What's With Big Newk in the World Series? (60 Years Ago, 1956)

A few days ago, on the 7th of October, Clayton Kershaw and David Price took the mound in post-season games having to live down mystifying questions as why, in the crucible of October baseball, they have been anything but the elite pitchers they are. Sixty years ago, on October 10, 1956, at Ebbets Field, the Dodgers' Don Newcombe did the same. 

(60 Years Ago):
What's With Big Newk in the World Series?

Don Newcombe was a 20-game winner for the third time in his six big league seasons, which were interrupted by two years of military service during the Korean War. He was, in fact, exceptional, with a 27-7 record—every one of his wins necessary for the 1956 Brooklyn Dodgers to return to the World Series and have a chance to defend their world championship the year before. Pitching and winning the last game of the season on Sunday, September 30, by which the Dodgers secured the pennant by just one game over the Milwaukee Braves, the Brooklyn ace would not have been ready for Game 1 on Wednesday. He would start Game 2 instead on five days of rest. 

Despite having won 70 percent of his decisions (a 112-48 career record) so far in his career, Newcombe went into the '56 World Series having already earned a reputation for a big-time winner in the regular season turned batting practice pitcher / loser in the Fall Classic.

It all began in his rookie year of 1949, when he broke in with a 17-8 record, and led the Dodgers in starts (31), complete games (19), shutouts (5), innings pitched (244⅓), strikeouts (149), and fewest-hits-per-9 innings (8.2). He was first in the league in shutouts, second in strikeouts, and third in complete games and hits-per-9 innings.

He pitched like the ace he was in the opening game of the 1949 World Series, shutting out the Yankees on four hits through eight innings. At Yankee Stadium no less. But Allie Reynolds was even better, shutting out the Dodgers on just two hits, and Reynolds had two of the four hits Newcombe had given up. But Tommy Henrich, the Yankees' first batter in the ninth, homered. The game was over. The Yankees won. So far, the worst you could say about Newcombe in World Series competition was that he pitched brilliantly, Reynolds pitched better, and Tommy Henrich was ... well, Old Reliable.

Just three days after his anguishing loss, Newcombe took the mound again at Ebbets Field in Game 4, needing to win for the Dodgers to tie the Series at two games apiece. Although he struggled through the first inning, giving up two hits and two walks but being helped out by a double play, Newcombe shutout the Yankees through three. He got only one out in the fourth, however, giving up 3 runs on three doubles and a walk before being sent to the showers. The Dodgers lost the game. The next day they lost the World Series.

Because of his time in the US Army, Newk's next World Series did not come until 1955, a season in which he won 20, lost 5, and led the league in winning percentage and in WHIP. He started the opening game against Whitey Ford and gave up 6 runs on 8 hits before being taken out with two outs in the 6th. He did not pitch again in the World Series, most likely because his arm was sore and he had a bad back. Brooklyn nonetheless won in seven games without him. 

Going into his start in Game 2 of the 1956 Series, Newcombe's line in 3 World Series starts was an 0-3 record and 5.19 earned run average in 17⅓ innings. He was up against Don Larsen, a so-so pitcher whose historic date with fate would come in Game 5. Newk gave up a run in the 1st and 5 in the 2nd, leaving with two outs in the inning after Yogi Berra belted a grand slam to make the score 6-0. The only reason Newcombe did not lose the game was because Larsen couldn't get out of Brooklyn's half of the second as the Dodgers scored 6 runs to tie the score on their way to a 13-8 win and a two-games-to-none lead in the Series.

But Newcombe had now allowed 16 earned runs in the 19 innings he had pitched in four World Series starts. His World Series ERA was now up to 7.58, and over 9.00 since the Tommy Henrich game. And so his reputation for "choking" in the big games went to the mound with him in Game 7. 

The Dodgers' defense of their 1955 championship was on the line. Berra hit a two-run homer in the 1st and another 2-run homer in the 3rd to give the Yankees a 4-0 lead. Newk's day was done when Elston Howard led off the 4th with a home run. The Dodgers lost, 9-0, in what turned out to be . . . The LAST World Series game played in Brooklyn.

