Catching Up on the '56 Home Run Chase (60 Years Ago, Sept 13, 1956)

On September 13, 1956, at Kansas City's Municipal Stadium, Mickey Mantle's 3rd inning home run—his 48th of the year—not only proved the margin of victory in the Yankees' 3-2 win over the Athletics, but ended a drought of 10 games and 35 at bats in which he had not hit a home run. With slightly more than two weeks left to the season, he was no longer likely to match, let alone eclipse, Babe Ruth's iconic 60 homers hit in 1927. Meanwhile, both the Cincinnati Redlegs collectively and their spectacular first-year left fielder, Frank Robinson, remained poised to set new single-season records for home runs by a major league team and by a rookie. 

Catching Up on the '56 Home Run Chase
(60 Years Ago, September 13, 1956)

When last we left Mickey Mantle in 1956, his 47th homer of the season had led the Yankees to victory on the last day of August. He was then well ahead of Babe Ruth's pace for 60 home runs. But no more. The Yankees had played 10 games in the first 12 days of September and won 6 of them to run their American League advantage up to 10 games over Cleveland. They had scored 58 runs and hit 13 homers, but Mantle, despite playing the entirety of all 10 games, had none.

It was, of course, inevitable that the best baseball player on the planet in 1956 was bound to hit a wall. He had just 5 hits in those 10 games and went hitless in 6 games. His only extra-base hit was a double, and he had exactly zero—that's "0"—runs batted in. It was not, however, the Mick's first extended long ball drought of the season. From June 22 to July 1, Mantle also went 10 games (and, ultimately, 33 at bats) without going deep, but he did hit .344 with 3 RBIs as the Yankees went 5-5. And from August 15 to 23, he went 9 games without a homer and hit just .121, striking out 10 times in 33 at bats, for the worst stretch of his season. He did drive in 2 runs. The Yankees were 4-5 in those games. Despite those slumps, he was still ahead of Ruth in his quest for 60, or even 61, going into September.

Mantle's 3rd-inning homer off KC's Tom Gorman on September 13 may have ended his latest homerless stretch of games, but it left him with little chance of out-homering the Bambino in a single-season. With the Yankees having played 140 games, they had just 14 remaining in which Mantle, now with 48 homers, would have needed 12 more just to tie the Babe with 60. Through the Yankees' first 140 games in 1927, Ruth had hit 52. It wasn't impossible for Mantle—just nearly so.

Even so, Mickey Mantle was still the Triple Crown leader in the American League. Besides having hit by far the most homers in baseball, his 119 RBIs were the most, and nobody had a higher qualifying batting average than his .353. 

The home run record that seemed almost certain to be broken was the 38 for a rookie set by Wally Berger in 1930. Frank Robinson started the month with 35, hit his 36th off the Braves' Lew Burdette in the first game of a September 3 doubleheader; hit his 37th in the 10th inning the next day off Braves' reliever Ernie Johnson to win the game; and his 38th on September 11 off the Giants' Steve Ridzik at the Polo Grounds to tie Berger's rookie record. 

Robinson went 1-for-4 against the Pirates in Pittsburgh on September 13, without a home run, but his 9th-inning single off Pirates' relief ace Elroy Face drove in the winning run in another must-win game for Cincinnati. With an 82-58 record, the Reds were 3½ games behind the first-place Braves, and 1½ back of the Dodgers. With 140 games down—(they had actually played 141, one game having ended in a tie because of rain)—and just 14 to go, Cincinnati was running out of time to catch Milwaukee. For Frank Robinson, however, there seemed to be plenty of time for him to send one going-going-gone at least once more to set the new record for home runs by a major league rookie.

While Robinson did not go deep in Cincinnati's victory over Pittsburgh, George Crowe, pinch hitting, did. It was the 202nd home run of the year for the Redlegs in 141 games. The 1947 Giants, whose team record of 221 was in sight, had 204 through their first 141 games (also one of which had ended in a tie, same as for the '56 Reds), so the Redlegs were now slightly behind the Giants' pace . . . But not by much. They still had 14 games to hit 20 more homers to set a new record—

—And, of course, hopefully win the pennant for the honor of facing Mickey Mantle and the Yankees in the 1956 World Series.

