From the desk: WHEN THE POLO GROUNDS WAS THE WORLD
100 Years Ago Today at the Polo Grounds:
New York Giants & New York Yankees
1921 Seasons Revisited
In their last season at Hilltop Park, the now formerly known New York Highlanders lost 102 games. Rebranded as the Yankees, in 1913, they moved just a few blocks away into the Polo Grounds as tenants of the Senior Circuit's New York Giants. To the chagrin of Giants manager John McGraw, the Americans proceeded to lose another 94 games.
Known to hold a grudge, McGraw, two full decades later, still harbored much animosity not only towards Ban Johnson and his rebel circuit (unkept promises included) but more so towards the Yankees themselves who were founded at the expense of his rendered defunct Baltimore Orioles.
For as long as the Yankees paid their rent, the tenant/landlord relationship with the Giants remained amicably strained. Mainly because the middling Americans, except for one season in 1916, never elevated themselves above the ranks of Junior Circuit also-rans. But that changed in 1919 when they briefly vied for the pennant but tuckered out down the stretch to finish third. A franchise-record 619,164 fans showed up to root for the American League contenders. However, the Yankees' burgeoning success was not yet a pressing issue, per se, for the Giants, who were coming off a second-place finish and their best season in a decade at the turnstile.
Then, in 1920, baseball's tectonic plates along the New York/New England fault shift. The Yankees' purchase of George Herman "Babe" Ruth from the Boston Red Sox sends seismic waves reverberating throughout the baseball world but none more intense than in Washington Heights. Ruth's earth-shattering record of 54 home runs was something never experienced before in the history of baseball but an accomplishment for which John McGraw has little appreciation as one who believes players worked too hard and earnestly only to have their skills disrespected by some miscreant's lone swing of the bat.
Gotham's citizenry never before descended from Coogan's Bluff in such quantity and spectacle than in 1920 as the Giants would set a franchise record with 929,609 reported attendance. However, the New York Nationals faced an economic dilemma of Ruthian proportions. McGraw's disdain for his tenants was further heightened when the Yankees outdrew the host Giants in their own home for the first time in each franchise's history. Headlined by Babe Ruth, the Yankees seized the city's attention, evidenced by an all-time major league record of 1,289,422 in attendance.
In 1921, over two million fans would again pack the Polo Grounds. Babe Ruth would continue forward accomplishing the unimaginable, and if that wasn't surreal enough, he proceeds to top it. All the while with each passing day, John McGraw grows more incensed. Lest we forget, New York City is still Little Napoleon's empire.
Sharing a ballpark for both teams is becoming an insufferable condition. A resolution lies not too far away ...
In the meantime, two major league titans charge headlong into a season-ending October clash at the Polo Grounds. It is New York City's first-ever World's Championship Subway Series. All games are played at the Polo Grounds, making Coogan's Bluff the center of the baseball universe.
This is my replay of that season. I'll be exercising my creative license whenever and wherever ever possible. More than anything, this is about having fun and celebrating New York City's baseball history.
- Stats: BASEBALL REFERENCE
Enjoy the games ... PLAY BALL!
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GAME #7
Philadelphia Phillies @ NEW YORK GIANTS
POLO GROUNDS
Jesse Barnes Hurls Giants First Home Victory; High Pockets Kelly Powers The Way
Roughly 10,000 fans anxiously sit through a nail-biter at the Polo Grounds. To open the game, starter Jesse Barnes issues a lead-off walk to Phillies' right fielder Casey Stengel who soon advances then scores on a Dave Bancroft misplay at short. Fans nibble away until catcher Earl Smith's home run in the fifth inning ties the game at one. Philadelphia starter Red Causey who to this point had limited the Giants to just four hits, yields his final hit in the bottom of the seventh - a long home run to deep left field by High Pockets Kelley, his fourth of the season. Kelly has now driven in 15 runs through the Giants' first seven games. Earl Smith enjoys a nifty day both at the plate and behind it by throwing out two baserunners attempting to steal. Jesse Barnes allows no earned runs on six hits and one walk over nine full innings for his first victory of the season and the Giants' first win at home.
- FINAL: PHI 1; NYG 2
- RECORD: 5-2; second place, 1.0 GB of Pittsburgh
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GAME #7
New York Yankees @ PHILADELPHIA ATHLETICS
Shibe Park
Babe Ruth Hits Number Four But Athletics Trounce Yankees To Even Series
The Yankees' four-game win streak comes to an abrupt halt this afternoon at Shibe Park. Philadelphia lands a stiff jab with four runs in the third inning, then connects on a straight right with seven runs in the seventh inning, and down go the New Yorkers. The A's punish Brooklyn-born right-hander Waite Hoyt for ten runs, seven earned, on eleven hits and four walks before Manager Huggins, with two outs in the seventh, throws in the towel. Second-year starter Eddie Rommel improves his record to 2-2 with a 3.92 ERA upon yielding four runs, two earned, on just four hits and three walks through a full nine innings. However, he fails to escape the bat of Babe Ruth, who swats his fourth home run of the season in the fourth inning with Roger Peckinpaugh aboard. Third baseman Aaron Ward off to an exceptional start drives in a run, as does Peckinpaugh to no avail. A's third baseman, Joe Dugan, finishes 3 for 5 with three runs batted in.
- FINAL: NYY 4; PHI 11
- RECORD: 5-2; first place, 0.5 GA of Cleveland/Washington
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