In baseball, post-season failures when everything is on the line can be unforgiving because that is when the games are most visible. Charlie Dressen, the Brooklyn manager for whom Newcombe pitched in 1951, once derided his ace's failures in big games as a "terrible flaw." Perhaps Dressen was not remembering that Newcombe's pitching in the last week of that season is what enabled the Dodgers to finish the schedule tied for first, forcing the playoff that ended with Bobby Thomson's home run. Newcombe rose to the occasion in those "big" games. Specifically, Newk had two complete-game victories, including a shutout, and pitching 5⅔ innings of shutout relief in a Dodgers' win in their 154th game on the schedule—all absolute-must win games for Brooklyn—in the last five days of the season.

Perhaps if his World Series record was not 0-4 in 5 starts with an atrocious 8.59 ERA, that might have made a difference the times he has since been considered for Hall of Fame validation. It's not necessarily apparent why some elite players have had such great struggles in the post-season, but it almost certainly has nothing to do with any "terrible flaw"—unless that flaw is taking on the psychological burden of being perceived as, even having to be, the savior because of their excellence during the season. 

Just as few would question today the excellence of either Clayton Kershaw or David Price despite their post-season let-downs, Don Newcombe was an outstanding pitcher—one of the best of his era—without whom the 1949-56 Dodgers would not have been as successful as they were. 

And as we all know, in those two post-season games on October 7 of this year, neither Kershaw nor Price pitched to the level typically expected of them. Kershaw struggled through 5 innings and gave up 3 runs on 8 hits. He got the win and is now 3-6 with a 4.65 ERA in the post-season. Price had another terrible start, giving up 5 runs in 3⅓ innings and is now 2-8 in post-season games with a 5.54 ERA. 

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. 

Fifth Game of the '56 Season (60 Years Ago): Yankees Move Into First For Good

It was a wild one at Yankee Stadium on Saturday, April 21, 1956. The Yankees blew an early 8-0 lead against the Red Sox, then had to come from behind, trailing 10-9, to snatch their fourth victory in five games. This early in the season, the standings didn't necessarily mean anything—certainly not with 149 games still to play—but their victory combined with the White Sox' loss put the Yankees into first place by half a game. Although there would be one day in May when they had to share top billing, the New York Yankees were never not first in the American League the remainder of the 1956 season.

FIFTH GAME OF THE '56 SEASON (SIXTY YEAR AGO):
YANKEES MOVE INTO FIRST FOR GOOD

The Yankees started the season by winning two of three in Washington and taking the first of a three-game set against the Boston Red Sox in their first home series of the year. The Chicago White Sox, along with the Milwaukee Braves in the National League, were the only undefeated teams going into just the fifth day of the schedule, both with 3-0 records, while the Yankees were 3-1. Whitey Ford had just pitched a five-hit complete game in the Yankees' first home game, with Mickey Mantle hitting his 3rd home run of the year and driving in four runs to pace the Bronx Bombers to a 7-1 victory over Boston.

Wasting no time in their determination to beat up on the Red Sox, the Yankees also made very clear to right-hander George Susce that he was not a "Yankee Killer" despite his success against them as a rookie the previous year. Susce pitched in five games against the Yankees in his first big-league season in 1955, all but the last in relief, giving up just 2 earned runs on 14 hits in 19.1 innings for an anti-Yankee ERA of 0.93. His one decision against the Yankees came in his only start against them, an 8-1 complete-game victory in the last game of the season. 

If Susce thought he might build on that making his first start in the 1956 campaign, the Yankees rudely reminded him why they were the Bronx Bombers. Yogi Berra doubled to give the Yankees a 1-0 lead in the last of the first, then scored on Joe Collins's single. In the second, Hank Bauer hit a 2-run home run, Mantle hit a 2-run home run, the Yankees now led 6-0, and Susce retired to the showers having pitched just one-and-a-third innings. The Yankees scored a pair of unearned runs in the third and Bob Turley, who was 17-13 in his first year in New York in 1955, had a comfortable, two-grand-slams-ahead 8-0 lead.

