Joe Collins

Joe Collins was a winning ballplayer. Known for his smooth fielding and timely pull hitting, the left-handed first baseman/outfielder played in seven World Series – five for the winning side – during his 10-year career (1948-1957) with the New York Yankees. After baseball, he built a strong family and community legacy.

Born Joseph Edward Kollonige on December 3, 1922, in Scranton, Pennsylvania, he went by the surname “Collins” throughout his baseball career. He had his name legally changed in 1954. The 1930 Census showed the Kollonige family living at 425 Breck Street in Scranton. Joe’s father George was a street construction laborer; his mother Nellie (née Pensack) cared for George Jr. (8), and Dolores (3) in addition to 7-year-old Joe.

The Sporting News contract card database described his family lineage as “Polish-Russian,” yet a 1958 New York Times article addressed the subject this way: “Most fans know that Joe’s surname originally wasn’t Collins and believe that he is of Polish descent. ‘No, I’m not Polish,’ Joe explained. ‘I’m a little mixed. My dad’s name was Kollonige and he was Russian-Greek. My mother was Polish, though, and I guess that’s where folks got the idea.’”1

“At 16 I started to play first class semipro ball,” Collins described. “My team was the Twentieth Warders, representing Minooka. Some great guys have played on that team . . . Steve O’Neill, Mike O’Neill and Mike McNally, to name a few. There was what we called a ‘bird dog scout’ following the team around, a guy called Bill Schroeder who’d go to all the semipro games in that part of Pennsylvania to spot likely recruits. When he’d find one, he’d recommend the boy to a major league club. He sent me to Binghamton, N. Y., for a weekend workout and that’s how I got into the Yankee chain.”2

Collins eventually played in 1939 for a pair of New York’s Class D affiliates – Easton (Maryland) of the Eastern Shore League and Butler of the Pennsylvania State Association. Collins appeared in 14 games and batted .133.

In 1940, Joe graduated from Scranton Technical High School (which later became Scranton High School), along with the woman who later became his wife, Peg Reilley. He returned to Butler and hit .320 in 99 contests to help the Yankees win the title.

Collins mentioned that his older brother George signed a contract with the Boston Red Sox. “My brother George went to spring training with me at Butler in 1940 as an outfielder and played in the Boston Red Sox chain at Bassetts[sic], Va., that year. But he couldn’t take the minors like I could and so he quit.”3 Evidence for George’s professional career is scant. The Sporting News’ contract card database includes a “George Kollonige” released by the Red Sox’ Danville-Schoolfield affiliate in April 1941, perhaps without ever playing in a game.

With such an early start in pro ball, Joe was usually extremely young for his leagues but nonetheless held his own as he ascended through the low minors. Promoted to the Akron (Ohio) Yankees of the Class C Middle Atlantic League in 1941, his batting line regressed playing against significantly older men but he was the everyday first baseman for a club that finished in first place before losing in the playoffs.

Four days after his 19th birthday, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States went to war. Collins started the 1942 season with the Norfolk (Virginia) Tars of the Class B Piedmont League, but he performed poorly. Returned to Class C – this time with the Canadian-American League champion Amsterdam (New York) Rugmakers – he acquitted himself well, hitting .341 and slugging .511 in 73 games. He also became an outfielder, an experiment that continued off and on for years.

Collins enlisted as a naval aviation cadet in December 1942. He missed the beginning of the 1943 season but was sent to the Springfield (Massachusetts) Rifles – the New York Giants’ Class A Eastern League club – and batted .260 without a homer in 70 games (it was not unusual at the time for teams to lend players to other organizations to accommodate minor league rosters). That September, he reported to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia for training as a pilot with the Naval Aviation Corps.4 “I spent two years learning how to fly and was sent with a squadron to Hawaii in 1945,” Collins recalled. “But soon after I got there, the war ended. I hadn’t played a single game of ball in two years and had to start all over again.”5

While in the service, he married Peg on May 12, 1945.6 Back from the war, he split the 1946 season between the Beaumont Exporters of the Double-A Texas League and the Newark (New Jersey) Bears of the Triple-A International League. Between reacclimating himself to civilian life and playing in faster company, Joe’s offensive performance was somewhat middling, although he played regularly and impressed with his glovework in the outfield and at first base.

