Washington DC Baseball

[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

[GeoPoto]

Thanks to Brian for the Howie Shanks card, which memorializes a player who will always have special appeal to me because his name reminds me of my golf game. Meanwhile,

The 1917 Washington Senators won 74 games, lost 79, and finished in fifth place in the American League. They were managed by Clark Griffith and played home games at National Park.

The Senators this season hit only four home runs for the entire campaign, second only to the 1908 Chicago White Sox in the modern era, who hit three. First baseman Joe Judge accounted for 50% of them, with two home runs for the season.

Deveaux leads in to the 1917 season: Attendance was down in Washington in 1917, where wartime seems to have had a particularly sobering effect. The Senators lost over $40,000 and could not have stayed afloat without the support of the men who sat on the board of directors. The franchise continued to operate because of loans the directors were able to personally underwrite. On the field, things were nearly as grim. The club climbed to fifth in 1917, but actually dropped two games off the previous year's pace.

Sam Rice led the offence, cracking the .300 mark during his first full season as a hitter and finishing at .302. George McBride, the regular shortstop since 1908, was replaced adequately by Howard Shanks, an outfielder with the Senators since 1912. Shanks' substitute in the outfield was Mike Menosky, from a place called Glen Campbell, PA., who hit .258. Joe Judge improved from a .220 hitter as a rookie to .285 in his sophomore year at age 23, but in July he broke his leg as a result of a sliding mishap.

Clyde Milan managed to improve to .294 after an off year in '16, and was joined by his brother Horace, who had been brought up for a second cup of coffee. Between the '15 and '17 seasons, Horace Milan got 32 hits in an even 100 at-bats, for a cool .320 career average frozen forever in time. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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[ValKehl]

George, welcome back! I truly missed your daily posts about the Senators.

And, in further recognition of your mention that in 1917, in his first year as a regular position player, Sam Rice broke the .300 mark, here are my two favorite 1917 Sam Rice rookie cards: