THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL
September 6, 1937
FED RACE TIGHTENS UP
What a difference a week makes. Just seven days ago the Boston Minutemen were riding high. Boston had a 5 and a half game cushion on second place Pittsburgh atop the Federal Association and were on a 5 game winning streak. Flash forward to today and the Boston lead is suddenly down to 1 and a half games with not only Pittsburgh, but also the Philadelphia Keystones and Chicago Chiefs right back in the thick of things.
Boston had a week they would rather forget as the Minutemen suffered 6 straight defeats including 3 in Chicago and a pair at home to the second place Miners. Pittsburgh went 4-2 to cut the gap including wins in Boston by 6-5 and 6-1 scores with Saturday's 6-1 loss especially difficult for the Minutemen to absorb as the Miners blew the game open with a 5 run outburst in the 8th inning. The week was not all good news for Pittsburgh as the Miners suffered yet another injury. This time it is shortstop Les Tucker (.248,5,56) who went down. Tucker, who has been bothered by a wonky back in the past, is done for the season after reinjuring it against Boston. It's hard to imagine any team in recent history that has been hit harder by injuries to position players than the Miners have this season. Mahlon Strong remains out while Ed Stewart, Sandy Grabow (twice) and George Cleaves (twice) have all missed substantial time.
The Chicago Chiefs did the essential, sweeping a 3 game set that allowed them to inch back into the race but Chicago shot itself in the foot over the weekend, dropping two of three to the lowly New York Gothams. Next up might be more trouble for the Chiefs as they have a Labor Day doubleheader in Detroit before moving on to St Louis. The Chiefs have struggled of late against the bottom three clubs in the Fed, and have dropped 5 of their last 6 contests with the Dynamos.
The Philadelphia Sailors took another big step forward in the Continental Association race by sweeping a pair from Brooklyn that adds another nail in the coffin of the defending CA champs. The Sailors went 5-1 last week and now lead second place Cleveland by 3 and a half games after the Foresters limped thru a 2-4 week that included absorbing a pair of weekend losses at home to Toronto.
QUICK HITS
- Washington Eagles outfielder Mel Carrol (.414,20,101) shows no signs of slowing down in his pursuit of a .400 season. The 25 year old hit .425 in August and is off to a torrid start in September with 10 hits in his first 21 at bats of the month. Max Morris was the last to hit .400 when he swatted at a .418 clip for the 1925 St Louis Pioneers. The only other player to hit .400 or better since 1911 is Powell Slocum, who did it 5 times in his career with the most recent being in 1922. The only Washington Eagle to ever hit .400 in a season was Freeman Rogers, who turned the trick in 1894 when he hit .402. T.R. Goins came close during his days as an Eagle, but topped out at .395 in 1926.
- The injury bug bit St Louis a couple of times this week with shortstop Ray Russell (.301,4,46) and starting pitcher David Abalo (15-11, 4.59) each coming up lame. Abalo will hopefully miss just a start or two but Russell is pretty much down for the year. At 6 games back with 26 games remaining the Pioneers have little wiggle room left if they want to win their first pennant since 1921.
- St Louis outfielder Gail Gifford (.346,15,90) had a five hit game last week against Pittsburgh. It was Gifford's second five hit game of the season as he did it in April against the New York Gothams and third of his career.
- Somebody should have pulled the trigger. Detroit was dangling Chuck Murphy (13-14, 3.71) at the trade deadline but found no takers. All Murphy did since the deadline was go 6-2 and win pitcher of the month honours in August for the Federal Association.
- Al Wheeler homered twice last week to give the Brooklyn slugger 23 on the season and 299 for his career. Wheeler's next homer will allow him to join Rankin Kellogg (457) and Max Morris (710) as the only players to reach the 300 homer plateau.
- Brooklyn pitcher Joe Shaffner had a big week as he tossed a pair of complete game shutouts. That times him for the CA lead in shutouts with 3 and improved his record to 15-3 and his league leading era to 2.66. Two years ago he led the CA in shutouts with 5 as part of his career best 24 win season.
- Not that there was really ever any doubt but the New York Stars have been officially eliminated from pennant contention. The Stars are the first team to be mathematically eliminated this season and sit last in the CA with a 50-79 record. New York's last pennant came in 1932 and the Stars, who currently trail 7th place Baltimore by 4 games, have not finished last in the CA since 1919.
- Tough break for the Cougars organization as 1936 second round pick Newt Jackson has been shut down for the year after a serious arm injury. The 19 year old righthander was 8-11 with a 5.96 era at Class C La Crosse.