In Newark in 1947, Collins started the season slowly and was optioned to the Philadelphia Athletics’ Double-A Birmingham (Alabama) Barons farm club when the Yankees demoted Nick Etten. Collins flourished down south, hitting .360 with significant power in 48 games before he was recalled to Newark in mid-July. He made a strong impression upon the locals, as noted by The Sporting News later that summer, “First Baseman Joe Collins was presented with a watch between games, August 21, from the fans and team in Birmingham. Ala. in appreciation for his play with the Southern Association club earlier in the season.”7

Back with the Bears, Collins hit well and continued to impress with his fielding at both first base and the outfield. In 1948, he solidified his resume with another good season in Newark, winning the fans’ most popular player poll and receiving a suit of clothes for the honor.8 Collins’s promotion – along with those of six teammates – to the Yankees was announced on September 7, pending the end of Newark’s season. When the Bears were eliminated from the International League playoffs by Syracuse on Wednesday, September 22, Collins reported to New York.

He debuted on Saturday, September 25, 1948, before a crowd of 65,607 at Yankee Stadium,  pinch-hitting for Frank Crosetti (nearing the end of his 17-year career). With the Yankees trailing, 7–2, in the ninth inning, Collins flew out to right field against the Red Sox’ Jack Kramer. Three days later, at Shibe Park in Philadelphia, Collins pinch-hit in the ninth inning again and doubled home the Yankees’ only two runs of the game with his first major-league hit. Overall, Collins saw action in five games, four of them Yankees’ losses, a stark contrast with the remainder of his career in New York.

Assigned to the Yankees’ Kansas City Blues farm club in 1949, Collins led the team in homers, batting and slugging, while placing second in walks. Demonstrating that he had nothing left to prove, he paced the Triple-A American Association in triples and was named to the All-Star team in his ninth and final season in the minors.9 The 6-foot-0, 185-pound Collins then received another September call-up and amassed an unusual batting line, going 1-for-10, with four RBIs and six walks. Collins celebrated with the team when New York clinched the AL pennant with a victory over the Red Sox at Yankee Stadium on the last day of the season. Left off the World Series roster, he was a bystander as the Yankees defeated the Brooklyn Dodgers in five games.

Collins spent the rest of his career in pinstripes. In spring training 1950, Yankees manager Casey Stengel had his pick of first base options (all left-handed hitters, oddly), with Collins and fellow prospect Fenton Mole in the mix with veterans Johnny Mize and Tommy Henrich. Henrich got the nod on Opening Day and started the season on fire, but he twisted a knee and was shut down for several weeks. Collins got his chance and ended up playing in 108 games, although only 52 as a starter. Stengel frequently used him as a late-inning defensive replacement, his prowess with the glove offsetting his poor batting average.

Despite Henrich’s retirement, Collins’ role remained ill-defined entering 1951. Stengel told The Sporting News, “I have been asked about first base by writers who seem to think I am in a desperate situation there. Well, I am satisfied at the bag. Johnny Mize, Joe Collins hitting better, and Johnny Hopp give me a three-platoon system. I will have to use each man in certain situations in certain parks, against certain pitchers.”10

Collins frequently experimented with his batting stances, almost always trying some variation that included a deep crouch. The press noted, “A few years ago, BASEBALL DIGEST published an article about Joe in which his teammates kiddingly credited him with 97 different stances at the plate. The kidding still goes on, with Joe called Old 97, as if he were a locomotive steaming on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe. He is loose at bat, sometimes crouching, some- times laying back, sometimes moving up on the ball. But, in fact, he always swings with the same well- oiled drive, like a golfer who has perfected his down-and-up motion.”11

The 1951 season was something of a breakout for Collins, as the aging Mize largely transitioned into a pinch-hitter. Collins’ improved average and power produced a 126 OPS+, including his only career grand slam – off Cleveland’s future Hall of Famer Bob Lemon. The Yankees won the World Series again (four games to two, over the Giants), with Collins getting the majority of playing time at first base and homering in Game Two.