Chasing Ruth and Berger and the Giants (60 Years Ago, August 31, 1956)

On the last day of August sixty years ago, the Cincinnati Reds belted two homers to run their major league-team-leading total to 191, which included the 35th of the year hit by rookie sensation Frank Robinson, and Mickey Mantle hit his major league-leading 47th home run. This meant that as the 1956 season turned to its final month, three single-season home run records were under assault—the 1947 New York Giants' team record off 221; Wally Berger's rookie record of 38 set in 1930; and Babe Ruth's famous 60 set in 1927. The first two were little remarked on, but Mantle's run at the Babe's record was a BIG deal.  

Chasing Ruth and Berger and the Giants
(60 Years Ago, August 31, 1956)

The score was tied at 4-4 at Washington's Griffith Stadium when Mickey Mantle came to bat with one out in the 7th inning against Camilo Pascual on the last day of August in 1956. He was batting left-handed against the Senators' 22-year-old Cuban-born right-hander, who was 6-13 so far in the 1956 season—his third year in the majors. Mantle proceeded to knock out his 47th home run of the year, giving the Yankees a 5-4 lead they would not relinquish.

Another day, another game, another Yankee victory. That was even though Washington outfielder Jim Lemon outdid Mantle by hitting three home runs in the same game . . . off Whitey Ford, no less. Jim Lemon hit 164 homers in his 12-year major league career, 7 of them off Whitey Ford. In all his years of pitching, no other batter touched Ford for more home runs than Lemon, and Lemon is the only player to have hit three in one game against the Hall of Fame master lefty. It was also the only time in the 1,010 games he played that he hit three homers in a single game. (Too bad it was in a losing cause.)

The New York Yankees entered the final month with an 83-46 record, 8½ games ahead of second-place Cleveland. It was 129 games down and just 25 to go for the Yankees. It would take a monumental collapse for the Yankees not to win the American League pennant for the seventh time in eight years, especially with the Indians having just two games left to challenge them head-to-head, the only circumstance under which they could assure a victory by them would mean a gain on the Yankees, since the Yankees could otherwise negate a Cleveland win against anybody else with one of their own.

Instead, the September drama for the Yankees would be whether Mickey Mantle would win the Triple Crown, and even more pertinent, whether he could break the record of 60 home runs belted by Babe Ruth in 1927. So far, the odds looked good for both quests. In addition to his 47 homers, Mantle was well ahead in batting average (.366) and runs batted in (118) for the Triple Crown crown. 

As for chasing the Babe? In 1927, Ruth had 43 home runs at the end of August in the 127 games the Yankees had played. In 1956, Mantle had 47 in 129. The Babe reached 60 by hitting 17 in September; Mantle would need 14 to break his record.

Meanwhile, at Cincinnati's Crosley Field, the Reds' Frank Robinson toed in at right side of the plate to lead off the bottom of the 9th against Cubs righty Bob Rush, his team down 3-2. Rush was the ace of the Cubs' staff and working towards his 13th victory of the year. That came to an end when Robinson crashed his 35 home run of the year to tie the score. The Reds went on to score another run that inning for a walk-off win that left them in third place, 3½ games behind the Braves and 1 behind the Dodgers, going into the final month.

Unlike for the Yankees, the September drama in Cincinnati would actually be a pennant race. With 128 games down and their record at 75-53, the Reds still had 26 games to go—more than enough for them to leapfrog both teams ahead of them, especially since they still had five games left against first-place Milwaukee, the first four of which would be their very next series beginning on September 3, and two against Brooklyn.

Paling in comparison, and quite likely little thought about, was the fact that Frank Robinson was comfortably ahead of Wally Berger's pace when he hit 38 home runs as a rookie outfielder for the Boston Braves in 1930. Both of their teams had played 128 games through the end of August. Berger entered September 1930 with 31 homers, and 26 years later, Robinson now had 35 and would need to hit just 4 more in September to set a new major league rookie record.

Hitting a home run earlier in the game for Cincinnati was catcher Ed Bailey, his 24th of the year. Big Klu—slugging first baseman Ted Kluszewski—had 33 and was aiming for a fourth consecutive 40-homer season. Outfielders Wally Post and Gus Bell had 27 and 25, respectively. Including Robinson, five of the Reds' eight core position players had at least 24 home runs. This was a club with long ball power, and it was that power that had them contending with the Braves and Dodgers for the National League pennant.

