Infinite Inning 350: Overlooked Baseball - The Greater Bullet and the Lesser Babe

First we make amends to a great of the game who was not only left out of last week’s Shohei Ohtani-Babe Ruth approbation, but was poorly served by baseball (and Baseball). Then we jump from the bizarre Muncy double play of NLCS Game 1 to the most famous baserunning mishap of the Dodgers’ Brooklyn years.  

The Infinite Inning is a journey to the past to understand the present using baseball as our time machine. America's brighter mirror, baseball reflects, anticipates, and even mocks the stories we tell ourselves about our world today. Baseball Prospectus's Steven Goldman shares his obsessions: history from inside and outside of the game, politics, stats, and Casey Stengel quotations. Along the way, we'll try to solve the puzzle that is the Infinite Inning: How do you find the joy in life when you can’t get anybody out?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's get right into it today, because it's World Series time.
There's a lot of baseball this weekend, and I know
I can't claim too much of your time. For that matter,
Show hey Tani is about to claim mine, at least
I think he is. Maybe he'll do Gil Hodges or
Dave Winfield and have a one for twenty one or
oh for twenty World Series. That would be depressing. And

(00:20):
I say that without rooting for anyone. I'm just rooting
for a good show. This week, I got a note
from listener Ken, who reminded me, and not just me,
but some other fellas in this space, that when I
talked about show Hey Otani's spectacular NLCS Game four, six
scoreless innings, three count them three home runs, it was
insufficient to say, well, that was unprecedented, Babe Ruth never

(00:44):
did that, or, as I believe I said last week,
you know when Reggie Jackson hit three home runs in
seventy seven, he wasn't also pitching, Ken, and thank you
for both listening and writing, also brought up games like
Bob Gibson's nineteen sixty seven Weld Series Game seven, the clincher. Obviously,
we don't play nine games anymore, in which he allowed

(01:05):
two runs on three hits and struck out ten in
a complete game while also home ering off of that
year's al Cy Young Award winner, Jim Lonborg. And the
reason it's insufficient to stop there, Ken pointed out, is
because we're slighting another great, great player, a man whose
name was Wilbur but we know him as Bullet, the

(01:28):
Negro League's great Bullet Rogan. I really appreciated Ken reminding
me of that, because today, more than ever, when a
political faction is trying to bleach our history of the
contributions of men and women of color, I should not
be guilty of doing the same by neglecting incredible players
like Rogan. Just saying the four going makes me feel

(01:50):
incredibly saddened and downhearted because what he and players like
him did, and Rogan was very much a foundational player
for black baseball are such a great part of both
our baseball and our national story. And what bothers me
most of all is that this isn't the first time
that he's been left out of the conversation. Some very

(02:13):
light background Briefly, there's some slipperiness to Rogan's birth date,
but he came into the world in Oklahoma, somewhere in
the early eighteen nineties. He was a small guy, only
five foot seven, but he was very strong, so he
could throw very hard, and he had the wrists for hitting.
He pitched sidearm, which reminds me, especially given the period,

(02:34):
a little bit of Walter Johnson. I so love looking
at old footage of Johnson's wind up. It's so smooth
and you can see how he's generating velocity out of
his hip rotation. Rogan was doing something similar, I expect,
and he always did it from the stretch. No wind up.
He threw a palmball as a changeup and a drop curve,
which actually, from some of the descriptions of hitters who

(02:57):
at it against him, makes it sound a little sliderish me.
But I might be misreading things because it does seem
to have come in from above and kind of arked
into the strike zone, as opposed to slashing in from
the side. I read a few descriptions like that too, though.
You can find a lot of anecdotes about how Rogan
would throw that hard fastball with a hop on it

(03:18):
and then have batters falling out of their shoes getting
out in front of the palm ball. Here's the thing, though,
even though Rogan was born well before Walter Johnson, his
professional career didn't get started until after the Big Trains,
in part because there really was nowhere for a black
player to go back then if he wanted to be

(03:39):
a professional. The Negro National League didn't get started until
nineteen twenty, when Rogan was already somewhere in the ballpark
of thirty years old. He and a number of contemporaries
who were there at the league's beginnings had actually spent
quite a bit of time in the Army, which had
built several all black units to patrol the West and

(03:59):
the imperial outposts like the Philippines. Rogan soldiered a lot
and played baseball a lot. It was his military playing,
in fact, that got him noticed by the incipient Negro
National leagues, and this came via the offices of Baseball
Zelig Charles Dylan, Casey Stangle. I didn't plan this, Ken,

(04:20):
you brought this up. I know I talk about the
old Man a lot, but I have no choice here
if we're going to talk about Rogan. Now, this story
might have gotten a bit garbled in terms of its
chronology over the more than one hundred years since it happened.
But the basic version of the story was that in
the winter of nineteen nineteen, Casey Stangle then playing very
unhappily as an outfielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates, which at

(04:43):
that moment were neither competitive on the field or in
the payroll department. What else is new? He was barnstorming
through the Southwest and played against a Black Army team
that was impressive, to say the least. When he returned
to his hometown of Kansas City, he told a friend J. L. Wilkinson,
the owner who was starting up the Kansas City Monarchs

(05:05):
franchise for the new Negro League, Hey, have I got
some players for you? And that is how the Monarchs began.
The reason I said that the chronology might have gotten
a little garbled in the interim is that there's reason
to believe that Wilkinson might not have been completely unaware
of the existence of Rogan and his teammates at that point.

