 ERA, Branca was 1-7 with a 5.71 ERA since the beginning of September, although he did pitch well—8 innings, 3 runs allowed—in the first game of the playoff.

Why not Erskine? Carl Erskine was 16-12 on the year, 8-6 with a 4.83 ERA in 19 starts, and 8-6 with a 3.97 ERA in 27 relief appearances. The standard narrative of why Branca and not Erskine is that Dressen made his decision after Oisk bounced a pitch warming up in the bullpen. The subtext of how his decision is portrayed is along the lines of Dressen losing his grip, not thinking clearly in a fraught moment with everything—everything—on the line. What was he thinking, letting Branca pitch to Bobby Thomson, who had been especially unkind to Mr. Branca the last three games they faced each other, including the game-winning long ball two days before? Thomson, however, was also batting .333 against Erskine (3-for-9) with two homers, both back in May.

What was Dressen thinking? He might have been thinking that Erskine was having control and location problems in his most recent appearances. In his three previous games—two starts and one in relief—Erskine had given up 8 walks, only one intentional, in 12⅓ innings. And he had averaged 4 walks in 9 innings in 38⅓ innings since the beginning of September, compared to 3.6 per 9 in 151⅓ innings through August. Upon hearing of Erskine's bounced pitch while warming up to enter the game, Dressen may have been reminded of the young right-hander's lack of control of late and concluded Oisk was too much of a risk with two runners in scoring position, representing the tying runs, and the pennant on the line.

And so, Charlie Dressen may have decided Ralph Branca was his only choice to pitch to the Giants' Bobby Thomson. 


NOTE: I cover this and other aspects of Dressen's decisionmaking concerning the third and final game of the 1951 playoff in the chapter, "Charlie Dressen's Worst Day at the Office," in my recent book, The Golden Era of Major League Baseball: A Time of Transition and Integration (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015). Here's the link to the publisher's website:

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442252219/The-Golden-Era-of-Major-League-Baseball-A-Time-of-Transition-and-Integration#

Haney's Hot Hand (More on the 1956 Braves, 60 Years Ago)

Finally. They lost. On June 26, 1956, in Philadelphia, eleven days after the Milwaukee Braves fired Charlie Grimm and replaced him with Fred Haney, the Braves lost for the first time under their new manager. They had won 11 in a row. Sometimes, all it takes is a change in command for the troops to rally and be as good as . . . they were supposed to be.

Haney's Hot Hand (More on the 1956 Braves, 60 Years Ago)

For the most part, the best managers are inextricably linked to the very successful teams they managed. Managers of poor and mediocre teams are not only typically lost to history, but get few subsequent chances. This was particularly true in major league baseball's pre-expansion era.

When Fred Haney was axed by the Pirates after finishing dead last in the National League for the third time in his three years as their manager, it was not obvious that the 60-year-old Haney—so old, he was born in the nineteenth century (but so was the even older Casey Stengel)—would get another chance to manage. His first managerial opportunity was with the St. Louis Browns in 1939, a team that had finished last or next-to-last in each of the four previous years. They finished last in Haney's first year at the helm with 111 losses. He brought the Browns home in sixth place in 1940, but was fired early in the 1941 season with his team having won just 15 of 44 games. A terrible team. 

So too were the Pirates, although they lost fewer games than the year before in each year he was their manager—from 112 losses in 1952 without him to 104 in 1953, to 101 in 1954, to just 94 in 1955. Guess that wasn't improvement enough; his Pirates never winning more than 39 percent of their games doomed his chances to stay on.

Hired by the Braves to be Charlie Grimm's "first lieutenant," Haney for the first time in his managerial career was in position to take over a team that was expected to compete for the pennant, and perhaps even knock off the Brooklyn Dodgers. For all of Grimm's much vaunted "patience"—Sport's Illustration's positive characterization of him in the magazine's 1956 pre-season preview—the Braves' owner lost patience with Grimm because his team, at 24-22 when he was replaced by Haney, was very definitely underachieving.

