Results tagged ‘ Polo Grounds ’
Fordham to honor memory of Gil McDougald
With the Yankees not playing until 8:05 p.m. Saturday in Texas (on YES), why not take in a game in the Bronx in the afternoon? Former Yankees infielder Gil McDougald, who died last Nov. 28 in Wall Township, N.J., at the age of 82, will be honored prior to Fordham’s 4 p.m. game against Saint Joseph’s at Houlihan Field.
Family members and former players will be on hand to salute McDougald, who reached the World Series eight times in his 10 seasons with the Yankees (1951-60) and won five rings. He was Fordham’s head baseball coach from 1970-76 and led the Rams to a 100-79-4 record.
That the tribute will be held May 7 is a sad piece of irony. On that date in 1957, a line drive hit by McDougald struck Indians pitcher Herb Score in the face in one of baseball’s most tragic accidents. McDougald vowed to quit the game if Score did not recover, which he did but was never again the imposing pitcher he had been in 1955 and ’56. It is fair to say that McDougald was not quite the same after that incident, either.
Later in life, long after his major-league career, McDougald fought a long battle with deafness. Below is a copy of the blog I wrote for The Cutoff Man after McDougald’s death. For those who may not have had a chance to read it, here it is again.
In memory of the late Gil McDougald, who died last week of prostate cancer at the age of 82, I would like to share a piece I wrote on the five-time All-Star Yankees infielder back in 1997 when the New York Chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America honored him with the Casey Stengel “You Can Look It Up” Award.
For a long time, Gil McDougald lived in a noiseless world. Embarrassed by his deafness, the former Yankees infielder withdrew from his friends, turned away from all but his immediate family and settled into a chamber of silence.
The lively sounds at Yankee Stadium were once music to McDougald’s ears. A hearing disorder stemming from a concussion McDougald suffered in 1955 during a batting practice accident worsened to the point that in 1976 he resigned as Fordham’s baseball coach because of communication difficulties. In 1985, he felt compelled to sell his building-maintenance business. His suburban New Jersey home had become more a place of exile.
An article in 1994 by New York Times columnist Ira Berkow drew attention to McDougald’s situation. He was contacted by Dr. Stephen Epstein, a Yankees fan who directs the Ear Center in Maryland and recommended McDougald consult Dr. Noel Cohen, chief of otolaryngology at New York University Medical Center. That November, in a 3-hour operation, McDougald received a cochlea implant of a microcomputer that helped restore his hearing. McDougald lectured around the country on the benefits of the procedure.
“There’s a real need to build awareness of the technology,” McDougald told Sports Illustrated. “When you’re fortunate and something good happens, even though you weren’t expecting anything, that’s when the payback comes. When you see the progress, particularly with little children, it’s so satisfying. It’s like hitting a home run with the bases loaded.”
That was one of McDougald’s career highlights, a grand slam off the Giants’ Larry Jansen at the Polo Grounds in the 1951 World Series. The honor bestowed by the writers is most appropriate for McDougald because Stengel was the only manager he played for in his 10 major-league seasons, all with the Yankees, from 1951 through 1960 before he quit rather than go into the American League expansion draft.
McDougald was among the most gifted of the tough, heady infielders who were integral figures on Stengel’s teams such as Phil Rizzuto, Billy Martin, Jerry Coleman, Bobby Brown, Andy Carey, Tony Kubek, Bobby Richardson and Clete Boyer.
The Ol’ Perfessor would have loved Derek Jeter.
That brings us to the “You Can Look It Up” part, which refers to one of Casey’s pet expressions. Among Jeter’s accomplishments in his Jackie Robinson Rookie of the Year Award season of 1996 was a .314 batting average. What’s the big deal, you say? Well, you have to go back 40 years to find a New York shortstop – Yankee, Met, Giant or Dodger – who hit .300 over a full season.
And that shortstop was Gil McDougald. True, Kubek hit .314 in 1962, but he played in only 45 games that year because of military duty and a back injury. McDougald’s .311 mark for the Yankees in 1956 was the highest for a fulltime shortstop before Jeter topped it in ‘96.