(05:26):
But even if that were true, it doesn't really change
the substance of the story because Casey still did play them,
still did give his endorsement, which would have carried some weight.
He was known as a very smart baseball guy even then.
That's in addition to being known as an eccentric, of course,
and so even if his endorsement did not fall on
Holy Virginal ears, I don't see that it would have

(05:48):
done anything less than enhance Wilkinson's interest. Rogan would spend
his entire career with the Monarchs, including managing them to
a pennant in the late nineteen twenties, although he didn't
play in that one because somehow, during some roughhousing with
one of his kids, said kid put a needle through
his knee. I had a friend I may have mentioned
this before when my wife was in graduate school who

(06:10):
had a toddler I believe daughter at the time, who
just ran up to him one day while he was
watching TV, said hey, Daddy, and shoved a Q tip
through his ear drum. I can still imagine what his
screams must have sounded like. Here's how Baseball Reference currently
sees Rogan's stats. As you know, Negro league stats are
always evolving via research. He had a record of one

(06:32):
hundred and twenty and fifty two on the mound with
a two sixty five era exceptionally strong two point four
walks per nine, five point five strikeouts per nine, and
because he was such a good hitter, he played regularly
when he wasn't on the mound and compiled averages of
three thirty eight with a four to thirteen on base
percentage and a five twenty one slugging percentage. In his

(06:54):
best season, nineteen twenty two, he hit three sixty nine
with a four to fifty three on bit and a
six to sixty slugging percentage, with fifteen home runs in
seventy four games. Again, take these stats with a grain
of salt, because the records are incomplete and the level
of competition was uneven, and yet there's still no reason
to think that they aren't representative of Rogan's abilities. Not

(07:16):
every Negro League player at the time was putting up
those sorts of numbers, particularly not while also serving as
a staff ace. In the final game of the nineteen
twenty five Negro League's championship series against the Saint Louis Stars,
Rogan pitched a seven hit, no walk shut out with
eight strikeouts in eight innings. I didn't get to see

(07:37):
if the rain came down at that point, but the
game only went eight and he also batted fifth and
went one for two driving into runs. So yes, Rogan
should absolutely be in the picture with Ruth and Otani.
It's hard for me to know what sort of person
Rogan was. It sounds like he was pretty guarded with outsiders,
but once he got to know you, he was fine.

(07:58):
I don't think there were many or any negative controversies
attached to his name. The worst thing I've seen said
about him is something that has been applied to many
great players, which is that he wasn't necessarily the best
manager because the game came so easily to him. It
was hard to relate when mere mortal players didn't execute
at the level of his expectations, and I wish that

(08:19):
it almost were the opposite. I wish that he was
not a nice man, because if he were, I would
feel a little better about the rest of what I'm
about to tell you. In books about the negro leagues,
such as John Holway's Black Ball Stars, there's always a
lot of space devoted to whether Rogan or satchral Page
was the better pitcher. They barely overlapped, so it's hard

(08:39):
to know. I'm going to talk about Dodger star Babe
Herman in the second half of the show. But he's
also going to show up right here, right now because
Holway talked to him about hitting off of Bullet. Rogan
Herman played in the twenties and thirties. Herman said he
was the best colored pitcher I hit against. Had one
of the best curve balls I ever saw, and a

(09:01):
good live fastball. I always said he was much better
than Satchel Paige. Satchel was real fast, but he had
a lousy curve and his fastball was pretty straight. Rogan's
fastball was just alive. Did you ever see Luke play?
I think Rogan must have learned his curveball from him.
Broke straight down, he could feel his position good, and

(09:22):
he used to hit a few over the fence in
that small park they played in in Los Angeles. The
Luke to which he was referring was neither the Disciple
nor Skywalker, but Dolph Luke Luque the pitching grate for
the Reds of Cuban origin but of Caucasian complexion that
allowed him to play in the National League, whereas a

(09:43):
darker skinned contemporary such as Christabal Torriente was restricted to
the same circuit that Rogan was. My point in including
the Babe Herman quote is that Rogan was not a
secret to players who were around back then. Certainly Casey
knew about him. Obviously Herman did too, and he had
a very strong record in off season games against white

(10:05):
players who were barnstorming out west. And just like all
the negro leagues, great sat various times bullet Rogan had
to sit there and hear from white players. Gee, if
you were only white, you could really help us this year.
Rogan was active in the Negro Leagues until nineteen thirty eight.
He played until he was quite elderly in baseball terms.

(10:26):
Babe Herman was active both in the majors in the
Pacific Coast League until nineteen forty five. Casey, of course,
was active in baseball until nineteen sixty five, was a
celebrity in the game until his death ten years after that.
My point is that this knowledge was not in any
way obscure. It had not been encased in amber somewhere

(10:47):
around nineteen twenty, It was pretty recent as of nineteen
forty seven, when baseball partially ended the color line, and
yet it was still so dedicated to the inferiority of
black people. That they didn't admit any of those former
greats who had been shut out of the white majors
to the Hall of Fame until the late date of

(11:09):
nineteen seventy one. Even then they wanted to put them
in a sort of side room and say, oh, and
these guys also played baseball. They'd be damned if they
were going to put Oscar Charleston and Cool Papa Bell
and the rest on the same wall as Babe Ruth
and Lou Garrick. We'll just look at them. It was horrible.
Satchel Page, who was going in first, called them on it.

(11:31):
This was all defended by Bouie Kune, a commissioner at
least as tone deaf as Rob Manfred, but he also
had two left feet. Eventually they backed down, and the
damned gallery is not segregated. Just think about that. Even
if players after the Negro leaguers were on that wall
with the Babe and Lou and so on. They wanted

(11:53):
to repeat the insult, the injury that had been done
to these men in life in history. In remembrance, Hey
said he wasn't a second class player, and he wasn't
going to be a second class Hall of Famer, so
you can keep it if you're going to be that way.
That was how the people in charge saw America, and
many still do. In Hallway's book, which predates all that

(12:13):
predates Satchel Page being taken into the Hall of Fame
as the first negro Leakue's player, Herman went on about
the need to induct them. They ought to put some
of those guys in the Hall of Fame. I told
Casey Stangel, the guys they put in the Hall of
Fame are a joke. Rogan's the guy ought to go in.
Casey recommended it to the commissioner, but it never took

(12:36):
I don't know when that conversation took place, or even
which commissioner Casey spoke with, but I do know that
the first Hall of Fame vote took place in nineteen
thirty six, that Casey was inducted in nineteen sixty five,
assuming he didn't speak out before then. Bullet Rogan died
in nineteen sixty seven, and some committee gave him a

(12:57):
plaque in nineteen ninety eight. He didn't know, he didn't hear,
and that honor quote unquote did nothing to stir him
from the box in which he dwelt for over twenty years.
Think he'd have felt something a little stronger if baseball
had put aside its traditional prejudices just a little earlier.