Milwaukee was in Brooklyn in the middle of a four-game series with the Dodgers when Haney replaced Grimm. They had just lost the first two games to fall 3 back of the Dodgers, who were in 2nd place, a half-game behind, of all teams, the first-place Pirates. The Braves came through for their new manager by winning the Sunday double header at Ebbets Field. Then they won four straight in Pittsburgh. It was back to New York for four games at the Polo Grounds, and Milwaukee won all of those games too. Then back to Pennsylvania, this time to Philadelphia, where the Braves won the first of three before losing to Robin Roberts and the Phillies, 4-2.

What explains Haney's hot hand? The Braves' batters found their hitting shoes after a very lethargic first half of June. No National League club scored fewer runs than the Braves' 47 in the first sixteen days (and 17 games) of June, during which they gave up 68 runs. Outscored by a per-game-average of 4 runs to 2.8, Milwaukee not too surprisingly was only 5-12, costing Grimm his job. They had hit just 8 home runs with a batting average of only .231 in those 17 games. As a result, the Braves dropped from fourth in total runs scored at the end of May to seventh by the time Grimm was let go. Only the 20-31 Giants had scored fewer runs.

In the heart of the Braves' line-up so far in the month of June, Hank Aaron (batting 3rd) hit just .219 with one homer and 7 runs batted in to bring his average down to .303 from .351 at the end of May; Eddie Mathews (batting 4th) hit just .206 with 2 homers and 4 RBIs to bring his batting average down to .247 with a team-leading 10 homers; and Bobby Thomson (batting 5th) hit just .222 without a home run and 6 runs batted in, and was now batting .278 on the year. 

During their 11-game winning streak after Haney took charge, the Braves scored 56 runs—the most of any other NL team since June 16—and gave up only 25. Mathews hit 3 home runs and drove in 12 runs while batting .275, and Thomson had 2 homers and 7 RBIs. Aaron continued to struggle, although his .239 average was still better than in the first half of June. Milwaukee was now back up to third in scoring, trailing only Cincinnati and St. Louis.

After their 11-game winning-streak to begin the Haney regime ended on June 26, the Braves with a 35-23 record were in first place by 1½ games over the second-place Reds, and 2½ over the third-place Dodgers. As was predictable, the Cardinals (5 games behind) and the Pirates (5½ out) were dropping fast out of contention. It was 58 games down and 96 to go. The Milwaukee Braves were looking good.

Monte Irvin and the Miracle of Coogan's Bluff

As we remember Monte Irvin, who passed away this week just a month-and-a-half shy of his 97th birthday, it is worth considering the decisive role he played in the New York Giants' epic comeback from 13½ games behind the Brooklyn Dodgers on August 11, 1951, to the National League pennant. On account of his dramatic bottom-of-the-ninth three-run home run off Ralph Branca to “win the pennant! win the pennant!” Bobby Thomson is of course the ultimate hero of the "Miracle of Coogan's Bluff." Monte Irvin, however, was the Giants' best player, their most valuable player, and arguably should have been the National League MVP in 1951.

Monte Irvin and The Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff

Monte Irvin is honored in the Hall of Fame as a star player in two separate baseball universes—the Negro Leagues and the Major Leagues, where he did not get the chance to play until he was 30 years old in 1949 because black players were not allowed. Irvin was among the trailblazers following in the footsteps of Jackie Robinson, and many Negro League players believed he should have been the one to integrate major league baseball. He and infielder Hank Thompson were called up by the Giants as their first black players on July 8, 1949.

Irvin had an outstanding Negro League resume and was hitting .373 for Triple-A Jersey City when he was called to New York. With Bobby Thomson, Willard Marshall, and Whitey Lockman all hitting over .300 in the Giants’ outfield, however, there was little reason for manager Leo Durocher to make a change; Irvin played in just 36 of the 81 games the Giants had left on their schedule; he started in just 19 and came to the plate only 93 times.

Durocher, however, certainly knew the quality player he had. After starting the 1950 season with Jersey City, where he hit .510 in 18 games (yes, .510 is correct), Irvin was back in New York, in the starting line-up—first in right field, then at first base—and hit .299 in his first substantive year of major league baseball. The next year Monte Irvin began at first base, finished up in left field, and validated that he was not merely a legitimate major league player, but an elite player. 

Bobby Thomson is the hero remembered, but there would have been no Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff without Monte Irvin in the Giants’ line-up. Moreover, the legitimacy of Thomson’s “shot heard round the world” has since been somewhat tarnished, or at least called into question, by the revelation that he may have had help—Bobby Thomson always denied this was so—from spying eyes beyond center field at the Polo Grounds. 

