As the disastrous month of April moved to its close, the Giants faced the Dodgers in enemy territory: the claustrophobic confines of Ebbets Field. The Giants dreaded playing on the Dodgers’ home ground. Brooklyn fans, notorious for raucous noise and nasty behavior toward all opposing teams, saved their worst vitriol for the Giants. Leo Durocher recalled how Dodger fans spat at him, threw things at him, sprayed him with Coca-Cola, and called him “every filthy name they could think of.”1 Monte Irvin declared that “it was an experience just going in and getting out alive.”2 Bobby Thomson remembered Durocher feeding his players a repetitious diet of hatred against the Dodgers, casting the Brooklynites not merely as rivals but as horrible human beings, creating an enmity that continued off the field. According to Thomson, Durocher claimed the Dodgers were “the kind of guys who, if you take your eyes off them at a party, they started groping your wife’s tits.” Listening to such talk day after day, Giants players learned to despise the Dodgers. “We didn’t even talk to those fellows,” Thomson recalled, and he compared playing at Ebbets Field to “walking into a lion’s den.”3

After they got trounced by the Dodgers two days in a row (April 28 and 29), the reeling Giants’ record was 2-12. The last-place New Yorkers had suffered 11 straight defeats, and the jubilant Dodgers rushed to rub their noses in the dirt of the cellar floor. After Brooklyn’s victory on April 29, some of the Dodgers gathered in front of the door to the Giants’ locker room and taunted their vanquished opponents, hurling easily audible insults. Monte Irvin remembered hearing the voices of Carl Furillo and Jackie Robinson shouting, “Eat your heart out, Leo, you sonofabitch. You’ll never win it this year!”4 The addition of insults to the injury of defeat was too much for Durocher, who exploded at his team with language that shocked even the veterans of his tirades. According to Bill Rigney, Durocher “was so hot you could have fried eggs on the language coming out of his mouth … motherfucking this, cocksucking that.”5 After ten minutes or so of Leo’s scorching insults, an interruption by the batboy with an innocent question caused Durocher to pick up one of the players’ gloves and hurl it at the wall. But then a couple of well-timed comments by Alvin Dark and Eddie Stanky broke the tension, and suddenly everybody, including Durocher, was roaring with laughter. “[The Dodgers] must have been able to hear [Leo],” Rigney continued. “Now they hear this hysterical laughter. They must have thought we were all gone crazy, like maybe we murdered Leo and were all celebrating over his body.”6

Durocher’s tirade and its funny ending had a positive effect: It broke the spell of defeatism. The next evening, April 30, the Giants defeated the Dodgers before an unhappy throng at Ebbets Field.7 Although he did not complete the game, the starter and winner of the contest that began the Giants’ climb out of the cellar was Sal Maglie. His teammates gave Sal a comfortable cushion by pouncing on three Dodger pitchers for six runs in the top of the first. Brooklyn counterattacked in its half of the inning as Gene Hermanski led off with a home run. Maglie’s first pitch to the next batter, Carl Furillo, came closer to giving him a haircut than one of the pitcher’s famous close shaves. The shaken Furillo flied out, but the Dodgers then scored another run on a homer by Jackie Robinson. The Giants put up two more runs in the second, and the Dodgers chipped away at Maglie for a run in their half of the inning, when Sal the Barber’s intimidation tactics failed to work against Pee Wee Reese. After Sal knocked him down, Reese bounced to his feet, socked a double, and scored on a single by Rocky Bridges. In the top of the third, the fourth Dodger pitcher of the evening, Clem Labine, engaged in some payback by decking Bobby Thomson.

But the real nastiness began with Robinson’s second at-bat, in the bottom of the third. Jackie had hit a home run his first time up, and this time on his first pitch Sal shaved Jackie’s chin with a fastball. On Maglie’s next pitch, a slow changeup, Robinson pulled a perfect ploy: He dropped a bunt down the first-base line. But then, instead of sprinting to first, he held back a little, gauging the distance and timing himself, watching Maglie as the pitcher charged off the mound to field the bunt. As Sal bent over near the foul line, his attention on the ball (which was rolling foul) rather than on Robinson, the 210-pound former football star gathered speed and barreled into Maglie. The force of the collision sent Sal sprawling in the dirt. Cursing a blue streak, the pitcher scrambled to his feet and lunged at Robinson – the closest Maglie ever came to an on-field fight. Members of both teams intervened to keep the two men apart. Durocher hurried out to calm his furious pitcher, and plate umpire Babe Pinelli said a few soothing words to the bristling Robinson. The game resumed, and Jackie tagged Sal for a single, but the pitcher struck out Gil Hodges to end the inning. The Giants scored no further runs, and although the Dodgers picked up two more, the rest of the game was uneventful. The Giants won it 8-5.

The third-inning collision between Maglie and Robinson became one of baseball’s fish stories, with the confrontation growing bigger in later retellings. Most newspaper accounts of the game, published the next day, took note of the clash, but none devoted much space to it.8 One later account contains numerous inaccuracies, including the claim that Robinson “made it to first,” when in reality the ball rolled foul and he returned to the plate. Another asserted that Jackie “barged into Maglie with crushing force,” and that Maglie and Robinson “had to be pried apart” by their teammates, although firsthand accounts indicate that the two men never tangled.9 Sportswriter Joe Overfield claimed that Robinson “body-blocked Maglie almost into right field,” and Maglie biographer James Szalontai wrote that Robinson sent Sal “flying into the air,” both far-fetched descriptions unsupported by newspaper descriptions.10 As a fish story teller, David Falkner topped them all by asserting that “Robinson left [Maglie] printed in the earth like a cartoon Road Runner.”11

The flare-up had one immediate consequence: Ford Frick, president of the National League and soon to replace Happy Chandler as the new baseball commissioner, took Maglie’s side against Robinson. Frick maintained he had received no reports from umpires of pitchers dusting off batters and snapped: “I’m getting tired of Robinson’s popping off. I have warned the Brooklyn club that if they won’t control Robinson, I will.”12 Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley, who disliked Robinson but disliked even more seeing one of his players criticized by the league’s top official, insisted that Jackie had the full support of the Dodger organization. Robinson also fired back, declaring, “Let Mr. Frick change the color of his skin … and go out there and hit against Maglie.”13 Although Robinson’s implied charge of racism must have hurt Maglie, who was the least prejudiced of men, the pitcher refused to be drawn into this war of words. He knew that racism had nothing to do with his conduct toward Robinson. The only colors he paid attention to were the colors on a batter’s uniform. Maglie was an equal-opportunity intimidator.

This article appeared in “The Team That Time Won’t Forget: The 1951 New York Giants” (SABR, 2015), edited by Bill Nowlin and C. Paul Rogers III.

Sources

This essay is based on material from Judith Testa, Sal Maglie, Baseball’s Demon Barber (Dekalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2007).

Notes

Interest in the game extended beyond the normal late May contest, as black fans, who usually came out in big numbers only for the Dodgers and Jackie Robinson’s visit to the City of Brotherly Love, came out in the “hundreds” for this particular Friday night tilt.3

In the New York Times’ account of the game, John Drebinger wrote, “During batting practice, Willie brought rounds of ‘ah’s’ from the early arrivals by driving three tremendous drives into the left field stand.”4 Giants manager Leo Durocher confirmed this in his book Nice Guys Finish Last:

I saw something then that I had never seen before in my life. The Philadelphia ball club was warming up on the sidelines getting ready to take infield practice when Willie stepped into the batting cage for the first time, and every player there stopped dead in his tracks and watched him. He hit balls on top of the roof, into the upper deck, the lower deck, all over the park, and everything he hit was a screamer.5

After his hitting display, Mays went to shag flies in the outfield. He threw the ball from deep center field to both third base and home plate on the fly.6

The game pitted Giants hurler Jim Hearn vs. the Phillies’ Bubba Church. Durocher had Mays batting third against the Phillies right-hander. The Phils drew first blood in their first time at bat, when Eddie Waitkus singled, was sacrificed to second by Richie Ashburn, and scored on Dick Sisler’s three-bagger, which was misplayed by Mays.7 The Giants answered in the second, tying the score on a walk by Henry Thompson, followed by two singles. Solo homers by the Phils’ keystone combo of Granny Hamner and Mike Goliat as well as by Giants catcher Wes Westrum accounted for the 3-2 Phillies lead entering the home sixth.