(13:18):
And why are such prejudices resurgent? Now, I'll tell you why,
because every chapter of the preceding story takes place in
the doom scarred lands of the Infinite Inning. Well, hello there,

(14:08):
and welcome back to the show. This is the Infinite Inning.
I am your host, Steven Goldman. And if I sound
a little excited, it's because the odometer just rolled over.
You know, I've never understood that. I was once as
a kid in a car with a family friend and
he said, look, we're going over one hundred thousand Look, look, look,

(14:30):
And it was like he had spotted an ivory built
woodpecker for the first time since nineteen twenty one. I'm
just not sentimental about things like that. I don't know
why i'm not, but I'm not. I don't see the
reason to be. And if you were thinking I was
going to say I'm excited because the World series is
about to begin, yes, that too is true, But I
was referring to the fact that, according to my records,

(14:52):
this is episode three hundred and fifty, a nice round
number worthy of celebration. No, it isn't exactly three point fifty,
and that's because I've thrown in the odd extra episode.
I didn't number the same way, and we've now had
over twenty reissue episodes, which I don't count against the total.
But I suppose I do feel some sense of accomplishment,

(15:14):
and that reflects the fact that we have been here
now together, you and I since twenty seventeen, I believe July.
So that number reflects something like eight years and three
months work during which I have told over seven hundred
baseball stories. I should amend that to say I've told
other kinds of history as well. Usually both are intertwined,

(15:38):
but not every time. I have given you a series
of historical fiction takes on players like Lou Garrick, Babe
Ruth and Broadway Lynn, Larry Joe McCarthy. Two, I should
do a few who aren't Yankees. We've done original songs
about baseball during the run of the show. I don't
mean to pat myself on the back, but when I
look back at that, it's similar to what I feel

(16:00):
when I look at my baseball perspectus. Files. Now. I
have been part of Baseball Perspectus for the majority of
the last twenty two twenty three years, and I have
written well over five hundred pieces for Baseballperspectives dot com,
not to mention various other ancillary bits and books and things.

(16:24):
And I think this it turned out to be my life.
I still feel very young inside. I'm not young outside.
I'm not young in a lot of ways, but I
still feel like I'm starting out. I still feel like
I'm trying to decide what I want to do when
I grow up. But here it is, this is what
I did. What does it add up to? I don't know.
I don't think it's for me to decide. I go

(16:45):
into a lot of use bookstores. I love to find
a bargain on an old book. Even more than that,
I love to find one that I didn't know about.
I've mentioned before that sometimes Stephanie and I have this
conversation and it could be about what we want to
have for dinner or what movie we want to watch,
and I'll say, I want to watch that one that
I like, which one, well, you know, the one that

(17:06):
we haven't seen yet but appeals to me in all
the ways that I really like things, and I think
what I mean is Raiders of the Lost Ark again,
just not the Raiders of the Lost Arc that I've
seen ninety eight times since nineteen eighty two or whenever
it came out, and that doesn't exactly exist. And that's
kind of the frustration. What would you like for dinner?
You know that food that I like but we haven't

(17:27):
ordered in a long time, the one that tastes really
good and isn't bad for you, and it won't disappoint
me because the place that we're going to buy it
from is actually good, and we won't just be settling
for a change. So that's all kind of futile and
not useful. But here's the wonderful thing about the wide
wide world of books. If you go into a well
stocked bookstore, used or new, there's a very strong chance

(17:49):
that you will find that book. And maybe you knew
about it in advance, and maybe you've never heard about
it before. But you pull it off the shelf and
you read the back or you read jacket copy, and
you say, yes, this is it. Now. I can't promise
you that it will be good. I can't promise you
that it will meet your every expectation, but it just might. Now.

(18:10):
The reason I bring this up is when I go
into those stores, I often find books whether I'm interested
in them or not, doesn't matter that might have been
big best sellers in their day but are totally forgotten now.
And I don't mean totally forgotten in a way that
they will eventually be rediscovered because they're that great. No,
they're just gone. More likely they didn't sell at all.

(18:30):
It came out for the author on a Tuesday, and
that author he or she or they was sitting at
home and saying, today is the day my life is
going to change. No. Actually, the box of books landed
at each bookstore with a thud. There, they stayed there,
it remained, and there might not have been an encore.
So I know that whatever legacy I have isn't up

(18:50):
to me. And if someday someone wants to say that
I wasted my life writing and talking about a kid's
game and doing it in the way that I do,
which is to interlink it with the culture and politics
and history of America at large, was especially alienating for
a large segment of our increasingly reactionary audience. Well, so
be it this is the life that I chose or

(19:13):
chose me a lot of both. Mostly I guess I
chose it. And although it's a cliche to say that
the real value was in the friends that we made
along the way, it really has been that for me
that I've gotten to talk with you and hear from
you and learn from you, as I did from Ken's
email this week, that I would never trade for a
much more popular or lucrative kind of occupation. So, speaking

(19:37):
of lucrative, that would be a good time to bring
this up. I feel kind of awkward about this. I
always do, and if you've been listening for long enough,
you know that the last thing I'm interested in doing
is a PBS style pledge drive. Our operators are standing
by This show is supported by a combination of its
many loyal Patreon subscribers and the small amount of money

(19:58):
that I received through advertise. Whereas the audience of The
Infinite Inning is not large by the standards of Joe
Rogan or any of those other top of the list podcasts,
it has been both consistently above average, except for a
bit of a sag I talked about maybe over a
year ago now, which we seem to have gone past,

(20:18):
and but for that blip where I worried that I
might have run my course with you, it has been
very loyal. Even so, the revenues that the show brings
in are not necessarily equivalent to the amount of time
it takes to produce the program. And so going back
to day one, this has been a labor of love,
but it has also been a battle to make it

(20:38):
something more than that in terms of my family. And
I say all of this is a kind of prologue
to a new kind of advertising I'm going to be
experimenting with over the next few weeks, which you may
or may not find intrusive, and I urge you to
let me know how you feel about it, whether via
email or the Facebook group. And it is this the
dreaded live read. I have heard it on other podcasts.