The story well told in his book, The Echoing Green, Joshua Prager relates how Giants batters benefited at home when Durocher sent coach Herman Franks to spy on opposing catchers' signs through a powerful telescope from the Giants' center field clubhouse at the Polo Grounds, beginning on July 20. It was from that point that Thomson, who had been in a season-long batting funk that forced him into a platoon situation, came alive at the plate. He also resumed playing regularly on that very day as a replacement for Hank Thompson at third base after Thompson suffered a grievous injury that sidelined him for virtually the entire rest of the season.

Monte Irvin's hitting, however, carried the Giants at least as much as Thomson's. And Irvin had been hitting all year. At the time Durocher's spy operation went into effect, Irvin was batting .302, had 12 home runs, and his 61 runs batted in led the team. He finished the year with 24 home runs—second on the Giants to Thomson—121 RBIs to lead the league, and a .312 batting average.

When Durocher was canvassing his clubhouse to get his team's buy-in, quite likely making the point as an offer they could not refuse, Monte Irvin, according to Prager, had the temerity to tell his manager he didn't need extra help to be a dangerous hitter. Irvin proved his point, less by continuing to hit well at home (3 home runs,16 RBIs, and a .300 batting average from July 20 till the end of the season), than by going into other team's ballparks and tearing the place apart. 

In 39 road games after July 20, Irvin hit .340 with 9 home runs and 44 runs batted in. Irvin's productivity in road games was critical because not only did the Giants play more away games after July 20 than at home, all but seven of their scheduled games in the final month were on the road—where they did not have their unique Polo Grounds advantage—and they still had to make up a big deficit to catch the Dodgers.

In the three-game playoff to decide the pennant with the Dodgers, Irvin had one hit in each game, including a home run in the first game when the Giants got the jump on Brooklyn by beating them in Ebbets Field. So dramatic were the Giants' pennant drive and the Thomson home run to win it all that the ensuing World Series against the all-mighty Yankees was almost an afterthought. The Giants lost in 6 games, but Monte Irvin hit .458 (11 hits in 24 at bats) to lead both teams, got on base in exactly half of his plate appearances (also the best on both teams), and stole two bases—including home with guardian Yogi Berra making a desperate lunge to tag him out. Unlike Mr. Berra's insistence till the end of his days that Jackie Robinson, in another World Series steal of home plate against the Yankees, was out—OUT! OUT!—Yogi did not say the same about Monte Irvin's theft.

Based on the wins above replacement metric, Monte Irvin was only the fourth-best position player in the National League in 1951, after Jackie Robinson, Stan Musial, and Ralph Kiner. But especially given his clutch performance in the final two months of the season—Irvin hit .338 with 11 home runs and 49 runs batted in—when his team had to make up a seemingly insurmountable deficit against the Brooklyn Dodgers, a strong argument can be made that Monte Irvin was the Most Valuable Player in the National League. The Giants surely would not have won without his exceptional productivity.

Monte Irvin wound up with only five first-place votes for MVP, second-most in the balloting, and finished third overall in the voting. Brooklyn's Roy Campanella, who had 33 home runs, 108 RBIs, and a .325 average, won the award by a land slide, getting 11 first-place votes. Stan Musial finished second overall.

Through no fault of his own, Monte Irvin did not have the major league career that by rights should have been his. That does not change that he was one of the greatest players of his generation, and one of the best of all time.

60 Years Ago (1955): Brooklyn Back in the World Series, Milwaukee Waits For Next Year

The Brooklyn Dodgers clubbed the Milwaukee Braves into submission on September 8, 1955—sixty years ago—with a convincing 10-2 win that officially cinched the National League pennant. They were going back to the World Series for the third time in four years, after having finished second in 1954. Not only would National League fans not have the excitement of a September pennant race in 1955, but the Dodgers may have felt great satisfaction in the fact that they secured their return to the Fall Classic so early in the final month against an up-and-coming team that seemed on the threshold of greatness and a good bet to come in first in 1955. 