Cincinnati's 191 home runs going into September was ahead of the 182 the New York Giants had hit when they set the major league team record of 221 nine years earlier in 1947. The '47 Giants had played 127 games through August, compared to the '56 Reds' 128. The 1947 Giants ended up with four players hitting more than 20—Johnny Mize, who tied with the Pirates' Ralph Kiner to lead the league with 51, followed by Willard Marshall (36), Walker Cooper (35), and Bobby Thomson (29), who were the next three players on the 1947 NL home run leader board.

So heading into the home stretch of the 1956 season, Mickey Mantle—who was leading the league by healthy margins in all three Triple Crown categories—Frank Robinson, having a sensational rookie year, and the Cincinnati Reds as a team were all poised to challenge major league home run records. 

The only home run chase anyone was really paying attention to, however, was whether the Mick could catch and pass the Babe. The kind of year Mantle was having, as of September 1, 1956, it would have been foolish to bet against him.

Temporary Yankee Lethargy in the Summer of '56 (60 Years Ago, August 7, 1956)

With the game scoreless, the bases loaded with Red Sox, and nobody out in the bottom of the 11th inning on August 7, 1956, at Fenway Park, Yankee manager Casey Stengel brought in southpaw Tommy Byrne to pitch to the great Ted Williams. The Red Sox won on a walk-off walk to Mr. Williams. The Yankees had now lost 7 of their last 8 games. Their lead in the American League pennant race was down to 7 games ahead of the Cleveland Indians. It had been 10 games just eight days before. Was it time for the Yankees to panic? Nah.

Temporary Yankee Lethargy in the Summer of '56 
(60 Years Ago, August 7, 1956)

Although there was no dramatic Ted Williams home run to win the game, the Red Sox' 1-0 victory over the Yankees was not without its Splendid Splinter drama. Taking umbrage at being booed by the hometown fans after dropping a routine fly ball to left hit by Mickey Mantle with two outs in the top of the 11th, Teddy Ballgame spit at the crowd behind the Boston dugout as he left the field at the end of the inning. Ironically, they were cheering him when he did so, for he had just robbed Yogi Berra of an extra-base hit that would have scored Mantle with a nifty over-the-head running catch in front of the Green Monster to end the Yankees' 11th.

He was also none too happy about walking-in the game-winning run, instead of driving it in, and tossed his bat high in the air in exasperation after receiving ball four. Then he took his frustrations out on a water cooler and generally behaved like a jackass in the clubhouse afterwards. It was, perhaps, Ted just being Ted, except worse than usual—and Ted being Ted never had the kind of eccentric charm of future Red Sox' left fielder "Manny being Manny."

Anyway, while the Red Sox had some public mending to do, some may have thought the Yankees were in need of some mending of their own. Every team, no matter how good, goes through hard times in a long season. And this was the Yankees' time for those hard times. 

They had lost four in a row at the beginning of June, and 6 of 8 at the start of that month, and also lost four in a row to the second-place White Sox in late June that cut their lead from five games to one, but each time they recovered their winning ways, decisively. After their four straight losses to the Chisox, the Yankees won 18 of their next 20 to take a commanding lead in the pennant race.

Of course, starting from a 10-game lead after winning their sixth in a row on July 30, it was the best of times for the '56 Yankees to have their worst of times. First they lost three straight in Cleveland (after Whitey Ford had won the opener of the four-game series). The Indians outscored them 14 to 1 in winning the next three games. Early Wynn shutout the Yankees on 3 hits on July 31, and Herb Score did the same on 4 hits two days later.

Then the Yankees went to Detroit, where they lost all three games and were outscored 23 to 13. They ended their six-game losing streak—which would be their longest of the season—with a 4-3 win in their first game at Fenway, only to fail to score any runs in 11 innings on August 7, despite Ted Williams dropping a routine fly ball that led to the latest (just mentioned) of his periodic epic spit-a-sodes.

During their eight-game hibernation from typical Yankee baseball, the Bronx Bombers scored just 18 runs and batted just .221 as a team. They not only weren't hitting, their on-base percentage was a woeful .293. They would hit .270 with an on-base percentage of .347 for the year. 

Mantle had the worst stretch of his season so far, with a .267 average, 8 hits in 30 at bats, and striking out 9 times in 35 plate appearances. He went hitless in five of the eight games, including the three losses to Cleveland. Only once before in the entire season—May 11 and 12 against the Orioles, when he was still batting over .400—did Mantle go consecutive games without a hit. Three of his hits, however, were home runs, giving him 37 in the Yankees' first 105 games. Mantle was still two home runs ahead of the Babe's pace when he knocked out 60 in 1927.

