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    When Boston Still Had the Babe: The 1918 World Champion Red Sox: SABR Digital Library, #59
    When Boston Still Had the Babe: The 1918 World Champion Red Sox: SABR Digital Library, #59
    When Boston Still Had the Babe: The 1918 World Champion Red Sox: SABR Digital Library, #59
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    When Boston Still Had the Babe: The 1918 World Champion Red Sox: SABR Digital Library, #59

    By Society for American Baseball Research

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    About this ebook

    Late into the Boston Red Sox's infamous 86-year championship drought—from 1918 to 2004—it was
    nearly taboo to talk seriously about the 1918 team. Some believed the Red Sox were cursed because the
    year after the Red Sox won their fifth World Championship, Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees
    (who went on to win the first of their many titles). The year the Sox had last won it all, 1918, became a
    sing-song taunt delivered by mocking Yankees fans, and a subject to be avoided.
    But 1918 was a fascinating season, played in the shadow of the first World War with dozens of players
    leaving for military service or war-related work all year long. With superstitions of "the curse" dispelled
    by the Red Sox return to championship glory in 2004 (and 2007 and 2013) we are free to explore 1918 in

    full. In this book, 28 members of the Society for American Baseball Research have compiled the most in-
    depth look at the 1918 Red Sox ever published. They have unearthed a wealth of information—much of it

    never seen before—about every one of the 32 players who suited up that year, from Hall of Famers Babe
    Ruth and Harry Hooper to Red Bluhm, who batted only once.
    This SABR edition of When Boston Still Had the Babe is newly available to celebrate the 100th
    anniversary of the 1918 season.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSociety for American Baseball Research
    Release dateSep 14, 2018
    ISBN9781943816781
    When Boston Still Had the Babe: The 1918 World Champion Red Sox: SABR Digital Library, #59

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      When Boston Still Had the Babe - Society for American Baseball Research

      1918-red-sox-cover-front-1466x21001918_title_page

      When Boston Still Had The Babe

      Copyright © 2008, 2018 Society for American Baseball Research, Inc.

      Edited by Bill Nowlin

      Associate Editors: Mark Armour, Len Levin, Allan Wood

      All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

      This 2018 SABR edition is based upon the 2008 Rounder Books edition.

      ISBN 978-1-943816-79-8 paperback edition

      ISBN 978-1-943816-78-1 ebook edition

      Interior design and composition by Jane Tenenbaum and Keith Barnes

      Cover design by Steve Jurgensmeyer

      Society for American Baseball Research

      Cronkite School at ASU

      555 N. Central Ave. #416

      Phoenix, AZ 85004

      Phone: (602) 496-1460

      Web: www.sabr.org

      Facebook: Society for American Baseball Research

      Twitter: @SABR

      Table of Contents

      1918 Red Sox – Introduction

      The 1917 Red Sox – An Off-Year

      1918 — Spring Training

      Sam Agnew by John McMurray

      Lore Verne King Bader by Rob Edelman

      Walter Barbare by John McMurray

      Bullet Joe Bush by Ron Anderson

      George Cochran by Craig Lammers

      John Francis Coffey by Maurice Bouchard

      Jean Dubuc by Tom Simon & Guy Waterman

      Eusebio Gonzalez by Bill Nowlin

      Dick Hoblitzell by Tom Simon

      Harry Hooper by Paul J. Zingg and Elizabeth A. Reed

      Sad Sam Jones by Alex Edelman

      Walt Kinney by Allan Wood

      Dutch Leonard by David Jones

      Wally Mayer by Doug Skipper

      Carl Mays by Allan Wood

      Dick McCabe by Nicole DiCicco

      Stuffy McInnis by Aaron M. Davis and C. Paul Rogers III

      Hack Miller by Mike Sowell

      Vince Molyneaux by Bill Nowlin

      Bill Pertica by Bill Nowlin

      George Herman Babe Ruth by Allan Wood

      Wally Schang by Don Geiszler

      Everett Scott by Ray Birch

      Dave Shean by Les Masterson

      Jack Stansbury by Tony Bunting

      Amos Strunk by John McMurray

      Fred Thomas by Craig Lammers

      Frank Day Truesdale by Jim Elfers

      Charles Francis Heinie Wagner

      George Whiteman by Jon Daly

      John Weldon Wyckoff by Christopher Williams

      Edward Grant Barrow

      Harry Frazee

      1918 Boston Red Sox — Day by Day

      Winning a Championship

      1918 World Series Boston Red Sox – Chicago Cubs

      1918 World Series Most Valuable Player

      The Years that Followed

      General References

      Special References

      Acknowledgements

      Contributors

      1918 Red Sox – Introduction

      by Allan Wood

      Late into the infamous 86-year championship drought of the Boston Red Sox — from 1918 to 2004 — it became nearly taboo to talk seriously about the 1918 team.

      One reason for that reluctance was the sullied reputation of the team's then-owner, Harry Frazee — the man who sold Boston's beloved superstar, Babe Ruth, to the New York Yankees. Then there were the four World Series losses — 1946, 1967, 1975, and 1986 — each loss coming in the seventh and final game, reinforcing the image of the Red Sox as a team unable to win when it truly counted.

      Over the last decade, the national sports media became obsessed with the idea that this chronic futility was caused by a beyond-the-grave curse. Indeed, media often reported with a straight face that the Boston franchise was cursed. The very year 1918 became a taunt at Yankee Stadium.

      Taken together, one can well understand why many Red Sox fans wanted to forget the year 1918 altogether.

      But winning a World Series championship is nothing to be ashamed of, and nothing to be brushed under history's rug. 1918 was a fascinating season — not only for the Red Sox, but for major league baseball in general.

      The United States had entered Europe's Great War in April 1917, but few players enlisted that summer and the war had very little direct impact on the national sport. During the winter of 1917-18, however, dozens of major league players left their teams. They either enlisted in the military or accepted jobs in war-related industries, such as shipyards or munitions factories.

      Some of the players the Red Sox lost were: manager/second baseman Jack Barry, left fielder Duffy Lewis (who led the team in batting and slugging in 1917), pitcher Ernie Shore, and utility infielders Hal Janvrin, Mike McNally, Del Gainer, and Chick Shorten.

      As 1918's spring training loomed, most owners bided their time, deciding to wait until the beginning of the season was closer and their needs became more certain. The one owner who was the most pro-active, who took the biggest and quickest steps to rebuild his team's roster, was Red Sox president Harry Frazee. In December 1917 and January 1918, Frazee made two headline-grabbing deals with Connie Mack of the Philadelphia Athletics, sending a handful of players and the sizable sum of $60,000 to Mack for pitcher Joe Bush, catcher Wally Schang, infielder Stuffy McInnis, and outfielder Amos Strunk.

      In the wake of this wheeling-and-dealing, a January editorial in the New York Times expressed disgust at the disorganizing effect that Frazee and Chicago Cubs president Charlie Weeghman were having on the national game by offering all sorts of money for star ballplayers. (Weeghman had spent a small fortune to acquire the superb battery of pitcher Grover Alexander and catcher Bill Killefer from the Philadelphia Phillies.) The Times wrote: The club owners are not content to wait for a few seasons while their managers develop a pennant winner, but have undertaken to accomplish in one year what other clubs have waited years to achieve.

      In other words, the Times was accusing Harry Frazee of trying to buy the American League pennant.

      This view of Frazee as a free-spending, win-at-all-costs magnate clashes with his modern-day image. If baseball fans know Frazee's name at all, it's because he was the man responsible for selling Babe Ruth to the Yankees after the 1919 season. But in 1918, Frazee was intent on bringing another World Series title to Boston. The Red Sox won the championship in 1912, their first year at Fenway Park, then won back-to-back titles in 1915 and 1916. (The cross-town Boston Braves had swept the 1914 series.) After a second-place showing in 1917 — Boston won 90 games, but finished 10 games behind the eventual World Series champion Chicago White Sox — Frazee was determined to put the Red Sox back on top.

      Boston was also fortunate in that most of its war-related personnel losses came well before spring training. Many other clubs started 1918 strong, but saw their lineups decimated as the summer went on.

      In addition to the two deals with the Athletics, Frazee hired former International League president Ed Barrow to manage the team. Barrow had previously managed the Detroit Tigers in 1903 and part of 1904 (for a combined record of 97-117). Next, Frazee signed George Whiteman, a 35-year-old outfielder, to replace Lewis. Whiteman was a career minor-leaguer, though he did have cups of coffee with both the Red Sox (1907) and Yankees (1913). And a few weeks before Opening Day, Frazee traded for Cincinnati's 34-year-old second baseman Dave Shean. Whiteman and Shean were both out of the draft's age range (21-31).

      Of the eight regulars in Boston's Opening Day lineup, only two were holdovers from the previous year: right fielder Harry Hooper and shortstop Everett Scott.

      The great Red Sox teams of the 1910s were built around excellent pitching and air-tight fielding. The team's offense had been below league average in 1916 and 1917 (and would be again in 1918), so it was fortunate that the 1918 pitching staff remained largely intact. Anchoring the rotation were Babe Ruth and Carl Mays, a left-right tandem that had combined for 41 wins in 1916 and 46 wins in 1917. Dutch Leonard was another lefty and newcomer Joe Bush would take Shore's spot as the fourth starter. After Leonard took a shipyard job in mid-season, right-hander Sam Jones took over. Those five pitchers — Mays, Ruth, Bush, Leonard, and Jones — would start all but six of Boston's 126 games.

      The roster upheaval caused by the war also gave plenty of marginal players the opportunity, however brief, to play in the major leagues. In Boston, a handful of players counted their time with the 1918 Red Sox as their only big league experience: Eusebio Gonzalez (seven plate appearances over three games) Red Bluhm (one at-bat as a pinch-hitter), George Cochran (.117 average), and Jack Stansbury (who slugged .149 in 20 games).

      In 1918, a summer-long soap opera played out over whether the remaining players would receive a blanket exemption from the draft, as other entertainers such as stage actors enjoyed. At first, the National Commission — the sport's ruling body, comprised of American League president Ban Johnson, National League president John Tener, and Cincinnati Reds owner August Herrmann –simply assumed that an exemption would be granted. When baseball was deemed not essential, the Commission scrambled to file requests for extensions, desperately hoping to finish the regular season.

      The Commission bumbled its way through the summer, insisting to sportswriters that it would be happy to cancel the season because winning the war was the highest priority, then begging the War Department for a further extension, so owners wouldn’t lose as much money. The government finally set September 1, 1918 as the absolute deadline. The owners decided against continuing the season past that point with players either under or over draft age.

      Not only did the regular season come to an early close, the World Series almost did, too. The 1918 World Series, played in early September, was nearly derailed by a furious off-field battle between the Red Sox and Chicago Cubs players, on one side, and the National Commission on the other, over what percentage of the gate receipts would be awarded to the winners and losers of the series.

      In the three previous years, 1915-17, the shares were almost $4,000 for each player on the winning team and $2,500 for each player on the losing side. In some cases, those amounts were as much as a player's annual salary.

      Ticket prices for the 1918 World Series were reduced with the hope of boosting attendance. In 1917, box seats were $5.00, grandstand seats were $3.00, pavilions were $2.00, and bleachers were $1.00. For the 1918 series, box seats were reduced to $3.00 and the other ticket prices were cut in half.

      The plan did not work. The crowds for the first three games at Comiskey Park were 19,274, 20,040 and 27,054 (the third game was on a Saturday afternoon thanks only to the rainout of Game One). The first two games of the 1917 World Series, also played at Comiskey, drew over 32,000 each.

      The National Commission had also decided, for the first time, that players on the second-, third- and fourth-place teams in each league would get a cut of the World Series dough. The Commission also volunteered to donate some of the players' shares to charity — without consulting the players. The players learned about all of this as the Series began. It looked like the shares could be cut by as much as 75%.

      The Commission refused to meet with the players. The two teams, led by Red Sox captain Harry Hooper, decided to not take the field at Fenway Park for Game Five until the matter was resolved.

      When Ban Johnson arrived at the park drunk, and with no intentions — or ability — to seriously discuss finances, and with nearly 25,000 fans waiting for the start of the game, the players reluctantly agreed to play that afternoon, and to finish the Series. A teary-eyed Johnson assured Hooper the players would not be punished for their one-hour delay of Game Five. One month later, Johnson broke his promise, as the Commission refused to award championship emblems, the equivalent of World Series rings, to the Red Sox. (The individual shares ended up being $1,100 for the Red Sox and $670 for the Cubs.)

      1918 was also the summer that a young man from Baltimore, Maryland, began his unprecedented transition from ace pitcher to the greatest hitter in baseball history.

      Babe Ruth had been one of baseball’s best pitchers in 1916 and 1917, but three weeks into the 1918 season, faced with a depleted roster, no reinforcements, and a need for more offense, Ed Barrow moved Ruth into the regular lineup, eventually playing him at first base and in left field.

      Although Ruth's potential as an everyday player had been an occasional topic in the sports pages since his rookie season of 1915, when he was actually out there, there was plenty of debate. Would Ruth's weaknesses at the plate be quickly discovered and exploited by opposing pitchers? Would he ruin his arm making long throws from the outfield? Could he play every day and continue pitching?

      On May 6, 1918, in a game against the Yankees at the Polo Grounds, Ruth debuted at first base and batted sixth. He went 2-for-4, including a two-run home run. The next day, in Washington, Ruth was moved up to the #4 spot in the lineup — and celebrated the promotion with another home run, off Senators ace Walter Johnson. In the final game of the Senators series, on May 9, Ruth lost a 10-inning complete game on the mound, but also went 5-for-5 with three doubles, a triple, and a single. (That is still the major league record for extra-base hits by a pitcher in an extra-inning game.)

      Oddly enough, Boston lost their first six games with Ruth in the field and slipped out of first place. Melville Webb Jr. of the Boston Globe was not impressed: Putting a pitcher in as an everyday man, no matter how he likes it or how he may hit, is not the sign of strength for a club that aspires to be a real contender.

      As Ruth's hitting began drawing more attention, his desire to pitch dwindled. This didn't sit well with Barrow, especially after Dutch Leonard's departure left the team without a left-handed starter. Ruth insisted his left wrist was sore; he and Barrow argued throughout June. After a dugout confrontation in Washington on July 2, Ruth quit the team, fleeing to his father's house in Baltimore.

      Babe considered joining a shipyard and playing for the company team, but quickly learned that the shipyard would also want him to pitch. He'd also betaking a huge cut in pay. Ruth returned to the Red Sox a couple of days later, patching up his differences with Barrow. As the Red Sox got hot in the month of July, Ruth turned in what was arguably the greatest nine- or ten-week stretch of play the game has ever seen.

      In one ten-game period (July 6-22) during a Fenway homestand, Ruth batted .469 (15-for-32) with four singles, six doubles, and five triples. Although he did not hit any home runs in July or August, Ruth was feared as a batter all year long. He was walked intentionally in the first inning as often as he was in the ninth inning. In mid-June, the St. Louis Browns gave him a free pass in five consecutive plate appearances over two games. As far as can be determined, that remains a major league record (Barry Bonds was also walked intentionally five straight times on September 22-23, 2004).

      After returning from his Fourth of July defection, Babe took his turn on the mound every fourth day and proved that he was still one of the game’s top pitchers. Ruth made 11 starts and won nine of them (all complete games), including the pennant-clincher against Philadelphia. In his last 10 starts of the season, he allowed more than two runs only once.

      Of the many nicknames Ruth earned during his Red Sox career — the Big Fellow, Tarzan, the Caveman, the Colossus — one was particularly apt. As the Colossus of Rhodes was believed to have straddled the entrance to the harbor of ancient Greece, his New England namesake towered over the national sport in 1918, one huge foot planted on either side of baseball’s pitching and hitting camps.

      Imagine Johan Santana playing first base or DH-ing in every game he didn't pitch. Then imagine Santana remaining a dominant pitcher while putting up a batting line to rival Barry Bonds or Albert Pujols. That was Babe Ruth in 1918.

      Ruth wasn’t the first major leaguer to pull double duty, but almost all of the players who pitched and played the field in the early 1900s either had very short careers or their performances were unexceptional.

      In contrast, Babe led both leagues in slugging average by a wide margin in 1918 — his .555 topped Ty Cobb's second place finish of .515 in the AL and Edd Roush's NL-best .455. His 11 home runs were more than the totals of five other AL teams. Ruth finished second in doubles, third in RBI, fifth in triples, and eighth in walks — all accomplished in 100 to 175 fewer plate appearances than his American League peers.

      Ruth's 2.22 ERA was eighth best in the AL. He allowed an average of only 9.52 hits and walks per nine innings, second only to the Senators' Walter Johnson. Ruth had the third lowest opponents' on-base average and fourth lowest opponents' batting average.

      In the World Series, Ruth beat the Cubs in Games One and Four, setting a new World Series record of 29.2 consecutive scoreless innings, a streak he began in 1916. Ruth set many records during his career, but that accomplishment was the one of which he was most proud. It would stand until the Yankees' Whitey Ford broke it in 1961.

      When lists are made of baseball’s top dynasties, the Red Sox teams of the 1910s are rarely mentioned. While they are not in the upper echelon of the 1906-12 Chicago Cubs (713-356, .667) or the 1936-42 New York Yankees (701-371, .654), their seven-year winning percentage from 1912-18 (632-406, .609) is better than the seven-year run of the 1996-2002 Yankees (685-445, .606).

      In this book, 28 members of the Society for American Baseball Research have compiled the most in-depth look at the 1918 Red Sox. They have unearthed a wealth of information — much of it never seen before — about every one of the 32 players who suited up that year, from Harry Hooper and Everett Scott, who played in all 126 games, to Red Bluhm, who had one pinch-hitting opportunity.

      For Red Sox fans, the life-changing events of October 2004 should forever remove any stigma attached to the 1918 club. And for all baseball fans, it will be a chance to travel back to a time when the Boston Red Sox were the kings of the diamond.

      The 1917 Red Sox – An Off-Year

      by Bill Nowlin

      The Red Sox were coming off back-to-back World Championships in 1915 and 1916. From 1910 through 1916, the American League pennant had either been won by Philadelphia or Boston. No one else.

      Early in January 1917, and after several entreaties that he stay, manager Bill Carrigan reaffirmed his earlier announcement that he would not be back as manager of the Red Sox. President Harry Frazee, who'd purchased the team right after the 1916 World Series, had earlier traveled to Lewiston, Maine to try and sign the popular Carrigan for another season, but it was not to be. Tim Murnane of the Boston Globe noted that second baseman Jack Barry and right fielder Harry Hooper had been mentioned as possible skippers, but added that Frazee probably hadn’t given the matter much thought, so determined was he to re-sign Carrigan.

      Renowned sportswriter Grantland Rice said Boston would be as hard to beat in 1917 as they were in 1915 and 1916. He foresaw another Giants/Red Sox World Series, reprising their classic from 1912.

      On Jan. 4, though, Carrigan definitively declared he would remain in Maine and not return to skipper the Sox.

      Frazee was ready with a replacement and on January 5, he named Jack Barry to manage, and continue as the team’s second baseman. Barry accepted the job, saying, I know that no cleaner living, more loyal fellows ever put on spikes and I am sure I will have hearty support from every man on the Red Sox team. Murnane predicted that the White Sox could give Boston a run for its money. The Red Sox, though, planned to bring back pretty much the same team that had done so well the previous two years — and that was a good thing.

      Pitcher Smoky Joe Wood wouldn’t be back, though. On February 24, Frazee sold him to Cleveland for $15,000. There was some wrangling over pay between Frazee and some of the players. Though Dave Fultz was trying to organize the Players' Fraternity — an early attempt at what might be called unionization — Frazee succeeded in signing most of the players in early February. Carl Mays balked at signing and was informed that he could pay his own way to spring training if he had not signed before the time to report.

      Anticipating U.S. entry into the World War, Frazee said he would have his players drill for a full hour each day, starting in spring training. On March 3, the Red Sox party left Boston for Hot Springs, Arkansas, departing from Track 13. On March 6, the players had a light workout and took a hike over a mountain trail. Some of the holdouts came into camp one at a time over the next week or two. On May 18, the Sox played their first opponent, the Brooklyn Robins, losing 7-2. The team got in their games, despite a few rainouts, and closed out March with a beauty, keyed by Jack Barry pulling a squeeze play to beat Brooklyn. The exhibition schedule brought the Red Sox north through Davenport, Indianapolis, Toledo, and other cities, arriving in New York on April 9, ready to play the Yankees on Opening Day.

      The season began with Babe Ruth pitching Boston to a 10-3 win over New York. Dutch Leonard beat the Yankees, 6-1, the following afternoon. After playing their first seven games on the road, the Red Sox came home for Opening Day with a 5-2 record. They beat the Yankees 6-4 in the Fenway Park opener but lost the next two, one of them a 2-1 loss in a no-hitter thrown by George Mogridge. Nonetheless, when Babe Ruth won his fifth start in a row on April 30, they closed out the month sporting a 9-4 record. They were in first place, a half-game ahead of the White Sox.

      Ruth ran his record to 7-0 with a two-hit 1-0 shutout against Washington and Walter Johnson on May 7 and a 2-1 win over Detroit on May 11. The Red Sox lost consecutive games to the White Sox on May 18 and 19, and actually dropped to third in the standings, percentage points behind the Yankees and White Sox. A 2-1 win by Carl Mays the next day put the Red Sox back in first, but Jack Barry suffered a serious knee injury during the game.

      A Good Month of May

      The Red Sox continued to play well, sweeping the Senators in back-to-back doubleheaders on May 29 and 30. They ended the month in first place, a game and a half ahead of the White Sox, with a record of 27-10. At this point the Red Sox had won 10 games in a row (there was one tie game in the midst of the stretch) and were, in the words of a Globe headline, not stopping to tie their shoelaces.

      Oops. On June 1, the Indians shut them out, on only one hit — the first time the Sox had been shutout in 1917. Then Cleveland shut them out again the next day. The Red Sox hit a stretch where they were shut out four more times and lost seven out of eight games, dropping to second place, a full 3¹/² games behind Chicago. The bats had gone quiet, hitting below .200 as a team during most of the first half of June. On the year, they were hitting .236 as of Bunker Hill Day.

      They took two from Chicago on June 18th to close the gap. Two days later, Babe Ruth won his 12th game of the year. In his next start, against the Senators, Ruth walked the first batter of the game on four pitches but disagreed with umpire Owens about two of the calls. Ruth punched the umpire and was thrown out of the game, dragged off the field by a few policemen; Ernie Shore came in and retired 27 consecutive men — the first one being the runner on first who was cut down trying to steal second. Retiring 27 in a row is a perfect game, regardless of how Major League Baseball might choose to define it. When June ended, the Red Sox remained in second, 1¹/² games behind Chicago.

      After winning the final five games of three back-to-back-to-back doubleheaders from the visiting Athletics, Boston was a half-game out of first, briefly taking first place on July 7. They then balanced the scales by dropping five of their next six. Visiting Chicago was a disaster. Boston won one, tied a game that ran 15 innings, but lost four, and left Comiskey Park for home with their tails between their legs, 4¹/² games behind the White Sox as of July 23.

      An August Decline

      Back in Boston, the Red Sox reeled off seven wins in a row, the last two against the visiting White Sox and worked their way into a tie atop the standings as of July 31. It was too good to last; they dropped the next two games to Chicago. Things went wrong. Rube Foster threw a one-hitter against the Indians, and lost 2-0. The following day, the Sox made five errors and lost that one, too. The two Sox teams kept pace with each other. August 17 saw the Red Sox up by percentage points over the White Sox, but the Chicagoans picked up the pace and won 13 of 15; by month's end, they had restored their 4¹/² game lead.

      The White Sox didn't cool down; they kicked off September taking 12 of their first 14 games. That 25-4 run was a torrid pace that the Red Sox couldn't match. By September 10, Boston was seven games behind. By the 20th, they were 9¹/² games out. The very next day, September 21, Chicago took a 2-1 game from the Red Sox after 10 innings at Fenway, clinching the 1917 pennant. The Red Sox would not repeat as World Champions.

      Fans Lose Interest

      Frazee sent a telegram of congratulations to Chicago's Comiskey. Several days later, he declined to play the Braves in a postseason exhibition City Series, saying that the fans just weren't interested. That was an understatement. On September 28, the Boston Globe reported that only 356 fans came out to watch the Red Sox drop a game to the St. Louis Browns. Boston finished the season with a very good 90-62 record, but were nine games behind the White Sox. Red Sox pitchers had allowed the fewest runs of any team in the league, but Chicago batters had scored the most runs of any team. The White Sox won the World Series, defeating the New York Giants in six games.

      On November 1, Jack Barry reported for duty in the Navy, as did Duffy Lewis, Ernie Shore, Chick Shorten, and Mike McNally. The war in Europe was on in earnest and would greatly impact the coming 1918 season. Hal Janvrin enlisted in the Signal Corps on December 1. More than 50 major league ballplayers had enlisted in military service, and 11 of those were from the Red Sox — clearly the team most affected.

      In the Navy were: Lore Bader, Jack Barry, Del Gainer, Duffy Lewis, Mike McNally, Herb Pennock, Ernie Shore, and Chick Shorten. Jack Bentley, Jim Cooney, and Hal Janvrin were serving elsewhere. Sam Jones had been accepted for service and awaiting orders, and Dick Hoblitzell was working to get into the Dental Reserve Corps. Another draft was expected to follow, which would scoop up more players. Harry Hooper, for one, was ready to go.

      On at least two occasions, Harry Frazee denied he was planning to sell the team. On the contrary, he was hoping the war would be wrapped up by Opening Day and vowed to have a strong team when it did. On December 14, he pulled off a major trade with the Athletics, sending them Pinch Thomas, Vean Gregg, Manny Kopp, and a reported $60,000 in cash (yes, Frazee spent some serious bucks on at least one occasion), acquiring pitcher Bullet Joe Bush, catcher Wally Schang, and outfielder Amos Strunk.

      The Globe called it one of the biggest baseball deals that has been pulled off in years. The newspaper expected it would make the Red Sox a very strong contender in 1918. He hoped to have Jack Barry back as manager and to add Ed Barrow to his executive staff. As events transpired, the war would continue and contribute to a shortened season.

      1918 — Spring Training

      by Bill Nowlin

      Frazee kicked off the new year making another move, again with Connie Mack's Athletics, trading players to be named later for first baseman Stuffy McInnis. Mack termed the deal a near-gift, letting McInnis go to the team where he wanted to play even though he could have sold him for more than $25,000. Mack later selected Larry Gardner, Tillie Walker, and Hick Cady. The first player to sign with the Red Sox for 1918 was pitcher Babe Ruth. He inked a contract for $7,000 and talked about the possibility of winning 30 games (he was 23-12 in 1916).

      Towards the end of January, the Red Sox received word that Jack Barry would not be relieved from Navy duties for at least several months and was effectively lost for the season. Frazee again approached Bill Carrigan, with no success. On February 11, Ed Barrow was named as Jack Barry's replacement as manager of the Red Sox. One of Barrow’s first pronouncements was that players would be prohibited from bringing their wives to spring training. Former Cubs star infielder Johnny Evers was hired as a coach, possible second baseman, and a general strategy man. ¹

      Assembling a team was far more difficult than usual, given the number of players who were either gone to service or likely to be called. Barrow and Frazee had to constantly consider the depth of their roster and the replacements that could be brought to bear if this player or that player left for war-related work or to enlist in one of the service branches.

      Hanging over it all was the question as to whether the season itself might be curtailed at some point. Even as late as early March, the Sox roster was — to put it mildly — a little unsettled. It wasn’t exactly clear who might play second base and Barrow was considering playing first baseman Stuffy McInnis at third base. Other teams faced similar situations.

      On March 8, the Red Sox left for spring training in the Ozarks, returning again to Hot Springs, Arkansas. A snow storm caused a delay of several hours in the trainyard outside Buffalo, and the Sox party missed their connection, costing them the first full day of practice. Soldiers on board the train sought out conversations with a gregarious Babe Ruth. The party heading south also included team secretary Larry Graver, attorney Thomas Barry, trainer Dr. Martin Lawler, and scout Billy Murray.

      Barrow Lays Down the Law

      On March 11, Barrow met with his charges and made it plain to them in a 15-minute talk that discipline more rigid than has ever been exercised before would be a feature of the camp and throughout the season. No player was to be seen in the breakfast room after 9:30 in the morning. Moreover, poker was too be confined strictly to the 10-cent variety and all games must end promptly each night at 11 o'clock.

      The same rules applied to newspapermen, rooters, and others associated with the team. Not one player failed to conform the first day; two who worked out so intently they had to be told to end their day were Johnny Evers and Babe Ruth. After three hours of working out, the players walked the two miles back to the hotel. Barrow refused to allow his men the luxury of a ride either to or from the park. [Boston Post, March 12 and 13, 1918]

      As for Barrow, he had cut a bit of a stern image sitting in the bleachers and watching the men work out without saying a word. Harry Frazee was in town and finalized contracts with Sam Agnew and Carl Mays.

      A couple of days later, Barrow decided to drop mountain climbing from the exercise program; only if it was too wet to work out on the ballfield would the players be compelled to take mountain hikes.

      Key Prospect Missing in Action

      Early in camp, a strange thing happened: despite some initial nervousness, 18-year-old prospect Mimos Ellenberg of Chuckey, Tennessee (some accounts say Mosheim), who Ed Barrow had proclaimed may be another Hornsby, impressed the Red Sox so much that they wanted to sign him. They couldn't find him; he simply disappeared. It was later determined he'd become quite ill and, come March 17, he was sent home.

      On March 16, several more of the squad turned up in town: Everett Scott, Amos Strunk, Fred Thomas, George Whiteman, and Paul Smith. Dick Hoblitzell arrived on the 19th — and four days later Ed Barrow named him as team captain. Dutch Leonard turned up on the 21st. McInnis was working out at third base, fielding bunt after bunt, while Fred Thomas ostensibly recruited as a third sacker, is developing into a likely second baseman. Pitcher Rube Foster said he wanted more money, then found Frazee telling him not to bother coming to Hot Springs unless he was to pay his own way, and was ultimately traded (on April 1) to Cincinnati for Dave Shean.

      The first exhibition game came on Sunday, March 17 and Red Sox batters bombed Brooklyn pitching for 16 hits at Majestic Park, and won 11-1. Babe Ruth hit two home runs for the 2,500 assembled, matching his total for the entire 1917 regular season. It was one of only two games the Red Sox played in their Hot Springs home. As it happened, both the Brooklyn Robins and the Red Sox trained at Hot Springs in 1918, Brooklyn working out at Whittington Park. The two teams played 11 games, with Boston winning seven. After six days of workouts in the Valley of the Vapors, the two teams played another couple of games and then took their show on the road and proceeded to play five games at Little Rock, before heading on to three cities in Texas, as well as New Orleans, Mobile, and Birmingham.

      Incident With a Track Hack

      Just a few days after the first game, however, there was a bizarre incident that could have ended the team’s pennant hopes before they had even really begun. Hooper, Ruth, Schang, Joe Bush, and Everett Scott had hired a car to take them from the race track back to the Hotel Marion. The driver tried to let them off short of the hotel, demanding payment, so he could run back to the track and pick up another fare. The Sox quintet called a policeman who ordered the driver to continue on to the hotel. The enraged driver shouted, I will tip you all out first, and then tore off at such speed that he banged a jitney aside, knocked a horse down and busted up a wagon. Hooper's threat regarding the chauffeur's nose brought an end to the affair. [Boston Globe, March 21, 1918]

      After the March 17 opener, the two teams didn't play another game for a week. Nevertheless, despite being a war-shortened season, the number of exhibition games was not diminished. The spring season comprised 14 games, more than any year since 1911. (During the season, they added three more. None of them were fundraisers for the war effort; this became widespread practice during the Second World War. The Red Sox hadn't played postseason games since 1910, though some of the players toured after the World Series — and paid a stiff price for doing so.)

      The weather failed to cooperate. Several players developed colds, and there were almost no intrasquad scrimmages. The Sox and Dodgers finally got in another game on the 24th, and Babe Ruth hit a grand slam home run as part of a six-run third inning that sank the Trolley Dodgers, 7-1.

      Mays and Ruth pitched; both Ruth and Dutch Leonard played right field. With two outs and the bases loaded in the third, Ruth swung at the first pitch and the ball cleared the fence by about 200 feet and dropped in the pond by the alligator farm. In Little Rock, the second-string Boston Yannigans clobbered the Brooklyn Rookies, 18-8.

      The following day, too many players were under the weather, so Barrow had the men work on signals, leads off first base, sacrifice bunts, and a number of fundamentals. Too many lame arms among the pitchers resulted in the following day being one devoted to batting practice.

      On March 27, the two teams matched off for two games in Little Rock. The games were held at Fort Pike; the first was played in front of 700 or 800 soldiers who saw the Brooklyn regulars beat the Red Sox, 3-2. The Post's Paul Shannon noted several situations where Red Sox players didn't seem to have their heads in the game, and lost opportunities as a result. Thomas was charged with two errors. The Red Sox regulars beat the Agnews the following day, 2-1. Prospect Lona Jaynes threw a complete game three-hitter for the Regulars and Dick McCabe allowed the first stringers only six hits.

      On March 29, the Red Sox learned that Majestic Park would be demolished later in the year so that railroad tracks could be laid through the property. The Sox signed a five-year option on Fordyce Park in Hot Springs as their new spring home, but it was a revocable deal and Frazee commented that he might move the team to another location, one that did not have a racetrack. He felt the ballplayers sometimes seemed a little too ready to end practice early and head out to the track.

      Sam Jones arrived in camp at this point; the Red Sox had thought he was due to be inducted at Camp Sherman, and had placed him on voluntary leave, but he had instead been placed in Class B and was hurriedly offered a 1918 contract. Frazee said he might seek an extra infielder but otherwise believed he had the men he needed.

      On March 30, the Red Sox beat the Dodgers at Little Rock, 4-3, scoring twice in the eighth and twice in the ninth — on Ruth's home run. It was his fourth home run in four games against Brooklyn.

      On the last day of March, the Red Sox again won the game in the ninth inning, scoring five times to come from behind and take the honors, 7-4. On the first day of April, the Sox did it yet again, scoring the run that broke a 2-2 tie with one out in the bottom of the ninth. Strunk walked, stole second, took third on McInnis's sacrifice. After Hoblitzell was walked intentionally, Whiteman singled Strunk in with the game-winner.

      The two teams traveled to Texas and played their first game on April 2, a dramatic 16-inning affair in Dallas that began with the Red Sox scoring four times in the top of the first. Tied 4-4 after nine, both teams scored twice in the 15th, the tilt going in Boston's favor in the 16th when newly-arrived Dave Shean doubled and then took third on a bad pickoff peg. He scored on Strunk's sacrifice fly for a 7-6 Boston victory. Ruth was so angry at striking out his first time up that he flung his bat half way to right field and then batted right-handed his second time up (he whiffed again). The teams traveled to Waco on April 3 and the Dodgers won 2-1, but not without some ninth-inning suspense, as Shean, the potential tying run, was stranded at second to end the game.

      And for the third game in a row, Shean shone. Playing in Austin at the University of Texas (most of the crowd being military aviation students), Boston beat Brooklyn, 10-4. Shean had himself a 5-for-5 day. Harry Hooper had three hits, including a triple and a home run. Boston lost in Houston on the 5th, 5-3, with two McInnis errors proving very costly. Shean drove in two runs. It might have been spring training, but the Boston Herald reported that the Sox manager gave the men a merciless tongue-lashing … a full hour of the ruthless criticism that big Ed Barrow knows how to hand out.

      The two teams squared off for 13 innings in New Orleans on April 7. Some 5,000 fans saw the Dodgers' Jim Hickman triple, then score on Clarence Mitchell's single for a 4-3 Brooklyn win. Moving on to Mobile, the teams played 13 innings again, but this time darkness brought an end to a game knotted 6-6. Each team scored once in the 14th frame. Playing the following day in Birmingham, the temperature dropped 50 degrees and Brooklyn beat Boston, 3-1, the game called after seven innings due to darkness.

      There was an odd twist on the two Alabama dates in that men from both teams joined together to play as the Supersox (derived by combining the old Brooklyn Superbas name with the Red Sox) for a couple of extra games. On April 7, the Brooklyn-Boston team (as it was shown in box scores) played the Southern Association team at Mobile and suffered a 2-0 one-hit shutout. The combined team was composed of second team players, by and large. On April 9, at Birmingham, the Barons beat the combined team by, again, a score of 2-0 in another Supersox game. The regular game was played in frigid conditions and both teams rushed through the work, completing the entire seven-inning game in 35 minutes.

      The game scheduled for Chattanooga on April 10 was called off due to cold weather after both teams arrived at the ballpark. Several of the players visited a nearby internment camp for German prisoners of war. Earlier hopes to play in Louisville and Pittsburgh, or Richmond, on the way north had come to naught. That evening, the Red Sox took the 10:30 train out of town and headed for Boston with a three-hour layover in Cincinnati.

      The Red Sox had won the series of games, 8-5, with one tie. There was also the game the Red Sox second team crushed Brooklyn's Yannigans. Scott, Strunk, and Hoblitzell were all hobbled with foot and ankle injuries and, in general, as Paul Shannon wrote in the Post, The Red Sox did not put up the brand of ball toward the end of the series that they did at first. There is a lot of room for improvement in their work.

      Snow on Arrival

      The team arrived home on April 12. Groundskeeper Jerome Kelley was to have had Fenway ready for an afternoon workout on Saturday the 13th, but the city was blanketed with snow. Those who boarded at Put's (a hotel where many players dwelled) checked in there; the others made their way to their various apartments/abodes.

      Coach Hugh Duffy arranged for the use of the Harvard cage - the first time major leaguers had worked out there - and after four days of inactivity the ballplayers raced around the cage like a lot of colts let out to pasture. [Boston Herald] Harry Frazee told the Herald, You can say that I am well pleased with the club's prospects for the coming season.

      The Boston Post's Paul Shannon wrote a long piece the day before the season opened, headlined Red Sox Feel All Set to Go After Another World's Title This Season. He began the article, Barring the absence of a strong utility string, hitherto one of the traditional features of a Boston Red Sox team, the newly constructed American League outfit, an organization that hovered on the verge of disruption only to be rebuilt with marvelous rapidity will take the field … Monday.

      The war had taken many, Carrigan was no longer manager, others had been traded away … all told, it was practically a new team. Shannon gave new manager Barrow credit for having moulded a team well worthy of supporting Red Sox tradition and repeating Red Sox triumphs.

      And triumph was, of course, the tradition for the Boston Americans who had won the pennant in five of the preceding 15 years. Credit must go, of course, to Harry Frazee, who hired Barrow and funded the acquisitions that seemed to Shannon to set the team up for a strong season. Frazee was not an absentee owner but, despite his other responsibilities in the theater world, an engaged and energetic owner.

      Shannon detailed the various positions. Even at this late date, two players that he expected to make strong contributions never did: Johnny Evers and Paul Smith. But all in all he saw an array of congenial, hard-working players with confidence in their own ability and supreme confidence in the judgment and ability of their new manager. A brainy, well-behaved set of players who will pull hard for victory all the time, because they see the vision of another pennant and regard their amalgamation that union of veterans with newly purchased stars as a remodeling, which may assure them of first honors for more than one year. No jealousy mars their good fellowship and harmony is the keynote of this crowd. Small wonder that Barrow is contented.

      No team can go through an entire season in harmony, however, but the Red Sox did begin the 1918 season on April 15 with a 7-1 win over the Philadelphia Athletics. No team can go through an entire season in harmony, however, but the Red Sox did begin the 1918 season on April 15 with a 7–1 win over the Philadelphia Athletics.

      Notes

      ¹ Burt Whitman, Boston Clubs Look Like New, Boston Herald, March 3, 1918: 17

      ’ When Boston Still Had the Babe

      The 1918 World Series Champion Red Sox ’

      Ruth’s spring training clouts attracted attention from the start. March 22, 1918 Boston Post.

      Spring training in Hot Springs, Arkansas, 1917. Front row l-r: Tilly Walker, Larry Gardner, Chick Shorten, Dick McCabe,

      Ernie Shore, Everett Scott, Fred Thomas. Back row: Unknown, Tyson, Kelleher, Walsh, Pennock, Jenkins, Devine.

      Courtesy of Michael Mumby.

      Detail from March 22, 1918, Boston Post cartoon, which appeared under headline Babe Ruth Is Hard Worker and He Is A Considerable Hitter.

      The 1918 Team

      1918 Boston Red Sox. Back row l-r: Trainer Dr. Martin Lawler, Hack Miller, Sam Jones, Fred Thomas,

      Babe Ruth, Harry Hooper, Carl Mays, Dave Shean, Walt Kinney, Amos Strunk, Stuffy McInnis, Edward Barrow.

      Front row l-r: Everett Scott, Jean Dubuc, Joe Bush, George Whiteman, Wally Schang, Wally Mayer,

      Heinie Wagner, Sam Agnew, Jack Coffey. Mascot and batboy in front.

      Sam Agnew by John McMurray

      Sam Agnew is best remembered for being the catcher for both of Babe Ruth’s pitching victories in the 1918 World Series. Although Agnew did not get a hit in the four Series games in which he played that season, he caught Ruth’s complete game shutout in Game One and eight innings of Ruth’s pitching in the tightly-contested Game Four before being removed for pinch-hitter Wally Schang in the bottom of the eighth; Schang singled and scored the game-winning run. A Hartford Courant subhead in mid-September, when a number of players appeared in an exhibition game in Connecticut’s capital, read, Ruth and Agnew Regarded as One of Strongest Batteries in Majors.

      Agnew shared the catching duties with Schang and Wally Mayer in 1918, catching the most games of the trio. He was known for taking risks trying to throw out baserunners, which contributed to his leading the league in errors twice in three years while with the St. Louis Browns, with 28 errors in 1913; 25 in 1914; and 39 in 1915. In 1918, however, Agnew made only 13 errors, one of the lowest totals of his career, albeit in fewer games.

      As a major leaguer, Agnew was never known for his hitting. Playing in 72 games in 1918, the right-handed batting Agnew got only 33 hits in 199 at-bats, finishing the year with a .166 average, no home runs, and six runs batted in. In fact, Agnew never hit better than .235 or drove in more than 24 runs in any of his seven major league seasons.

      Samuel Lester Agnew’s first professional baseball experience came in California with Vernon of the Pacific Coast League in 1912. There, the Farmington, Missouri, native had a strong offensive season, hitting .283 with five home runs. His performance caught the eye of the St. Louis Browns, who selected Agnew in the day’s equivalent of the Rule 5 draft. One thing that had caught their eye: He was reported to be the only catcher in the United States who had caught more than 100 games without a passed ball.

      Agnew made his major league debut with the Browns two days before his 25th birthday, on Opening Day, April 10, 1913, in a 3-1 St. Louis victory over Detroit. Agnew’s rookie season was his best offensively: The 5-foot-11, 185-pound backstop had a career-high nine doubles and five triples and stole 11 bases. Agnew also hit the only two home runs of his career in 1913, the first a three-run homer off Boardwalk Brown on June 11 and the second a solo homer served up by Russ Ford on July 13 at Sportsman’s Park.

      Agnew’s rookie success was short-lived. On July 25, 1913, in a game against the Washington Senators, Agnew suffered a broken jaw after being hit by a Joe Engel fastball. During that game, which ended in an 8-8 tie after 15 innings, Walter Johnson struck out 15 batters in the last 11 innings. Agnew was hospitalized for a week, until August 1; he began work again with the Browns on August 20. He completed the year hitting .208 with the two homers and 24 RBIs.

      After the regular season was over, Agnew took part in a spirited city championship series in which the Browns beat the Cardinals, the final doubleheader apparently degenerating, as reported in the New York Times to a fist fight between players, numerous verbal battles between the managers, the desertion of the umpires, and many other existing features.

      Agnew caught more than 100 games in both 1914 and 1915 for the Browns, but the team languished, finishing in seventh place in both seasons. In 1914, he caught 115 games and hit .212, driving in only 16 runs. The following year, he hit .203 in 104 games with 19 RBIs. Incidentally, he led the league in passed balls both years, with 18 and 17 respectively. Once more, the Browns won the St. Louis city series.

      Agnew made one headline after a bizarre moment on August 18, 1914, when he was called out by the umpire while sitting in the Browns dugout. With two runners on base, when Tilly Walker came up to bat in place of Doc Lavan, umpire Evans noticed that, according to the lineup card, the Browns had been batting out of order. Agnew was supposed to be batting, not Lavan. Agnew was called out and Wallace, who had singled, was removed from first base.

      On December 16, 1915, Agnew was sold to the Boston Red Sox, who wanted him to serve as a backup to incumbent catcher Pinch Thomas. He had impressed with his ability to cut down basestealers; in 1915, Agnew had thrown out Harry Hooper six times. Despite his anemic batting average, the Boston Globe termed the new acquisition a fine all-around player and asserted that he is a pretty good batter. The price was apparently $10,000. League president Ban Johnson announced that the deal would not be allowed to go through, but he was soon forced to back down

      Although Agnew played in only 40 games in 1916 with Boston, he was involved in one of the most dramatic incidents of that season. During a June 30 game, Senators shortstop George McBride threw his bat at Boston pitcher Carl Mays, who had hit McBride with a pitch. In the ensuing brawl, Agnew reportedly punched Washington manager Clark Griffith in the face. The outcry was so great that Agnew was arrested on the field, and Boston manager Bill Carrigan was required to bail him out of jail.

      Fortunately for Agnew, all charges were ultimately dropped.

      Agnew and Hick Cady both backed up Thomas throughout the 1916 season. Thomas, Cady, and Carrigan all saw service in the World Series, but Agnew did not. He was, however, the first player to report to Hot Springs for spring training in 1917.

      Now 30 years of age, Agnew caught more games than any other Boston catcher in both 1917 and 1918. Appearing in 85 games to Thomas’s 83 in 1917, he hit .208 and drove in 16 runs. In 1918, after a brief holdout in spring training, Agnew appeared in 72 of the season’s 126 games, batting just .166.

      Agnew did have his moments in the 1918 World Series: Though hitless in nine at-bats, he threw out three of the four Chicago Cubs baserunners

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