Like many players, injuries were a consistent problem for Collins, though he rarely missed significant time. But he was spiked in the left foot during a 1952 spring training game, wound up on crutches, and didn’t start his first regular season contest until May 3 – the Yankees’ 14th game. Now in his prime, Collins was the Yankees’ primary starter at first base from 1952 to 1954, though he never topped 130 games played. His substantial platoon split limited his playing time, as he had a career .610 OPS (.216/.315/.295) against lefty pitching, and a .812 OPS (.266/.359/.453) against right-handers.

In 1952, he ranked sixth in AL slugging and finished with career highs in (retroactive) WAR (3.3), RBIs and homers, despite not hitting his first until June 11. Two of his blast were walk-offs against Indians’ future Hall of Famers, Lemon and Satchel Paige. The Yankees won their fourth consecutive World Series and Collins received one ninth-place vote for AL MVP.

The Yankees made it five straight titles in 1953, when Collins ranked 10th in AL in home runs, and hit a go-ahead seventh-inning shot off Brooklyn’s Clem Labine in World Series Game One at Yankee Stadium.

In 1954, the Yankees won 103 games but finished eight games behind Cleveland. The season saw the introduction of Collins’ successor, Bill “Moose” Skowron. Although the young, right-handed power hitter’s excellent rookie season meant he was likely to lose playing time, “Collins did not begrudge the twenty-three-year-old Skowron his due. Quite the contrary. He welcomed him with open arms. ‘You know, Moose,’ Collins said one day to Skowron during his first spring training, ‘you’re my competition. But I hope when I play, you’ll cheer for me. And when you play, I’ll cheer for you.’”12

Skowron, accustomed to players who would do anything to squeeze out the competition, was taken aback. “I never forgot that,” he later remarked. And so, Skowron would forevermore value the older player’s contribution to the club—even when Collins replaced him at first base during the 1956 World Series. “He was a great teammate,” Moose later said of Collins.13

In 1955, Collins started only 44 games at first base, plus 23 in right field, where he began to see more time. In the Yankees 2-1 victory over the Indians on August 2, he accounted for both New York runs with a pair of solo homers off future Hall of Famer Early Wynn. Collins’ game-ending blast in the bottom of the 10th was particularly timely for F. Hoyt Gilman, a 62-year-old Yankees fan in West Long Branch, New Jersey. “After Joe hit the game-winning homer, Mr. Gilman turned off the television set and went to bed,” the Asbury Park Press reported. “Several minutes later, a careening car crashed into his enclosed front porch and living room. A large beam supporting the roof fell on the chair Mr. Gilman occupied just minutes before. ‘If Joe hadn’t homered when he did,’ Mr. Gilman recalled, ‘I’d still been in that chair when the beam fell on it. Joe saved my life.’” Gilman wrote to Collins and sent him a newspaper clipping about the accident and a picture of the extensive damage. The driver of the car was charged with reckless driving.14

In addition to his game-ending heroics, Collins hit his only career inside-the-park homer (also against Wynn) in 1955 and finished with a 102 OPS+ as the Yankees returned to their pennant-winning ways. He hit two home runs off Brooklyn’s Don Newcombe in the World Series opener, but the Dodgers finally prevailed over the Yankees for the first time, winning in seven games.

No longer a regular, Collins saw reduced time in 1956 and 1957, spelling Skowron at first base or Hank Bauer in right field, playing almost exclusively against right-handed pitching. He did start five of seven 1956 World Series games, however, as the Yankees regained the title from the Dodgers.

In 1957, his final season, Collins had only 174 plate appearances and hit poorly. He played his last regular season game on September 29, the same day teammate Jerry Coleman and Dodgers star Roy Campanella played for the final time.