Brooklyn Back in the World Series, Milwaukee Waits for Next Year

The 1955 Dodgers arrived in Milwaukee on September 7 for the start of a 10-game road-trip—and their final games with the would-be rival Braves—on a hot streak that began on August 27 in Brooklyn when Sandy Koufax shutout the Reds on two-hits for his very first major league victory (the subject of a previous post on Baseball Historical Insight). They had lost only once since, to Milwaukee at home on the last day of August, while winning 11 of 12 to boost their league-lead to 15 games. That included a second shutout by Mr. Koufax for his second big-league win, against the Pirates. In only his third career start, Koufax surrendered five hits but walked only two—the inverse of two hits and five walks in his previous start—and did not allow the Pirates to advance anyone beyond second base. Koufax had yet to lose a game, and he was still nearly four months shy of turning 20.

The three runs scored by the Dodgers after two were out in the first of the two games in Milwaukee were all Billy Loes needed to outduel Lew Burdette, 3-1. If they lost all their remaining games, the Braves would still have to win all of theirs just to tie with Brooklyn at the end of the 154-game schedule. The next day, the 8th of September, the Dodgers emphatically put an end to the pennant race with four runs in the first off starter Bob Buhl, who did not get out of the inning, and four more in the fifth.

It was Brooklyn's 9th straight win and their 12th in 13 games. It was their longest winning streak and best stretch since beginning the season with winning streaks of 10 and 11 games on their way to a 22-2 record.

Being eliminated so early in September was surely a disappointment for the Braves, who expected to be a serious contender for the 1955 pennant. Robert Creamer's conclusion about Milwaukee in SI's pre-season prognostications issue was that "the Braves are a good bet for the pennant, particularly if [Bobby] Thomson proves healthy and the pitchers ["a top-notch pitching staff"] do as expected." He was arguably proven correct, in a negative way, on both calls.

Bobby Thomson struggled in his comeback year following a severe ankle injury in spring training 1954 that limited him to 43 games and opened the door for Hank Aaron's entry into the major leagues. Three times in '55 he was out of action for at least seven days, and his 12 home runs were his fewest yet in any season he had at least 100 at bats dating back to his big league debut in September 1946. He hit only.257 and his player value as measured by wins above replacement was that of a marginal big leaguer.

And the Braves' pitching was good, but not at the level of expectations. Rather than his customary 20 wins, Warren Spahn finished the year with a 17-14 record, although his 17 wins were third and his 3.26 ERA fourth in the league. Burdette's 13-8 record was among the league leaders in winning percentage, but his victory total was down from back-to-back 15-win seasons and his ERA had jumped from a second-best 2.76 in 1954 to a less-than-ace-like 4.06 in '55. Buhl rebounded from a mediocre sophomore year in 1954 to match the victory total of his rookie year in '53 with a 13-11 record. Gene Conley (11-7) and Chet Nichols (9-8), who each started 21 games, both had ERA's over 4.00.

But the real reason for the Braves' disappointing season in 1955 was that the Dodgers got off to such a phenomenal start, winning 22 of their first 24 games, to grab a 9½-game lead as early as May 10th. No matter how well they played, no matter that Hank Aaron had a breakout season with 24 home runs, 106 RBIs, and a .314 average, no matter than Eddie Mathews knocked out 41 home runs, falling 10 games behind—as the Braves did—before May was even half over was a tough deficit for any team to overcome. From then till the rest of the way, the Milwaukee Braves were only 3½ games worse than the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Now, on September 8, 1955, with 138 games gone, their record at 92-46, their lead up to 17 games, and just 16 games to go ... and with the Braves having just 15 games left... the Dodgers could lose every remaining game and Milwaukee could win every remaining game, and it would not make a difference. The middle three games of the 1955 World Series were going to be played in Brooklyn's Ebbets Field. Perhaps this year "wait till next year" would become a reality.

But first, the Dodgers would have to wait to see who would win out in the American League, where the Yankees and Indians were in a tight tango for the pennant and the White Sox were still hanging around.

As for the Braves ... Well, for the third consecutive year since moving to Milwaukee, more fans came to see their home games than any other team, including the Yankees in the AL. Over 2 million visited Milwaukee's County Stadium in 1955, and the Braves home attendance since 1953 now stood at just under 6 million (5,963,621 to be precise). They would finish second for the second time since moving to Milwaukee. But after their loss to the Dodgers on September 8, 1955, it was the Braves who were waiting for next year.