They were still coasting with an 8-0 lead in the fifth when Turley gave up a two-run homer to Faye Throneberry and a solo blast to Mickey Vernon. The Yankees made it 9-3 in the sixth, and then the Red Sox unloaded for 4 in the seventh and 3 in the eighth on home runs by Jimmy Piersall and backup catcher Pete Daley off reliever Jim Konstanty to improbably take a 10-9 lead.

That lasted … not at all. Berra immediately tied the score by leading off the Yankee eighth with a home run, and before the inning was over the Yankees henpecked the Red Sox for four more runs to make the final score, New York 14, Boston 10.

With the White Sox crushed by the Kansas City Athletics, 15-1, the Yankees were now in first place by half-a-game over both clubs. In their first five games, the Yankees had scored 43 runs. The Red Sox, with 31 runs, were the closest major league team in terms of offensive productivity. The Yankees had hit 8 home runs and were batting .303 as a team.

And as many were projecting, Mickey Mantle looked like he might have a truly outstanding season. He was batting .444 with a league-leading 4 home runs and 11 runs batted in—all in just five games. And Yogi Berra was pretty impressive, too, hitting .467 with 2 home runs and 9 RBIs.

But of course, it was still far too early in the season to draw any conclusions. The Yankees still had 149 games to go, including all 22 against both of their would-be competitors for the pennant—the Cleveland Indians and Chicago White Sox. Still, Casey Stengel ... he who had endless things to say ... sure wasn't complaining about how things so far were going.

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.

Back Story to the Catch and Throw That Ended the "Wait Till Next Year"

On October 4, 1955—sixty years ago—Johnny Podres retired the Yankees in order in the last of the 9th at Yankee Stadium to complete an eight-hit 2-0 shutout in Game 7 that finally, after seven previous Brooklyn visitations to the Fall Classic, ended the "wait till next year." Podres, who also won Game 3 to prevent the Yankees from taking a three games-to-none lead in the '55 Series, was the World Series MVP. But it was an exquisite defensive play by Sandy Amoros that saved the day for the Flatbush Faithful, which might not have happened if not for the decision to pinch hit for Don Zimmer.

Back Story to the Catch and Throw That Ended the "Wait Till Next Year"

When the late, great Yogi Berra, then managing the 1973 New York Mets, said in the midst of a pennant race in which his team was lagging in August, "It's not over 'til it's over," he most assuredly was not thinking about the 6th inning of Game 7 in the 1955 World Series. 

That’s when, with Yankee runners on first and second and nobody out, Sandy Amoros made a great catch at the left field fence after a long run to rob him of an extra-base hit that would have tied the score at 2-2. Savvy veteran Gil McDougald, the runner on first, was so certain Berra's drive would be a hit and so determined to score, that he failed to consider it might actually be caught. But catch it Amoros did. He immediately fired a strike to cut-off man Pee Wee Reese, whose throw to first doubled off McDougald before he could scramble back.

And thus was the game and the World Series over before it was over, regardless of any philosophical musings to the contrary by Mr. Berra.

A key part of the lore and majesty of that moment is that Amoros had just entered the game to play left field. This has usually been described as a prescient move by Dodgers manager Walt Alston. 

But Amoros was put into the game at that precise moment, just in time to make the most important defensive play of the World Series, less because Alston had an inclination to upgrade his defense than because he had just pinch hit for starting second baseman Don Zimmer with the bases loaded, two out, and the Dodgers ahead 2-0, in the top half of the inning in a bid to put the game away. Stengel had relieved left-handed starter Tommy Byrne with right-handed Bob Grim two batters earlier, and Alston judged the left-handed George Shuba as the better bet to break the game open than the weaker-hitting, right-handed Zimmer. 

