Washington DC Baseball

[GeoPoto]

Player #54G: Walter P. "Barney" Johnson. "The Big Train". Pitcher for the Washington Senators in 1907-1927. 417 wins and 34 saves in 21 MLB seasons. 1924 World Series champion. 1913 and 1924 AL Most Valuable Player. 3-time triple crown. 6-time AL wins leader. 5-time AL ERA leader. 12-time AL strikeout leader. He had a career ERA of 2.17 in 5,914.1 innings pitched. He pitched a no-hitter in 1920. He holds the MLB record with 110 career shutouts. MLB All-Time Team. Inducted to the MLB Hall of Fame in 1936. One of his best seasons was 1913 as he posted a record of 36-7 with a 1.14 ERA in 346 innings pitched.

Deveaux addresses a development in 1916: Boston had a southpaw who was providing worthy opposition to Walter Johnson as the league's best pitcher. While Johnson, with his easy whiplike sidearmer, remained overpowering in 1916 -- leading in wins (25), strikeouts, complete games and innings pitched -- he also lost 20 games for the second time in his career. Thirteen of those defeats were by a single run, and four were of the disheartening 1-0 variety. Meanwhile, the big raw youngster of the Red Sox, George Herman "Babe" Ruth, led the American League in earned average, starts, and shutouts (nine, still the single-season league record for a lefthander).

Ruth would also establish a dominance over the Big Train when the two were the pitchers of record. Ruth would win the first six matchups, including a 13-inning barnburner. Within a few short years, however, American League batters would be rejoicing when Ruth would be converted into the greatest offensive phenomenon ever to grace a baseball diamond. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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[GeoPoto]

Player #56D: George F. "Pinch" McBride. Shortstop for the Washington Senators in 1908-1920. 1,203 hits, 7 home runs, and 133 stolen bases in 16 MLB seasons. Debuted with the Milwaukee Brewers in 1901. Has the lowest batting average of any player with 5,000 MLB at-bats. Managed the Washington Senators in 1921 but was struck in the face by a line drive during batting practice and forced to retire.

. . . Never strong from the plate, McBride did not hit for either average or power. He compiled a paltry .218 lifetime batting average with just seven home runs, and never collected more than 26 extra base hits in any season. His most productive and consistent offensive seasons in the AL were from 1908 through 1911, during which he averaged between .230 and .235 a season. His hitting declined in the years following, as his average dipped to only .203 and .204 in 1914 and 1915, respectively, while still playing full time. Relegated to part-time duty after that, McBride mustered only a .185 mark over his final four seasons. Like many bad hitters during the Deadball Era, McBride acquired a reputation as a good hitter in the clutch. Incredibly, F.C. Lane of Baseball Magazine once declared that there were “few worse men for the pitcher to face with men on base than this same quiet, flawless fielder …” . . .

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[GeoPoto]

Player #39H: J. Clyde "Deerfoot" Milan. Outfielder for the Washington Senators in 1907-1922. 2,100 hits and 495 stolen bases in 16 MLB seasons. 1912 and 1913 AL stolen base leader, including a then record 88 in 1912. His career OBP was .353. Managed the Washington Senators in 1922. His best season was probably 1911 for the Washington Senators as he posted a .395 OBP with 58 stolen bases and 109 runs scored in 705 plate appearances.

Milan's SABR biography: . . . Milan began the 1906 season by hitting .356 for Shawnee (Indian Territory) of the South Central League, but the team again disbanded before Milan received his pay. Disgusted with professional baseball, he was thinking about quitting when he received an invitation to join Wichita of the Western Association. “I felt none too sure that I could make good there, for the company was much faster,” Clyde recalled. That partial season in Wichita saw him hit just .211, but he returned in 1907 and batted .304 with 38 stolen bases in 114 games, attracting the attention of Washington manager Joe Cantillon, who had seen him in a spring exhibition. That summer Cantillon dispatched injured catcher Cliff Blankenship to Wichita with orders to purchase Milan’s contract, then go to Weiser, Idaho, to scout and possibly sign Walter Johnson. In later years Clyde loved to relate Blankenship’s remarks during his contract signing: “He told me that he was going out to Idaho to look over some young phenom. ‘It looks like a wild goose chase and probably a waste of train fare to look over that young punk,’ Blankenship said.” Milan cost the Nats $1,000, while Johnson was secured for a $100 bonus plus train fare. . . .

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[GeoPoto]

Player #65B: Raymond C. "Ray" Morgan. Second baseman for the Washington Senators in 1911-1918. 630 hits and 88 stolen bases in 8 MLB seasons. His career OBP was .348. His best season was 1913 as he posted a .369 OBP with 19 stolen bases in 565 plate appearances. He has an odd link to Babe Ruth: in 1917, he led off a game by drawing a 4-pitch walk from Boston starter Ruth, who was then ejected from the game by the home plate umpire. Ruth was replaced by Ernie Shore and Morgan was thrown out attempting to steal on Shore's first pitch. Shore then retired the next 26 batters he faced. Shore's "perfect game" was eventually down-graded to a "combined no-hitter" by subsequent revisions in the MLB criteria.