The AL Rookie of the Year Award is another link between the two Yankees shortstops. McDougald was the first and Jeter the most recent of the eight Yankees who have won the award. McDougald wasn’t a shortstop when he won in 1951 by two votes over White Sox outfielder Minnie Minoso, 13-11. The more heralded Yankees rookie, Mickey Mantle, did not receive a vote.
McDougald played third base and second base until 1956 when Stengel tabbed him to succeed Rizzuto at shortstop. In the 10 years McDougald played for the Yanklees, they won more than 90 games nine times, eight pennants and five World Series, including ‘56, which made him a precursor to Jeter as a .300-hitting shortstop for a Series champion.
In that ‘56 Series, McDougald made an alert play that helped preserve Don Larsen’s perfect game against the Dodgers in Game 5 at Yankee Stadium. Jackie Robinson led off the second inning with a line drove to third that glanced off Carey’s glove to McDougald, who threw out Robby at first base.
Hitting out of an unorthodox, open stance which he moderated midway through his career, McDougald compiled a .276 career average with 112 home runs before retiring at age 32 after the 1960 World Series rather than play for the expansion Los Angeles Angels or Washington Senators.
McDougald was an unwilling participant in a baseball tragedy May 7, 1957. Indians lefthander Herb Score, then in the third year of a career that might have led him to Cooperstown, was struck in the face of by a liner off McDougald’s bat. Score was never the same pitcher again.
Less known is the incident two years earlier in which a BP liner by Bob Cerv hit McDougald above his left ear. It was diagnosed as a concussion, and McDougald was back in uniform in several days. He later learned that he had inner ear damage from an undetected fractured skull, which began McDougald’s quiet retreat.
“Except for playing golf, Gil had really become a recluse,” said former AL president Bobby Brown, one of McDougald’s oldest and closest friends. “But now since he can hear again, he’s his old self and able to contribute. It’s an emotional thrill for all of us.”
Anniversary of a legendary voice
Sunday marks the 60th anniversary of the first game worked by public address announcer Bob Sheppard at Yankee Stadium. The Yankees will conclude the homestand with an 8 p.m. game against the Rangers on ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball.”
Back on April 17, 1951, the Yankees opened their season against the Red Sox. The game also marked the major-league debut of Mickey Mantle, who played right field and batted third in the order and had a single in four at-bats.
Sheppard, who died in 2010 at the age of 99, was the Stadium’s PA voice until late in the 2007 season before he was sidelined by illness. His voice is still heard at the Stadium whenever Derek Jeter steps to the plate. Sheppard recorded his announcement of Jeter and it continues to play before each of the Captain’s at-bats.
Bob worked 121 consecutive post-season games at the Stadium, including 62 games in the World Series, from 1951 to 2006. He also handled similar duties for the football Giants, who moved to Yankee Stadium from the Polo Grounds in 1956. Sheppard continued to do Giants games at their stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands through 2005, a total of 50 seasons.
Here are the lineups Bob introduced for that ’51 opener, won by the Yankees, 5-0.
Boston Red Sox New York Yankees
Dom DiMaggio, CF Jackie Jensen, LF
Billy Goodman, RF Phil Rizzuto, SS
Ted Williams, LF Mickey Mantle, RF
Vern Stephens, 3B Joe DiMaggio, CF
Walt Dropo, 1B Yogi Berra, C
Bobby Doerr, 2B Johnny Mize, 1B
Lou Boudreau, SS Billy Johnson, 3B
Buddy Rosar, C Jerry Coleman, 2B
Billy Wright, P Vic Raschi, P
McDougald’s struggle against silence
In memory of the late Gil McDougald, who died last week of prostate cancer at the age of 82, I would like to share a piece I wrote on the five-time All-Star Yankees infielder back in 1997 when the New York Chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America honored him with the Casey Stengel “You Can Look It Up” Award.
For a long time, Gil McDougald lived in a noiseless world. Embarrassed by his deafness, the former Yankees infielder withdrew from his friends, turned away from all but his immediate family and settled into a chamber of silence.
