Washington DC Baseball

[GeoPoto]

Player #39J: 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.

Deveaux takes us through Milan's time as Washington manager: After McBride's terrible accident (manager McBride was struck in the face and partially paralyzed by a thrown ball while hitting infield practice) in August (1921), 34-year-old Clyde Milan, who batted .288 in 112 games in his player's role, took over. Milan now in his 15th year with Washington, guided the club to its 80-73 finish. . . .

(Aside to loyal readers: You may have noticed that yesterday saw an unplanned failure to post on my part. Because there is no excuse, I will simply explain that a series of entanglements with rabbit holes and confusions involved in preparing for an early morning departure conspired to distract me until I was beyond the conveniences of desk-top computing. I believe the medical term for what happened is "I forgot all about it." Oh, well . . .)

. . . They (the Nationals) fell to 69-85 (in 1922) and, after just one year at the helm, Deerfoot Milan gave up his managing job, having found the work decidedly unsatisfying. He'd been beset by stomach problems all year, brought on by nonstop worry about his sixth-place charges. In Walter Johnson's opinion, his best friend was too nice a guy, and some of the players had taken advantage of him. Milan's batting average, as an occasional insert in the lineup, had plunged from .288 to .230. He would never play again in the big leagues, although he would hit over .300 in the following two years as a player-manager in the minors. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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[GeoPoto]

Player #93A: George A. Mogridge. Pitcher with the Washington Senators in 1921-1925. 132 wins and 21 saves in 15 MLB seasons. 1924 World Series champion. He debuted with the Chicago White Sox in 1911-1912. His most productive season was 1921 with Washington as posted a 18-14 record with a 3.00 ERA in 288 innings pitched. He finished his career with the Boston Red Sox in 1926-1927. In 1917 he threw the first no-hitter in New York Yankee history. It was also the first no-hitter thrown in Fenway Park.

Deveaux points at Mogridge's importance to Washington: Clark Griffith was taking more measures (in 1921) towards building a championship-class ballclub out of his Senators. He had solid offense and defense particularly at first base with Joe Judge, at second with Bucky Harris, and in right field, where San Rice had taken over. The pitching was probably as good as the Nats had ever had, with Tom Zachary and George Mogridge complementing Walter Johnson as starters. Mogridge was a tall, friendly lefty whose past history had not foretold the consistency he would bring to Washington's pitching staff. Obtained from the Yankees in a deal involving outfielder Braggo Roth, who'd hit .291 in his one year with the Nationals, Mogridge would average 16 wins a season over the next four years. . . .

. . . Top man on the Senators' 1921 pitching staff was not Walter Johnson, but George Mogridge, who made good use of a befuddling mixture of off-speed offerings. Mogridge was the workhorse and top winner at 18-14, and Walter Johnson went 17-14 with an inflated 3.51 ERA, up considerably from 1.49 just two years earlier. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.)

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[ValKehl]

George, that is a wonderful photo of Mogridge, who was no "spring chicken" when he was obtained from the Yankees for the 1921 season - he was age 32 at the beginning of his 4 years of glory with the Senators.

I think I'm correct in stating that the only cards issued of Mogridge prior to his time with the Senators in the 1920's, were his T207 cards issued in 1912, when he was in his second year with the White Sox at age 23. Here are his four known T207 cards, and if a T207 Red Cross of Mogridge exists, I'd love to see it:

[GeoPoto]

Outstanding Mogridge T207 back run from Val. Thanks for posting!

Player #74F: 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.

Carroll explains how baseball strategies were evolving in 1921, much to the chagrin of oldtimers (a process that continues 100 years later): Though Rice's 1921 season was another success at the plate, he did see a huge drop off in one part of his game -- stolen bases. After leading the American League with sixty-three steals in 1920, Rice stole just twenty-six bases the following season, fourth in the league. . . .

. . . Base-stealing had been losing popularity even before the live-ball era made it a graver risk for a manager to risk outs on the bases. In 1911, the New York Giants had stolen 347 bases as a team. By 1920, the Giants total was down to 131. . . . By the late 1910s the Senators didn't run as often as they did before, either, but they still were running more than most teams. Clark Griffith was the reason. . . .

He was, of course, lucky enough to have Rice and Clyde Milan at his disposal. . . . Many decades later, the baseball thinker Bill James would (demonstrate that) . . . base stealing . . . Only positively influences a lineup's ability to score runs when it is successful more than seventy percent of the time. . . . Of course, in the early 1920s Clark Griffith wasn't armed with (James') formulas . . . But he believed he'd seen enough baseball to grasp when was a good time to run and when it might get a team into trouble. . . .

Baseball writers lamented the decline of base-stealing, feeling that suddenly conservative managers were extracting much of the color and excitement out of the game. . . . Rice blamed his fall-off in stolen bases to the trend of "freak deliveries." According to Rice, the deliveries themselves weren't so much responsible for the stolen base drought as their impact on the pitcher's repertoire of pitches. As they are today, curveballs were the easiest pitch to steal on . . . But in 1921, said Rice, pitchers were throwing far less curveballs, relying more on their delivery deception to throw hitters off rhythm. . . .

. . . Ultimately, most purists accepted the demise of the stolen base as a primary offensive weapon. "Under conditions such as they are at present, where pitching is indifferent and almost every batter is a potential slugger, the home run is always a possibility," one such purist wrote. "And before this imminent prospect the manager is prone to throw into the discard such relatively feeble efforts as the stolen base . . . Why should this base-runner risk getting caught at second when the next man up may knock out a two-bagger or a homer?" (Sam Rice by Jeff Carroll.)

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