The Yankees gave up 41 runs in their eight-game slide, 10 of which were unearned, for an earned run average of 4.16. Cleveland, Detroit, and Boston hit a collective .262 against Yankee pitchers in that stretch. And Yankee pitchers had command and control problems, walking 37 batters in addition to the 66 hits they surrendered, while striking out just 26. For the year, the Yankees held opposing batters to a .249 average and had a team ERA of 3.63.

With their record at 68-37, it was 105 games down and 49 to go for the 1956 New York Yankees. Despite their recent lethargy in the summer heat, the Yankees still had a seven-game lead. It would never again in the 1956 season be that low. In direct opposition to their 7 losses in 8 games, the Yankees turned around to win 7 of their next 8 to bump their lead up to 10½ games half-way through August. 

1956 Yankees Wave Bye-Bye to Rest of League (July 20, Sixty Years Ago)

The first-place Yankees put away the last-place Kansas City Athletics on July 20th, sixty years ago, to extend their advantage over second-place Cleveland to 11 games. After beginning the month with only a 2-game lead over the White Sox, and the Indians 5½ behind, the Yankees' streak of 16 wins in their first 19 games in July had them now firmly in control of the American League pennant race. 

1956 Yankees Wave Bye-Bye to Rest of League

The Yankees began the month of July with three straight wins at home, two of them walk-offs. In the second game of a July 1st Sunday doubleheader against Washington, after Joe Collins's 2-run homer off Camilo Pascual in the 8th inning of the opener lifted the Yankees to a 3-2 win, Mantle blasted his 29th home run of the season with a runner on and the score tied 6-6 in the last of the 9th to end the game. The Mick had also homered in the 7th, that one erasing the Senators' 6-5 lead. 

Two days later, after an off day, Casey Stengel made the unconventional move of sending Mickey McDermott, a pitcher by profession—but a pitcher who could hit—up to bat for Gil McDougald with the bases loaded and one out in the last of the 12th in a 3-3 game against the Orioles. That seemed odd, given that McDougald was batting .295 and was 2-for-5 on the day. As so often was the case with Mr. Stengel, his instinct proved the correct one; McDermott singled home the winning run for another Yankee walk-off. For more on Mickey McDermott's prowess with the bat, see my post of May 14 in this series on the 1956 season, "Batting 8th for the New York Yankees, the Pitcher ..." (link at end of article.)

Then it was off to Boston for the Yankees, who were walked-off by a Jimmy Piersall run-scoring single in the bottom of the 11th in the first game of a July Fourth doubleheader, but easily won the second game. Game 2 was the first time all year that Mickey Mantle was given a game off. It wasn't a day off, because he played in the first game. 

In fact, Mantle not playing the second game was less a nice gesture by Stengel to give his best player a breather than concern that Mantle might have reinjured his ever-troublesome right knee charging Piersall's single into center field trying to cut down the winning run at the plate in the opener. Failing to do so, he hobbled off the field and ended up missing the next four games. Mantle returned to play in the final game before the All-Star break, went 1-for-3 before being removed in the 5th inning, then played all 9 innings in the All-Star Game two days later, hitting a home run.

The Yankees' triumph in the second game of their Fourth of July doubleheader in Boston was the first of 11 straight victories that broke open the American League pennant race. It surely helped that five of those wins came consecutively against the only two clubs anyone thought could actually, seriously, challenge the New York Yankees for the 1956 pennant.

The All-Star break ended with the tied-with-Chicago-for-second Cleveland Indians coming to Yankee Stadium for three games beginning July 12. For the Indians, trailing the Yankees by 6½ games, this was a pivotal series, and they went into it with their three best pitchers—Bob Lemon, Early Wynn, and Herb Score—lined up to face the Bronx Bombers. They got bombed, the Yankees won all three games, and the Indians left New York, New York down by 9½ games. The Yankees won the concluding game of the set, 5-4, in the last of the 10th when Billy Martin greeted relief pitcher Bob Feller, brought in specifically to face him, with a one-out bases-loaded single to drive in the winning run.