Morgan's SABR biography: During the 1913 season, he began to draw Griffith’s ire, who didn’t like Morgan’s frequent trips home to Baltimore by automobile to socialize with his friends. Travel by car, even the 30 or so miles between Washington and Baltimore, could be an adventure in those days. Morgan also developed a reputation as a fun-loving cut-up on road trips. He was an accomplished piano player, able to accompany any song his teammates wanted to sing. He’d break out in song by himself in hotel rooms or on trains “in that high tenor of his,” often in conjunction with a teammate or two. When these performances came late at night, they surely would not have pleased Griffith, a stickler for training rules.

Spring training in 1914 was the first of several to which Morgan reported well over his playing weight. Although a March 24 report praised his pre-season hitting, it noted that “Morgan is still considerably overweight.” He again started at second base on opening day. Morgan “Chevrolets to Baltimore and back twice a week,” the Washington Times wrote. Driving a car still was unusual enough that when Germany Schaefer, his roommate on the road, joined Morgan as an automobile owner, it was news. So was Griffith’s concern for his player’s safety.

The concern proved warranted. On April 10, Morgan’s auto collided with a Baltimore trolley car. He and two friends were on their way back to Washington. Morgan and another man were thrown from the automobile. All three men were shaken up but uninjured. “The machine was so badly damaged that it had to be abandoned,” a newspaper reported.

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[GeoPoto]

Player #74B: Edgar C. "Sam" Rice. Outfielder for the Washington Senators in 1915-1933. 2,987 hits and 34 home runs in 20 MLB seasons. 1924 World Series champion. 1920 AL stolen base leader. He was inducted into the MLB Hall of Fame in 1963. Led the Senators to three AL pennants (1924,1925, and 1933). Best known for controversial "over the fence" catch in the 1925 World Series. He had many excellent seasons, but one of his best was 1930 as he posted a .407 OBP with 121 runs scored in 669 plate appearances. He had 63 stolen bases in 1920. He last played in 1934 with the Cleveland Indians. His early life was marred by tragedy when his wife, two daughters, parents, and two sisters were all killed by a tornado in Indiana.

Here is Deveaux's account of Rice's development beginning in 1916: The Senators' offence took another step backwards in 1916, putting the Nats in that regard pretty much on a par with the pathetic A's at the bottom of the league. In a case not unlike Ruth's, the Nats were taking notice of the hitting skills of pitcher Sam Rice. Washington third baseman Edie Foster, for one, was convinced that Rice, with his flat stroke, should give hitting a try. Rice himself became convinced he should when pitcher George "Hooks" Dauss of the Tigers, a notoriously weak hitter, banged a game-winning triple off him.

Given some time in the outfield, Sam Rice hit .299 in nearly 200 at-bats and was on his way to his Hall of Fame induction in 1963. A model of consistency over 19 years with the Senators, Rice would never hit below .294. (He played one final year with the Indians in 1934 and hit .293 at age 44.) He was the classic contact-type hitter who practically never struck out; he did so only 275 times in 20 years. He had no power but hustled enough to hit a good number of doubles and triples; his career high in homers was six, and his life-time total 34. Of Sam Rice's 33 round trippers as a Senator, not one in 19 years was hit over the fence at home, testimony to National Park's disheartening dimensions. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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[GeoPoto]

Player #75B: Howard S. "Howie" Shanks. Outfielder for the Washington Senators in 1912-1922. 1,440 hits and 185 stolen bases in 14 MLB seasons. His best season was 1921 with Washington as he posted an OBP of .370 with 81 runs scored and 69 RBIs in 647 plate appearances. He finished his career with the New York Yankees in 1925.

We go back to Shanks' SABR biography: He was rated an “ordinary hitter” but was “one of the few outfielders who frequently take part in infield plays” because he learned the art of positioning better than most. Numerous stories over his early years–accurately or otherwise–rated him as tops among left fielders in the game.

Shanks improved to .254 in 1913, despite what at first seemed like a broken foot (but was not) and then a turned ankle in mid-September. This season was the closest the Senators came to contending during his 11 seasons with Washington; they finished in second place, 6 1/2 games behind the Athletics. After the season, the famous Bonesetter Reese of Youngstown found a dislocated tendon in Shanks’s ankle and manipulated it back into position. (We will return to this account when Shanks next surfaces in our progression.)

This thread will now pause. Expected restart: 23 November

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[brianp-beme]

Until this informative thread makes a return, I leave you all with an incredibly large scan of a slim and trim Howard Shanks M101-4 Sporting News card with tougher to read, and less informative, scribbling on the back.

The incredibly large scan does have one side benefit - it is providing a better view of the enormous hat the woman spectator is wearing.

Brian