September 7, 1914: Larry McLean leads Giants over Braves in first-place battle before record crowd at Fenway Park

New York Giants catcher Jack Meyers injured his finger during batting practice before a critical Labor Day doubleheader against the Boston Braves in 1914, forcing manager John McGraw to scratch him from the starting lineup.1 The Giants, in a first-place tie with the surging Braves, turned to veteran backup John “Larry” McLean to catch both ends of the twin bill. The scenario was reminiscent of Game Two of the 1913 World Series, when Meyers injured his hand in the pregame warm-up and McLean stepped in, going 6-for-11 with a pair of RBIs in the final four games of the Series.2

After Boston took the morning game on Johnny Evers’ ninth-inning walk-off single against the suddenly mortal Christy Mathewson,3 New York pulled back into a first-place tie in the afternoon affair. The Giants, paced by McLean’s three hits and three RBIs and hurler Jeff Tesreau’s four-hitter, trounced Boston, 10-1. The Canadian-born and New England-raised McLean did yeoman’s work as a last-minute substitute for Meyers, registering five hits and scoring three runs in the twin bill.4

McLean had been one of the best catchers in baseball during the peak five years (1907-11) of his career, all of which were spent with the Cincinnati Reds.5 Known primarily for his elite defense,6 McLean had thrown out a remarkable 14 consecutive baserunners attempting to steal in September 1911. But the 33-year-old McLean, like many of his contemporaries, struggled to control his alcohol use and had been in steady decline since his career year of 1910.

The hulking 6-foot-5 backstop had been acquired by the Giants in a trade with the St. Louis Cardinals in early August 1913,7 shortly after Meyers hurt his throwing hand on a foul tip.8 McLean hit .304 during Meyers’ 23-game absence from the starting lineup and the Giants cruised to their third consecutive pennant. McLean settled into a backup role with New York and his first two seasons with the Giants were free from controversy.

On August 12, 1914, it looked as if the Giants — boasting a 6½-game lead in the standings — were headed for their fourth consecutive pennant. The season took an unexpected turn when the charging Braves, who had been in last place as late as July 18, swept the next three games from New York at the Polo Grounds and pulled to within 3½ games of the Giants.

Boston continued to win, while New York, weighed down by the implosion of pitcher Rube Marquard,9 merely treaded water. The Giants and Braves came into their September 7 doubleheader, the first two contests in a three-game series in Boston, with identical 67-52 records.10

The surprising Braves, a second-division team for the previous 11 seasons, had captured the imagination of Boston baseball fans. To accommodate a huge increase in demand for tickets late in the 1914 season, the Red Sox permitted the Braves to use two-year-old Fenway Park instead of the much smaller South End Grounds for two home games in early August and 27 more in September.11

The crowds at the Labor Day doubleheader broke the major-league attendance record for a twin bill. By allowing thousands of fans onto the field in each game,12 35,000 people witnessed the morning game and another 39,162 fans set a single-game Boston attendance record in the afternoon contest.13 As of 2025, that mark still ranked as the seventh largest regular-season crowd at Fenway Park.14

The 26-year-old righty Tesreau got the start for the Giants in the second game. With Mathewson’s sudden decline in 1914, Tesreau had become the Giants’ ace; he sported a record of 20-8 and a 2.45 ERA.15

The Braves countered with Lefty Tyler, a 24-year-old hurler who was crucial to Boston’s second-half turnaround. Since July 18 he had gone 7-2 with a 1.27 ERA and five shutouts.16 He continued his strong pitching early in this game, limiting the Giants to a single and a walk in the first three innings.

Tyler issued a two-out walk to speedster George J. Burns in the fourth. Burns, the National League’s stolen-base leader,17 swiped second and then third on ball four to Art Fletcher, putting runners on the corners. Red Murray poked a ground-rule double into the overflow crowd in left field, scoring Burns. Fletcher would have scored easily under normal conditions, but he had to stop at third.18 The crowd on the field ended up saving the Braves a run, as Tyler struck out third baseman Eddie Grant, stranding Fletcher.