The lively sounds at Yankee Stadium were once music to McDougald’s ears. A hearing disorder stemming from a concussion McDougald suffered in 1955 during a batting practice accident worsened to the point that in 1976 he resigned as Fordham’s baseball coach because of communication difficulties. In 1985, he felt compelled to sell his building-maintenance business. His suburban New Jersey home had become more a place of exile.
An article in 1994 by New York Times columnist Ira Berkow drew attention to McDougald’s situation. He was contacted by Dr. Stephen Epstein, a Yankees fan who directs the Ear Center in Maryland and recommended McDougald consult Dr. Noel Cohen, chief of otolaryngology at New York University Medical Center. That November, in a 3 -hour operation, McDougald received a cochlea implant of a microcomputer that helped restore his hearing. McDougald lectured around the country on the benefits of the procedure.
“There’s a real need to build awareness of the technology,” McDougald told Sports Illustrated. “When you’re fortunate and something good happens, even though you weren’t expecting anything, that’s when the payback comes. When you see the progress, particularly with little children, it’s so satisfying. It’s like hitting a home run with the bases loaded.”
That was one of McDougald’s career highlights, a grand slam off the Giants’ Larry Jansen at the Polo Grounds in the 1951 World Series. The honor bestowed by the writers is most appropriate for McDougald because Stengel was the only manager he played for in his 10 major-league seasons, all with the from Yankees, from 1951 through 1960 before he quit rather than go into the expansion draft.
McDougald was among the most gifted of the tough, heady infielders who were integral figures on Stengel’s teams such as Phil Rizzuto, Billy Martin, Jerry Coleman, Bobby Brown, Andy Carey, Tony Kubek, Bobby Richardson and Clete Boyer.
The Ol’ Perfessor would have loved Derek Jeter.
That brings us to the “You Can Look It Up” part, which refers to one of Casey’s pet expressions. Among Jeter’s accomplishments in his Jackie Robinson Rookie of the Year Award season of 1996 was a .314 batting average. What’s the big deal, you say? Well, you have to go back 40 years to find a New York shortstop – Yankee, Met, Giant or Dodger – who hit .300 over a full season.
And that shortstop was Gil McDougald. True, Kubek hit .314 in 1962, but he played in only 45 games that year because of military duty and a back injury. McDougald’s .311 mark for the Yankees in 1956 was the highest for a fulltime shortstop before Jeter topped it in ’96.
The American League Rookie of the Year Award is another link between the two Yankees shortstops. McDougald was the first and Jeter the most recent of the eight Yankees who have won the award. McDougald wasn’t a shortstop when he won in 1951 by two votes over White Sox outfielder Minnie Minoso, 13-11. The more heralded Yankees rookie, Mickey Mantle, did not receive a vote.
McDougald played third base and second base until ’56 when Stengel tabbed him to succeed Rizzuto at shortstop. In the 10 years McDougald played for the Yanklees, they won more than 90 games nine times, eight pennants and five World Series, including 1956, which made him a precursor to Jeter as a .300-hitting shortstop for a Series champion.
In that ’56 Series, McDougald made an alert play that helped preserve Don Larsen’s perfect game against the Dodgers in Game 5 at Yankee Stadium. Jackie Robinson led off the second inning with a line drove to third that glanced off Carey’s glove to McDougald, who threw out Robby at first base.
Hitting out of an unorthodox, open stance which he moderated midway through his career, McDougald compiled a .276 career average with 112 home runs before retiring at age 32 after the 1960 World Series rather than play for the expansion Los Angeles Angels or Washington Senators.
McDougald was an unwilling participant in a baseball tragedy May 7, 1957. Indians lefthander Herb Score, then in the third year of a career that might have led him to Cooperstown, was struck in the face of by a liner off McDougald’s bat. Score was never the same pitcher again.
Less known is the incident two years earlier in which a BP liner by Bob Cerv hit McDougald above his left ear. It was diagnosed as a concussion, and McDougald was back in uniform in several days. He later learned that he had inner ear damage from an undetected fractured skull, which began McDougald’s quiet retreat.
“Except for playing golf, Gil had really become a recluse,” said former AL president Bobby Brown, one of McDougald’s oldest and closest friends. “But now since her can hear he can hear again, he’s his old self and able to contribute. It’s an emotional thrill for all of us.”
