June 30, 1915
Phillies vs. Boston Braves
Athletics @ Boston Red Sox
Athletics @ Boston Red Sox
While the Athletics were up at Fenway Park in Boston showing
their defensive deficiencies (the Sox scored 20 runs in the doubleheader), the
Phillies were at the Baker Bowl with ace Grover Cleveland Alexander strutting
his stuff on the mound. And luckily for
him (and the fans) the Phillies offense decided they would contribute to
today’s win! What a novel idea! Their opponent was Iron Davis, who was making
his first appearance of the year. Davis,
who did not have a particularly “long” or “successful” career, started this one
off on the right foot by allowing only one base runner in the first two
innings. Alex matched him.
But Davis let his true stripes show when Fred Luderus,
league leader in batting average at .321, led off the third with one of those
ground-rule-double home runs. He
launched a ball over the head of Joe Connolly that one-hopped over the fence
for a round-tripper, 1915-style. This
unfortunately wasn’t the worst thing to happen to poor Connolly today. The Phils didn’t stop there, though, two
walks and two singles later and Philadelphia left the inning with a 4-0
lead. The fourth inning proved almost as
plentiful as the first. Four singles and
an error provided Philadelphia with three more runs. The onslaught was on. To make matters worse for the Braves, as the
Phillies added yet another run in the fifth inning, Gavvy Cravath rocketed
another ball toward Joe Connolly, but it skipped away or took a bounce the
fielder wasn’t expecting and smashed him right in the face, knocking him
immediately unconscious. Cravath showed
the vigor of the ballplayers of the era by not stopping his circuit while
Connolly lay prone in left field, reaching all the way to third base for his
third triple of the year. Connolly was
rushed to the hospital after the play and recovered nicely. He sat out three games but made his triumph
return on July 5th. At least
Gavvy didn’t kill him.[1]
Alexander’s pitching from here out could be viewed two ways;
either the 7-0 lead meant Alex could pitch to the score and not strain himself to
get the win and that’s why he started letting up runs, or the fantastic hitting
performance by the Phillies covered up one of Alex’s worst outings of the
year. I’ll let you decide. He allowed five runs from the fifth to the
seventh inning, making the game seem much closer than it was. His six strikeouts were on par with his norm,
but he did let up an uncharacteristic home run to former-Phillie Sherry
Magee. Well, it was no harm no foul as
the Phillies put this one away early on, taking the win 8-5.
The end of June marks the calendar mid-point of the season
(the games mid-point is still a few
weeks away), so I figured now would be a good time to put the season into context. Philadelphia sat in second place, 2.5 games
back of Chicago. St. Louis and
Pittsburgh rounded out the first division, 3.0 and 3.5 games back respectively. Boston and New York were 7 games back while
Brooklyn and Cincinnati were 8.5 behind.
Of that group only Boston would make a play for the pennant, the rest
were effectively finished.
The National League was not a “hitting” league per se in
1915, that’s for sure. The median slash
line was .248/.318/.330 and most teams did not have double-digit home runs as
of yet. Chicago led the league in home
runs with 25, but the Phillies were hot on their trail with 24; the Cardinals
sat third with 11, to put the Cubs and Phillies lead into perspective. Gavvy Cravath had nine homers, which was more
than Cincinnati, Brooklyn, and Pittsburgh had as teams! But, teams of the era were more inclined to
get a base hit and move runners along using small ball tactics, and stealing
bases was a huge part of the game.
Pittsburgh had 90 steals so far to lead the league; second place was
Chicago with 79.
The slump we’ve seen with the Phillies (though at this point
it had gone on for two-thirds of the season, so slump may be a gracious term
for their performance) is evident in the stats.
Hits were hard to come by, and their 452 made them the least hitting
team in the league. Even adjusting for
hits per game only jumps them over Pittsburgh, and the difference was small at
that. They sat second to last in team
OPS at .630 (Brooklyn was below them with .585) and dead last in stolen
bases. So, they didn’t hit for average,
they didn’t hit for extra bases, and they didn’t play small ball. How they hell were they only 2.5 games back
of first place?
You know the answer; it’s pitching. The Phillies led the league in team ERA
(2.10, second place was Pittsburgh 2.65, more than a half run worse!), WHIP
(1.10, second St. Louis 1.21), hits per game (2.13, second Pittsburgh 2.56),
and strikeouts per game (4.28, second Chicago 4.18). The Phillies spent the entirety of the first
half of the season dominating their opponents on the mound. Obviously the credit for this stellar
performance starts with Grover Cleveland Alexander, but let’s not forget that
Erskine Mayer would have been the ace on most other teams in the league. The staff has thus far carried this team, but
signs were pointing to the hitting taking up some of the responsibility they’ve
lacked. In their two wins to close out
June, Philadelphia scored 13 runs, something the team had not done since
early-June when they scored 13 runs in a game.
Obviously, it takes more than two random games in June to prove
proficient in hitting, but if they could keep it up it would only be a matter
of time before they closed in on the Cubs and took their rightful spot at the
top of the National League.
[1]
“Long Drives Are Numerous In Phils’ And Braves’ Game,” Evening Ledger, June 30, 1915, accessed June 30, 2015, http://1.usa.gov/1KnCbJW.
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