New York broke the game open in the sixth, sending nine men to the plate. With one out, Fletcher reached on a wind-blown popup that dropped untouched near the pitcher’s mound for a single.19 After the Giants loaded the bases on Murray’s single and a walk to Grant, Fred Merkle’s long sacrifice fly scored Fletcher.20 All baserunners moved up 90 feet, although a Boston Globe scribe felt strongly that umpire Bob Emslie should have called Grant out at second base on the throw from newly acquired right fielder Herbie Moran.21

The inning continued and McLean, who had singled an inning earlier, was up next. He lined a double past third baseman Red Smith,22 plating Murray and Grant. Tesreau drove in McLean with a single, extending the Giants’ lead to 5-0.23

The next batter, Fred Snodgrass, dodged a ball thrown near his head and responded with a snide hand gesture toward Tyler. On the next pitch the Braves hurler plunked him on the sleeve. Snodgrass continued to be jeered by the crowd and after reaching first base he exchanged taunts with Tyler.

When the inning ended,24 Snodgrass returned to his position in center field and made an insulting gesture toward the crowd, prompting fans on the outfield grass to toss dozens of empty pop bottles in his direction.25 “Fred [Snodgrass] is always making errors in Fenway Park,” quipped Heywood Broun of the New York Tribune. “Today’s [muff] was one of judgement and of manners.”26

Tesreau held the Braves scoreless through six innings on a single, a double, and three walks. The shutout was broken in the seventh on a pair of ground-rule doubles by Joe Connolly and Smith that were hit into the crowd on the outfield grass.27

Tyler was knocked out of the game without retiring a single batter in the eighth. He surrendered four runs (three earned) in the inning on four singles, two errors, and a wild pitch.28 Rookie Dick Crutcher came on in relief with runners on the corners, and he retired the side without any further damage. New York led, 9-1, after eight innings.

The Giants tacked on another run in the ninth on an RBI single by McLean, his third hit and third RBI of the game. McGraw avoided any postgame incidents by wisely sending Bob Bescher to center field to replace Snodgrass for the bottom of the ninth. Tesreau limited the Braves to a walk in the final inning and New York and Boston were back in a first-place tie.

The next day the Braves grabbed sole possession of first place with a convincing 8-3 win over Marquard and the Giants.29 It was a lead they would not relinquish. Boston won 26 of its final 32 games and finished with a 94-59-5 record, 10½ games ahead of the second-place Giants.30 The Miracle Braves went on to sweep the Philadelphia Athletics in the World Series.

The September 7 twin bill turned out to be one of McLean’s last hurrahs. His career came to an abrupt halt in June 1915 after a nasty fight with McGraw’s right-hand man, Sinister Dick Kinsella, and several other Giants.31 McLean was upset at Kinsella for telling McGraw that he had been drinking, which cost him a large bonus in his contract for good behavior.32 According to McLean, it was “a scheme [for the club] to save $1,000.”33

McLean’s life continued to spiral downward and on March 24, 1921 – 14 months after Prohibition came into effect – he was involved in a deadly incident at a Boston “near-beer saloon.”34 According to court testimony,35 McLean had been drinking in the establishment for some time that Thursday afternoon when he was joined at the bar by a friend. McLean attempted to buy a drink for his pal, a known troublemaker at the saloon. The bartender refused to serve his friend and an argument ensued. When McLean’s drinking buddy attempted to hop over the bar, the bartender pulled out a revolver and fatally shot him. McLean went to the aid of his friend and the bartender shot and killed him too.36 The bartender pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the death of McLean in return for receiving a not-guilty verdict on the second-degree murder charge for killing the other man.37

Sportswriter Damon Runyon paid tribute to McLean after his death. “A fine, good-natured fellow with many admirable characteristics, liquor changed him as it changes all men,” Runyon wrote.38 “Everybody who knew Larry liked him and only his weakness for the merry-go-round of life prevented him from being the greatest catcher ever produced by the game of baseball.”39

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Ray Danner and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, Retrosheet.org, Stathead.com, Seamheads Ballparks Database, Ancestry.ca, and the SABR biographies of Larry McLean and Christy Mathewson. Unless otherwise noted, all detailed play-by-play information for this game was taken from the article “Boston’s Biggest Baseball Crowd” on the front page of the September 8, 1914, edition of the Boston Globe.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BSN/BSN191409072.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1914/B09072BSN1914.htm   

Photo credit

Larry McLean, Library of Congress.

