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Saturday, August 28, 2021

100 YEARS AGO AT THE POLO GROUNDS 8/28/1921: Giants Turn Back Cubs For Sixth in a Row; Yankees Fall at Navin Field

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 Season Revisited

In their last season at Hilltop Park, the now formerly known New York Highlanders lose 102 games.  Rebranded in 1913 as the Yankees, they move 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 proceed to lose another 94 games.  

Known to hold a grudge, McGraw two full decades later still harbors much animosity not only towards Ban Johnson and his rebel circuit (unkept promises included) but more so towards the Yankees.  As they were founded at the expense of his rendered defunct Baltimore Orioles.  

As long as the Yankees paid their rent, the tenant/landlord relationship with the Giants remains 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 of 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 at the turnstile in a decade.

Then, in 1920, baseball's tectonic plates shift along the New York/New England fault.  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.  However, it was an accomplishment for which John McGraw had little appreciation.  He believes players work too hard and earnestly 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 as 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 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 accomplishing the unimaginable - if the preceding season 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 is becoming an insufferable condition—the Giants attempt to evict the Yankees before the 1921 season to no avail.  But a solution lies not too far away ...  

Until then, 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. Of course, I'll be exercising my creative license whenever and wherever ever possible. But, more than anything, this is about having fun and celebrating New York City's baseball history.  
Enjoy the games ... PLAY BALL!


GAME #126
POLO GROUNDS

Jesse Barnes Outduels Grover Cleveland Alexander; Giants Win Sixth Straight

Back-to-back 20-game winner Jesse Barnes, who did not appear against the Pirates, outperforms the great Pete Alexander as the Giants take the series opener against Chicago and win their sixth straight game.  Frankie Frisch triples home Dave Bancroft in the first inning.  Chicago then takes a 2-1 lead with three hits in the fourth.  But the Giants answer right back in the home half of the frame; Ross Youngs triples home Dave Bancroft and Frankie Frisch, and Johnny Rawlings drives home Youngs for a 4-2 Giants leads.  Jesse Barnes makes it stand, hurling five scoreless innings to close out the game.  Barnes yields the two runs on just five hits and one walk for his twelfth win against eight losses with a representative 2.87 ERA.  Grover Cleveland Alexander takes the loss, his tenth against twelve victories.  Dave Bancroft and Frankie Frisch account for half of New York's twelve hits.  Ross Youngs now has 90 runs batted in.
  • FINAL: CHI 2; NYG 4
  • RECORD: 76-50 (.603); second place, 2.5 GB of Pittsburgh


GAME #119
Navin Field

Yankees Humbled by Detroit Novice; Tigers Salvage Series Finale

One has to wonder if the Yankees took the proverbial one step forward and two steps back.  When Detroit Tiger rookie Bert Cole, making just his thirteenth major league appearance, limits the Yankees to three runs, two of which come after the seventh, one is left to ponder the Yankees' present condition and perhaps the status of their field manager.  With only 37 games left in the season, we will soon know if Col. Rupport regrets not replacing Miller Huggins earlier this summer.  Waite Hoyt gets off to a problematic start, yielding two runs in the first inning on two hits and two walks along with a hit batsman.  Hoyt helps himself with a run-scoring single in the fourth.  But with Hoyt out of the game, reliever Jack Quinn yields another two runs in the fifth inning on four hits for a 4-1 Tiger lead through five.  With the bases loaded in the visitor's sixth, left fielder Bobby Veach clears the bases giving the Tigers a 7-1 lead.  Aaron Ward homers leading off the eighth, and Wally Pipp drives home a run in the ninth for a 7-3 final in Detroit.  Waite Hoyt takes the loss, and Bert Cole, the win.
  • FINAL: NYY 3; DET 7
  • RECORD: 73-46 (.613); second place, 1.5 GB of Cleveland





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