(21:02):
Hey folks, go to that website and get fifteen percent
off your trust when you mentioned the show. Well, that's
the kind of thing I'm going to try. It's been
made available to me by my podcast platform. I'm not
supposed to read it like that, Hey, folks. It's not
supposed to be phony, but I just want to be
straight with you. It's a list of about fifty products.
I wasn't very happy with most of them. They were

(21:23):
not things that I felt like I could recommend to you.
But I found a couple that I might actually use myself.
And at that point I thought, well, okay, I haven't
used them, not yet. Again, not going to lie to you,
but I thought we'd experiment and see how this thing goes. Again.
If you object, let me know, because you matter more
than the few pennies that we might add to this
show's bottom line. Now, in addition to companies that pitch

(21:46):
themselves by saying wear hats just like Milania's a possibility
that caused me to swear very loudly and creatively and
then be sick for a week, there were a number
of purveyors of coffee, and coffee is very important to me.
To me, it is, this is sad to say, but true,
the best part of every day. I look forward to
it when I get to fill my bespoke oversized coffee

(22:09):
mug with the latest Java that we are trying out.
We experiment quite a bit with the good stuff, which
is a commitment nowadays because, as you know, the wholesale
price of coffee is up. Something like forty five percent
year over year. That's partially due to climate change, a
Chinese hoax. I understand. I was told that by one
of Malania's hats, and of course the tariffs that have

(22:32):
been placed on just about everyone who actually produces coffee,
because just about no coffee is produced here in the
United States. That's why I decided to partner with Afuera Coffee.
I hope I got that right. You know me in accents,
we don't go well together. Afuera Coffee takes your coffee
experience to the next level with their specialty hand selected beans.

(22:53):
Starts directly from sustainable certified Rainforest Alliance farms in Central
and South America, presently about to be visited by the
aircraft carrier Gerald Ford. These are very strange times, but
they primarily ship out of El Salvador, which just this
one time is not in trouble, not yet. Their meticulous
roasting process brings out the rich, smooth, and aromatic flavors

(23:15):
Afuera Coffee is known for. I wouldn't know. I haven't
tried it yet. If you try it, you can let
me know. And if you do try it by going
to Afueracoffee dot Com and you type in the code
infinite inning, you will get fifteen percent off of any product.
You're really not supposed to read it that way, but
I feel like reading things that way. I've done it

(23:37):
so many times, including for the erg gil ex Body Battery.
I feel like phony old radio callbacks are really part
of my shtick. That said, I'd love to do these
as diegetic ads. You know what I mean by that,
ads that are actually part of the story. There was,
for seemingly one hundred years a great old radio sitcom
called Fiber McGhee and Molly. Fibber and Molly were husband

(23:59):
and wiferom the show. They were played by a real
husband and wife, and a couple of times an episode
the announcer Harlow Wilcox would intrude on the action. Fibber
would be mumbling to himself, I can't believe that Guildersleeves
stole my stamp collection, and Wilcox would say, gee, mister McGee,
you sure seem down in the dumps and say, yeah,
I lost my stamp collection, and Harlow would say, I

(24:19):
know what'll cheer you up, A good wax of your
floor with Johnson wax and to the show's credit. I
think Fibber was generally like, would you get the hell
out of here with that? But it was all part
of the gag as opposed to being intrusive. We'll be
right back after this message from Ovaltine. See that's interrupting
the action, whereas you just stayed in the world of
Wistful Vista where Fibber and Molly made their homes. I'll

(24:42):
tell you a fun thing to look out for if
you listen to that show. One of the characters was
played by Arthur Q. Brian. Now, we tend to think
of all the Looney Tunes voices as having been done
by mil Blank. Well many of them were, and eventually
so was Elmer Fudd because Arthur Q. Bryan kicked off
after a certain amount of time. But he was the
actor who originally voiced the character. Before that point. Obviously

(25:06):
he was not doing Fiber McGhee from Beyond the Grave.
He was on the show and he sounds well exactly
like himself, which is to say, exactly like Elmer J. Fudd.
So we got our first Dad in and hopefully next
time I won't take like ten minutes doing it. How
do you feel about that very briefly. This week at
Baseball Perspectus, I wrote about the possibility of labor strife
at World Series time next year, overhanging this year's postseason

(25:29):
like a vampire. The day after I wrote that, my
good friend and occasional guest here, Mark Normanden, wrote about
the owner's desire for a cap and how it really
shouldn't drive the negotiations this time around. I'm not so
sure about that, but Mark generally knows his apples. So
if that kind of subject matter intrigues you, then you've
got two barrel double fisted action. Or is that double

(25:50):
barrel two fisted action, however you like it. It's the
Titanic team up that you demanded. See what I mean
about this being part of my stick. When someone tells
you that a salary cap is necessary for baseball to
improve competitive balance, tell them that they're full of it,
and we can unpack that if you want another time.
But just the basic math does not work, And primarily

(26:12):
what it will do is lop the top off of
teams like the Dodgers and the Yankees, not so that
they're suddenly having to scrap for good players, but so
that ownership can pocket more dough. It will not change
that much for teams like the Pirates. They're not going
to suddenly become competitive. Now. If the owners simultaneously started

(26:34):
sharing a lot more revenue, then that might be the case.
But as it is right now, any reasonable salary floor
is not being met by teams like the Pirates. In
any reasonable cap situation, they would have to add salary.
But the thing is they're not spending that much because
they supposedly can't afford to so without increased revenue sharing,
that would seem to be a recipe for going broke,

(26:56):
unless unless they've been dishonest about that. You don't think,
all right, well, we'll put a pin in that for now.
The World Series doth approach, and I would like to
let class go early. The World Series doth approach pursued
by a bear little Shakespeare for you, very bad Shakespeare.
So let us not tarry, let us not dally, but

(27:17):
rather move on to the second act of the show
just after this on rushing break. This story suggested itself
to me based on something that happened in the first
game of this year's NLCS between the Dodgers and Brewers.
I've already mentioned the main character. I wonder if when
it happened you've thought of this too. You can let
me know about that as well, and you don't even
have to include a coupon code. Back in the first

(28:01):
game of this year's NLCS National League Championship Series, for
those of you who came and laid, the Dodgers hit
into one of the stranger double plays in postseason history,
if not baseball history in general. Oddly enough, though, it
had an antecedent in team history. As I said before
the break, I bet some of you have already guessed

(28:22):
where I'm going with this, because in our current insane epoch,
time feels like a thirty three played at forty five.
A brief refresher. It was the fourth inning of Game one.
There was one out, the bases were loaded, and Max
Munsey was at the plate against Quinn Priester. Munsey hit
a fly ball to deep center field. Brewers center fielder

(28:43):
Sal Frelick got back to the wall made a leaping
attempt at catch, but while his mitt and the ball
did come together for a brief moment, the ball bounced
out and hit the top of the wall. So live
ball in play, not a grand slam, but not an out.
This was unclear to just about everyone involved. Freylick caught
the ball in the air, but off the wall. He

(29:05):
later said it was just kind of hovering there. If
he had caught it off of his mit, it would
have been an out, but no, it had made contact
with something other than him before being caught, so it
was still a live ball. The umpire did signal no catch,
but the base runners were a little too harried to
pick up on that. The runner on third, ta Oscar Hernandez,

(29:26):
didn't know if he should tag up. Just run, stay put,
dig a hole and we'll never come out again. The
Brewers threw the ball to the plate where catcher William
Contreras was hipped to what was going on, and he
stepped on the plate for a force out one down.
He then jogged the ball over to third base and
stepped on that bag for the second force out, this
one on will Smith, who should have advanced from second

(29:48):
after the ball had hit the wall if he had known.
If he had understood that the ball had hit the wall.
Inning over score that a four hundred foot ground ball
double play eight six'. Two although it wasn't that. Simple
it took quite a bit of discussion before everyone had
understood what had. Happened it's never a bad thing when a,
play in particular in a postseason, game inspires one to.

