May 29, 1915
Phillies @ Boston Braves
Athletics vs. Boston Red Sox
Athletics vs. Boston Red Sox
The Athletics had their first taste of doubleheader action
of the 1915 season 100 years ago today at Shibe Park. In the first game, Red Sox manager Bill Carrigan
gave the ball to Babe Ruth. This was the
Babe’s sixth start of the year and so far it wasn’t going exceptionally
well. He had lost his last three starts
and his ERA had ballooned to 3.93.
Though, to be fair, one of those starts came a few weeks ago against his
future team, the New York Yankees, and he dominated them until the 13th
inning when allowed his fourth and deciding run. You can’t really blame him if he keeps the
other club at bay for over 12 innings and the rest of his team can’t bail him out. Today was the third appearance Ruth made
against the A’s this season; in the previous meetings he only allowed five hits
and three runs over ten and a third innings.
The Mackmen had their work cut out for them.
Ruth picked up right where he left off. Through eight innings of work he was the most
dominant player on the field, allowing only four Athletics to reach base and
striking out six. But as well as he played
he was match almost inning by inning by Weldon Wyckoff. The fans at Shibe Park were treated to a
pitchers duel as zero after zero was placed on the scoreboard. The only blemish from either pitcher was when
Wyckoff allowed Sox third baseman Hal Janvrin to drive in Everett Scott with a
single in fourth. Ruth ran with the one
run lead until the bottom of the ninth.
The first batter he faced was right fielder Eddie Murphy, who worked out
a walk. Jimmy Walsh went down but Jack
Lapp reached out a poked a single through the infield. Wickey McAvoy made an out, which set the
table for pinch hitter Harry Davis. Two
out, runners on first and second, and Davis slams a Babe Ruth pitch into the
gap for a single that scored the tying and winning runs. A’s win in dramatic fashion! Poor Ruth pitched a great game and deserved a
better outcome, but I think he’ll be fine going forward.
In the second game A’s pitcher Rube Bressler got knocked
around. He surrendered six runs and ten
hits in a complete game effort, but the damage was done early which contributed
to the deflating feeling of the game.
Chick Davies apparently misplayed a ball by letting it get over his head
that allowed three Red Sox to score in the second, but Bressler was charged
with those runs so there’s no telling who was to blame. Most likely they both were. Anyway, the A’s trailed for most of the game
6-1. In the bottom of the ninth Sox
pitcher Ernie Shore started to get shaky.
Could the A’s pull off the miracle of winning both games of a
doubleheader in walk-off fashion? Well, no,
not today. Shore did allow a rally to
start but the A’s only got within a run before they were retired. After the game Connie Mack looked at his
roster, saw a lot of his starters on the injured list (including Nap Lajoie,
Amos Strunk, Wally Schang, Rube Oldring, and Stuffy McInnis; five-eights of his
starting lineup), and decided it was time to cut ties with his Opening Day
starter and best lefty, Herb Pennock.
Mack had no trade lined up, but both he and Pennock agreed that it would
best for the young pitcher to find employment elsewhere. Almost as soon as he was placed on waivers
the Red Sox nabbed him up. Pennock went
on to have a Hall of Fame career and Mack let him go for nothing. So it goes.[1]
The Phillies were taking on the Braves at Fenway Park. Braves Field, which would be the new home of
the Braves, wasn’t ready yet so they played their home games for the first half
of 1915 at Fenway. Dick Rudolph was
pitching for the Braves. You may
remember Rudolph from the first game of the season. He was the only pitcher in baseball on Grover
Cleveland Alexander’s level in 1914 and the ace for the Braves. The Phillies beat him in their only two
matchups this season, but his 2.39 ERA proves that he was still one of the tops
in the game. If there was any question
about that, he proved his worth in today’s game.
The scoring started in the second when the Phillies squeezed
two runs by Rudolph and the Braves, but he quickly settled down and only
allowed one more run over the next six innings.
As in command as Rudolph proved to be, Al Demaree was his exact
opposite. He got one out in the fourth
before Pat Moran had seen enough, but before he was pulled he walked seven
batters, gave up two other hits, and allowed five runners to score. Once again, to be fair, we have to mention
that Gavvy Cravath and Beals Becker both made errors that allowed three runs to
score. So while Demaree’s line looks
terrible, he might have actually only pitched really badly. George Chalmers, who apparently wasn’t great
at relieving, came in and gave up three more runs in an inning and two-thirds. This was his second game in a row where he
was asked to put out the fire and get his team going only to perform as poorly
as his predecessor. So, at the end of
four, it was 7-2 Braves. The Phillies
scored a run in the fifth and seemed to have a good thing going in the sixth
when Rabbit Maranville caught a deep fly ball in foul territory and made a
great throw home to catch the runner as he tagged up from third. The double play killed the rally and
essentially ended the Phillies chances to get back into the game. The final score was 9-4 Braves.[2][3]
This loss was not only the club’s third loss in a row
(actually third loss in two days), not only their sixth loss in their last
eight games, but also the coupe de grace for first place hopes for a
while. The Cubs beat the Red 3-1 in
Cincinnati and jumped a full game over Philadelphia. The bumper Philadelphia built by starting the
season 8-0 was gone now and the Cubs were kings of the National League. In a couple of weeks the Phillies will flirt
with first and even managed to hold it for a few days, but they essentially fell
out of the spot until mid-July. Of course
nobody at the time thought that it would take that long to get back to first;
one game is easy enough to overcome.
But, as I’ve been saying, the road trip the Phillies are on is a
killer. As a fan back in 1915 you’d have
to be worried that this club isn’t what they appeared to be at the beginning of
the year. If there was sports talk radio
back then you just know callers would be saying they knew all along that this
team was fraud and they weren’t ever going to do anything until they got a new
owner and Pat Moran is a terrible manager and on and on and on. This was a tough position for the
Phillies. They just couldn’t get it
together like they had done earlier in the year. The good news (for the club, fans, me, and
readers of this blog) is that eventually they will pull out of this mess and
play as well as the best teams in baseball.
But we have to go through the darkness to appreciate the light.
[1]
“Boston and Athletics Split,” The Sun,
May 30, 1915, accessed May 28, 2015, http://1.usa.gov/1KB0Yvy.
[2]
“Braves Win, But Rudolph Is Hurt,” New
York Tribune, May 30, 1915, accessed May 28, 2015, http://1.usa.gov/1FQ7snk.
[3]
“Beat Phillies; Lose Rudolph,” The Sun,
May 30, 1915, accessed May 28, 2015, http://1.usa.gov/1KB0Yvy.
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