Tom Dougherty

Baseball players dream of being perfect. The perfect hit, the perfect pitch, going 4-for-4, but in a game where doing something right 3 out of 10 times makes you an all-star, perfection is hard to achieve. For pitcher Tom Dougherty, he was perfect throughout his major-league career, albeit his major-league career amounted to only one appearance. In his one appearance, on April 24, 1904, he pitched a perfect two innings, retiring all six batters he faced, and sparked the Chicago White Sox to a 5-4 come-from-behind win over the Cleveland Naps.

For Dougherty, whose nickname, Sugar Boy, came from his diabetes, it was a circuitous route that took him from his hometown of Chicago and around the country before he made his return back to the Windy City for his one and only major-league appearance. His path on the diamond was just as circuitous. The 5-foot-11, 195-pound Dougherty, who threw right-handed and batted left, started his career at first base and shuffled around the diamond with each stop of his career, moving to second, back to first, and then to the outfield before finally finding his place as a pitcher.

Thomas James Dougherty was born on May 30, 1881, in Chicago to Patrick and Ellen Dougherty, the youngest of eight children (four boys and four girls). His parents had immigrated from Ireland and settled in Chicago, where his father became a policeman. He discovered baseball as a youngster and began his professional career in his late teens in Manistee, Michigan, as a first baseman. In August of 1900 he signed with Manchester, Iowa, making his debut on the 5th at second base. Ten days later he made a solid if unspectacular debut as a pitcher in a 6-2 loss in which he gave up five hits, struck out five, and walked three. Over his season and a half with Manchester, he proved to be a solid and popular player.

In 1902 Dougherty made the jump to the Chattanooga Lookouts of the Southern League. He moved back to first base and while playing good defense struggled at the plate against the improved competition, hitting .226 in 17 games before being released. Dougherty’s struggles at the plate would be a recurring theme for the rest of his career. He ended up with Crookston, Minnesota, of the Northern League at the end of June. He found his form and hit .328 in 41 games. When the season ended at the beginning of August, Dougherty signed with the St. Paul Saints of the newly formed American Association for the rest of the 1902 season. Again, against improved competition he struggled at the plate, hitting a weak .154 in 18 games.

Dougherty spent his entire career up to that point bouncing around the field trying to find a suitable position. He was noted for his speed and usually acquitted himself well defensively but was always a liability at the plate. His struggles at bat led to his never being able to find a steady spot, and after his miserable showing with St. Paul he was again looking for a new team. He eventually signed with the Monroe Hill (Louisiana) Citys of the Cotton States League for the 1903 season. While waiting for the train to take him south to join the team, Dougherty was lamenting his hitting woes and struggles to a friend and bemoaning his future in baseball if his production at the plate did not improve. As he dejectedly discussed his prospects a local boy saw Dougherty’s glove and asked if he would like to have a catch. The boy coaxed Dougherty into pitching a few to him. The boy was impressed with Dougherty’s speed and control and said he must be a pitcher. Dougherty insisted he was not, but a seed was planted.1 Over the ensuing days, Dougherty continued to work on his pitching, developing a small repertoire of pitches. Shortly after the start of the season, Monroe Hill was struggling and manager Harry Hunt was short of pitchers. Dougherty volunteered to pitch and impressed Hunt. Given the team’s struggles, Dougherty soon became its top starter. Over the remainder of the season, he proved to be a workhorse. Multiple times throughout the season he pitched both ends of a doubleheader, including tossing complete-game 18-inning and 11-inning ties.2 After years of struggling to find his place in baseball, Dougherty finally found it as a pitcher. On a terrible team that finished 36-75, 35½ games out of first, he won nearly a third of its games, going 11-3-2. His hitting was still dismal (he batted .232), but no longer mattered as he had established himself as one of the Cotton States League’s top pitchers.

Dougherty’s pitching drew the attention of several clubs that wanted to secure his services for the remainder of the season. Atlanta Crackers manager Ab Powell was especially interested in signing him. Atlanta was sitting fourth in the Southern League and Powell vowed to make a run at the league title.3 He offered financial incentives to his team based on where they finished the season to improve their play and hoped to strengthen his pitching staff by signing Dougherty. He traveled to Monroe with “wads of dough stuffed in his inside pocket” in hopes of luring the pitcher into signing with Atlanta.4 Powell was successful. Dougherty shined for Atlanta over the remainder of the season in the increased competition of the Southern League, going 9-1. His standout work on the mound did not translate into a championship for the Atlanta team, which finished the season where it was when it signed him, in fourth place. Dougherty still struggled at the plate, hitting .184, but was now firmly ensconced as a pitcher and starting to draw the interest of major-league teams, one of which, the White Sox, signed him.

Heading into the 1904 season, Dougherty struggled in preseason exhibitions, showing a “little raggedness in delivery,” but White Sox owner Charles Comiskey thought he possessed potential and planned to develop him throughout the season.5 Comiskey believed Dougherty would be a “good emergency twirler.”6 It appeared that Dougherty would get a chance to prove himself early in the year when manager Jimmy Callahan announced he would start the final game of the opening series against Cleveland. He did not; instead Doc White started, losing 5-0. Dougherty waited a few more weeks to get a chance to play in what proved to be his one and only game.