The Phillies extended their lead to 5-2, scoring two unearned runs on one hit plus infield errors by Eddie Stanky, Alvin Dark, and Whitey Lockman. The Giants answered with a run of their own in the top of the seventh, and after Hearn was lifted for a pinch-hitter, Giants relievers George Spencer and Sheldon Jones retired nine of the last ten Phillies batters. The Phillies’ lone hit in the last three innings was a double by Waitkus.

The Giants took the lead for good when they sent 10 men to the plate in the eighth, scoring five runs, capped by Lockman’s bases-loaded double. In the inning Mays reached base for the first time as a major leaguer, on an error by Hamner. He had made two loud outs to end both the fifth and seventh innings; Drebinger described them as “a lusty clout to deep right center which [Del] Ennis hauled down” and one that “sent Dick Sisler to the left-field wall [with another powerful drive].”8 The Giants won, 8-5.

In the ninth inning, Mays’s “great speed almost brought him into a collision with Monty [sic] Irvin. … Monty failed to hold onto the ball, and it went for a double.”9 It appears that, from then on, Durocher ordered Mays to catch anything he could reach, and Irvin and Thomson were to play closer to the foul lines.10

Mays went 0-for-12 in the series in Philadelphia, but the Giants won all three games. They took a .472 winning percentage into Willie Mays’s debut, and went 79-39 (.669) the rest of the way. Mays played every day, batting .281 after the Philly series and earning NL Rookie of the Year honors.

This article appeared in “The Team That Time Won’t Forget: The 1951 New York Giants” (SABR, 2015), edited by Bill Nowlin and C. Paul Rogers III.

Notes

The New York Giants were on an upswing when they headed to the Polo Grounds on Sunday morning, June 3, 1951, for a doubleheader with the St. Louis Cardinals, the sixth and seventh games of a 14-game homestand. They had won seven of the previous nine games to improve their record to 23-21, moving from sixth into a tie for third place with the Chicago Cubs and Boston Braves. The last time the Giants and Cardinals played in New York, the Giants had swept a three-game set (May 8-10); however, the memory of Giants’ two-game loss at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis two weeks earlier (May 20-21) was no doubt fresh on the minds of manager Leo Durocher’s players. In 1951 the St. Louis Cardinals were a team in transition. They had slipped to fifth place in 1950, their worst showing since 1938. But like the Giants, the Cardinals were playing well, having won nine of their last 14, and were in second place, three games behind the Brooklyn Dodgers, with a record of 22-19.

The starting pitchers for the first game of the doubleheader were two well-known southpaws, Dave Koslo and Max Lanier. The 31-year-old Koslo, the dean of the Giants staff and in his eighth season, was a rubber-armed starter and reliever who averaged 206 innings the previous five years, led the NL in ERA in 1949 (2.50), and had a 65-77 career record. He had fallen out of favor with Durocher and was making just his second start of the season. But Koslo was no stranger to the Cardinals, whom he beat in four out of five decisions in 1950, including a stellar two-hit shutout on June 22. Max Lanier, the 35-year-old former anchor of the strong Cardinal staffs during their three consecutive pennants (1942-1944), was perhaps best remembered for jumping to the outlaw Mexican League in 1946. He was subsequently suspended by Commissioner A.B. “Happy” Chandler and was reinstated in 1949, having lost three years of his prime. The former National League ERA leader (1.90 in 1943) owned a 92-63 record and was in the 12th season of his 14-year major-league career.

The two veteran pitchers treated the 32,564 spectators to a classic pitching duel.1 Koslo started out the game strong, holding the Cardinals hitless through 4⅔ innings before Nippy Jones reached base on an error by first baseman Whitey Lockman. After Jones was caught stealing, center fielder Peanuts Lowrey singled to center. Koslo induced catcher Del Rice to ground out to shortstop Alvin Dark to end the inning. Koslo, who often battled control problems, issued only two walks in the game (to Enos Slaughter in the second and Stan Musial in the fourth). Musial nicked Koslo for a slow-rolling single to lead off the seventh and beat Dark’s throw to first base by a “split second.”2 After second baseman Billy Johnson executed a sacrifice bunt to move Red Schoendienst to second, Koslo retired Slaughter and Nippy Jones to quell a rally.

After a 1-2-3 first inning, Lanier ran into trouble in the second. With two outs he walked right fielder Monte Irvin; then 20-year-old rookie Willie Mays, batting seventh, hit a double down the right-field line. After intentionally walking Hank Thompson to fill the bases, Lanier ended the threat by striking out Koslo. Lanier surrendered a single to Giants leadoff hitter Eddie Stanky to begin the third inning, and then hit his stride. He erased Stanky on a double play, the first of 14 consecutive retired batters through the seventh inning.

As the eighth inning began, both hurlers were working on sparkling two-hit shutouts. After Koslo set down the side in order, Mays led off the bottom of the eighth by belting a double over first baseman Nippy Jones’s head. Playing it safe, Durocher had Thompson sacrifice Mays to third. But the rally seemed to stall when Koslo grounded to second baseman Red Schoendienst. Stanky, a career .268 hitter but batting .301 at the time, dug in against Lanier. Perhaps Lanier should have played the percentages and walked Stanky, who batted .418 and slugged .500 in his career against Lanier. The 35-year-old hit a solid line-drive single to left field, scoring Mays. First baseman Whitey Lockman flied out to Musial, playing left field, to end the ending. Koslo set down Stan Rojek, Schoendienst, and Musial in order in the ninth, to end the game, which took only one hour and 44 minutes to play.

“So dazzling was Koslo’s hurling,” wrote John Drebinger in the New York Times, “that as the innings rolled by there was a great deal of eyebrow lifting among those in the press box as to why Leo has been keeping the stocky Wisconsin southpaw under wraps.”3 The Giants staff was led by a trio of right-handers (Sal Maglie, Larry Jansen, and Jim Hearn) who started a combined 105 games, and sorely need a productive left-hander. Lefties Roger Bowman, 23 years old, and Monty Kennedy, 29, each made five starts during the season, though Bowman struggled. Koslo, whose performance Joe Reichler of the Associated Press described as “brilliant,” made 14 more starts among his 39 appearances during the season en route to a 10-9 record.4 Koslo tossed three more complete-game victories against the Cardinals in 1951, including his fourth and final two-hitter, on August 4 (he never had a one-hitter or no-hitter).

The Giants lost the second game of the doubleheader (another battle of lefties, Harry Brecheen and Bowman), 4-3, to fall to 4 ½ games behind the Dodgers, in sole possession of third place.

This article appeared in “The Team That Time Won’t Forget: The 1951 New York Giants” (SABR, 2015), edited by Bill Nowlin and C. Paul Rogers III.

Sources

Baseball-Reference.com

Retrosheet.org

New York Times

Notes

Mocking the Giants and their manager, Leo Durocher, Brooklyn’s crew yelled through the thin wall separating the two clubhouses after the sweep, “Leo, Leo, you in there? Eat your heart out. Leo! Yeah, that’s your team! Nobody else wants it!” A few raucous songs and Jackie Robinson pounding a bat on the door while swearing at the dejected Giants generated helpless outrage. Having lost 12 of 15 contests to their crosstown rivals at that point in the season, there was little in the way of retort New York could offer.1

Now, on August 11, the only bright spot for New York seemed to center on their having beaten the Phillies seven straight times and the fact that Jim Hearn, 10-6 so far, was their starting pitcher.2 Hearn, the 1950 ERA leader,3 had a career 10-1 record against Philadelphia’s Roberts, on the other hand, was just 2-6 against New York. If nothing else, these factors boded well for the Giants.