(30:10):
Discuss Floyd Cave's herman one of baseball's other, babes lesser
babes we might call. Them it was probably, though the
second Best babe there Was Babe, ruth then a big,
gap and then the number two Was Babe, herman or
maybe the Great pirates control. Pitcher Babe, adams who we've
spoken about a lot on this, show was, second And
herman was. Third Babe phelps was a platoon catcher who

(30:32):
could really, hit but was very. Eccentric they called him
the Grounded blimp for a, reason and of course he
was not necessarily in the best of shape, either hence
the second part of that. Appellation Babe young drove in
one hundred runs twice for The giants in the, forties
but the war stopped him just when he was getting.
Going Babe borton And Babe dahlgren are remembered mainly because
they were linked with The, yankees the former being one

(30:55):
of the two players acquired for Hal, chase the latter
for Taking Lou garrigs spot in the lineup in nineteen
thirty nine When lou was too ill to go. ON
i Guess Babe borden is also kind of remembered for
getting himself banned from The Pacific Coast league for game
fixing just before The Black sox affair went into full
public crisis. Mode chase was involved with that, too and

(31:17):
if life were, literature then it would have been foreshadowing
a couple of. Episodes back when we discussed the passing
Of Mike, GREENWELL i remembered that in his book about
The hall Of, Fame Bill james responded to someone who
advocated For Babe herman to be in The hall Of
fame by saying that he didn't deserve to be in
for his Little Mike greenwell kind of. Career by, THAT

(31:40):
i take it that he meant That herman had just
a few notable seasons during a relatively brief. Career the
first part isn't really. Accurate herman was much more consistent
at his best Than greenwell because the chronic injuries that
truncated both of their careers didn't get him until later
than they Struck. Greenwell greenwell seems to have started suffering
pretty much right away in his early, twenties not that

(32:02):
long after he reached the, majors Whereas herman at least
got in a pretty complete shot at being in his
twenties and maintaining his health and athleticism for at least that.
Long what they do have in common is that both
of their thirties were just one long. Trudge herman was
a career three twenty, four three eighty, three five thirty

(32:23):
two hitter for a fifteen hundred game career that began
in the majors in nineteen twenty six and ended in
nineteen forty, five although there's an eight year gap there
at the. End he didn't play often enough after his
peak to have a true decline, phase so that leaves
us with averages that are stronger than they otherwise would have.
Been but it hurts his counting. Stats he had fewer

(32:44):
than two thousand, hits didn't make it to two hundred home,
runs didn't score one thousand runs or drive in one,
thousand although he was just three RBIs short in the latter.
Category there's a good response to, that which is who?
Cares But i'm not going to give you My hall
Of fame screed for the oh one hundred and eightieth
time in three hundred and fifty. Episodes if you've heard
more than two of, these you've probably come across. It

(33:04):
one thing THAT i have learned doing this show is
that for every player who has a long and successful
career with a sustained peak going into his late, thirties
there are at least two who turned, thirty and it's
like a gate slams. Down After herman's major league career was,
over he went to the miners and played another eight

(33:24):
years before briefly making it. Back AS i alluded to
just a few minutes, ago that was due to the.
War he never did stop, hitting but he couldn't play
more than a couple of times a. Week maybe if
the majors had had a designated hitter back, then he
might have lasted a little longer in the big, leagues
But i'm not sure of even, that because it just
seems like he was really. Debilitated when we look At,

(33:45):
herman as we have to with most players or all
players from his, time is that we have to separate
his seasons from their. Environment he played in the high
scoring twenties and thirties in a small park in a segregated.
League so you look at his biggest offensive season nineteen,
thirty when he hit three ninety, three four fifty, five

(34:07):
six seventy, eight and all those caveats have to be. Applied,
now there's nothing fake about that. Season it's. Real it's
just also not one of the top three hundred or
so best hitting seasons in modern baseball. History even if
the numbers wow you at first, glance because the floor
was so, high you have to start with the fact
that the average hitter hit three hundred and then apply

(34:28):
all the other factors THAT i just, mentioned and it
starts to shrink on. You and this is true not
just of his nineteen thirty, season but most of. Them
is that his baseball card is almost completely absent of black,
ink despite these, averages which today would be very. Gaudy
just to be super clear about, this if your favorite
player just had the three hundred and first best offensive

(34:48):
season in modern baseball, history he had a terrific. Year
that's the kind of season that in most, years, well
get that guy AN mvp. Award but nineteen thirty was
such a crazy year That herman finished fifth in The
National league Behind Hack, Wilson Frankie, Frish Bill, terry And Chuck.
Kline SOMETIMES i hear my inflections WHEN i do this,
show AND i think that they're all based On John

(35:09):
cleaes In Monty Python's Architects. Sketch just dial up one
of their several versions of it and listen to the
way he intones the phrase past the rotating. Knives maybe
it's just a, coincidence but that's precisely the WAY i
just said He Chuck. Kline then, again kleinstats are even
more inflated Than Babe, Herman so there might be something
subconscious happening WHEN i say his, name as If i'm

(35:32):
pronouncing a, punchline where the humor derives from the very
serious way that we speak some absurd and shocking. Words
thus does the conveyor Belt. Carrie Chuck kline passed de rotating. Knives,
now we're not yet, done because we must to accurately
Describe Babe, herman shrink him yet, further because we haven't
accounted for bad fielding and weird base. Running, now the