Notes

1 Meyers returned to the starting lineup five days later. “Boston Braves Bat Out Victory in Ninth Round,” New York Evening World, September 7, 1914: 6.

2 The Giants lost the 1913 World Series to the Philadelphia Athletics in five games. McLean had gone 0-for-1 in a pinch-hitting appearance in Game One.

3 Evers was the league’s MVP in 1914. Mathewson had a severe drop-off in performance that season. His ERA jumped from a league-leading 2.06 in 1913 to 3.00. In the Deadball Era that qualified as a severe drop-off: His adjusted ERA (ERA+) plummeted from 153 in 1913 (53 percent above league average after adjusting for park effects) to 88 in 1914 (12 percent below league average). Mathewson reported a pain in his left side toward the end of the season that went undiagnosed — he may have been playing with tuberculosis.

4 McLean also made “the best catch of his life” in the fifth inning of the first game when he dived head-first to catch Joe Connolly’s popup on a failed bunt attempt. He also threw out the only stolen-base attempt by the Braves in the doubleheader. McLean tossed out the speedy Herbie Moran attempting to steal second base in the third inning of the second game. “Notes of the Giants,” New York Sun, September 8, 1914: 9.

5 McLean accumulated 12.7 Baseball-Reference Wins Above Replacement (bWAR) from 1907 to 1911, more than all major-league catchers other than future Hall of Famer Roger Bresnahan, who accumulated 17.7 bWAR in that period.

6 McLean was the best defensive catcher in the major leagues from 1909 to 1911. He compiled a major-league-leading 6.0 Baseball-Reference defensive WAR (dWAR) in that three-year period. George Gibson of the Pittsburgh Pirates was next with 5.4 dWAR

7 After he wore out his welcome in Cincinnati, McLean’s contract was sold to the St. Louis Cardinals before the 1913 season. McLean was traded to the Giants for the popular Doc Crandall on August 6, 1913. The Cardinals sold Crandall’s contract back to the Giants on August 19.

8 Meyers was hurt on August 4; he returned to the starting lineup on August 30. “Giants’ Hits Sparse but Most Timely,” New York Sun, August 5, 1913: 8.

9 In his 12 starts from August 8 to September 23, the 27-year-old Marquard went 0-12 with a 4.26 ERA. In 1913 Marquard had gone 23-10 with a 2.50 ERA.

10 The Braves had two ties and the Giants had tied once.

11 The capacity of Fenway Park was 24,000; the South End Grounds held just 11,000 fans. The first two Braves games at Fenway Park in 1914 were on August 1 and August 8. The 27 other regular-season Braves games played there that season were September 7 to 29, when the Red Sox were on an extended road trip. The Braves also played Game Three and Game Four of the 1914 World Series at Fenway Park, although attendance for both games was smaller than for the second game of the September 7 doubleheader.

12 For both games, a ball hit into the outfield crowd beyond the ropes was a ground-rule double.

13 By contrast, the biggest crowd to watch the second-place Red Sox in 1914 was 26,884. The previous Boston record of 35,000 fans was tied in the first game of the September 7, 1914, twin bill. The record was originally set when an estimated 35,000 fans jammed into the Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds on October 8, 1904, to watch a critical late-season doubleheader between the Boston Americans and New York Highlanders.

14 The six larger crowds were at Red Sox games between 1934 and 1937, before fire codes were established. As of 2025, only one postseason game at Fenway Park had a bigger crowd than the second game of the September 7, 1914, twin bill. There were 39,530 fans at Game Three of the 2016 ALDS against Cleveland.