The 37-year-old Feller was by now worn out, pitching mostly in relief, and in his last major league season. This was his 10th appearance of the year, and he would pitch in just 9 more games before calling it a career. Feller's last two appearances were complete-game starts 15 days apart in September. He lost both games to go 0-4 for 1956, and 266-162 for his career. If not for missing three full seasons and most of a fourth serving his country during World War II, Bob Feller almost certainly would have been in the neighborhood of at least 340 wins.

The Yankees were the only team against which Feller had a losing record, winning just 30 of 67 decisions in 79 games (73 of them starts). One of those 30 wins was the second of his three no-hitters, a 1-0 masterpiece at Yankee Stadium on April 30, 1946, in which he fanned 11 but walked 5.

Anyway, back to 1956. 

Coming next to New York for a Sunday doubleheader on July 15 were the Chicago White Sox, tied with Cleveland for second, 9½ games back of the Yankees. This really was a make-or-break two games for the White Sox because they had lost 6 in a row. Whitey Ford outdueled Chicago ace Billy Pierce to win the opener, 2-1, and after the White Sox took a 5-4 lead in the top of the 10th of the nightcap, the Yankees won their fourth walk-off in their last 13 games when Hank Bauer lined a two-out bases-loaded single in the bottom of the inning to drive in the tying and winning runs. The White Sox had now lost 8 in a row on their way to a season-destroying 11-game losing streak before they were finally back in the win column.

After splitting their next four games with the Tigers, Kansas City came to New York for three games beginning on July 20. Whitey Ford's victory in the first of those games gave the Yankees their largest lead of the season. Their record at 60-28, the Yankees had won more than two-thirds of their games. 

With 88 games down and 66 to go, their lead over second-place Cleveland at 11 games and Chicago 13 games behind in fourth place, and with Mantle having a year for the ages, the Yankees had effectively said good-bye to the rest of the American League. Especially it being these were The New York Yankees, it was highly improbable they would not win their seventh pennant in the eight years of the Stengel regime, even with more than two months to go. The big question for the Yankees now was:

Might Mickey Mantle, with 31 home runs in the Yankees' first 88 games, keep up the pace to break Babe Ruth's record of 60 home runs in a single season? It took the Babe 94 games into the season to get to 31 in 1927, so the Mick was ahead of the Bambino. Both players had missed just four of their team's games by the time they hit their 31st home run.

For more on Pitcher Mickey McDermott, the Batter, see:
 http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2016/05/batting-8th-for-new-york-yankees.html)

INTRODUCING YOUR 1956 AMERICAN LEAGUE ALL-STARS

The American League went down to a 7-3 defeat in the 1956 All-Star Game, played on July 10th in Washington's Griffith Stadium. All of their runs came on a pair of 6th-inning home runs by Ted Williams (with a runner on) and Mickey Mantle off Braves' ace Warren Spahn. For Williams, his 4th—and last—All-Star home run hardly was as dramatic as any of his first three, in part because his league was already trailing by five runs. For Mantle, it was his 2nd All-Star home run, after a 3-run blast he hit the previous year. Although he played in 12 more All-Star Games, it also turned out to be the last for Mickey Mantle, All Star, as well as his last All-Star run batted in.

Introducing Your 1956 American League All-Stars (60 Years Ago)

Given they had a 6½ -game lead over both the Chicago White Sox and Cleveland Indians and had won exactly two-thirds of their games, it was no surprise that the New York Yankees had the most players on the 1956 AL All-Star squad—six. Batting fourth and fifth in manager Casey Stengel's All-Star starting line-up, although they hit third and fourth in Stengel's Yankee line-up, were Mickey Mantle and Yogi Berra. Mantle was having an epic year, leading the universe—well, the majors, anyway—in runs (70), homers (29), RBIs (71), and batting (.371).

The other Yankee All-Stars were second baseman Billy Martin, making the All-Star team for the first and only time in his playing career; their Mr. Versatility, infielder Gil McDougald, whose only previous All-Star selection was in his second big league season in 1952; and pitchers Whitey Ford and Johnny Kucks. 

In just his second year, Kucks was 11-4 and had become an unexpectedly important contributor to the Yankee cause because both Bob Turley, who was 17-13 with a 3.06 ERA in 247 innings the previous season, and southpaw Tommy Byrne, whose 16-5 record was the AL's best winning percentage in 1955, were pitching poorly so far this year. Ford, 10-4, had thrown 3 scoreless innings starting the 1954 All-Star Game and also pitched in the 1955 Game, giving up 5 runs in 1⅔ innings.