(35:53):
writers tried to make it sound over the years like
he dropped a ball in every game or ran into
the wall every, time and that's just not. True that,
said some of his, adventures shall we call, them in both,
departments are pretty. Ridiculous he went through the miners as
a first, baseman but when he got to the major's
it was like he was a stranger to the. Position
he certainly wasn't the only first baseman who couldn't. THROW

(36:15):
i love to Watch Frank thomas, hit BUT i tended to.
CRINGE i really had to avert my eyes whenever he
had to attempt something like a three to six y
three double. Play herman couldn't do that. Either it mattered
more in his time when bunts were a big part
of the. Game he just couldn't make the throw from
the grass to second. Base dodgers Manager Wilbert Robinson Uncle,

(36:35):
robbie once he had Seen herman screw up enough of these,
plays told the pitchers that on any bunt play they
had to Beat herman to the. Ball just hustle over
there and grab it before he Can that's a. Quote
they couldn't do, it in part because he was actually,
Quick So Uncle robbie no doubt doing some sort of
old slapstick comedy red in the face grabbing his hat

(36:57):
and crushing it in his hands and Going ere Took
herman side and gave him new. Programming if we're in
a bunt situation and the bunt comes to, you don't
attempt a play at second, base no matter. What do you? Understand,
YEAH i, understand, never never at. All but he couldn't.
Remember he just didn't think That quickly his instincts took,

(37:20):
over and he kept trying to make the. Play and
that's how he wound up in the, outfield where Columnist
Westbrook pegler, said in his pre insanity pace they called
him the self defense. Outfielder he began to catch flyballs
just so they wouldn't hit him in the. Head herman
always denied that flyballs had hit him in the. Head
maybe a few bounced off his, shoulders but never the.

(37:41):
Head it's a good. Line and then there was the base.
Running John, kieran the Great New York times, columnist, wrote
it is respectfully suggested that as soon as the yachting
series is, over The Brenton Reef light be removed from
its rocky bass Off newport and erected at first base
on The Brooklyn. Diamond, ordinarily it could be left. Dark
but When herman gets on the, basis the great light

(38:03):
should be turned, on and the lighthouse keeper and his
whole family should get busy and polish the mirror and.
Reflectors it would be a warning that runners in the
wake Of Babe herman had reached dangerous territory and should
go at half, speed tooting a foghorn every thirty. Seconds
kiaren wrote that column on an occasion In september nineteen

(38:24):
thirty in which Shortstop Glenn wright hit what would have
been a home, run But herman was on, base and
somehow he stopped to watch it and right past. Him Uncle,
ROBBIE i always have to add That Uncle robbie was
an Old, oriole so he knew something about the game
from some of the people who kind of created the
modern version of. It, besides he always added, it so

(38:45):
why SHOULDN'T i honor his? WISHES i Like Uncle robbie.
Seriously AS i reported in a prior, Episode i'm an
Old oriole was among the last words he spoke on this.
Planet in any, case he was not. Happy on this.
Occasion he, said this thing of one runner standing still
on the baselines while another runner passing him has got

(39:07):
to be. Stopped he, added as if his players didn't
quite understand the basics of the. Game we can't win
ballgames that. Way by this, TIME i Think Uncle robbie
was an, example and many managers have reached this point
of the great Early Elvis costello. LINE i used to be,
disgusted but NOW i try to be, amused as anyone

(39:28):
who has ever attempted to cultivate a similar attitude, Knows
AND i feel like there have been many, times particularly
recently in our, lives when it was healthier to try
to do. So you can attempt, it and you can
succeed a lot of the, time but you won't succeed
one hundred percent of the. Time As casey, said they
say you can't do, it but sometimes it doesn't always. Work,

(39:49):
recently there was posted on YouTube some colorized footage of
this Very brooklyn, team the nineteen thirty, team opening spring,
training and there is sound you can Hear Uncle robbie.
SPEAK i had never Heard Uncle robbie speak on the. Page,
yes from his actual living. Body. No and what's great

(40:11):
about it is that it actually goes to this thesis
That i've just given you about his attitude at the.
TIME i, mean he seems to be in a good.
HUMOR i think he mostly. Was but as camp, opens
he's giving the traditional address to the assembled roster and
he says something, like, WELL i think we've assembled a
good team this, year AND i think that we are

(40:33):
likely if you fellas put your shoulders to the wheel
and really work to get out of the second, division
which we've been in for a while too. Long the
we can't win ballgames that. Way lay was the second
such Play herman had been part of in about a.
Month the previous one occurred in the top of the
first inning At Saint louis On august, eleventh nineteen, thirty

(40:57):
and it mattered, too Because robbie was. Right The dodgers
were in first place at the. Time they had a
decent team that. Year After brooklyn's leadoff, Man Johnny frederick
homeward off Of Cil johnson to start the, game third
Baseman Wally gilbert doubled And Babe herman walked right bunted
the runners, over giving a pitcher in trouble a free.

(41:18):
Out but that's the way they played it back, then,
unless of, course you're talking about this year's, playoffs in
which case, managers as always get overcaffeinated and try too
hard to make things. Happen put that. Aside first Baseman
Dell bissonette walked reloading the. Bases Al lopez hit one
the other, way lining a single over first Baseman Jim
bottomley's head into right. Field gilbert scored, easily But herman

(41:40):
rounded third and stopped as the throw came Into cardinals
Catcher Jimmy. Wilson bisonette kept on going and arrived at
third to see herman standing. There what are you doing,
Here bisonette asked, herman And herman replied to everybody's got
to be. Someplace, no that's not. True what happened was,
that As karen later, observed the bases are one runner
sized and added occupants are illegal according to the, rules

(42:04):
and this will come up again in a. Minute berman
was entitled to the bag because he got there, first
And bisinette was a. Trespasser All herman had to do
was wait For cardinals third Basement Sparky adams to Tag
bisonette with the ball and the play would have been,
over leaving The dodgers still batting with two outs and
runners on first and. Third B herman didn't know the,

(42:26):
rule he let out for, home leaving third To, bisinette
and of course he was instantly caught in a. Rundown,
biscinette Seeing herman coming back to, third headed back to
second instead of holding his ground even though it was his. Bag,
wilson The cardinal's catcher in case you don't have a,
scorecard fired the ball To cardinals Shortstop Charlie, gilbert who

(42:47):
put the tag On bisonette as he came into second
base from the wrong. Direction and Since Babe herman had
apparently been permanently blasted out of orbit like The moon
in the opening credits From space nineteen ninety, nine he
still had. Time gilbert did to throw the ball back To,
wilson who was there waiting at home. Plate As herman
came down the line, Again herman did a Tech avery double,

