Washington DC Baseball

[GeoPoto]

If the Senators dominated the league in 1933, Bill Terry's New York Giants did the same in the rival loop, emerging as clear-cut champs with a five-game edge over the Pittsburgh Pirates. The upcoming World Series would pit two "boy managers" against one another. At 34, Terry had taken over from John McGraw early in the 1932 campaign, marking the end of the Lil' General's 30-year reign as the Giants' field boss. Cronin, eight years Terry's junior, became the youngest manager in World Series history, a distinction he still held at the beginning of this century.

So it would be, as in 1924, a confrontation between the Giants and the Senators. However, unlike the '24 Giants team, which was built around hitting, this outfit centered around an outstanding pitching staff. Its ace was Carl Hubbell (Hubbell would be forever remembered in baseball lore for something that would happen during the following year. In the 1934 All-Star game, he struck out, in succession, no less a group of sluggers than Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Al Simmons, and Joe Cronin.), a lanky, floppy-eared, 30-year-old lefthander who'd been pitching in the National League for six years with some success.

Carl Hubbel's specialty was the screwball, and he delivered it with a slow, cartwheeling movement toward the plate. Until this season, his best showings had been a pair of 18-11 efforts in '29 and '32. But in 1933, Hubbell occupied another stratosphere, leading all National League pitchers in wins (23), ERA (an overpowering 1.66), innings pitched, and shutouts. His ten shutouts were three more than were posted by his teammate, Hal Schumacher, second best in the league in that category. "Prince Hal," a righthander who threw a heavy ball and had a very good overhand curve, went 19-12 with a 2.16 ERA, third best in the league. Hubbell and Schumacher were 1-2 in the N.L. in allowing the fewest number of hits per nine innings, and third on that list was another Giant, Fat Freddie Fitzsimmons, 16-11 with another ERA under 3.00.

Rival managers and future Hall of Famers, Bill Terry and Joe Cronin exchange pleasantries before game 1 at the Polo Grounds:

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