Neither Yankee pitcher started for the 1956 American League All-Stars. That honor went to White Sox ace Billy Pierce, who had won 13 of 16 decisions. Pierce had also been the starting pitcher for the American League in the 1955 All-Star Game.

The fifth-place Red Sox had five players make the All-Star team, including left fielder Ted Williams and first baseman Mickey Vernon in the starting line-up. Williams was voted in despite not starting any games between April 18 (the 2nd game of the year) and May 29 (34 games later) because of a foot injury when he slipped in the showers, which limited him in the games between to coming off the bench as a pinch hitter. 

Indicative of the difference in the two leagues when it came to integration, in this the 10th year since Jackie Robinson's 1947 debut, the National League All-Star team included seven black players from five different teams—Frank Robinson and Brooks Lawrence from the Reds; Hank Aaron from the Braves; Roy Campanella and Jim Gilliam from the Dodgers; Ernie Banks from the Cubs; and Willie Mays from the Giants. The American League All-Stars, by contrast, included just two black players, both from the same team. 

They were Kansas City Athletics first baseman Vic Power and outfielder Harry Simpson. Power had also made the 1955 AL All-Star team, getting into the game as a pinch hitter. Simpson, who broke in with Cleveland in 1951 but had spent all of 1954 back in the minors, was having an extraordinary year. His 60 RBIs at the break were second to Mantle.

Neither of the American League's outstanding and most prominent black players since integration made the 1956 All-Star squad. Larry Doby, who made seven straight All-Star teams from 1949 to 1955 playing for the Indians, was not selected in his first year with the White Sox. The 32-year-old Doby got off to a sluggish start with his new club and was injured for part of May, but had a strong June with 8 homers, 27 RBIs, and a .290 batting average in 30 games that month. Not enough to be named an All-Star. Doby's teammate, Minnie Minoso, a four-time previous All-Star, also did not make the 1956 AL team despite 45 run scored, 37 RBIs, and .311 batting average, as well as having hit .348 in the month of June. 

For all their excellence, both players had started All-Star games just once—Doby in 1950 and Minoso in 1954—and remained, as of 1956, the only two black players to ever start for the American League team. As of 1956, Doby, Minoso, Satchel Paige in 1953, and now Simpson were the only black players to be American League All-Stars. 

Of course, that was not so much about snubbing black players for the AL All-Star team, whether by the fans voting or the managers selecting, as it was there were so few blacks on the rosters of American League teams.


The following is the list of the American League's starting position players, reserves, and pitchers for the 1956 All-Star Game with their key stats up to the All-Star break:

AL STARTING LINE-UP	RUNS	Power	BA
Kuenn, DET, SS	38 R	42 RBI	.354
Fox, CHI, 2B	54 R	28 RBI	.286
Williams, BOS, LF	21 R 39 GS	5 HR      30 RBI	.368
Mantle, NYY, CF	70 R	29 HR   71 RBI	.371
Berra, NYY, C	44 R	18 HR  51 RBI	.281
Kaline, DET, RF	48 R	12 HR  54 RBI	.283
Vernon, BOS, 1B	31 R	8 HR   41 RBI	.324
Kell, BAL, 3B	23 R	27 RBI	.320

AL POSITION RESERVES	RUNS	Power	BA
McDougald, NYY, SS	54	30 RBI	.310
Martin, NYY, 2B	42	23 RBI	.270
Lollar, CHI, C	30	44 RBI	.313
Boone, DET, 3B	37	12 HR  33 RBI	.252
Maxwell, DET, OF	49	17 HR  39 RBI	.361
Piersall, BOS, OF	51	35 RBI	.301
Sievers, WAS, OF	61	17 HR  54 RBI	.267
Power, KC, 1B	31   52 GS	25 RBI	.294
Simpson, KC, OF	42	12 HR  60 RBI	.304

AL PITCHERS	Record	G	ERA
Pierce, CHI * ( SP / ASG )	13-3	17 GS	3.11
Brewer, BOS	11-3	16 GS	3.02
Kucks, NYY	11-4	15 GS	3.26
Jim Wilson, CHI	11-5	15 GS	3.56
Ford, NYY *	10-4	16 GS	2.43
Wynn, CLE	10-4	17 GS	3.00
Sullivan, BOS	8-3	17 GS	3.26
Score, CLE *	8-6	15 GS	2.96
Narleski, CLE	3-2          4 SV	25 G relief	1.62
*  Left-handed pitcher