Charlie Dressen's Worst Day at the Office: To Walk or Not to Walk Thomson, Was That Ever the Question?

What if, surely knowing that Bobby Thomson was not a good match-up for Ralph Branca, Dodger manager Charlie Dressen decided to walk him with first base open, putting the potential pennant-winning run on base, and have Branca take on Willie Mays instead? What factors might have led Dressen to make such a decision--the emphasis on "might" since there's no way to know--instead of the one he did? This is the second of two Insights offering possible explanations for Dressen's decisions made (or not made) in that fateful ninth inning leading up to Thomson's home run and "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" 

Charlie Dressen's Worst Day at the Office--Part II

When last we left Charlie Dressen, he had just brought in Ralph Branca instead of Carl Erskine to relieve starter Don Newcombe and protect what was now a 4-2 lead (after Whitey Lockman's double) with the dangerous Bobby Thomson coming to bat for the New York Giants in the bottom of the ninth of the third playoff game to decide the 1951 National League pennant. The Dodgers needed just two more outs to advance to the World Series, where the Yankees were waiting. Although quite controversial, certainly in the historical retelling, his decision to bring in Branca was reasonable given the alternative, if Dressen was indeed concerned with Erskine's inability in his recent appearances to pitch consistently within the strike zone, as I argued he had every reason to be (although we don't know if he actually was) in my previous post http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/08/charlie-dressens-worst-day-at-office.html.

With Branca toeing the rubber, Dressen had one immediate decision to make: whether to pitch to Thomson with the tying runs in scoring position, one out and first base open, or intentionally walk the veteran slugger and the Giants' leading home run hitter (31 at the moment) to pitch to the rookie on deck, Willie Mays. And after Mays was another rookie, Ray Noble, who had come into the game in the top half of the ninth as a defensive replacement after Giants' manager Leo Durocher pinch hit for starting catcher Wes Westrum (probably because Westrum's .199 average against right-handers in general and .167 against Newcombe in particular were more compelling as weaknesses than his 20 home runs on the season were as a strength).

A key factor for consideration was certainly that Bobby Thomson was on a roll with a hot hand. He already had two hits in this game, extending his hitting streak to 15 games, and Thomson had now hit safely in 22 of 23 games. (Most of these were on the road, by the way, where Thomson would not have benefited from knowing what pitches were coming, courtesy of the spy operation set up in the Giants' clubhouse beyond center field at the Polo Grounds, where coach Herman Franks sat behind a powerful telescope stealing opposing catchers' signs.) Thomson was batting a torrid .457 (37 hits in 81 at bats) in those 23 games, including six home runs. And let's not forget he was 3-for-6 in the last three games Branca had pitched against the Giants, all since September 1st, including two home runs, the second of which beat Branca in game one of this pennant-race playoff.

Willie Mays, waiting on deck, by contrast was a 20-year old rookie with tremendous promise who was in a batting funk. Not only did he have just one hit in ten at bats so far in this playoff against the Dodgers. Not only did he have just three hits in his last 32 at bats (.094). Not only had he struck out in 10 of his last 32 plate appearances. Not only did he have just seven extra-base hits since September 1st, only one a home run. But Ralph Branca totally owned Willie Mays. Mays had come up to bat 19 times against Branca, and Branca had gotten him out 17 times. Finally, although perhaps unbeknownst to the Dodgers, the kid was scared to death waiting in the on-deck circle, thinking the Giants' season might come down to him.

In his manager's mind, parsing the situation, thinking through the possible outcomes of his various options, Dressen could have decided he would rather intentionally walk Thomson to load them up than risk Branca pitching to him--especially given the game-winning two-run home run Thomson hit just two days before--even if Mays were to drive in a run while making an out--an important caveat--which would make it two outs with Noble up next  and the Dodgers' lead now possibly down to one run, 4-3. What are the odds, Dressen might have asked himself, that a backup catcher, and a rookie, could win this thing for the Giants? Ray Noble had only 141 at bats for the season (and in his career) with a .234 batting average, was hitting only .207 against right-handers and had never faced the right-handed Branca.

