[Jiggs McGee]

OCTOBER 7, 1938

SERIES SHIFTS WEST KNOTTED AT ONE

The Chicago Chiefs accomplished what they needed to do by earning a split of the first two games of the World Championship Series on the road while for the hometown Brooklyn Kings the win in the opener helped erase the bad memories from two years ago when the same two clubs met in a series that the Chiefs dominated, winning in a sweep. The Series now moves to Whitney Park in Chicago and while it is a little more homer-friendly than Brooklyn's Kings County Park the expectation is we will continue to see quality pitching.

BARRELL FANS 11 IN GAME ONE

The Series opener certainly provided the kind of pitching we would expect with a combined 6 Allen Awards on the mound as Brooklyn's Tom Barrell and Chicago's Rabbit Day squared off in a Series game for the second time. The initial meeting between the two in Game One of the 1936 campaign was a one-sided affair with the Chiefs roughing up the Brooklyn ace for 8 runs in the first three innings of a rout. The story was different this time around as Barrell fanned 11 in tossing a 4 hit gem to lead the Kings to a 4-1 victory. It marked just the third time in World Championship Series history a pitcher had fanned as many as 11 hitters in a game. Day was nearly as impressive, going the distance for Chicago but suffering just the second series loss of his career. (He has won 6 games in WCS play).

An announced crowd of just 39 below Kings County Park's capacity of 32,000 had cause for concern early as after a 1-2-3 opening inning Chicago's lead-off man in the second, Hank Barnett, singled and moved to third on Cliff Moss' double. He would score on a Bob Martin groundout but Barrell would escape with no further damage striking out Rabbit Day for his first K of the day. Brooklyn evened the contest in the bottom of the second in much the same fashion as Al Wheeler and Fred Barrell singled with a ground out by former Chief Bob Worley plating Wheeler with the equalizer.

Tom Barrell would settle down with 3 strikeouts in the third inning allowing only a single by Day in the fifth and and one by Tom Bird in the sixth with no Chicago players getting into scoring position the rest of the way. Day was nearly as efficient but allowed a lead-off double to Fred Barrell in the fifth and he would eventually score on a sacrifice fly from his brother Tom making the score 2-1. That would be enough for the Barrell battery to work with but Alf Pestilli added some insurance with a 2-run homer in the 8th inning to complete the scoring.

Tom Barrell's 11-strikeout game is the most ever by a Kings pitcher, smashing the old mark of 6 he set in that 1936 Series opener against the Chiefs. He also becomes just the third pitcher in history to fan at least 11 in a WCS game. The other two are Hall of Famer Woody Trease, who also K'd 11 in a 1906 game for Boston and the little known Jimmy Redpath, who fanned 14 in an 11 inning game for Baltimore against Pittsburgh in 1907.

JIMMY REDPATH

Redpath is one of those unusual stories the sport is so full of. 14 k's is impressive but it also is the only season Redpath played professional baseball. Signed by Baltimore prior to the 1897 season as a 19 year old, Redpath came out of nowhere (well, Millcreek Utah to be precise) and went 25-7 with a 1.63 ERA while leading the league in K's with 286 as Baltimore made a Detroit Dynamos type turnaround by improving by 32 wins and going from 6th to first in the CA.

They were known as the Clippers back then and among their many young stars was also Powell Slocum, then a 19 year old himself along with another sensational teen that season by the name of Mike Marner, who won 34 games as a rookie. Marner went 0-1 in the Series against Pittsburgh that year but the youthful Clippers took the title in 6 in no small part due to the effort of Redpath, who won both his starts including a 14 strikeout extra-inning effort.

While Marner and Slocum continued on to both have outstanding careers and Slocum to be the Kings manager in Barrell's 11 k effort, the third member of the teenage trio never pitched again. The Clippers released Redpath following that World Championship victory for some reason and his entire pro career consisted of that single magical season. So after his 14 K effort on October 10th Redpath would pitch just one more professional game - winning it as well as the Clippers claimed the Series in six games. What is also puzzling is if you look up Jimmy Redpath he is listed as a catcher but never caught a pro game, making 34 appearances that year plus the 2 Series starts but all were on the mound. Also unknown is why he never played again. No mention of any sort of injury. He simply was released by the Clippers, sat in limbo for a year and then retired. Speculation on why ranges wide: Did he do something so heinous behind closed doors he was blackballed by all owners or could it have been as simple as he was homesick and returned to Utah, only playing sandlot ball after that magical series? The true answer may lie somewhere in between but it is lost in history now.

EARLY START GIVES CHIEFS GAME TWO WIN

The Chiefs swept Brooklyn in 1936 easily by getting off to quick starts and actually never trailed in that series. They scored first in game one this time around as well and did the same thing here in the second game. It was a 4-run first inning that proved to be the difference in Chicago's 4-3 victory.

Brooklyn pitcher Mike Murphy allowed 3 hits in the first inning and the Chiefs were aided by two Brooklyn errors in the opening frame. Murphy settled down nicely after that but the damage was done with perhaps the biggest moment in the game coming very early in the contest. Ron Rattigan popped out to lead-off the game but then Pete Layton doubled. That brought up Chicago catcher Tom Bird who worked the count to 3-2 and then fouls off 4 pitches before hitting a triple to the gap in right-center. Layton scored on the play and than Hank Barnett lifted a deep sacrifice fly to score Bird with the second run. Bird is not the fleetest of creatures, he hit just 4 triples this season and only 14 in his career. The Chiefs would add two more runs and send 8 men to the plate, leading 4-0 before Jim Lonardo had to throw a single pitch.

The veteran Lonardo was not at his best on this day but did just enough to preserve a 4-3 victory. Al Wheeler, who has had some rough postseasons in the past, had a 2 hit game for the Kings and Alf Pestilli homered for the third game in a row. Pestilli, who hit a 2-run shot in the win yesterday and a 10th inning homer to beat the New York Stars in the regular season finale, continues to display some of the power that his younger brother Sal is becoming famous for in Detroit. Bob Martin had a pair of doubles for the Chiefs in the win.

The Week That Was
Current events from 10/07/1938

• Germany's demand for "reparations for injustices inflicted by the Czechs on the Sudetens since 1918" looms as a new obstacle in successfully completing a peaceful settlement of the German quarrel with Czechoslovakia.
• Czech President Eduard Benes, who had been denounced as an enemy by Hitler resigned today calling the move in the best interests of the Czechs in negotiations.
• A key member of British Prime Minister Chamberlain's cabinet reiterated that London has no desire to shut Russia out of any future settlement talk for Europe. Britain urges Russia to play a key role in guaranteeing the boundaries of the Czech nation that is to be left after dismemberment.
• After being hit by a bouquet of roses and scratched while making a triumphant tour thru Sudenten lands, Hitler issues a general order for the Nazi party to ban the holding of flowers along his travel route.
• On the hopes of a boom in the auto, steel and chemical sectors, stocks rose today hitting a new high ground for the year.