Memories of Giants in the World Series
The last time the Giants were in the World Series was in 2002. I covered that Series as the national baseball writer for the Hartford Courant newspaper and suffered one of my biggest disappointments.
It had nothing to do with the Giants losing. Baseball writers learn early on in their careers that the only thing worth rooting for is your story. Because of deadlines, writers work on their copy throughout the game. At times a certain storyline appears that you pursue and hope doesn’t get ruined by a turn of events.
The Giants had a 3-2 lead in games over the Angels heading into Game 6 at Anaheim. In the fifth inning, Shawon Dunston hit a two-run home run that broke a scoreless game. Two innings later, the Giants’ lead was up to 5-0 as they were on the verge of winning their first World Series since 1954 when they still played in New York at the Polo Grounds.
I thought back to that Series and knew the hero was a part-time outfielder named Dusty Rhodes, who came off the bench to get some huge hits for the Giants in their sweep of the Indians. Rhodes was 4-for-6 in that Series with two home runs and seven RBI.
Dunston, who had been a regular shortstop during his prime, was a bench player on those 2002 Giants. He was the designated hitter batting ninth in Game 6. A thought came to me, and I quickly typed out this lede:
ANAHEIM, Calif. – Move over, Dusty Rhodes, and make room for Shawon Dunston.
Just then, my pal Mark Whicker of the Orange County Register came over to me to chat about something. He looked at the sentence on my laptop screen and said, “Hey, that’s pretty good. I hope it holds up.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when Scott Spiezio belted a three-run home run to get the Angels to 5-3. The lede is still good, I told myself. An inning later, Darin Erstad homered and Troy Glaus doubled in two runs. There went my lede, and there went the Giants. The Angels won that game and the next one, too.
My other two experiences with the Giants in the World Series were in 1989 and 1962. In ’89, while typing early notes prior to Game 3 at Candlestick Park, the building started shaking. I saw the guys in the front row, all Bay Area writers, bolt for the exits. “This might be the big one,” one of them said.
It was big all right, an earthquake that registered 6.9 and shut down the World Series for 10 days. The people in San Francisco and Oakland were remarkable in the aftermath over the next two weeks as the area recovered not only from the quake but also the fires it caused in both cities, including the Presidio district where Yankees Hall of Famer Joe DiMaggio was among those whose home was severely damaged.
On a more light-hearted note, there was 1962, the only year I ever played hooky from school – and I did it twice. The first time was in February to see the ticker-tape parade for John Glenn, the astronaut who had orbited Earth three times. The second time was Oct. 8, a Monday for Game 3 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium between the Yankees and the Giants, Whitey Ford versus Juan Marichal.
A friend of mine had gotten tickets from a business associate of his father. I had never been to a World Series game, but I knew my parents would not let me out of school for something like that. I was going to a Catholic high school in Nassau County, Long Island. We didn’t wear uniforms, but we had to wear jackets, ties and leather shoes. I left the house that way but instead of taking the bus to school I walked to the nearest LIRR station and took the train to Penn Station and the subway to the Bronx.
It was worth it. The Stadium was all dressed up with the red, white and blue bunting I had never before seen in color and on the field were Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays, the central figures although neither one had a big Series. Marichal had to leave the game early because of an injury. The score was 2-2 in the seventh when Giants second baseman Chuck Hiller homered with the bases loaded. I didn’t find out until reading the paper the next day that it was the first grand slam hit by a National League player in World Series history.
It felt neat to have witnessed some history, but for most of my life I had to keep that day a secret. In fact, it was only a year ago that I finally told my mother and father what I had done. My father, who had been a Giants fan before switching to the Mets in the 1960s, said, “I wish I could have gone with you.”
Jeter top New York hit maker
Derek Jeter’s leadoff single to right field Wednesday night off Cliff Lee was career hit No. 2,877 for the Yankees shortstop and captain, and it was a big deal.
Coming in the same week in which Jeter passed Babe Ruth on the career list, this time he pushed ahead of Mel Ott and in so doing now has the most hits of any player while playing for a New York team, not just the Yankees but also the Mets and the former New York Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers. That covers a lot of territory.