Although deliberately putting the potential winning run on base, as an intentional walk to Thomson would have done, was certainly not an optimum move--and few managers, especially in Dressen's time, would think to do so--discretion in this case may have been the better part of valor.  After all:

Thomson was hot.
Mays was not.

And Durocher had no viable pinch hitting options to bat for Noble. He had used both Bill Rigney and Hank Thompson, his best players on the bench, to pinch hit in the eighth inning and then been forced to put Clint Hartung into the game as a pinch runner for Don Mueller, who broke his ankle sliding into third base on Lockman's double.

Walking the lock-in veteran to pitch to the struggling rookie (and then, if necessary, another rookie after that) would have been a move worthy of a manager who prided himself on his baseball genius, on his ability to out-think the guy in the other dugout (or, in this case, the third base coach's box, where Durocher now stood). It would have been risky, to be sure, but Dressen--whose mantra is said to have been, "Keep it close, I'll think of something"--was a believer that taking risks, doing the unexpected, the unconventional thing, often made the difference in winning close games. Of course, if the unconventional move backfires--say, Willie Mays breaking his slump with an extra-base hit to drive in three runs to win the game and the pennant--the relentless second-guessing that is the bane of managers' existence begins.

Charlie Dressen went with the more conventional wisdom of not putting the possible winning run on base, especially not in the bottom of the ninth--a defensible move to be sure. He allowed Ralph Branca to pitch to Bobby Thomson. And we all know how that turned out for him. He has been relentlessly second-guessed to this day, although for bringing in Branca instead of Erskine to pitch to Thomson.

Charlie Dressen's Worst Day at the Office--Explaining Why Branca and Not Erskine

Managers are relentlessly criticized by us passionate fans for decisions made and not made in heartrending losses, but as knowledgeable as we fans like to believe we are, we do not know all the considered factors that go into those decisions. At this year's annual SABR conference in Houston from July 30 to August 2, I presented on Charlie Dressen's worst inning in baseball, identifying some possibilities of what Brooklyn's manager might have been thinking--emphasis on "might"--in the decisions he made in that fateful ninth that led to Bobby Thomson's home run and "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" This first of two Insights assumes Dressen knew exactly what he was doing when he chose Ralph Branca to pitch to Thomson instead of Carl Erskine and offers a possible explanation of why Erskine's inopportune bounced pitch while warming up was so troubling to his manager.

Charlie Dressen's Worst Day at the Office--Part I

A double by Whitey Lockman had narrowed the Dodgers' lead to 4-2 over the Giants in the last of the ninth at the Polo Grounds in the third and final playoff game that would decide the 1951 National League pennant after New York's 37-7 record to finish the schedule had entirely erased Brooklyn's 13-1/2 game lead on August 11 to force a playoff. With the tying runs in scoring position, one out and Giants' slugger Bobby Thomson coming to bat, it was obvious Brooklyn starter Don Newcombe could go no further. Including his 8.1 innings in this game, Newcombe had now faced 91 batters in 23 innings pitched in 3 games over five days--which included a season-saving shutout of the Phillies on the next-to-last day of the season (on only two days of rest after a complete game victory against the Braves) and 5.2 innings of shutout relief from the 8th to the 13th inning the very next day against the Phillies in a game the Dodgers absolutely had to win (and did, in the 14th) to force the playoff. But who was Dressen gonna call to relieve Newk?

A good question, because ... the underlying reality was that Brooklyn no longer had a bullpen worthy of the name. For most of the season the Dodgers did have a decent bullpen--Brooklyn relievers were 27-16 with 15 saves and a 3.79 ERA through the end of August.  But in September, the Dodger bullpen was a shambles. With a collective ERA of nearly 5.00, the Dodgers' relievers were sufficiently ineffective that every Dodger victory down the September stretch except for the 14-inning win on the final day of the scheduled season required a complete game effort from Dressen's starting pitcher. What happened to the bullpen?

Well, Dressen using Clyde King, his best reliever, for 23.2 innings in 11 games over 26 days between July 24 and August 22 is what happened. Clyde King is best remembered as one in a long line of Steinbrenner managers, both after and before Billy Martin, but in 1951 he was the Dodgers' relief ace. As of August 22, King had a 14-5 record with 5 saves and a 3.36 ERA in 38 appearances. On that day, however, King pitched a total of four innings to win both games in a doubleheader. He was never the same thereafter, and I do mean never, and certainly not in 1951. He appeared in only 10 more games with a 10.67 ERA, including 12 earned runs in only 9 September innings.

