28 June 1914: The Feds

Dutch Zwilling

One hundred years ago this coming Saturday (28 June), the world changed. A Serb nationalist named Gavrilo Princip fired two shots that killed the Erzherzog (Archduke) Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie. Ultimately, a month later, that action led to the outbreak of World War I. The United States stayed out of the war until 1917, but was eventually drawn in. Most Americans might have been horrified at the assassination, but very few understood that it would eventually lead their sons, fathers, and brothers into places like the Argonne Forest.

Baseball games were played on 28 June 1914. It was a Sunday and people turned out to watch three leagues play ball. Here’s a look at what was happening in each league on 28 June 1914, one hundred years ago.

Of the eight Federal League teams playing the 1914 season, four were in action on Sunday the 28th of June: Kansas City, Indianapolis, St. Louis, and Chicago. The Packers (KC) and Hoosiers (Indy) played a double-header. For the Terriers (St. Louis) and the Whales (Chicago) it was a single game.

The early game in Indianapolis saw KC pick up a 2-0 win. The Packers got both runs in the sixth when catcher Ted Easterly tripled, then scored on an error. Lefty Gene Packard pitched a complete game shutout giving up only three hits, striking out eight, and walking none. It was his tenth win of the season.

In the late game, you got a slugfest. The Hoosiers earned a split  with an 8-7 victory. KC picked up 18 hits, but committed three errors as Indianapolis scored one more run on only 11 hits. Eventual batting champion Benny Kauff went two for three with a walk and scored two runs while driving in one. Right hander George Kaiserling picked up his sixth win (against one loss) by going nine innings, walking one, and striking out three. He would finish the year 17-10.

In the other game, Chicago beat up on St. Louis 7-3. First baseman Fred Beck hit a solo home run while center fielder Dutch Zwilling went four for five with two runs scored and an RBI. Max Fiske pitched the first 7.1 innings, giving up all three runs, while walking two and striking out two. It was Fiske’s sixth win against two losses. Hall of Fame pitcher Three Finger Brown went the distance for St. Louis absorbing his fourth loss against five wins.

At the end of the day Indianapolis went home with a half game lead over Chicago with KC in fifth and St. Louis holding last place. By the end of the season, the Packers would drop a spot to sixth, but the other three teams would remain where they sat on 28 June. As the new league, they were not invited to postseason festivities.

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1910: Naps Postmortem

The 1910 Cleveland team is one of the more interesting failures in the American League. It has several first line players (four made it to the Hall of Fame), but not enough to make it into the first division. Ultimately the Naps finished 71-81, 32 games back in manager Deacon McGuire’s first full season. He didn’t get a second, being fired 17 games into 1911.

Cleveland’s hitting numbers reveal that they  probably finished where they should . They rank fifth in almost all major categories like hitting slugging, runs, and RBIs. The problem is that the stats are uneven across the starters. Second baseman Napoleon LaJoie hit .383, slugged .520, led the league in hits doubles, and in some sources the .383 won the batting title (Other sources give the title to Ty Cobb). Those are great numbers, but now look at the third baseman, Bill Bradley. Bradley hit .196, slugged all of .210, had 12 RBIs and 42 hits. It’s true he played only 61 games, but those kinds of numbers are typical of what’s wrong with Cleveland’s hitting. LaJoie is great, catcher Ted Easterly didn’t do bad, but the rest of the starters were nothing special. Other than LaJoie and Easterly, only first baseman George Stovall managed to hit .250.

The bench is equally bad. Of the 10 players appearing in 2o or more games, only Joe Jackson (who plays in exactly 20 games) managed to hit .300 (.387) and Hall of Famer Elmer Flick in his final season managed .265 in 24 games. The rest of the bench gives the team nothing.

The pitching is disappointing. A staff of Cy Young, Addie Joss, and Cy Falkenberg should have been pretty good. But Joss managed only 13 games (and never came back, dying the next season). Young was 43 and although winning his 500th game during the year, managed only a 7-10 record. That left Falkenberg as the ace. There’s a reason you’ve never heard of him. As an “ace” he left a lot to be desired. He was 14-13, had an ERA of 2.94, and managed 107 strikeouts to 75 walks. Respectable numbers, maybe, but not “ace”-like.

Cleveland looks like a team ready to make a few strides in 1911 (and it will rise to third), but it is a deeply flawed team. LaJoie is 35, Joss is ill (and, as stated above, will not return), Flick retired, and Young is old at 45 (and was traded after seven starts in 1911). On the other hand Joe Jackson is starting to embark on a great career, George Stovall is pretty good sometimes and Easterly is a decent catcher.

The year 1911 turned out to be interesting for Cleveland. The end of 1910 gave some indication of that.

Opening Day, 1910: Cleveland

Addie Joss

For the first time since 1905, Cleveland began the season with a new manager. Napoleon LaJoie took over in 1905 and remained in charge until late in 1909, when old-time catcher Deacon McGuire was handed the job. It changed the team dynamic, it changed the team name (they were called the Naps in LaJoie’s honor), and it changed Lajoie’s game.

For a team that had not done well in its ten-year history, including a sixth place finish 27.5 games back in 1909, Cleveland underwent very little change in the field for 1910. George Stovall stayed at first, LaJoie at second, and Bill Bradley at third. Terry Turner, the former backup middle infielder, took over at short. It wasn’t a particularly distinguished infield, except for LaJoie. Only LaJoie hit above .250 in 1909 and Bradley finished at .186. LaJoie had been on a downward spiral since taking over the managerial spot. There was some hope that released from those duties, he might return to the former player who won a triple crown in 1901, and batting titles on 1903 and ’04.  Neal Ball and George Perring were the infield backups. Ball was the starting shortstop in ’09 and Perring was a holdover.

The outfield saw two of three starters change. Joe Birmingham was a good fielding, decent hitting center fielder with little speed on the bases, a common trait in Cleveland,despite the prevailing strategy of the era. John Graney and Art Kruger were both new. Both had played a little for Cleveland in previous years (’08 for Graney and ’07 for Kruger), but were never regulars. Briscoe Lord remained the backup outfielder. It wasn’t a big hitting outfield and wasn’t a particular improvement over the 1909 version.

Ted Easterly remained the backstop. He hit .261 the year before and shared time with backups Nig Clark, and Harry Bemis. Both remained in 1910, but Clark ended up hurt and Grover Land became the third catcher.  Easterly would have a good year with the bat.

A real strength of the Cleveland team, if it had one, was its aging pitching staff. The problem was the “aging” part. Cy Young was 43 at the end of the 1909 season. Addie Joss, Bob Rhodes, and Cy Falkenberg were all 30. Among the starters, only Heinie Berger was under 30 (he was 27). For 1910 they kept all but Rhodes who disappears from major league rosters forever. They tried Willie Mitchell and Specs Harkness to fill in the gaps for age and loss. Mitchell pitched three games the year before and Harkness was a rookie.

Cleveland is a difficult team to figure. There are spots where they are pretty good (second, catcher, specific pitchers), but there are spots where they lack quality (third, the corner outfield, other pitchers). It’s a team that could rise, but if anybody gets hurt, or anything goes wrong, they could be in trouble. Late in the year they will bring up a 20-year-old rookie outfielder named Joe Jackson. He looks to have some talent.

Next: a break from the monotony of team-by-team to celebrate the accomplishments of Addie Joss.