Appel: Frank Scott, the first (and most likable) modern agent

From SABR member Marty Appel at The National Pastime Museum on October 20, 2016:

You would have liked Frank Scott.    

On the list of things we love about baseball, player agents don’t rank very high.         

But if you had known Frank Scott, it would have been different. He could charm anyone, except for the old Yankees General Manager George Weiss.

But eventually, even Weiss came around.         

Frank was the first significant player agent of “modern times,” that being post-World War II. Christy Walsh, best known as Babe Ruth’s agent, sort of invented the profession in the ’20s, and then C. C. “Cash and Carry” Pyle carried on as football hero Red Grange’s agent. Maybe there were a few others along the way, but not significant ones.          

And then there was almost nothing until Frank Scott came along.

Frank was not an agent as we think of them today, negotiating player contracts, frantically calling teams when his player gets released. That was unthinkable at the time when the clubs owned all the negotiating leverage. No, Frank handled endorsements and appearances and raised it all to a much more respectable level than he had found things. So while Christy Walsh handled Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, Frank came in for Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle. His timing was good and his skills were right for the times.         

Read the full article here: http://www.thenationalpastimemuseum.com/article/frank-scott



Originally published: October 20, 2016. Last Updated: October 20, 2016.