Not all of the Babe’s 2,873 hits were for the Yankees. He also played for both Boston teams, the Red Sox and the Braves. In Ott’s case, all of his 2,876 hits were with the Giants in a 22-season career spanning 1926 to 1947. No player wearing a New York uniform had more hits than Ott, a record he held for 63 years until Wednesday night.
Just last year, Jeter surpassed Lou Gehrig as the Yankees’ franchise hit leader, which was rarified air enough. Now this. Think about the long history of major league baseball in New York City, much richer than even the supposed hot beds of St. Louis and Boston, and now Derek Jeter stands heads and shoulders over all the hit makers.
There are 203 players in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Of that total, 92 played a portion of their careers for at least one of the New York teams. The city has seen some of the greatest hitters ever, from the Babe and Lou to Joe DiMaggio and Jackie Robinson, from Willie (Mays), Mickey (Mantle) and the Duke (Snider), on to Don Mattingly and Keith Hernandez.
Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio and Mantle all won batting titles as did fellow Yankees Snuffy Stirnweiss, Paul O’Neill and Bernie Williams. Other batting champions in New York were the Dodgers’ Robinson, Jake Daubert, Zack Wheat, Pete Reiser, Dixie Walker and Carl Furillo and the Giants’ Mays, Larry Doyle and Bill Terry, the last National League player to hit .400 (.401 in 1930). No Mets player has led the league in batting, but Dave Magadan and John Olerud came close.
Ott won no batting titles, either, even though he was a career .304 hitter. Ott’s specialty was the long ball. His total of 511 was the NL record for 20 years before Mays passed him in 1966. Ott led the league in home runs six times, and the NL trophy for the annual home run champion is named after him. He also had 488 doubles and 72 triples and hit .295 with four homers and 10 RBI in 16 World Series games.
Ott would have fit very well into today’s game as an on-base specialist. He led the NL in walks six times, walked more than 100 times in 10 seasons and had a career .414 on-base average. A left-handed batter, Ott took advantage of the short right field dimensions at the Polo Grounds utilizing a quirky hitting style in which he lifted his right leg as he started his swing. Copying that style years later was the Japanese slugger Sadaharu Oh of the Yomiuri Giants.
In his last six seasons in the majors, Ott wore two hats for the Giants as a player manager. A soft-spoken man from Louisiana with a demeanor not unlike that of Gehrig, it was Ott to whom Leo Durocher came up with his famous line, “Nice guys finish last.”
Ott never did finish last, and when he did finish his career he was first among New York players in total hits. Now that distinction belongs to Derek Jeter, another nice guy who doesn’t finish last.
Museum honors Subway Series
What better time than the upcoming Subway Series this weekend at Yankee Stadium than to visit the newest exhibit at the Yankees Museum, “Subway Series: New York’s Baseball Rivalries.”
The exhibit is devoted to the real Subway Series, those World Series in which the Yankees opposed the New York Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers from the 1920s to the 1950s, as well as the 2000 matchup against the Mets.
Among the many items on display in the exhibit that opened last week are game jerseys worn by Willie (Mays), Mickey (Mantle) and the Duke (Snider); catcher’s mitts that belonged to three-time Most Valuable Players Yogi Berra and Roy Campanella; plus game programs, scorecards, pennants, pins and photographs. It is a wonderful nostalgic journey through New York City’s baseball past.
Technically, the Subway Series refers to the World Series the Yankees played against the Dodgers at Yankee Stadium and Ebbets Field in 1941, 1947, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1955 and 1956 (all but ’55 won by the Yanks) and the 2000 Series against the Mets (also won by the Bombers).
The phrase was also used for the Yankees’ World Series against the Giants, although there was no direct subway connection between Yankee Stadium and the Polo Grounds, the Giants’ former home that was located across the Harlem River from the Stadium in upper Manhattan. You could get from one park to the other merely by walking across the Macombs Dam Bridge a lot quicker than taking the subway.