15 Tesreau finished the 1914 season 26-10 with a 2.37 ERA (112 ERA+). He led the NL in shutouts (8) and starts (41) and was the only Giants pitcher to have an ERA+ above 95 and toss more than eight innings. Tesreau finished sixth in voting for the NL Chalmers Award, which was given to the league’s MVP.

16 Tyler threw a 10-inning shutout against the Giants on August 15, outdueling Mathewson for a 2-0 victory. The win completed a three-game sweep and may have been the pivotal victory of the Braves’ season. Tyler’s 10-inning shutout was part of his 27-inning scoreless streak on August 11-19. He came into the September 7 twin bill with a 13-11 record and a 2.75 ERA.

17 Burns came into the doubleheader leading the league in stolen bases (46) and runs scored (81). He finished the season with a league-leading 62 stolen bases, 100 runs scored, and 6.6 in bWAR for a position player.

18 “Giants Unable to Oust Braves,” New York Times, September 8, 1914: 8.

19 “Giants Unable to Oust Braves.”

20 “Giants Unable to Oust Braves.”

21 Two weeks earlier, the Braves had purchased Moran’s contract from the Reds for the stretch drive.

22 The Braves had purchased Smith’s contract a month earlier from the Brooklyn Dodgers. Heywood Broun, “Frantic Fans See Giants and Braves Fail to Break Tie,” New York Tribune, September 8, 1914: 8.

23 Tesreau took off for second on the throw home and went to third on catcher Hank Gowdy’s throwing error.

24 Larry Doyle lined out to left fielder Joe Connolly for the third out, stranding two baserunners.

25 Snodgrass was unhurt. “Morning Game Draws 35,000; In Afternoon Crowd Numbers 38,000,” Boston Globe, September 8, 1914: 6; “Giants Still Tied in Lead with Braves,” New York Sun, September 8, 1914: 9; Broun, “Frantic Fans See Giants and Braves Fail to Break Tie.”

26 Broun, “Frantic Fans See Giants and Braves Fail to Break Tie.”

27 “Giants Still Tied in Lead with Braves.”

28 The only RBIs in the inning were on singles by Tesreau (scoring McLean) and Doyle (scoring Tesreau).

29 Giants starter Rube Marquard lasted only four innings, giving up six runs (two earned) on nine hits and five walks. It was Marquard’s ninth consecutive start resulting in a loss. He lost 12 straight starts from August 8 to September 23.

30 The Braves were in last place after the games of July 4 with a record of 26-40-1 (.394). For the rest of the season, they went 68-19-4 (.782).

31 According to McLean, Larry Doyle was fined $400 and Jeff Tesreau $200 for their involvement in the fracas. McGraw was also involved in the scrap. “No Gas Pipe; Fists Beat McGraw et al., McLean Says,” Chicago Tribune, June 13, 1915: 3-3.

32 McLean had similar bonuses built into his contract dating back to at least 1906, when he played in the Pacific Coast League. “Catcher McLean Paid to Be Sober,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, March 9, 1906: 15.

33 “No Gas Pipe; Fists Beat McGraw et al., McLean Says.”

34 A near-beer saloon was an establishment that was permitted to sell low-alcohol malt beverages during Prohibition in the United States. Many defied the law and sold more potent drinks. Diane Fannon-Langton, “Moonshine Royalty,” Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Gazette, February 7, 2021: C4; “Larry McLean Killed in South End Saloon,” Boston Globe, March 24, 1921: 1.

35 The details of the incident published in the Boston papers in the hours after the shooting were considerably different from the court testimony published a month later.

36 “Connor on Trial for Death of Two Men,” Boston Globe, April 27, 1921: 7.

37 “Pleads Guilty in M’Lean Case,” Boston Globe, April 28, 1921: 2.

38 Damon Runyon, “The Lesson of Larry McLean,” New York American, March 25, 1921: 16.

39 Damon Runyon, “Weakness for Primrose Path Kept M’Lean From Being Greatest Backstop,” Buffalo Courier, March 27, 1921: 65.