Shuba, in his last at bat in a major league game, made out, after which Alston moved Jim Gilliam from left to replace Zimmer at second, and put Amoros in to play left. Gilliam was the Dodgers' Mr. Versatility. He had replaced Jackie Robinson at second base in 1953, with Jackie moving to play third and occasionally left field, and had started the '55 season playing second, but Alston used him increasingly in the outfield as the season drew to a close when Amoros, who had started the year in left field, was mostly sidelined because of his struggles at the plate.

These moves were consistent with the 1950s baseball renaissance in platooning and substituting for position players based on the game situation that was brought back into prominence by Alston's rival in the Yankee dugout—one Mr. Casey Stengel. (The heyday of both practices, particularly platooning, had been in the 1920s.) 

Alston, however, then in his second year as Dodgers manager, was not yet anywhere near Stengel’s zip code when it came to substituting for position players in his starting line-up. Stengel made 211 position-player substitutions during the regular season (much fewer than the record-setting 286 he made in 1954), while Alston made only 106, which was also below the National League average of 127. That might be because the Dodgers’ faced only 55 left-handed pitchers all season.

The Dodgers also faced only 11 southpaw starting pitchers in 154 National League games, so Alston had little opportunity to platoon even if that was something he was inclined to do. But two of the Yankees’ top starting pitchers, Whitey Ford and Byrne, were left-handed, causing Alston to bench the left-handed-batting Amoros, who was now being platooned, in favor of right-handed infielder Zimmer in the eighth spot of his batting order in three of the four games Stengel started his southpaws. Gilliam, the Dodgers' lead-off batter, was in the starting line-up for every game of the Fall Classic, in left field when Zimmer played and second base when Amoros played. 

Until Game 7, Alston had substituted for a position player just once in the Series, in the sixth game. But that was a move made necessary when Duke Snider twisted his ankle on a sprinkler head making a catch in center field in the third inning. Those darned Yankee Stadium outfield sprinklers . . . let us not forget Mickey Mantle was maimed by one during the 1951 World Series. Snider was back in the line-up for the Series finale, although the sprained ankle may have contributed to his 0-for-3 day.

Anyway, with Stengel starting Byrne in the finale, the right-handed-batting Zimmer was in Alston's Game 7 starting line-up, and the left-handed-batting Amoros not. And after Stengel changed pitchers, Alston pinch hit for Zimmer the first chance he had, necessitating a defensive replacement, which meant Gilliam moving to second and Amoros replacing Gilliam in left field.

That series of moves came just in time to save the game for the Dodgers, helping them to secure their first World Series triumph, which turned out to be their only World Series championship in Brooklyn.

Postscript: Neither Zimmer nor Amoros had the career they or the Dodgers envisioned. 

Sandy Amoros was a brilliant prospect who led the International League in batting with a .353 average in 1953, when he played for Brooklyn's top Triple-A team in Montreal. In the majors, however, Amoros had difficulty hitting lefties. Playing in only 517 major league games, mostly between 1954 and 1957, Amoros was almost exclusively a platoon-player against right-handed pitching, starting just six games against southpaws in his career—three of them, plus Game 6, in 1955—and had only 92 plate appearances against lefties. 

Zimmer had difficulty hitting anybody, perhaps because of a horrific beaning in 1953, when he was a hot prospect with the Dodgers' Triple-A team in St. Paul, that left him unconscious for 10 days with a fractured skull. Don Zimmer was never a star player, but went on to become a cherished baseball figure as a manager and, ultimately, as the wise confidant to Joe Torre when Torre was building his Hall of Fame managerial credentials in the Yankee dugout.

60 Years Ago (1955): Before "Next Year"--the Dodgers Vexed World Series History

The Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Yankees had vastly different post-season histories as they squared off in Game 1 of the 1955 World Series at Yankee Stadium on September 28. The Yankees had been to 20 World Series and won 16 of them. The Dodgers did not win any of the seven World Series they had played, the last five of which were all against the Yankees. And their Fall Classics history seemed particularly vexed, because it always seemed that some odd event—or Billy Martin—did them in.