- No homers but not a bad week for John Herrick. The 28 year old first baseman, who hit 38 homers in 117 games for AAA Buffalo, was promoted by Toronto and hit .320 (8-for-25) in his first 6 games with the Wolves. Herrick, who was originally a 1929 second round pick of the Chicago Chiefs out of Boulder College, had a 78 game stint with Toronto two years ago, hitting .259 with 2 homers in 78 games after the Wolves grabbed him from the Chiefs in the Rule Five draft that year.
SCOUTING THE 1938 DRAFT CLASS
It is still a long ways away but TWIFB thought it would take a look at the players OSA feels have the best chance to be part of the new 32-man lottery. We found 29 players that OSA at this point in time projects to be a solid big league regular. Over the next few weeks let's take a closer look at each of them. We will feature a different position group each week. We start today with the Catchers.
There have been some great catchers in the feeder league days: guys like Dick York, T.R. Goins, Alex Diaz, Fred Barrell and George Cleaves were all first round picks. However, since the death of the feeder leagues we have seen a big run of high quality catching prospects popping up regularly. In 1934 we had a debate over which Tennessee native was better - Adam Mullins the college kid who played at Eastern Oklahoma or Dunlap High Schooler Woody Stone. Mullins would end up going 6th and Stone 8th in that year's draft and both have made their big league debuts. 1935 the story was Bill Van Ness, who Boston took with the 6th pick. 1936 was a bit of a drop-off but two catchers went in the second round in Bill Wilson and Cliff Smith. Last year we had the highly touted Pete Casstevens as one of the prize picks of the new player lottery. Casstevens went to Detroit while Washington also landed a solid catching prospect in Paul Wilkerson.
This season may not give us a player of Casstevens talents behind the plate but there are a few good ones, led by the son of current Terre Haute manager and former Detroit Dynamos legend Dick York. It is asking a lot, probably too much for Rick York to approach the career his father had, and he will need a huge senior season to even come close to being compared with last year's catching gem Casstevens. If it isn't York, the next big catching prospect may not be that far away as Cal Morgan, a Cincinnati born 16 year who just completed his sophomore high school season at Alexandria (IN) High is a 2-time High School All-American with a .529 career batting average. While he lacks Casstevens raw power, Morgan did have a higher batting average than the Detroit prospect in each of the last two seasons. Morgan will draft eligible in 1939.
There are 4 catchers from the 1938 draft class that OSA feels have big league potential. Here they are in alphabetical order:
BILL JOHNSON: 17 Jacksonville (FL) High School
Size might be a concern as the diminutive Johnson stands just 5'9" and weighs in at 140 pounds but has a work ethic that is off the charts. The odds are against Johnson as just 8 Florida born catchers have ever played major league baseball led by Will Ogan, who appeared in 524 games over 8 seasons with the Philadelphia Keystones in the 1920s but there are 2 current Floridan catchers in the big leagues in Baltimore's Joe Rainbow and Bill Smith of Detroit.
MIKE LOGAN : 17 Catholic Central HS, Detroit, MI
At 6'2", 195 lbs and growing there is hope Logan could develop a bit of power. He hit 3 homers as a junior but just 1 last season although he did deliver 31 doubles over that time frame. He hit .462 at Catholic Central last season which places him in the upper range of high school hitters. OSA says Logan won't win any batting titles but should be a solid hitter.
SOLLY SKIDMORE: 17 Monroe (GA) High School
Only 3 high school catchers hit for a higher average than the .488 Skidmore put up last season. He hit just 1 homer in 21 games last season which as a junior was his first year of high school ball. While lacking the power you might like to see in a catcher he does project to be a .310 hitter with decent defensive abilities. Like Logan, Skidmore has plenty of size.
RICK YORK: 17 Terre Haute (IN) High School
The son of former major league catching legend Dick York and younger brother of infielder Joe York, who was Brooklyn's first round pick this past June. Rick was a two-time honourable mention for the High School All-American team and projects to be a pretty solid hitting catcher. Not blessed with much speed but he has good instincts and stole 19 bases the past two seasons in high school ball.
Next week we will take a look at the corner infielders to watch for next June.
The Week That Was
Current events for the week ending 9/05/1937
- US, British and French Consuls General demand that Chinese land forces and Japanese warships shift their fight away from the vicinity of international settlements in Shanghai.
- China's supreme army commander told nations of the world that their own safety is at stake without immediate international intervention to end the Sino-Japanese war.
- French and British warships are hunting the Mediterranean after Italian submarines torpedo sinks a Soviet Freighter. Italy claims to have no knowledge of the attacking submarines.
- Both sides err in Labor strife says President Roosevelt in his Labor Day statement as he urges a sane attitude from both sides and calls for the conference table to take the place of the strike.