With King unavailable, Dressen had few options. Bud Podbielan, who was the winner of that 14-inning schedule finale that (temporarily) saved the Dodgers' season, and Johnny Schmitz pitched the most innings in relief for the Brooklyn in September, but the southpaw Schmitz wouldn't do because Thomson was a right-handed slugger and despite Podbielan having pitched well in seven relief appearances down the stretch, his limited major league experience (only 54 games in parts of three seasons, all of which included time in the minors) made it unlikely that Dressen would have trusted him in such a critical situation--two outs away from a pennant. Another right-hander, Phil Haugstad, was similarly inexperienced and had given up 25 runs in 30.2 innings.

Then there were the starting pitchers. Preacher Roe was a superb 22-3 on the season and had limited Thomson to a .250 batting average and only one home run in eight at bats, but he had been ineffective his last two starts and was probably suffering from the arm trouble that would plague him the entirety of next year. There is no indication Dressen ever considered Roe. So warming up for the Dodgers were Ralph Branca and Carl Erskine. Bobby Thomson was batting .333 against both Brooklyn pitchers in 1951 with 9 at bats against Erskine and 12 against Branca (not including his epic at bat still to come). And Thomson had hit two home runs off both pitchers, his pair off Erskine coming in May and and his pair off Branca since the beginning of September, including a two-run blast that beat Branca in the first game of this playoff for the pennant.

Branca had pitched poorly down the stretch, although his start in the first playoff game was not bad--3 runs (2 thanks to Thomson's home run) in 8 innings. But before then, Branca had lost five of his six September starts, including his last four, and in four of those decisions failed to last six innings and had an ugly ERA of 11.35. Branca had started three games against the Giants since the beginning of September and lost them all, by 8-1 (September 1), 2-1 (September 9) and 3-2 just two days before. In those three games, Bobby Thomson had tagged Branca for 3 hits in 6 at bats, including the two home runs, plus he had walked twice.

Erskine, for his part, in four starts and three relief appearances had his best ERA month of the season in September, although that ERA was a shade under 4.00 at 3.99. But he lost both of his last two starts, giving up 11 runs (8 of them earned) in 10.1 innings. Erskine had not faced the Giants since August 8, when he got the win by allowing only one run in 7 innings of relief. Thomson faced off against him three times that afternoon, and Erskine got him out each time.

The standard narrative of why Branca and not Erskine mentions that Dressen's decision was made after Oisk bounced a pitch while warming up to come (maybe) into the game. The subtext of how this decision was made is usually portrayed along the lines of Dressen losing his grip, that he was not thinking clearly in the heat of the moment. What was he thinking, letting Branca pitch to Bobby Thomson, who had gone deep against him just the other day to win game one?

What was he thinking? We of course can only speculate, but what he certainly must have known was that Erskine was having difficulty of late with his control and location. In his last three appearances of the season (two starts and one in relief), Erskine had given up 8 walks--only one intentional--in 12.1 innings. And he had averaged 4 walks per 9 innings in 38.1 September innings, compared to 3.6 per 9 in 151.1 innings through August. Hearing of Erskine's bounced pitch while warming up to enter the game may have caused Dressen major heart palpitations and convinced him that Oisk was not the pitcher for this moment in time--even though Thomson had been treating Ralph Branca like a batting practice pitcher in the last three games they faced each other, including the game-winning shot two days before. (It's not as though Branca had been a control artisan recently, by the way, as he had walked five Giants batters in eight innings in his playoff start ... but, at least he didn't bounce any pitches in the bullpen ... presumably.)

While the decision to bring in Branca seems reasonable given the alternatives--especially if Dressen was indeed concerned about Erskine's recent inability to pitch consistently within the strike zone, Charlie Dressen still had one immediate decision to make: whether to pitch to Bobby Thomson with the tying runs in scoring position, one out, first base open and the pennant on the line ... or pitch to the rookie waiting on deck, one Willie Mays.

That will be the subject of my next post.