Before "Next Year: Brooklyn's Vexed World Series History

1916: After the Dodgers—then known as the "Robins" after their manager, Wilbert Robinson—lost the opening game of their first World Series to the Boston Red Sox, the two teams battled into the 14th inning of Game 2 in Boston. Both starting pitchers, Sherry Smith for Brooklyn and some guy named Babe Ruth for the Red Sox, were still in the game. After Ruth retired the Robins in order in the top of the inning, Smith walked the lead-off batter, who went to second on a sacrifice bunt, from where he scored on a walk-off single by Del Gainer, pinch-hitting for veteran third baseman Larry Gardner. Gainer was strictly a bench player, but was sent up to hit for the left-handed-batting Gardner, whose .308 batting average was fifth in the league, as a percentage move against the southpaw Smith. Gainer's game-winning hit was his only plate appearance in the 1916 World Series.

Down two games-to-none, Brooklyn owner Charles Ebbets caused some controversy by banishing the Red Sox' band of Royal Rooters (a real band) to the far reaches of his ballpark when the Series moved to Ebbets Field, which may or may not have helped his team win Game 3. The Robins took a 2-0 lead in the first inning of Game 4, only to watch the aforementioned Mr. Gardner slide under the catcher's tag with a three-run inside-the-park home run. (There was no New York review.) The Red Sox won the game, and the next day the Series as well when the teams returned to Boston, where the Royal Rooters put up a celebratory hoot.

1920: Now oh-for-one in World Series competition, Brooklyn was back in the Classic in 1920, against the Cleveland Indians. With the Series tied two games apiece in Game 5 in Cleveland, the Indians jumped off to a 4-0 lead in the first inning when their first three batters touched future Hall of Fame pitcher Burleigh Grimes for singles to load the bases and clean-up hitter Elmer Smith hit the first grand slam in World Series history. And the Indians still had all 27 outs to play with. 

Later in the 5th inning, as if that World Series first was not enough to victimize the Dodgers—still called the Robins—they hit into the first and only unassisted triple play in World Series history. With runners at first and second, and behind 7-0 in the score, Clarence Mitchell, a very good-hitting pitcher who had relieved the ineffective Grimes, hit a line-drive that seemed destined to land safely in center field—except that second baseman Bill Wambsganss leaped to his right and snared the drive for the out. Both Robins took flight for the next base when the ball was hit—it sure looked like a hit—allowing Wambsganss to touch second to double-up the lead runner and tag out the runner from first, standing just off the keystone sack, for unassisted out number three.

The Robins were shut out the next two games and were now oh-and-two in World Series play. Brooklyn did not return to the Fall Classic for 21 years, during which time the Robins went back to being called the Dodgers once Wilbert Robinson retired.

1941: With the Yankees and Dodgers tied at a game apiece, Brooklyn manager Leo Durocher called upon his ace reliever, Hugh Casey, to hold the Yankees at bay in a scoreless tie in Game 3 at Ebbets Field. Casey gave up four consecutive singles and wound up the losing pitcher.

The next day, having entered the game in the sixth inning, Casey was protecting a 4-3 lead that would have tied the Series and had the Yankees down to their last strike—which he got, except that strike three got passed catcher Mickey Owen and Tommy Henrich reached first base, whereupon Casey proceeded to unravel, surrendering a single, a walk, and a pair of doubles that resulted in the Yankees winning the game. The Series mercifully ended the next day, the Dodgers never again with a lead.

1947: Jackie Robinson tormenting the Yankees with his base-running, Al Gionfriddo’s robbery of Joe DiMaggio causing the normally unflustered Yankee Clipper to kick the dirt, and Cookie Lavagetto’s two-out last-of-the-ninth double not only breaking up Bill Bevens’ no-hitter but turning him into the losing pitcher were Brooklyn highlights in the 1947 World Series. But Yogi Berra had the first pinch-hit home run in World Series history, Bobby Brown went three-for-three as a pinch hitter, and Joe Page pitched five scoreless innings allowing only one runner to reach base to win Game 7 and send the Dodgers to their fourth straight World Series defeat.