The game at the Polo Grounds began before a paying crowd of 8,160. After the Phillies went down without scoring in the top of the first, the Giants leadoff batter was second baseman Davey Williams, playing in place of Eddie Stanky.4 Williams’s start was a telling story on the Giants at that point in the season.

He came up from the minors in mid-July, even though the 35-year-old Stanky was performing capably. The Giants were eight games out at the time and seemingly going nowhere. Durocher, feeling the pennant race was all but over, wanted to see how Williams might fit into his plans for the 1952 season. Now, a month later, they were deeper in the hole – a double-digit deficit to Brooklyn. Neither Williams, shortstop Al Dark, nor right fielder Don Mueller distinguished themselves against Roberts in the first, going down in order.

The game was scoreless until the top of the third, when Roberts coaxed a one-out walk off Hearn (Jim’s only walk of the game). Eddie Waitkus and Richie Ashburn singled, loading the bases. Third baseman Willie Jones flied out to Monte Irvin in left, and Roberts scored. The game remained 1-0 the next 3½ innings as the Giants could not get a runner past second.

Philadelphia’s offense was equally impotent until the top of the seventh, when catcher Andy Seminick slammed his tenth home run of the campaign, a solo shot, giving Roberts a bit of a cushion. The Giants continued having trouble with Roberts, with no semblance of a rally, and runners unable to get past first.

Hank Thompson pinch-hit for Hearn in the bottom of the eighth and popped out. Dark singled with two outs, but Mueller grounded to first, ending the threat. 5 George Spencer, the Giants’ chief reliever (he would appear in 57 games in 1951), replaced Hearn.

In the ninth Phillies second baseman Putsy Caballero greeted Spencer with a home run, Caballero’s first (and as it turned out his only) home run of the season, to make the score 3-0. Seminick followed with a single, and eventually scored on Waitkus’s second single of the game.

With New York now down 4-0 in the bottom of the ninth, Willie Mays singled with two outs. The Giants’ last hope to extend the game rested with Bobby Thomson. But Thomson popped up to Jones, ending the contest. Roberts won his 16th game, and got his league-leading 17th complete game and fifth shutout. He gave up seven hits, did not walk a batter, and struck out three, a rather low amount for one who would lead the league in strikeouts several times during his career.

The loss pushed New York 13 games behind Brooklyn, which split a doubleheader with the Boston Braves that day. The Giants were now a game and a half ahead of Philadelphia with 44 games left on the schedule. New York’s loss, its fourth straight, represented the lowest point of the season for the Giants. None of their fans leaving the Polo Grounds that day could dream what was in store the rest of the season. The next day, the New York Times story on the game began: “Knocked completely out of sight as a pennant contender by the Dodgers earlier in the week …”6

*****

The fortunes of New York and Philadelphia as well as Hearn and Roberts went in decidedly different directions after the August 11 contest. Roberts ended up with 21 victories in 1951, the second of six seasons the future Hall of Famer reached the 20-victory plateau. However, his record after beating Hearn on the 11th, was just 5-7, reflecting Philadelphia’s late-season slump, which dropped them from challenging the Giants for second to a fifth-place finish.

Hearn, after losing to Roberts, went 7-2 down the stretch, ending with a career-high 17 victories. New York swept a doubleheader from Philadelphia the next day to begin a 16-game winning streak that pulled them within five games of Brooklyn. After losing to Pittsburgh on August 28, the Giants reeled off 21 victories in their remaining 27 scheduled games. After 154 games they were tied with Brooklyn despite the Dodgers’ having played over .500 during the same period.

A three-game playoff to determine the pennant winner began on October 1 in the Polo Grounds. Splitting the first two games, the teams went into the bottom of the ninth with the Dodgers leading 4-2. As was the case on August 11, Bobby Thomson came to bat in the last frame. This time, he did not disappoint.

This article appeared in “The Team That Time Won’t Forget: The 1951 New York Giants” (SABR, 2015), edited by Bill Nowlin and C. Paul Rogers III.

Notes

So the Giants and Dodgers were deadlocked as the Sunday games, the last of the regular season, were to begin. For the Giants, manager Leo Durocher called upon 21-game winner Larry Jansen to start. Tommy Holmes, the Braves player-manager, sent Jim Wilson to the hill. In Philadelphia, the Dodgers’ Preacher Roe and the Phillies’ Bubba Church were the starters.

The Giants and Braves had made a blockbuster trade at the winter meetings the previous December. The Giants received Eddie Stanky and Alvin Dark from the Braves in exchange for Sid Gordon, Willard Marshall, Buddy Kerr, and Red Webb.1 Five of the players, all but Webb, were in the starting lineups on this Sunday afternoon. Also, Walker Cooper, the Braves catcher, was a former Giant. No doubt the ex-Giants hoped to knock their former team out of the pennant race. And Stanky and Dark before leaving Boston had developed an acrimonious relationship with Billy Southworth, who was the Braves manager at the time.2

In the top of the first for the Giants, Dark singled to right after one out but was stranded at first. Bob Addis led off the bottom of the first for the Braves with a double to right field. Sam Jethroe flied out to left, and Earl Torgeson’s grounder to second moved Addis to third, and Gordon’s single drove him home for a 1-0 lead. With one out in the Giants’ second, Bobby Thomson hit a game-tying solo home run to left field, his 30th round-tripper of the season. In the bottom of the second, Jansen retired the Braves in order.

Jansen and Stanky singled to start the Giants’ third. Stanky was out at second on Dark’s groundball. Jansen went to third and scored on Don Mueller’s single to right. Dark took third on Monte Irvin’s force-play grounder, then Wilson walked Lockman, loading the bases, but Thomson flied out to Jethroe in center, stranding the runners with the Giants ahead 2-1.

The fourth inning saw both teams go down in order. In the top of the fifth, Dark singled to center with one out and stole second. After Mueller flied out to right field, Irvin drove Dark home with a single to left, giving the Giants a 3-1 lead. Jansen retired the Braves in order in the bottom of the inning. In the top of the sixth, Thomson led off with a single but was thrown trying to steal second as Willie Mays struck out. Wes Westrum ended the inning by grounding out. Johnny Logan, pinch-hitting for Wilson, led off the sixth for the Braves by striking out. Addis flied out, then Jansen walked Jethroe, ending his string of 15 batters in a row retired. Jethroe was stranded at first as Torgeson struck out for the third out of the inning. Given the clouds forming over Braves Field, the lights were turned on to begin the sixth inning.3

In the top of the seventh, Max Surkont came in to pitch for the Braves. Dark continued his hot hitting with a two-out double to left field. Mueller failed to bring him home, grounding out to shortstop. The Braves went out in order in the bottom of the seventh. In the top of the eighth, Thomson walked with two outs, but Mays grounded out to third.

Sibby Sisti struck out to begin the Braves’ eighth. Manager Holmes called upon himself to bat for Kerr. He flied out to center field. Slugger Bob Elliott pinch-hit for Surkont and became Jansen’s sixth strikeout victim. Vern Bickford pitched the top of the ninth for the Braves and retired the Giants in order.

In the bottom of the ninth, the Giants had a 3-1 lead. If they held on, they would do no worse than tie for the lead and force a playoff. Jansen was still on the mound. Braves left fielder Bob Addis led off the ninth as he had led off Braves first, with a double to right field. Jethroe flashed his speed and beat out a hit to the right side; Addis went to third base. With two runners on and no outs, Torgeson grounded to shortstop, where Dark grabbed the ball and tossed to Stanky for a force play as Addis scored. Gordon, with 29 home runs and 109 RBIs and representing the winning run, grounded to Dark, who threw to Stanky at second for the second out. Cooper, another formidable slugger (18 home runs), legged out an infield hit to third. Willard Marshall came to the plate, the third ex-Giant in a row to bat. Marshall made good contact but it was right to Irvin in left field for the third out. The Giants celebrated at the mound and carried Jansen to the dugout.

As the game ended, the scoreboard showed that the Phillies were leading the Dodgers in Philadelphia.4 A Dodgers loss would give the Giants the National League pennant. As the Giants showered and dressed to catch their train to New York, there was great anticipation that the flag would be theirs. However, in one of the Dodgers’ greatest games, they refused to die and defeated the Phillies 9-8 in 14 innings on Jackie Robinson’s home run. In the bottom of the 12th inning, Robinson had made an unbelievable catch of Eddie Waitkus’s line drive up the middle with the bases loaded and two outs to save the game. The Giants learned of the Dodgers victory on the train back to New York.5

Larry Jansen’s complete-game victory was his 22nd of the season. Jansen commented after the game, “I was never really worried, not even in the ninth inning.”6 While Jansen may not have been worried, Durocher admitted that he was nervous after the double by Addis to lead off the ninth.7 The ebullient Durocher then exclaimed, “What a game, what a game. What a hit that Irvin gave us. He’s been hitting the big ones for us all year.”8 Irvin with his game-winning single recorded his league-leading 120th RBI. Thomson (home run) and Dark (three hits) also contributed offensively. Addis with two doubles and two runs scored was the hitting hero for the Braves and a thorn in the side of the Giants.

As both the Giants and Dodgers arrived back in New York, they were greeted by their fans. Five thousand Giants fans, by police estimation, greeted the Giants at Grand Central Station, and 2,000 Dodgers fans were at Pennsylvania Station.9 While both teams were probably a bit weary, they had to be ready to play each other at 1:30 P.M. on Monday at Ebbets Field in the first game of a best-of-three playoff. On the previous Thursday at a coin-tossing ceremony at National League headquarters, owner Horace Stoneham of the Giants called the toss but lost. Jack Collins, the Dodgers business manager, selected the playoffs to begin at Ebbets Field with the second and the third game, if needed, to be played at the Polo Grounds.10 As fandom knows, the playoff culminated in Bobby Thomson’s “Shot Heard ’Round the World.”

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted the Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet game logs:

baseball-reference.com/boxes/BSN/BSN195109300.shtml

retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1951/B09300BSN1951.htm

Notes

1 Mark L. Armour and Daniel R. Levitt, Paths to Glory: How Great Baseball Teams Got That Way (Dulles, Virginia: Potomac Books, 2003), 144.

2 Armour and Levitt, 145.

3 James P. Dawson, “Jansen Pitches Durocher’s Team to Triumph Over Braves by 3-2,” New York Times, October 1, 1951: 26.

4 Dawson.

5 Dawson.

6 Dawson.

7 Dawson.

8 Dawson.

9 Milton Bracker, “Giants, Dodgers Tie; Play-Off Today; Brooks’ Victory in 14th Leaves Fans Limp,” New York Times, October 1, 1951: 1.

10 John Drebinger, “Play-Off to Open at Ebbets Field if Dodgers and Giants Finish in Tie,” New York Times, September 28, 1951: 43.

He would ultimately become known as the man with the rubber arm but, on this day Clem Labine was a relatively unknown rookie whom manager Chuck Dressen of the Dodgers had chosen to save the Dodgers from elimination in their best-of-three playoff with the New York Giants for the National League pennant. Labine had been called up from St. Paul in July, and his Dodgers contract called for a stipend of $5,000 per year. The hopes of the Dodgers were being pinned on a man who would be paid $38.50 for that day’s work.2 Labine pitched a six-hit shutout as the Dodgers won, 10-0, to force a decisive third game at the Polo Grounds.

The second game was played at the home of the Giants, the Polo Grounds, and the fans hoped to see their heroes win the National League pennant. Overcast skies and threatening weather conditions kept the crowd down to 38,609.

Labine shared the spotlight with Jackie Robinson, whose first four appearances in New York had been as a member of the Kansas City Monarchs in 1945. Robinson’s first-inning homer, on the first pitch to him after a leadoff single by Pee Wee Reese and Duke Snider’s strikeout, gave the Dodgers a 2-0 lead before the Giants had an opportunity to bat. The homer barely made it over the 315-foot sign in left field. It came off the Giants starter, Sheldon “Available” Jones, whose career was on a downward spiral at the relatively young age of 29. Going into the game, his record for the 1951 season was 6-10, after a combined 44-36 record over the prior three seasons. His major claim to fame was having led the National League in hit batsmen for two consecutive years (1948-1949).

In the top of the third inning, the day’s brouhaha (what’s a Dodgers-Giants game without a good argument?) took place. A one-out walk to Snider and a single by Robinson put runners on first and second and occasioned a visit by Giants manager Leo Durocher to the mound to remove Jones from the game. The new Giants pitcher was George Spencer. After Andy Pafko popped out, Gil Hodges hit a grounder back toward Spencer. Spencer’s throw to Whitey Lockman at first base hit Hodges and bounded about 10 feet away. Snider rounded third and raced toward home but Lockman retrieved the ball and gunned out the Duke at home, catcher Wes Westrum applying the tag.

Dodgers coach Cookie Lavagetto and manager Dressen got into a heated exchange with umpire Larry Goetz after Snider was ruled out, Goetz saying that he never touched home plate. After the game Dressen noted that “Snider did a hook side and one of his feet touched the base, but the other didn’t. Goetz looked at the wrong leg – the one off the base.”3

The Giants mounted threats in three consecutive innings against Labine but came up empty. In the second inning with one out, the Giants threatened as Bobby Thomson doubled and Willie Mays had an infield hit. They were left stranded.

An inning later, the Giants loaded the bases on an error by Reese, a single by Don Mueller, and a walk to Whitey Lockman. With two out and the count full, Labine got Thomson lunging after a wide curve for a strikeout to end the inning. In the fourth inning, with two out, Spencer and Eddie Stanky singled. Al Dark’s liner was snatched by Billy Cox at third, and that threat died. After that, the Giants had little in the way of offense, and not a runner got past first base.

In the top of the fifth inning, the Dodgers extended their lead to 3-0 when Snider’s double was followed by an RBI single by Robinson, giving Jackie three hits and three RBIs – and the game was only in the fifth inning.

In the top of the sixth inning, the umpires ordered the lights turned on as dark clouds assembled in the skies above the ballpark in Harlem, and the Dodgers broke the game open with three runs. Hodges led off the inning with a homer, his 40th of the season. Cox then hit a liner that third baseman Thomson knocked down. Bobby’s throw to first base was wild and Cox wound up at second on the error. A fly out by Rube Walker advanced Cox to third, bringing up Labine. Dressen ordered a suicide squeeze. Spencer’s pitch went wide of the plate and Labine could not reach it with his bat. The Giants had Cox in a rundown between third and home. The ball eventually wound up in the glove of Spencer and when he attempted the tag, Cox jarred the ball loose and scampered home with the Dodgers’ fifth run.

Labine then walked, and Carl Furillo lined out for the second out of the inning. The rains then came and suspended play for 41 minutes. After the game resumed, Reese singled off Spencer, advancing Labine to third base. Clem scored on a single by Snider to make the score 6-0.

After sending up a pinch-hitter, Bill Rigney, for Spencer in the bottom of the sixth, the Giants brought in Al Corwin to pitch and his first throw in the seventh inning was hit over the left-field wall by Andy Pafko, his 30th of the season, bringing the score to 7-0. Hodges drew a walk and after Cox lined out to left field, Walker singled to center field. Mays misplayed the ball and Hodges scored from first base. Walker wound up on second. The error by Mays was the fifth by the Giants in the game. Three of the Dodgers runs to that point were unearned.

In the bottom of the seventh inning, Robinson topped off his great day with a fielding gem. He raced from his second-base position to the other side of the bag to grab a soft liner. In the same inning, two late-arriving pigeons positioned themselves in the Dodgers infield so as to get an up-close view of Jackie Robinson. Robinson chased them away, but they came back some time later (they were not on the field when the Dodgers were at bat) and positioned themselves near Gil Hodges. They helped themselves to a meal, on the sod behind Hodges, doubtless knowing of the fielding wizardry of the Dodgers first baseman.4

The Dodgers completed the scoring with two ninth-inning runs. With two out, Cox walked and came home on Walker’s homer, “the longest home run I ever hit in my life,” he said.5 It was Rube’s third hit of the game. He had proved to be more than an adequate replacement for Roy Campanella, who sat out the game with a bad leg.

The Dodgers win snapped a Giant win streak of eight games. They had won the last seven games on the schedule and won the first playoff game before succumbing to Labine and Robinson.

“The magic number is down to one.” – Ralph Branca, October 2, 19516

The Dodgers, if they could win Game Three of the playoff the following day, would head to Yankee Stadium for the first game of the World Series. Robinson had first appeared at Yankee Stadium on June 17, 1945, in a 3-1 Kansas City Monarchs win over the Philadelphia Stars. In that game his seventh-inning single ignited a rally that accounted for all of his team’s runs.7 He next appeared there on August 12, 1945, going 2-for-3 and doubling in a run in the seventh inning when the Monarchs defeated the New York Black Yankees, 4-1.8

Robinson’s first appearances in Brooklyn had also been in 1945, with the Monarchs on June 22 and August 15 at Dexter Park against the Bushwicks. In June he went 3-for-4 with a pair of doubles and an RBI, accounting for all of his team’s runs in a 4-3 loss to the Bushwicks.9 In August he went 2-for-5 in a 9-3 win.10 By the end of August, Robinson was back in Brooklyn for his first meeting with Branch Rickey.11 In October he was back at the Dodgers offices to sign his first contract with the Dodgers.

Robinson’s 3-for-5 against the Giants brought his average for the season to .337. The next day he went 1-for-2 to bring his batting average for the full 1951 season to .338. His first-inning homer was his 19th and last of the season. It was his third consecutive season over .300. He continued to hit over .300 through 1954.

As for Bobby Thomson, who struck out against Labine with the bases loaded in the bottom of the third inning, tomorrow would be another day.

The next day, at the Polo Grounds, the Giants won, 5-4, and advanced to the World Series.

Sources

In addition to Baseball-Reference.com and the sources cited in the Notes, the author used:

Drebinger, John. “Dodgers Win, Tie Play-Offs as Labine Halts Giants, 10-0,” New York Times, October 3, 1951: 1, 42.

Haley, Martin J. “Bums Bounce Back, Even Playoff on Labine’s 6-Hitter and Four Homers,” St. Louis Globe Democrat, October 3, 1951: 3C.

Holbrook, Bob. “Rookie Labine Stuns Baseball World,” Boston Globe, October 3, 1951: 1.

Rennie, Rud. “Dodgers Trounce Giants, 10-0, and Tie Play-Offs as Labine Pinches Six-Hitter,” New York Herald Tribune, October 3, 1951: 1, 29.

Siler, Tom. “Rookie Labine Saved Brooks for Day, Now It’s Up to Big Guys, Maglie or Newcombe,” Knoxville (Tennessee) News Sentinel, October 3, 1951: 20.

Smith, Red. “Views of Sport,” New York Herald Tribune, October 3, 1951: 29.

Talbot, Gayle (Associated Press). “Dodgers Maul Giants, 10-0, Knot Playoff,” Wilmington (Delaware) Morning News, October 3, 1951, 1, 28.

Young, Dick. “Labine Trips Giants 10-0 on 6 Hits: Flock Ties Playoff, Blasts Four Homers,” New York Daily News, October 3, 1951: 90, 93-94.

Notes

1 Roscoe McGowen, “Rookie Pitcher’s Brilliant Performance Hailed by Jubilant Brooklyn Team,” New York Times, October 3, 1951: 42.

2 Lester J. Biederman, “Desperate Move Saves Dodgers: Rookie Labine Starts, Blanks Giants, 10-0,” Pittsburgh Press, October 3, 1951: 33.

3 Will Grimsley (Associated Press), “Dodgers Jubilant Over Playoff Win,” Wilmington (Delaware) Morning News, October 3, 1951: 28.

4 Chester L. Smith, “The Village Smithy: NL Winner Due for Rough Time,” Pittsburgh Press, October 3, 1951: 33.

5 McGowen.

6 McGowen.

7 “Paige Sparkles as K.C. Tops Philly,” Pittsburgh Courier, June 23, 1945: 16.

8 “Satchel Paige Slips Black Yankees 4 to 1 Defeat: Monarchs Win Before 19,000 Fans,” New York Amsterdam News, August 18, 1945: 8-B.

9 “Martin Bombers in Doubleheader with Bushwicks,” Brooklyn Eagle, June 23, 1945: 6.

10 “Monarchs Show Bushwicks Some Stylish Tricks,” Brooklyn Eagle, August 16, 1945: 14.

11 “Rickey Admits Calling in Jackie Robinson,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 1, 1945: 16.

On August 11, 1951, the second-place New York Giants trailed their rivals, the Brooklyn Dodgers, by 13 games. From that point until the end of the season, the Giants won 39 of their final 47 games, an incredible .830 clip. The 154-game season ended with both clubs tied for the top spot in the National League, necessitating a three-game playoff series. After splitting the first two contests, the foes faced off at the Polo Grounds on October 3 for the deciding game.

Despite the high stakes, it was a relatively-disappointing crowd that made its way to the ballpark that afternoon. Perhaps it was the threat of rain in the forecast, or maybe the 10-0 drubbing that the Dodgers had inflicted on the Giants the previous day. Whatever the excuse, only 34,320 fans were in attendance. In the ensuing decades, tens of thousands more would claim that they were there. What the no-shows missed was one of the most legendary games in baseball history.

The Giants were managed by Leo Durocher, who chose Sal “The Barber” Maglie as his starting pitcher. Maglie had gotten his nickname either because he usually looked like he hadn’t shaved, or because the fearless pitcher liked to welcome batters to the plate with a little chin music. He had won 23 games so far that season, including five against Brooklyn. His mound opponent for Charlie Dressen’s Dodgers was hard-throwing Don Newcombe, who had won 20.

The Dodgers drew first blood, when Pee Wee Reese scored on a one-out single by Jackie Robinson in the opening frame. Maglie pitched his way out of further damage, however.

In the bottom of the second, the Giants Whitey Lockman singled with one out, bringing up Bobby Thomson, New York’s 27-year-old third baseman, who had been sizzling down the stretch. Earlier, on his way to the ballpark, Thomson had said to himself that it would be great if he could somehow get three hits that day. He got off to a good start in this at-bat, lining one down the left field line. Thinking double all the way, he rounded first with his head down, racing for second. The Dodgers left fielder, Andy Pafko, had a rifle for an arm, and Lockman, not wanting to get thrown out at third, held at second. Pafko threw the ball to shortstop Reese. Thomson was suddenly caught in no-man’s land between first and second, and he was out on Reese’s relay to first baseman Gil Hodges. It was a costly base-running gaffe by Thomson. Instead of runners on first and second with one out, the Giants now had a runner on second with two down. The next batter, Willie Mays, flied out to end the inning. For the moment, Thomson wore the goat horns. In the darkening gloom, the Polo Grounds lights were turned on.

In the fifth, Thomson, still wielding a hot bat, doubled to left. His mates, however, were unable to drive him in, and the score stood 1-0 in favor of the Dodgers. It remained that way until the seventh, when Thomson’s deep fly to center scored Monte Irvin from third.

In the eighth, the wheels fell off for the Giants and the exhausted Maglie, as the Dodgers scored three runs to take a commanding 4-1 lead before the Barber was replaced by Larry Jansen. Newcombe, meanwhile, was seemingly growing stronger.

Then came the bottom of the ninth. Many of the Polo Grounds crowd had already begun making their way to the exit ramps. Alvin Dark singled to open the inning. The next batter, Don Mueller, noticed that Dodger first baseman Gil Hodges was playing close to the bag, as Dark edged his way off first. It was an odd strategy on Hodges’s part; there wasn’t much chance of Dark attempting to steal. The Giants, after all, needed base runners. Mueller hit a slow grounder to Hodges’s right, just out of his reach. Had the first baseman been playing wider of the bag, he may have easily gobbled it up and started a double play. It went as a single to right field, however, with Dark taking third.

Monte Irvin, the leading RBI man on the Giants and their best clutch hitter, fouled out to Hodges for the first out. At that point, an announcement was made in the press box that World Series credentials for Brooklyn’s Ebbets Field could be picked up later that evening at the Biltmore Hotel.

Lockman, the next hitter, doubled to left, scoring Dark and sending Mueller to third. Mueller slid awkwardly into the bag, injuring his ankle. Thus, in the middle of the mounting excitement, the game was halted for several moments as Mueller was carted off the field, pinch-runner Clint Hartung taking his place. “The corniest possible sort of Hollywood schmaltz,” wrote Red Smith, “stretcher bearers plodding away with an injured Mueller between them, symbolic of the Giants themselves.”1

Next up, Bobby Thomson. To face him, Dressen brought in Ralph Branca. The Brooklyn righty had been the starter in Game One, giving up a homer to Thomson but pitching well in a 3-1 loss.

Gordon McClendon was calling the game on radio for the Liberty Broadcasting System. “Boy, I’m telling you!” he declared. “What they’re going to say about this one I don’t know!”2 Branca somehow sneaked a fastball down the middle for strike one. “A ball I should have swung at,” Thomson, a fastball hitter, admitted later.3

At 3:58 pm, Branca’s second pitch, another fastball, came in high and tight. Thomson swung, his uppercut driving the ball deep toward the corner in left. Pafko, dashing toward the high wall, ran out of room. The ball landed in the first row, just above the 315 ft. sign for a three-run home run. Game over. The Polo Grounds shook as the euphoric crowd erupted. Joe King wrote in The Sporting News, “(Thomson’s homer) touched off scenes in this place which never before had been witnessed in connection with the winning of a pennant.”4

By any measure, and for pure excitement, Thomson’s home run, referred to down the years as “The Shot Heard ‘Round the World,” belongs on the short list of the most legendary in baseball history. Some consider it the most famous blast ever. Much of the mystique surrounding the home run lies in the iconic, delirious radio call by Giants broadcaster Russ Hodges (“The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!”)5Dodger broadcaster Red Barber’s call summed it up: “It is…a home run! And the New York Giants win the National League pennant and the Polo Grounds goes wild!”6 Gordon McClendon described the home run this way: “Going, going gone! The Giants win the pennant!” Then, after a brief pause, “I don’t know what to say! I just don’t know what to say! It’s the greatest victory in all of baseball history!”7 Ernie Harwell, calling the game on the Giants television network, simply said “It’s gone!”8Felo Ramirez, describing the game in Spanish for Latin-American listeners, cried “Los Gigantes son los campeones!”9

As Thomson raced around the bases to be greeted at home by a throng of ecstatic teammates, the stunned Dodgers began the long walk off the field. All except Jackie Robinson, who can be seen in a well-known photograph taken from center field looking in toward second base. The photo shows the scrum of players at home plate, with Thomson somewhere in the middle. Branca, head hanging, is walking dejectedly away from the mound. Robinson, standing all alone just beyond second base, his back to the camera, is staring, hands on hips, toward home, in order to make sure that Thomson actually touched the plate. It is one of the classic photos of sport, a poignant juxtaposition of dejection and giddy victory. Bobby Thomson had certainly gotten his three hits.

Probably no one in the old ballpark was more delighted at Thomson’s home run than the on-deck hitter, rookie Willie Mays, who later admitted he was terrified at the prospect of having to bat in such a pressure-packed situation.

Branca, of course, took the loss, while Jansen, who pitched one inning, got the win, his 23rd of the season.

Attending the game that day was the motley quartet of comic actor Jackie Gleason, New York restaurateur Toots Shor, FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover, and crooner Frank Sinatra (who had been given four tickets by Durocher). The group had been drinking all day, and just before Thomson hit his home run, Gleason unceremoniously threw up in the lap of Sinatra, a Giant fan. Said Sinatra later, “The fans are going wild and Thomson comes to bat. Then Gleason throws up all over me! Here’s one of the all-time games and I don’t even get to see Bobby hit that homer! Only Gleason, a Brooklyn fan, would get sick at a time like that!”10

Not only did the game feature perhaps the most famous home run ever hit, the most famous radio call in sports broadcasting history, and one of the most iconic sports photos, but it resulted in one of the most wonderful leads ever in a newspaper article. The day after the game, Red Smith, writing in the New York Herald-Tribune, opened his story “Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff” with the famous lines: “Now it is done. Now the story ends. And there is no way to tell it. The art of fiction is dead. Reality has strangled invention. Only the utterly impossible, the inexpressibly fantastic, can ever be plausible again.”11

This article appeared in “The Team That Time Won’t Forget: The 1951 New York Giants” (SABR, 2015), edited by Bill Nowlin and C. Paul Rogers III.

Notes

As in Game One, Eddie Stanky and Alvin Dark were retired to begin the match for the Giants, but unlike Yankees starter Allie Reynolds in the opener – who had allowed three first-inning baserunners and two Giants runs after two outs – Lopat, starting a World Series game for the third season in a row, put away Bobby Thomson to retire the side in order.

The Yankees struck first in the bottom of the first against Jansen, who two days earlier had retired three Brooklyn Dodgers in relief, then became the pennant-clinching winning pitcher when Thomson’s “Shot Heard ’Round The World” capped the Giants’ ninth-inning rally.

This time, the Yankees used some uncharacteristic small ball to start the inning: consecutive bunt singles by Mantle, batting left-handed, and Phil Rizzuto. Mantle later “admitted he had planned to bunt the first time up against Jansen even before he left the clubhouse for the game. … It was a perfect drag, too fast for the tumbling Jansen to reach, too slow for [second baseman] Stanky to play in time.”1

Mantle took an extra base on Rizzuto’s bunt due to some sloppy defense by the Giants: “There was no chance to nail Rizzuto, but [Whitey] Lockman threw anyway,” a sportswriter covering the game observed, adding, “His throw eluded Stanky, and Mantle took third.”2

Unlike Giants manager Leo Durocher, who took partial credit for Monte Irvin’s steal of home in Game One, Yankee boss Casey Stengel disavowed any role in the unusual first-inning attack.3 “Both bunts were breathtaking affairs and perhaps, on his own say so, no one was more surprised than Stengel himself, Casey later insisting that he had not conceived this part of the attack,” the New York Times reported.4

Mantle scored when Gil McDougald “lifted a rather feeble pop fly in short right. Henry Thompson … came tearing in for it and for a few fleeting moments, it looked as if he would catch it.”5 But when the Texas Leaguer landed for a single, Mantle crossed the plate, giving the Yankees the lead for the first time in the Series.

Continuing his hot hitting after recording four hits, including a triple, in Game One, Irvin singled to start the second and “stole another base, pilfering second base with a fallaway slide worthy of Ty Cobb.”6 But Lopat needed just seven pitches to garner three groundouts and strand Irvin.

The Yankees expanded the lead with RBIs from the eighth- and ninth-place hitters. With two outs and no one on in the bottom of the second, Jansen “made a bad pitch, a curve ball that hung[,]”7 to first baseman Joe Collins, who hit “a towering high fly with barely enough strength to drift into the right-field stand.”8 Having sat out Game One against Dave Koslo due to a lack of power against lefties,9 Collins hit a classic Yankee Stadium homer put the home team up, 2-0.

No one scored through the middle frames, but three future Hall of Fame center fielders intersected historically – and tragically – in the top of the fifth. Giants rookie Willie Mays flied out to Joe DiMaggio in center, and Mantle, preparing to back up on the play from right, severely injured his knee.

Patrick Burns photographed the play for the New York Times. Mantle sprawls on the grass with one leg down and the other scissor-kicked up in the air while DiMaggio, probably distracted by his fallen mate, goes up on tiptoes with his glove under the path of the approaching ball as if readying to make a basket catch. The framing of the picture shows seated fans, many of whom sport suits and ties, following the ball and the outfielders, doubtless oblivious to how a seemingly routine fly ball would impact Mantle for the rest of his baseball life.

As his biographer Jane Leavy concluded, “That October afternoon was the last time Mantle set foot on a baseball field without pain. He would play the next seventeen years struggling to be as good as he could be, knowing he would never be as good as he might have become.”10

Stengel’s propensity to platoon meant the Yankees had a more than adequate substitute for Mantle in Hank Bauer, who would go 0-for-2 in Game Two, then play a major role in the rest of the Series.

Meanwhile, Lopat, still with a two-run lead, “was at his coy best, befuddling the right-handed batters with a screwball that faded away and mixing just enough fast balls with his curves and change-ups to baffle all,” observed the Philadelphia Inquirer.11 “He tosses an odd assortment of [pitches] at various degrees of comparative slowness,” the New York Times noted. “Although the ball looks big as a balloon, lucky is the fellow who contrives to nick a piece of it.”12

The Giants threatened in the top of the seventh as the incomparable Irvin singled, Lockman singled, and, with one out, Wes Westrum walked. With the bases loaded, Durocher made a trio of moves, using two pinch-hitters and one pinch-runner, but got only one run, as Irvin came home on Bill Rigney’s fly ball to Bauer, the latter’s only putout after he replaced Mantle.

Lopat helped the Yankees get the run back in the bottom of the eighth, with sloppy defense by the visitors once again playing a key role. After Bobby Brown singled, Stengel pinch-ran Billy Martin, a 23-year-old reserve infielder in his second season in the majors. Collins grounded to third baseman Thomson, “[b]ut Dark and Stanky somehow left the keystone sack uncovered and, with nobody at second to retrieve his throw, Thomson finally fired the ball to first for the putout on the batter.”13

Shortstop Dark deserved no blame, as the second baseman should cover the bag in this situation. The usually heady Stanky, however, “was somewhere between first and second, thinking beautiful thoughts.”14

The Yankees capitalized when Lopat singled to center to score Martin, a substitution praised by Durocher. He asserted that Stengel “got himself an extra run by putting Martin into the game. Brown would have never beaten Willie Mays throw to the plate,”15 but Martin did, giving the Yankees a 3-1 lead. “Despite Lopat’s five-hit hurling, he was prouder of his single in the eighth inning, The Sporting News reported. “‘It drove in the insurance run and kept the Giants from bunting in the ninth,’ he beamed.”16 In 19 World Series at-bats over the Yankees’ five straight titles from 1949 through 1953, Lopat had three RBIs, an excellent total for a pitcher.

The Giants did get the tying run to the plate in the ninth after Irvin once again singled for his seventh hit in two games. “‘If any of you guys know how to pitch to Irvin,’ Casey Stengel told the writers who visited his office after the game, ‘I wish you’d tell me. … I don’t even know how we got him out twice.’”17

Lopat, however, retired the final three Giants after Irvin on groundballs, getting the last putout himself on an assist from Collins for the first World Series complete game of his career … but not the last one of the Series. “It was easily the best of the three World’s Series games Lopat has hurled for the Yankees since 1949,” The Sporting News wrote, adding, “He fed Leo’s warriors his assortment of soft stuff, dinky curves and a 1951 version of Dizzy Dean’s ‘nothing ball’ of the 1938 Cub-Yankee series, and the Giants could do nothing about it.”18 Tied at one win apiece, the Yankees and Giants would move across town to the Polo Grounds for the next three games.

Sources

In addition to the Sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted the Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org websites for pertinent material and the box scores noted below.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA195110050.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1951/B10050NYA1951.htm

Notes

1 Harold Kaese, “Father Sees Mantle Fall, Thinks First of Mother,” Boston Globe, October 6, 1951, 4.

2 Hy Hurwitz, “Raschi vs. Hearn Today; Mantle Out,” Boston Globe, October 6, 1951, 4.

3 Stengel said, “Mantle and Rizzuto were bunting on their own with those two stabs that brought our first run. They’re drilled to do whenever they think they can get away with it. They got away with it both times.” James P. Dawson, “Yanks’ Joy Over Triumph Is Tempered by Loss of Mantle for Remaining Games,” New York Times, October 6, 1951: 24.

4 John Drebinger, “Yanks Win 3 to 1, Tie Series; Lopat Holds Giants to 5 Hits,” New York Times, October 6, 1951: 10.

5 Drebinger, “Yanks Win 3 to 1.”

6 Arthur Daley, “A Drowsy Day at the Stadium,” New York Times, October 6, 1951: 25.

7 “Stanky’s Delay Gave Yanks Run,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 9.

8 Daley, “A Drowsy Day at the Stadium.”

9 Dan Daniel, “Yanks in ’52? There’ll Be Some Changes Made,” The Sporting News, October 3, 1951: 10. Collins actually hit .322 against southpaws in 1951 in 59 at-bats, but all 20 of his extra-base hits that season came off right-handers.

10 Jane Leavy, The Last Boy (New York: HarperCollins, 2010), 37.

11 Art Morrow, “Yanks Beat Giants, 3-1, Even Series,” Philadelphia Inquirer, October 6, 1951: 13.

12 Daley, “A Drowsy Day at the Stadium.”

13 Drebinger, “Yanks Win 3 to 1.”

14 Red Smith, “Lopat Pitched 3-Hitter Against Irvin, 2 vs. Rest,” Boston Globe, October 6, 1951: 4.

15 “Irvin Fishes Once – Not Twice,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 9.

16 “Lopat Foot-Work Watched,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 9.

17 Hy Hurwitz, “Monte Irvin Just Five Hits from Series Record,” Boston Globe, October 6, 1951: 4.

18 “Lopat’s Five-Hit Pitching, Collins’ Homer Turn Tide,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 9.

The Giants had seized the upper hand in Game One at Yankee Stadium, rolling to a win after Monte Irvin’s first-inning steal of home, but the two-time defending champion Yankees evened the Series behind Eddie Lopat’s pitching and hitting in Game Two, adding an eighth inning insurance run after Stanky failed to cover second on a potential force play.

For the first time in the Series, neither team scored in the first inning in Game Three, although both threatened to do so. In a bit of foreshadowing, Stanky used his body to get on base (via a hit-by-pitch against Yankees starter Vic Raschi), and Rizzuto cost the Yankees at second base (when he was caught stealing after singling off Jim Hearn of the Giants).

The hosts took a 1-0 lead in the second thanks to Bobby Thomson’s double in his first home at-bat since his pennant-winning “Shot Heard Round The World” off Ralph Branca three days earlier, and Willie Mays’ first World Series hit after nine hitless at-bats, an RBI single.

The Yankees had repeatedly capitalized on miscues by the Giants in Game Two but failed to do so in Game Three. In the third, after Hank Bauer reached when Lockman failed to corral Alvin Dark’s throw on a grounder to short, Raschi bunted to Hearn, who forced Bauer at second. Dark, seeking a double play, threw wildly to first, but Lockman, making amends for his error on the previous play, retrieved the ball and threw to Dark, who put the tag on Raschi trying to advance on the overthrow.

Media accounts offered three theories regarding the unconventional twin killing: (1) Raschi failed to hustle, seemingly taking the extra base for granted; (2) Raschi ran with the proverbial piano on his back; and (3) Dark faked out Raschi at second base by standing there nonchalantly until the throw arrived.

The game account in the New York Times supports the first theory: “Raschi rumbled down to second as leisurely as though the little white pill were rolling down Eighth Avenue. Big Vic, therefore, was the most surprised person in the arena when Lockman threw to Dark in time to nip Raschi standing up.”1

Two other writers for the Times had fun with the 32-year-old hurler’s slowness: “Big Vic chugged past first base like a moving van toiling uphill.”2  “Time flies, but Vic Raschi crawls. … Raschi … had what seemed like ninety seconds to negotiate ninety feet, [but] was retired.”3

Giants manager Leo Durocher, true to form, credited his clever shortstop: “‘He really decoyed him,’” Leo laughed. “‘Raschi thought there wasn’t going to be any play at second base. Then he slowed up and Dark really put it on him. I thought I’d fall right off the dugout steps.’”4

Some combination of all three theories plus an injury unreported at the time5 likely explains the odd 1-6-3-6 double play. In more than 600 career plate appearances, Raschi had just one triple and no stolen-base attempts, suggesting both a lack of speed and a desire to take the extra base. Dark’s long managerial career attests to his strategic smarts.

But an even more interesting play on the bases happened two innings later, featuring a more evenly matched pair in Stanky and Rizzuto. The game remained 1-0 with one out in the fifth when Stanky again reached, as he so often did, without the benefit of a hit6 (he walked this time).

Stanky then set off for second. American League Most Valuable Player Yogi Berra threw a perfect peg to Rizzuto, who had the ball in his glove, waiting for Stanky.

The 36-year-old baserunner had other designs. “[Stanky] slid into Rizzuto and Phil never realized that Master Eddie was a skilled soccer player in his youth,” Arthur Daley reported in the New York Times. “Stanky never kicked a better goal in his life.”7

“Stanky looked to be a dead duck,” Daley’s colleague John Drebinger wrote. “But the Brat still had one more trick up his sleeve, or rather it should be said, in his shoe.”8 The Brat booted the ball out of the Scooter’s glove.

As Rizzuto ran into the outfield to chase the ball, Stanky raced for third. Somehow the Brat had transformed a caught-stealing into two bases.

Rizzuto and Casey Stengel predictably protested. They claimed both interference by Stanky via the kick and the failure of Stanky to touch second base since Rizzuto claimed he had it blocked.

The two bases instead of the one out mattered in a one-run game, but the post-imbroglio mojo shift mattered more. The Yankees lost focus; correspondingly, the Giants, a one-man Irvin-led offense through Game Two, revived.

Dark singled to plate the heroic – or villainous – Stanky. Thompson singled to chase Dark to third. Irvin grounded to Bobby Brown at third, who threw home to Berra in plenty of time to get Dark. Initially, “[u]mpire Joe Paparella … called Alvin out, but had to reverse his decision when Berra dropped the ball”9 for an error to allow another run.

The Yankees now trailed 3-0, a troubling but not impossible deficit to overcome. But “Lockman lined a three run homer into the lower deck of the right field stands,”10 a hit that might never have taken place without Stanky’s startling kick. “He upset the applecart and the Bombers haven’t picked up all the scattered apples yet,” Timesman Daley observed.11

Stanky had a history with this play: “[I]t was the third time this season that Stanky has pulled this trick,” a Boston scribe noted. “He kicked the ball away from Red Stallcup of the Reds and Roy Smalley of the Cubs when he was palpably out. He tried it against the Braves, but of course they were too smart – or they knew their former teammate better.”12

Wrote another reporter: “Stanky, a mocking grin on his face and a look of pretended innocence in his eyes, explained: ‘I guess Phil Rizzuto didn’t have too good a grip on the ball.’”13

The score remained 6-0 until the top of the eighth. Hearn hit the slight Rizzuto, who took a beating in the game, and gave up a single to Gil McDougald.

The Yankee rally cooled when Joe DiMaggio popped up for the first out. McDougald had reached base four straight times, but the venerable DiMaggio, playing in his ninth World Series with his 37th birthday a month away, had followed with four fruitless at-bats, which drew unfavorable press attention.

“The Clipper had another disastrous day at the plate, going hitless for the third consecutive game, and so contributed nothing to the slim five-hit total which the Bombers managed to compile off Hearn and [Sheldon] Jones,” wrote the Times’s John Drebinger.14

In a bylined article, Hearn revealed, “I used a lot of sinkers against the Yankees. Except on Joe DiMaggio. … I threw him sidearm curve balls.”15

After Berra grounded out for the second out, Hearn issued consecutive walks to Brown and Joe Collins, the latter of which scored Rizzuto. Jones replaced Hearn and got out of the bases-loaded jam by inducing a comebacker from Bauer.

Gene Woodling homered in the ninth off a first-pitch fastball; Sheldon Jones commented after the game, “[W]ho’d think he’d be swinging at a time with the Yanks five runs behind?”16 Still, the final score was 6-2 in favor of the home team, which allowed the Giants to regain the Series lead with two more home games to come.

Unlike the sensitive Rizzuto, who fumed about Stanky’s pivotal kick for more than a generation, Stengel kept his sense of humor and perspective, admitting, “All the kicking wasn’t done by the other fellows. We kicked away a couple of chances to win. … They kicked the ball over for a while, too.”17

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Kevin Larkin and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources 

In addition to the Sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted the Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org websites for pertinent material and the box scores noted below. 

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NY1/NY1195110060.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1951/B10060NY11951.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F3JOWv5MKw

Notes

1 John Drebinger, “Giants Beat Yankees, 6-2, for 2-1 World Series Lead; Princeton and Columbia Win; Fordham., Yale, Army Lose,” New York Times, October 7, 1951: S3.

2 Arthur Daley, “Rendezvous with Destiny?” New York Times, October 7, 1951: S2.

3 Louis Effrat, “Turnstiles Await 10,000th Fan,” New York Times, October 7, 1951: S2.

4 Oscar Fraley (Associated Press), “Stanky Guesses Rizzuto Didn’t Have Too Good a Grip,” Boston Globe, October 7, 1951: C46.

5 “[A] collision at home plate with Indians catcher Jim Hegan in August 1950 resulted in torn cartilage in Raschi’s right knee. … Raschi and the Yankees kept the injury to themselves to prevent other teams from taking advantage by bunting on him. Not until November 1951 did he undergo surgery to remove the cartilage.” Lawrence Baldassaro, “Vic Raschi,” in Lyle Spatz, ed., Bridging Two Dynasties: The 1947 New York Yankees (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press and Society for American Baseball Research, 2013), 141.

6 Stanky reached base via hit by pitch (6) and walks (127) more than by hits (127) in 1951.

7 Daley.

8 Drebinger.

9 “N.L. Champs 5-Run Frame Routed Raschi and Yankees,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 10.

10 Hy Hurwitz, “Yanks Pin Hopes on Sain Today,” Boston Globe, October 7, 1951: C1.

11 Daley.

12 Harold Kaese, “Aging Eddie Stanky Still Kicks Like Colt,” Boston Globe, October 7, 1951: C46. The Globe editorialized, “The only surprising thing about Eddie Stanky’s kicking act was that anyone was surprised.” “Editorial Points,” Boston Globe, October 8, 1951: 12.

13 Fraley.

14 Drebinger, “Giants Beat Yankees, 6-2, for 2-1 World Series Lead.” “Joe DiMaggio was bemoaning the fate that has kept him hitless in what may be his farewell to baseball. ‘I’ve lost the swing through the strike zone,’ he said.” James P. Dawson, “Bombers Loud in Criticism of Decisive ‘Field Goal’ Kick in the Fifth Inning,” New York Times, October 7, 1951: S3.

15 Jim Hearn, “Victorious Hearn Relied on Sinkers,” New York Times, October 7, 1951: S2.

16 “Casey Explains Bauer Strategy,” The Sporting News, October 17, 1951: 10.

17 Dawson.