In fact, the first two World Series between the Yankees and the Giants, in 1921 and 1922 (both won by the Giants), were played in the same place, the Polo Grounds, where the Yankees were tenants for 10 seasons before the original Stadium opened in 1923, the site of World Series between the teams that year plus 1936, 1937 and 1951, all won by the Yankees.
Another recently opened exhibit is “Iron Horse: The Life and Career of Lou Gehrig,” examining the Hall of Famer’s life on and off the field. Artifacts include two game-worn Gehrig jerseys, two game-used bats (one of which was autographed) and the “Don’t Quit” parchment given to him during Lou Gehrig Day July 4, 1939 when he delivered his famous farewell speech calling himself “the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”
Of more recent vintage is the exhibit, “2009: A Season to Celebrate,” which focuses on last season’s memorable events. Artifacts include the ball from the final out of the 2009 World Series, a World Series ring from Balfour, and the plate and pitcher’s rubber used during the first game at the current Stadium, which were also used during the last game at the original Yankee Stadium Sept. 21, 2008.
The Museum, presented by Bank of America, is located at the Stadium on the Main Level near Gate 6 at East 161st Street and River Avenue. Guests may gain access to the museum on game days from the time the gates open two hours before gametime until the end of the eighth inning. On non-game days, visitors may visit the museum as part of Yankee Stadium tours.
Eerie moment of silence
A seriously injured player lying on the ground for an inordinate amount of time is a scene that has been repeated in the long history of American League games between the Yankees and Indians, a figure that reached 1,911 Saturday.
The latest episode silenced a Yankee Stadium crowd of 46,599 as Cleveland pitcher David Huff, 25, a lefthander in his second major-league season making his first start of the year and ninth of his career, fell to the mound and lay there still after being struck below the left ear by a line drive off that bat of Alex Rodriguez in the third inning.
Teammates and coaches along with Tribe manager Manny Acta encircled the mound to see after the prone pitcher. Just behind the mound was Rodriguez kneeling on one knee, his head bowed. The eerie quiet as trainers from both teams attended to Huff was interrupted several times only by a hush sound from the crowd as they viewed replays of the incident from the multitude of screens around the Stadium.
The ball was hit so hard that Hall couldn’t get his glove up in time to soften the blow. He was hit flush in the head. The force was such that the ball ricocheted into right field for a double. Hall was removed from the field by a cart. As he was being placed on a stretcher, the crowd began to cheer, and he acknowledged their response by giving the thumb’s-up sign with his right fist. As the cart motored toward an opening in the fence in left center field where an ambulance awaited, Hall raised his left palm to the bleacher creatures giving him a standing ovation.
Word came later from Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center that a CT scan was negative, that Huff never lost consciousness or memory, indications that there was no brain damage. The preliminary diagnosis was much more positive than that of two other chapters in Yankees-Indians lore which are among the most infamous in baseball history.
Huff’s injury most closely resembled that of Herb Score, another young lefthander who on May 7, 1957, a month before his 24th birthday, was hit in the right eye with a line drive by Yankees shortstop Gil McDougald at the old Municipal Stadium. The blow broke several bones in Score’s face and put him out of action until late in the 1958 season. Score was the AL Rookie of the Year in 1955 and on his way to a terrific career, but he was not the same pitcher after that.
Score was 38-20 with a 2.63 ERA and led the AL in strikeouts twice before the accident and 17-26 with a 4.43 ERA afterwards. Score never blamed the accident but rather a torn tendon he suffered a year later. McDougald was never quite the same player after that, either. He retired after the 1960 World Series at the age of 31 rather than risk being taken in the ’61 expansion draft. Score enjoyed a second career as a broadcaster with the Indians for 34 seasons. He retired in 1998 and died 10 years later at the age of 75.
Perhaps baseball’s darkest moment occurred in a Yankees-Indians game Aug. 16, 1920 at the Polo Grounds when Tribe shortstop Ray Chapman was struck in the head by a submarine pitch from righthander Carl Mays. Chapman never regained consciousness and died the next day. In those days, pitchers routinely scuffed and applied dirt to balls which turned them brown. Chapman’s death resulted directly in a rule ordering umpires to remove balls that were discolored. The ruling came far too late for Chapman.
Jack O'Connell
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