1949: Don Newcombe, 17-8 in his rookie year with Brooklyn, was dominant for the Dodgers in Game 1 of the World Series, making history as the first black pitcher to start in the Fall Classic. He shut out the Yankees through eight innings, giving up just four hits and striking out 11. Unfortunately, Allie Reynolds was just as good for the Yankees. Henrich led off the bottom of the ninth for the Yankees and hit a home run to defeat Newcombe, 1-0. The Dodgers won the next day by the same score, but Brooklyn lost the Series in five games. This game was the undeserved beginning of criticism that Newcombe had a tendency to choke in big games.

1952: The Yankees and Dodgers met again in the 1952 World Series. The Dodgers had a 3-games-to-2 advantage, lost Game 6, and in the bottom of the 7th of Game 7, trailing by 4-2, loaded the bases with just one out . . . and did not score a single run. Their last hope died on a popup around the pitcher’s mound that looked for sure like it would drop for a cheap game-tying hit when the Yankee first baseman lost the ball in the sun and the pitcher just stood there. But to the rescue came Billy Martin, charging in from his position at second base, losing his hat racing to the interior of the infield, and making a knee-high catch to end the threat. The Dodgers did not threaten again, and were now oh-for-six in World Series play.

1953: It was Billy Martin to the Yankees’ rescue again the next year. This time it was the Yankees batting in the bottom of the 9th of Game 6 with a 3-games-to-2 advantage, the score tied 3-3, runners at first and second, one out, Dodgers ace reliever Clem Labine on the mound, and darned if Billy the Kid doesn’t slap a game-winning, World Series-winning, single up the middle. It was his 12th hit of the Series, tying a record, and his 8th run batted in.

The Ebbets Faithful always consoled themselves with, "Wait till next year."

But the Dodgers were up against the Yankees once again in 1955. And wasn’t it just their luck that Billy Martin had returned from his service commitment in September, just in time to help the Yankees win the ’55 pennant and play in the World Series.

Appreciating Yogi Berra

Yogi Berra has passed away, beloved by multiple generations of baseball fans. As much as his assorted "Yogi-isms" were such a delight and made him an American cultural icon beyond baseball, and though the culture often had fun with his seemingly unathletic physique, Berra was very much an athlete—strong, faster than he looked, especially in his youth, and quick—and one of the great players of his generation. He played in 14 World Series and managed in two, one with the Yankees and one with the Mets. And he was a man of great dignity and personal integrity, best revealed the two occasions he was fired as Yankee manager. His death comes almost exactly forty years to the day after that of his managerial mentor, Casey Stengel.

Appreciating Yogi Berra

There were four catchers in the debate about the best in history at the time Berra made the Yankees for good in 1947, alternating his rookie season between catcher and the outfield. Three were contemporaries in the late-1920s through the 1930s—Gabby Hartnett of the Cubs, Mickey Cochrane of the Athletics and then the Tigers, and the Yankees' Bill Dickey—and the fourth was 19th century catcher Buck Ewing, one of the earliest entrants into the Hall of Fame. 

There was no question the Berra kid could hit. The Yankees were still debating what position he should play, however, when Dickey took charge of "learning me his experience," as Yogi put it in one of his earliest Yogi-isms. The two made for an odd couple, at least by appearance—the tall, lanky, statesman-like Bill Dickey at 6-1 and 185, and the short, stout, arguably-neanderthalish Berra at 5-7 and also 185. Anyway, Berra proved a superb pupil and, appearances notwithstanding, had the athletic attributes Dickey could leverage in learning the seemingly awkward kid his experience.

While Mickey Mantle was the superstar when the Yankees dominated the American League in the 1950s, Yogi provided critical ballast. He was a dangerous hitter to complement the Mick, made more so by his uncanny ability to hit pitches out of the strike zone that might have been meant to set him up or throw him off-stride. Perhaps more importantly in the grand scheme of championship baseball, Berra was a fine defensive catcher and savvy handler of the Yankee pitching staff, and his leadership and knowledge of the game caused Mr. Stengel to call Yogi his "assistant manager." 