(43:08):
take threw all his gears into, reverse and headed back
to third base once. Again there's no place like. Third
there's no place like. Third another rundown, ensued And herman
this time was put out By Sparky adams two and the,
inning The dodgers scored only two runs when they might
have scored, more and subsequent errors on defense handed even

(43:29):
more runs to The. Cardinals herman hit a home run
later in the game that temporarily restored the lead to The,
dodgers but what was remembered were his. Mistakes The dodgers
had lost by one run his, run and by that,
result slipped out of first. Place the imagination falters at
the cruel and unusual punishment That john McGraw Or joe

(43:50):
McCarthy would have Dealt. Herman Westbrook pegler, wrote but it
seems That Uncle wilbert likes some goofy and only remarked
that the boys were running true to. FORM i Know
i've said it, before BUT i hate Quoting Westbrook. Pegler
i'll remind you. Why on the other side of this,
break Maybe i'll pause for a second to take him.
Down pardon the expression a peg or. Two but, again

(44:11):
that's right after this brief, Intermission so forgive me If

(44:34):
i'm repeating Information i've given you too many times. Before
but you know HOW i love the great old newspaper
calumness of, yesteryear AND i quote them here WHENEVER i.
Can they wrote so, colorfully, well the best of. Them
you just heard me cite the Great John kieran the
writer and naturalist and the guy who seemingly had memorized
all Of. Shakespeare if you want to hear improve, it

(44:55):
just dial up any old episode of information. Please unfortunately
there are only three. YEARS i mentioned this. Before it
ran for like, ten but they only recorded the first.
Three AND i remain heartbroken that those radio waves just
went out into space. Somewhere and if you're listening to
me out by serious Or Alpha centauri or, something and
you happen to catch those waves drifting, by could you

(45:17):
bring them in for? Me just reel them, in record,
them and then send them some kind of information. Energy
pack it out this, Way i'm SURE seti will pick it.
Up Unless doze has turned off all of those antennas
pointed towards, space all those satellite dishes that oh they're just.
Dead now you, say, ah, great wonderful. Swell, actually that's
a good mode in which to Discuss Westbrook pegler for

(45:38):
just a. Second As i've said, before he started out
writing reasonably intelligently and entertainingly about, sports but over the
course of a roughly half century career he drifted dramatically.
Rightward radicalized by The New, deal he became a full on.
Reactionary everyone was A COMI i think the last TIME
i mentioned, HIM i gave you some of a parody

(46:00):
of his stuff From The New, yorker in which he
Revealed Santa claus to secretly be Comrade. Jellybelly here's one
From Mad magazine in nineteen fifty. Seven i'd say who
the writer, was but they didn't credit him UNLESS i
missed it. Somewhere but the springboard for this story was
that they took A jejun news ARTICLE i suppose it

(46:20):
was a real THING i don't actually, know and then
imagined how various publications would respond to. It one of
them Was. Pegler the actual news hook Was Billy, poohba
son of mister and Missus, jimpooba took a bicycle ride.
Yesterday but imagine his surprise when he returned home to
find his father waiting for him with a hair. Brush
it seems that the Bike billy took for a ride wasn't.

(46:40):
His it belonged to the little boy next. Door so
here's The pegler version under his usual column, name As
pegler sees, it a delinquent chip off the old blockhead
By Westbrook, PEGLER i see they finally caught up with this,
guy this billy what's his, Name This poohba whack out In.
Kansas but what doesn't surprise, me and shouldn't surprise anybody

(47:04):
who got out of the sixth grade on his own
hook and has half a brain for what's going on
it isn't a bunch of. Dopes is that it's the
Same poohba character whose old man was a charter member
of The Roosevelt Truman juan perone ful launch that carried
the citizens Of abilene along with their votes in its
hip pocket for so. Long and it's the Same poohba

(47:27):
the old man this time who's undercover of being a
janitor in one of those egghead high, schools carried waste
baskets for years in one hand and his party membership
card in the. Other and you know WHAT i think
Of Eleanor. Roosevelt before, janitor this lob was a patrol
leader In Boy Scout troop, eighteen the Notorious Kami front

(47:48):
GROUP i exposed Last Christmas. Eve it was his old
lady who used to bake cookies for The Salvation Armies
send A boy To camp movement alias The Abraham lincoln,
brigade the same summer camp you, recall which brought together
such commy loving. Cronies as you know WHAT i think
of Eleanor. Roosevelt it. Stinks the whole thing. Stinks you.

(48:11):
Stink that's up there with some of the best work
that mad ever did and, kids nothing ever. Changes some
of it sounds, familiar doesn't. It, heck if you want
to go back to twenty sixteen or, so and who,
doesn't you could just copy paste In Hillary clinton over Eleanor.
Roosevelt you know WHAT i think Of Hillary. Clinton back
to The Brooklyn. Babe this, play the One i'm about

(48:33):
to describe from nineteen twenty, six his rookie year anticipated
the Improbable munsey drive IN LCS lcs how ABOUT lct
Landing Craft tank on To Normandy beach AND Lcs game.
One but as With, munsey whatever happened after Wasn't floyd's,
fault well mostly. Not the, game which would be remembered for,

(48:54):
years took place On august, fifteenth nineteen twenty, Six braves At,
dot which is to say that from our, perspective it's
a total. Anachronism boston At. Brooklyn neither team was going.
Anywhere the matchup Was Johnny wurtz for The braves Versus Dazzy.
Vance The braves didn't bring too many players you might
have heard, of, though Future hall Of Famer Dave Bancroft

(49:17):
Beauty bancroft was. Managing bancroft did play that, year and
he played. Well hit three eleven with a three to
ninety nine on base percentage in one hundred and twenty seven,
games AND i assume his usual grand. Defense that was
his last big. Year it just happens he didn't play
in this. GAME i should also mention THAT i wrote
up another player they had in their, lineup number five
Hitter glass Arm At Eddie, brown as one of the

(49:39):
one hundred player biographies contained In Baseball's Brief Lives The
Infinite Inning Book. Order now the holidays are fast. Approaching you.
Know it's not That i'm selling all the. Time it's
just THAT i want my work to be, read And
i'd like to do another one of. Those on The dodgers,
SIDE i should have Mentioned vance was one of the
all time great strikeout pitchers and was headed for The