That fall, Collins played in his seventh World Series, and the Yankees won for the fifth time, beating the Milwaukee Braves. (He played briefly for an eighth pennant-winning team in 1949 but wasn’t on the postseason roster.) While that is already impressive, consider that the Yankees’ winning percentage – .634 over the course of his career – was even better in games that Collins played, .643.

Collins’ contributions, both on-field and off, did not go unnoticed. “Collins’ friendly demeanor proved to be a valuable force in defusing tension among his teammates. “He was a terrific influence inside the clubhouse,” said Tony Kubek, a Yankees’ rookie in Collins’ final season. “All of the Yankees—Collins included—were fierce competitors. But some, like Billy Martin or Gil McDougald, were prone to explode in the face of confrontations with umpires and other players. “Collins was a little laid-back and easygoing,” Kubek recalled, “and that tempers some of the atmosphere in the clubhouse.””15

On March 20, 1958, the Yankees sold Collins to the Philadelphia Phillies. Almost immediately, he decided against continuing his career. “I’m quitting baseball,” said Collins. “I made up my mind some time ago that if I had to leave New York, I would quit.”16

Collins finished his career with a .256 batting average, 86 home runs and a fine 111 OPS+ in 2,704 plate appearances – 75 percent of which came against right-handed pitchers. Although Yankee Stadium’s dimensions were inviting for left-handed pull hitters, Collins’ career OPS was 57 points higher on the road.

With wife Peg and their five children (Joe Jr., Jim, Gary, Kathy, and Cheryl), Collins lived his last 40 years in Union, New Jersey, where he was a member of the Holy Spirit Church, its Holy Name Society, the Knights of Columbus Council 4504, and the Board of Senior Citizens Housing. For three decades he was the vice president of People’s Express, a trucking firm based in Newark.

Collins was 66 when he died on August 30, 1989, survived by his wife, children, siblings and seven grandchildren. He is buried in Fairview Cemetery in Westfield, New Jersey. In 1985, Union dedicated Joe Collins Park in his honor, at 1150 Liberty Avenue.

Acknowledgments

This biography was reviewed by Malcolm Allen and David Bilmes and checked for accuracy by members of SABR’s fact-checking team.

The author would like to thank the anonymous SABR colleague who — posting as “sonofabutch” on Reddit — alerted him to some interesting angles about Collins’ life and career to pursue. He would also like to thank Kathy Collins, Joe Collins’ daughter, for her encouragement.

Photo credit: Joe Collins, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted www.baseball-reference.com, FamilySearch.org, and Ancestry.com

Notes

1 Roscoe McGowen, “Joe Collins Still a Yankee at Heart,” New York Times, March 27, 1958: 44.

2 Charles Dexter, “Collins and the 97 Stances,” Baseball Digest, October 1952: 68.

3  Dexter, Baseball Digest, October 1952: 66.

4 “Eastern League,” The Sporting News, September 2, 1943: 19.

5 Dexter, Baseball Digest, October 1952: 65­68.

6 “Insecure Collins Now In 6th Series,” New York Times, September 29, 1955:  41.

7 Cy Critzer, “International League,” The Sporting News, September 3, 1947: 28.

8 Cy Critzer, “International League,” The Sporting News, September 22, 1948: 34.

9 Sam Levy, “American Association,” The Sporting News, August 31, 1949: 30.

10 Dan Daniel, “Aches, Pains Harass Front-Line Bombers,” The Sporting News, April 18, 1951: 10.

11 Lew Paper, Perfect: Don Larsen’s Miraculous World Series game and the Men Who Made It Happen, (New York: New American Library, 2009): 333.

12 Paper, Perfect: Don Larsen’s Miraculous World Series Game and the Men Who Made It Happen:  333.

13 Paper, Perfect: Don Larsen’s Miraculous World Series Game and the Men Who Made It Happen: 333.

14 “Saved by a Homer,” Asbury Park (New Jersey) Press, August 6, 1955: 1.

15 Paper, Perfect: Don Larsen’s Miraculous World Series Game and the Men Who Made It Happen: 333.

16 Roscoe McGowen, “Joe Collins Still a Yankee at Heart,” New York Times, March 27, 1958: 44.