On April 24, a cold, wet day, in the third game of a four-game series with Cleveland, Chicago was down 4-1 heading into the eighth inning. Callahan called on Dougherty to replace starter Patsy Flaherty, who had given up all four runs in a disastrous seventh inning. Dougherty started the eighth inning and faced the heart of Cleveland’s lineup. With his fastball working, he retired Cleveland’s three, four, and five hitters, including future Hall of Famer Napoleon Lajoie. Chicago clawed back one run in the bottom of the eighth when center fielder Fielder Jones scored on a double by shortstop George Davis.

Dougherty again shut down Cleveland one-two-three in the top of the ninth. Chicago started the bottom half of the inning with third baseman Lee Tannehill reaching on an error. Catcher Billy Sullivan was retired, bringing up Dougherty for his one and only plate appearance in a major -league game. Proving that even though his pitching had improved, his hitting had not, Dougherty appeared to stall out the comeback with a weak fly out for the second out, threatening to end Chicago’s hopes for a last-at-bat rally. Cleveland pitcher Otto Hess helped keep the rally alive by hitting the next batter, left fielder Ducky Holmes, and walking Jones to load the bases. Up next came Callahan, who delivered a three-run double to tie the game. Callahan scored the winning run and completed the comeback when Danny Green brought him home on a line shot to right field. In his one and only appearance in a major-league game he picked up a win while working two perfect innings in which he retired all six batters he faced and gave up neither hits, walks, nor runs. The next day the headline in the Chicago Tribune blared, “Sox Pull Game Out of the Fire.”7  

It was Dougherty’s only big-league game played. While his career batting average was .000, he had handled two chances in the field, with a putout and assist to his credit for a career fielding percentage of 1.000.

A few weeks after his appearance, Dougherty was sent to Kenosha for a month before being sold to the Milwaukee Brewers of the minor-league American Association. The sale of Dougherty was not without controversy. The Atlanta Crackers believed he should have gone back to them, citing Article VI, section 9, of the National Agreement, which read: “If a selected player is released within the year of, or the next year after, his selection by a Major League club, and no other Major League club claims him prior to the expiration of his notice of release, the minor league club which lost him by selection shall have the priority of right to him over all clubs.”8 The National Commission ruled that the rule cited by Atlanta applied only if the player was given his unconditional release. The Commission determined that Dougherty was an asset of Chicago, so the club had a clear right to dispose of him by selling him outright.

At the end of the 1904 season instead of returning to Chicago, Dougherty returned to Milwaukee. Over the next few years there were rumors of a return to the majors, and Dougherty was even drafted by Cincinnati in 1910, but he never appeared in majors again, spending the remainder of his career with Milwaukee. In Milwaukee he had a solid 12-year career, compiling a 174-140 record, three times eclipsing the 20-win mark (22 in 1905, 20 in 1907, and 21 in 1909), and in 1910 putting together a 14-1 season. Dougherty, 34 years old, retired in 1915 after posting a disappointing 8-15 mark.

After retiring Dougherty worked as a foreman at the local branch of the Ford Company. He did not give up baseball completely. Over the next few years, he was the player-manager of the semipro Milwaukee White Sox of the Wisconsin State League. As he was at every stop in his career, he was always a fan favorite because of his friendly disposition, his willingness to work hard, and the success he had on the field.9 Dougherty also briefly umpired in the Florida State League in 1920.

One sees no clear reason why Dougherty never played in the majors again. He was a good, not great talent who was weak with the bat, but was a solid pitcher and could have been a productive addition to any roster. Over the years he was often rumored to be signing with a major-league team, but after joining Milwaukee he married his wife, Emma, and was content to stay close to home for the remainder of his life. He died on November 6, 1953, in Milwaukee.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author used Baseball-Reference.com, Newspapers.com, manchesteria.advantage-preservation.com, Retrosheet.com, StatsCrew.com, Ancestry.com, and the 1902-1919 Milwaukee Brewers research files by Dennis Pajot.

Notes

1 “Chicago Gleanings,” Sporting Life, November 21, 1903: 5.

2 “Cotton States League,” Shreveport Times, July 30, 1903: 3. “Demand for Dougherty.” Pine Bluff (Arkansas) Daily Graphic, August 7, 1903: 5.

3 “Rich Rewards to Players if Atlanta Wins Pennant,” Atlanta Constitution, August 9, 1903: 9.

4 “Rich Rewards to Players if Atlanta Wins Pennant.”

5 “Sox Beat Blues in Fierce Rally,” Chicago Inter Ocean, April 25, 1904: 6.

6 “Play Ball the Cry Once More,” Chicago Tribune, April 14, 1904: 6.

7 “Sox Pull Game out of Fire,” Chicago Tribune, April 25, 1904: 8.

8 “Court Cases,” Sporting Life, July 23, 1904: 5.

9 “Johnny Hughes, Veteran Catcher, Quits the Game,” Milwaukee Sentinel, February 27, 1916.