(50:00):
hall Of fame. Himself That Babe herman batted, third the
Manager i've already mentioned was the hall bound Uncle, Robbie
and if you want to titter in an adolescent boy,
way the cleanup hitter was right Fielder Dick. Cox cox
had spurts of hitting on. Occasion i'm so. Sorry cox
was a decent. Hitter he was one of the many
minor league journeymen that The dodgers were very good at

(50:22):
unearthing in this, period and, so in, fact in a
way was Dazz. Evans you just only get one of
those per. Eternity so to the bottom of the seventh
there was one out and the bases were, loaded with
Catcher hank De berry on, Third dazzy on, second and
second Baseman Chick feuster a stand in on. First herman was.
Up bancroft decided to make a very modern pitching change

(50:45):
at this. Point herman was a left handed, hitter So
bancroft brought in Veteran Southpop George, magridge who might be
familiar to you from either Early yankees history or nineteen
twenty Four Washington. Senators, lord that's A World series winning.
TEAM i know you study. Daily he was a pretty
good pitcher, actually although getting to the end of the

(51:07):
line by nineteen twenty. Six, Well herman doubled off of.
Him it turned out to be about the worst thing
he could have. Done, now there are several different versions
of the play by, play but what seems to have
happened is That herman pulled a fly ball to the
right field. Wall, Again ebbittsfield was a small. Park right
field wasn't too far, away three hundred and one feet

(51:28):
at that, time with an angled nineteen foot concrete. Wall
later there'd be a fence added to that, wall which
would double the. Height i'm not, sure BUT i don't
think it was there at this. Point, now some versions
of the story say the ball hit that, fence which
of course it couldn't have done if it wasn't, there
but it doesn't matter very much to the. Story the,

(51:48):
point rather is that the runners had to hold up
to see If braves right Fielder Jimmy welsh would catch the. Ball,
well he. Didn't unlike The dodgers runners last, week The
dodgers did understand that the ball was in. Play De
barry scored from, third practically walked, home vance advanced to,

(52:08):
third but then, hesitated maybe because the ball was coming
on from the outfielder coming, IN i should, say and
the third base coach was yelling go, back go. Back
fuster belatedly attempted to go from first to. Third as For,
herman he was just running full tilt without thinking much
about what was going on in front of. Him the

(52:28):
cries of go back were intended for him or him And,
fuster not For. Vance as the old saying, goes he
who hesitates is. Lost welsh's throw relayed by second Baseman Doc,
gatrow was now about to Beat vance to the. Plate seeing,
This vance retreated to the. Bag feuster And herman kept

(52:50):
going As vance found himself in a. Rundown incredibly. Dazzy
who if you look at the pictures or even some
of the, films doesn't look like the fast or most
Agile impala in The. Zoo beat the. Play he got
back to, third and he arrived at the same moment
as Both feuster And herman. Did, actually and this is,
Important herman arrived Before. Feuster you know the old joke

(53:15):
about The dodgers back, Then, uh, say how's the game?
Going The dodgers have three men On oh, yeah which?
Base The braves just tagged everyone in. Sight, ultimately the
umpires decided to rule this. Way the bag belonged To
vance because he had gotten there. First feuster was out
for standing On vance's, bag And herman was out for

(53:37):
Passing feuster double play inning. Over for those scoring at,
home the play was nine four two five. Four those
are your Lucky lottery numbers for. Today best, part besides
the fact that this happened in the first, place the
run De berry scored broke a one one. Tie that
was the winning, run so none of it. Mattered the
same thing turned out to be true of THE nlcsq

(54:00):
game that inspired this week's adventure in time. Travel The
dodgers won that game as, well so this was the
play for Which Babe herman was most. Famous it's not so,
bad actually it's. Not Bill. Buckner herman didn't love being
thought of his dumb but he has a story you
can tell that's not true with Many hall Of. FAMERS i,

(54:21):
mean you can tell A Bobby wallace. Story, Heck i've
done it on this, show but it's much more effortful than.
This while playing for The cubs On july, twentieth nineteen thirty,
Three herman had a terrific day against The, phillies going
four for five with three home, runs won A Grand.
Slam he drove in eight runs in. Total it's a great,
game but like his big nineteen thirty, season it's special

(54:44):
without being. Unique the nineteen twenty six, game, though the
three men on third. Game it comes with an oft
repeated description by the great sports Writer John. Lardner he
never tripled into a triple, play but he once doubled
into a double, play which is the next best. Thing if,
Anything bardner undersold that it's not the next best, thing

(55:05):
it's the best. Thing and so we come to the
end of the historic three hundred and fiftieth. Episode should
you wish to me on social, media you can do
so At stephngoldman dot bsky dot. Social you can also write,
us by WHICH i mean me At Infinite inning at
gmail dot, com and there's still A facebook. Group there

(55:27):
are reasons go To facebook search On Infinite. Inning. Bang you're,
there and despite my distaste for the, ENTERPRISE i am
happy to talk with you there or anywhere. Else AS
i mentioned, earlier should you wish to support the, show
AND i very much hope you, do please Visit patreon dot,
com slash The Infinite inning gear of a rudimentary kind

(55:47):
THAT i am overdue to update is available at the
Hyphen infinite Hyphen inning dot, creator hyphenspring dot. Com original
soundtrack available grant us at Casual Observer music dot bandcamp dot. Com,
finally should you find yourself with the proverbial moment to,
spare please go to the podcature of your choice and,
rate review and. Subscribe if you're watching on YouTube or,

(56:07):
LISTENING i should, say then do hit that like and subscribe.
Button and if your podcatcher held YouTube doesn't let you
do those, things find one of the few surviving LST's
and refurbish it as a floating dockside restaurant that should be.
Cheap How ard theme, song which you are hearing now
and have been listening to throughout the, episode was a
co composition of myself and Doctor Rick, mooring who, SAYS

(56:31):
i am exhausted after three hundred and fifty innings of
telling people what's on my. Mind i'm a total. Blank,
plus you just stole my idea for a FLOATING lst,
restaurant more like saved Your, rick more like saved. You
as the old saying, goes the quickest way to turn
a large fortune into a small. One is to open
up a Floating lst. Restaurant, well let's hope The World

(56:55):
series goes, seven so The winter stays away for. Longer
but in the, Meantime i'll set to work on the
next three hundred and fifty stories from inside The Infinite
inning