Headline: Mickey's in a Slump ! (60 Years Ago, 1956)

As the Yankees began play on June 9, 1956, their lead over the second-place Cleveland Indians—the team considered the most likely to compete with them for the American League pennant—was down to 3½ games. They were shutout by the visiting Indians the previous day, 9-0, behind the 5-hit pitching of their ace, Early Wynn. The first of those five hits was a double by Mickey Mantle, who went hitless in his next three at bats to bring his batting average down to an even .400. The Mick was in a slump.

Headline: Mickey's in a Slump ! (60 Years Ago, 1956)

 In singing Mantle's praises in its preview of the 1956 season, Sports Illustrated wrote: "Mantle is so good, they say he has a disappointing season if he doesn't hit .400." That was hyperbole, perhaps, but the point was well taken. After five big-league seasons, and having led the American League in home runs in 1955 with 37 to go along with 99 runs batted in and a .306 average, Mantle was poised for a tremendous year.

Except, maybe they were really serious about the .400 part. On May 9, after going 3-for-4 in a 6-5 Yankee loss to the Indians, Mantle was batting .446. It was 20 games into the season. Mantle had played in every game. He had gone hitless in just three and been on base in all but one. He had multi-hit games in twelve. And in addition to his .446 batting average, the Mick also had 10 home runs and 24 RBIs in the 20 games. Nobody could get the guy out.

Batting third in Casey Stengel's line-up, Mantle was certainly helped by the protection of Yogi Berra hitting behind him in the clean-up spot. Berra, having also played all 20 games, was batting .351 with 9 homers and 23 RBIs. Pitchers, pick your poison. Undoubtedly worried about the three-time MVP Berra coming up next, Mantle had walked just 12 times as of May 20, and none were intentional walks. 

One month and 29 games later, Mantle was batting a mere .400. Berra, a model of consistency, had seen his average dip to .330, but it was now back to .351. Opposing teams were now definitely pitching more carefully to Mantle. After going 1-for-4 against Wynn in the first game of the series on June 8, Mantle's average since May 9 was .373—certainly excellent for anyone else, but maybe not for the player who SI said would "have a disappointing season if he doesn't hit .400." (Hey, they were just kidding ! Kind of.)

Some slump, if we must call it that. He had failed to get a hit in only five of the Yankees' 29 games since May 9, and he had played in them all. Mantle had hit 11 more home runs, bringing his total to 21 in the Yankees' first 49 games, and he had driven in 28 runs, so now he had 52 RBIs.

There's a reason why .400 is such rarefied air. It's harder to do than to climb the highest Himalayan mountains (not to demean the difficulty and magnitude of that achievement). 

After walking in his first at bat against Cleveland starter Mike Garcia at Yankee Stadium on June 9, Mantle led off the bottom of the third off reliever Don Mossi with a single up the middle. The Yankees were already ahead, 4-0, and he soon came around to score on a 2-RBI single by Bob Cerv. That hit brought his batting average up to .403. The next inning, still facing Mossi, Mantle grounded into a fielder's choice. His average was now .401. 

That would be the last time in what was becoming—and would forever be—the epic Mickey Mantle season, that the Mick's batting average was over .400 for the season. While the Indians came roaring back to win the game, 15-8, starting with rookie Rocky Colavito's two-run homer in the fourth (the fifth of his career), Mantle flied out in the sixth with a runner on first and the Yankees' holding onto a now-slim 8-7 lead. He was now just a shade below .400 at .399. In the last of the 8th, the Mick popped out to the shortstop, making him 1-for-4 on the day and bringing his average down to .397.

The Yankees' loss reduced their lead over the Indians to 2½ games. Their record was now 31-19—a .620 winning percentage—with 50 games down and 104 to go. They played even better with a .635 winning percentage the rest of the way, 6½ games better than Cleveland. 

As for Mickey Mantle, he batted .327 the rest of the season with 31 more home runs and 78 RBIs. When all was said and done for 1956, Mickey Mantle had won the Triple Crown with a .353 average, 52 homers, and 130 runs batted in. 

But he didn't hit .400. 

Disappointing.