July 4, 1938: Shacking up with neighbors: Phillies join Athletics at Shibe Park

After 51 seasons and a single pennant at the Baker Bowl, the Philadelphia Phillies moved house. In late June of 1938, Phillies President Gerry Nugent announced that his team would become tenants of the Athletics at Shibe Park. The declining condition of the Baker Bowl motivated the relocation and was probably no surprise to baseball fans. It would not have been a surprise to the late John D. Shibe, the former Athletics vice president who had built a third clubhouse several years before in anticipation of the Phillies’ eventual arrival.1 The Phillies played their final game at the Baker Bowl on Thursday, June 30, a 14-1 drubbing by the league-leading New York Giants witnessed by a mere 1,500. The next day Nugent signed a 10-year lease for Shibe Park and the Phillies were scheduled to debut in their new home with a July 4 doubleheader against the Boston Bees.

The Phillies spent the weekend between home games on a busy road trip. They took two out of three against the Bees in Boston over July 1 and 2 and dropped both games of a July 3 doubleheader against the Dodgers at Ebbets Field. Typical of the Phillies during this era, they occupied a position at the bottom of the standings. They were in the middle of an era in which they finished seventh or eighth in the NL every season between 1933 and 1945. Independence Day of 1938 found the Phillies dead last: 18-44, and 22 games behind the Giants. The Bees arrived in slightly better condition. Also a regular occupant of the second division, Boston had a 30-31 record and was in fifth place.

The Bees were managed by Casey Stengel, who had led the Dodgers to three second-division finishes between 1934 and 1936. His stint in Brooklyn portended similar results over his time in Boston (although his third big-league managerial job would prove more successful). Jimmie Wilson served as Phillies player-manager, the skipper since 1934 with declining use as a backstop. For the first game of the twin bill, Boston’s Johnny Lanning (3-1, 4.34 ERA) opposed Philadelphia’s Hugh Mulcahy (5-9, 4.93 ERA) in a matchup of right-handers. Lanning was an occasional starter for the Bees, while Mulcahy served as the Phillies’ workhorse. He would pace the 1938 Phillies in starts and innings pitched while leading the league in losses.

Gene Moore led off the first game with a double to left field. After Vince DiMaggio struck out, Gil English was credited with a single on a pop fly lost in the sun by shortstop George Scharein.2 Max West’s grounder to first baseman Buck Jordan started a 3-6-1 double play to end the Bees first. The Phillies went down in order. Boston scored in the top of the second. Mulcahy issued a leadoff walk to Tony Cuccinello and then surrendered a single to Elbie Fletcher. Cuccinello scored from third for the game’s first run on a groundout by Ray Mueller. Fletcher took second on the play and also claimed third on Mulcahy’s balk. Outs by Rabbit Warstler and Lanning ended the visitors’ half of the second.

Tuck Stainback was credited with the Phillies’ first hit in their new home when he reached on a one-out bunt single in the bottom of the second. After Pinky Whitney’s double advanced him to third, Stainback also scored the first Phillies run at Shibe Park, on Scharein’s RBI grounder. Bill Atwood plated Whitney to take the lead, 2-1, before Mulcahy’s out ended the inning. The Phillies extended their lead to 3-1 in the third inning when Chuck Klein’s two-out double scored Hersh Martin.

Boston regained the lead in the top of the fourth on productive batting and “fiddle-winks outfielding.”3 West led off with a single and, after Cuccinello struck out, Fletcher singled to move West to second. Mueller got his second RBI of the afternoon when his single scored West. Warstler made the inning’s second out, but his ball allowed Fletcher to score the game-tying run from third. The rally continued with Lanning’s single, bringing Moore to the plate. Stainback played Moore’s ball to left field into a triple that scored Mueller and Lanning for a 5-3 Boston lead.

Lanning walked Whitney to start the Philadelphia fourth. Scharein’s groundball to second baseman Cuccinello appeared certain to result in a double play, but after Whitney was forced, Warstler’s poor throw to Fletcher missed nailing Scharein at first base.4 Two batters later, that miss proved costly when Mulcahy doubled to score Scharein. Stengel replaced Lanning with Bobby Reis, but the move did not pay immediate dividends as Mueller’s single to center brought home Mulcahy to even the score at 5-5.

The game remained tied for the next few innings. In the top of the eighth, that would change. Fletcher led off with a single to left field, went to second on Mueller’s sacrifice, and crossed the plate on Warstler’s double to right. Boston now led, 6-5, and the Bees were only getting started. Reis reached safely when Scharein’s throw was too low for Jordan to make the play at first.5 Mulcahy walked Moore to load the bases, and DiMaggio’s fly out to left allowed Warstler to cross the plate. With two on and two out, English’s smash into the left-field seats gave Boston a 10-5 advantage. The Phillies proved unable to mount much of a rally in the eighth and ninth, allowing Boston to claim victory in the opener.

The second game pitted Philadelphia’s 29-year-old right-hander, Claude Passeau (5-8, 4.95 ERA), against Boston’s Dick Errickson (0-4, 4.50 ERA). Errickson served as an occasional starter for the Bees, but he had lost his previous two starts. Passeau had pitched well in his last start, in Boston during the weekend road swing to the Northeast; Harl Maggert’s pinch-hit eighth-inning homer accounted for the only run in Passeau’s complete-game win on July 1. Passeau also looked forward to pitching now at Shibe Park instead of the Baker Bowl. He commented, “This is great stuff. A fellow can pitch naturally and not be afraid of a lucky hit.”6

After Passeau held the Bees scoreless in the top half of the first, his Phillies teammates got to work atoning for dropping the opener. Mueller led off with a walk and Martin’s sacrifice moved him to second. Jordan singled to place runners at the corners, and Klein’s walk loaded the bases for Morrie Arnovich. Described as a “big man with the wagon tongue,”7 Arnovich doubled to score Mueller and Jordan for a 2-0 Phillies lead. Apparently believing the script was not going to improve, Stengel pulled the plug on Errickson’s afternoon five batters into the game. Ira Hutchinson had pitched a complete-game victory over Philadelphia just 48 hours before in Boston. Now, he would be called upon to keep the Bees in this game. Klein scored from third on Whitney’s groundout to Warstler for a 3-0 advantage. Arnovich also advanced on the play, but was stranded at third on Scharein’s fly out to right fielder Johnny Cooney. In the third, Arnovich “smashed”8 a run-scoring single that brought Jordan home for a 4-0 lead.

Cooney singled to open the Boston fourth. English flied out to Arnovich in left field, but West smacked a double off the right-field wall. Cooney crossed the plate for the first Bees run. Successive outs by Cuccinello and Fletcher ended the rally. In the bottom half of the inning, Cap Clark led off with a walk and Passeau’s sacrifice moved him to second. Mueller’s single drove in Clark to score and, just like that, the Phillies had restored their four-run lead. They extended the lead in the fifth. Arnovich hit a leadoff single. Whitney’s sacrifice moved him up, and Scharein’s single sent him home. Hutchinson walked Clark for the second successive inning and, after Passeau’s fly out to DiMaggio in center field, a walk to Mueller loaded the bases. Martin’s grounder to Cuccinello seemed likely to end the inning, but the second baseman could not make the play. The error meant that everyone was safe with Scharein scoring for a 7-1 tally.

An extraordinary play by catcher Johnny Riddle in the sixth inning merited special attention from the Boston Globe. Reliever Art Kenney issued a leadoff walk to Klein. English, who had moved to second to replace Cuccinello, then muffed a ground ball from Arnovich. With Klein on second and Arnovich at first, Whitney tried to lay down a bunt. But the ball popped up off his bat, causing Maggert, who had taken over third base from English, to charge in for a diving catch in fair ground between third and home. The ball “slithered through his hands and rolled a foot or so into foul ground.”9 Klein made a break for third, and Riddle rushed over, gathered the ball in stride, and also raced toward third. The catcher won the race, and Klein was out.

In the Phillies’ seventh, Bees reliever Art Kenney walked Mueller and Martin, and Jordan’s single loaded the bases. Klein’s grounder to second was bobbled by Gil English, and Mueller scored. Kenney walked Arnovich and Martin scored. With Whitney at the plate, Jordan scored on a play with runners in motion; Arnovich, however, was out at second. Had everyone stayed put, they would have advanced anyway. Kenney surrendered another walk to Whitney, his fourth pass of the inning and sixth in 1⅓ innings. Stengel ended the walk parade, giving Lanning an encore after his winning performance in the first game. The move worked; Lanning struck out Clark and Passeau to stop the bleeding, but at 10-1, the game was beyond the Bees. Three singles in the top of the eighth resulted in a consolation run by DiMaggio, but Passeau shut the door on Boston as a one-two-three ninth inning ended the game at 10-2, Philadelphia.

Given the state of the Phillies, a split improved their winning percentage but they would remain rooted to the bottom of the league. With their Athletics landlords in similar rough condition, the decision for potential visitors to Shibe Park would be which of Philadelphia’s last-place teams they wanted to see in 1938.

SOURCES

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

NOTES

1 James C. Isaminger, “Shibe Park Switch a Break, Say Phils,” The Sporting News, July 7, 1938: 2.

2 James C. O’Leary, “Bees Triumph, 10-5; Bow to Phils, 10-2,” Boston Globe, July 5, 1938: 6.

3 Stan Baumgartner, “Phils Wallop Bees in Final, 10-2, But Bow in Opener, 10-5,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 5, 1938: 21.

4 O’Leary.

5 O’Leary.

6 Baumgartner.

7 Baumgartner.

8 Baumgartner.

9 “Remarkable Play Is Made by Riddle Forcing Out Klein,” Boston Globe, July 5, 1938: 6.