In the 10 years from 1949 to 1958, while the Yankees were winning 9 pennants, Berra hit at least 20 home runs every year, with a career-high 30 in both 1952 and 1956. He drove in over 100 runs five times, including four seasons in a row from 1953 to 1956. All this while playing baseball's most demanding position, long before the armor and accoutrements of the modern catcher. And he was durable. In the seven years from 1950 to 1956, Berra caught at least 137 games every year. He was in at the finish of 93 percent of the games he started.

Indicative of his value to the Yankees, Yogi Berra won three MVP Awards, in 1951, 1954 (when, ironically, the Yankees did not win the pennant), and 1955—sixty years ago—which is the focus of most posts on Baseball Historical Insight this season. Beginning in 1958, when he turned 33 but already had nearly 1,500 major league games under his belt, Berra was typically platooned behind the plate with Elston Howard, which nonetheless meant he had by far the most catching responsibility because he was the left-handed-batting half of the platoon. His playing career began winding down in 1960, when he began alternating between catching and playing left field. Howard became the Yankees' regular catcher in 1961, and Berra a valuable part-time catcher-outfielder.

Berra took over as the Yankees' manager in 1964 and retired as a player. In a very eventful season that included the Phil Linz harmonica incident, the most important thing is that he led the Yankees to a pennant they won by a single game after the team looked lost for much of the summer. After falling in seven games to the Cardinals in the World Series, Yogi was gracelessly fired, in a decision that had apparently been made when the Yankee struggles earlier in the summer raised questions about his leadership abilities.

As manager of the Mets, Berra is most remembered for saying “it ain’t over till it’s over” when the 1973 Mets were in last place in mid-August, and then managing his team to the division title and into the World Series by beating an early iteration of Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine (winners of 99 games to the Mets’ 82) in the NLCS. Alas, his team was once again on the losing side of a 7-game World Series. But perhaps Berra's best Mets legacy was holding the team together in trying circumstances in 1972 when he took charge following the death of their beloved manager Gil Hodges, who suffered a massive heart attack in spring training. 

Returning to the Yankees as a coach after being fired by the Mets in 1975, Berra got to manage the entire 1984 season for George Steinbrenner, not without having to endure considerable Boss interference. He was summarily dismissed just 16 games into the 1985 season, with Steinbrenner sending his GM to do the dirty work—an event that said much about the relative integrity of both men and ruptured his relationship with the Yankees for nearly the entire rest of the 20th century.

Bill James in 2001 concluded that Yogi Berra was the best catcher in baseball history. Ahead of Hartnett, Cochrane, and Dickey who came before. Ahead of Campanella who was a contemporary. Ahead of even Johnny Bench, Carlton Fisk, and Ivan Rodriguez who came later. Given that Joe Mauer, despite having won three batting championships as a catcher, caught 100 games in only five of his 10 big-league seasons before moving over to first base, and that this year will mark only the fourth time Buster Posey has caught 100 or more games, it seems safe to conclude that James's judgment still holds: Yogi Berra, baseball's best catcher ever. 

A final thought: Casey Stengel exited this world on September 29, 1975, almost exactly 40 years ago. Not only was Stengel a mentor to Berra as a leader and game-manager, just as Dickey was to Berra's catcher's skill set, but they were two of the game's most colorful personalities in the use of language—both of whose clever, confusing, confounding words contained (when pondered) some profound meaning, observation, or immutable truth. 

Yogi, of course, was the master of the one-line quip; Casey of the telling anecdote, although each could do the other. They would have made for a great vaudeville act, which was not an uncommon off-season gig for some of the higher-profile names in baseball in the early days of the 20th century. They could have had a dueling banjos kind of act between Stengel-speak and Yogi-speak.

Of course, we were now in the middle of the 20th century. Still, it would have been fun.