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.
- Stats: BASEBALL REFERENCE
Enjoy the games ... PLAY BALL!
GAME #134
POLO GROUNDS
Rescheduled: 7/1/1921
Rescheduled: 7/1/1921
Boston Takes Series From Giants, Three Games to One
... and this is why the Pittsburgh Pirates are still favored to win the National League pennant. After sweeping five games from the Bucs then sweeping three from the Cubs, the Giants have since split games with the Robins and, with today's defeat, lose their series against the Boston Braves three games to one. The Braves and Giants trade an opening run on Lloyd Christenbury's home run and Ross Youngs' run-scoring double. Starter Jesse Barnes yields another two-run home in the second to Tony Boeckel. In the third, Dave Bancroft successfully executes a suicide squeeze with George Burns crossing home. But the Giants' scoring ends there. Brave starter Dave Phillingim holds the McGrawmen scoreless over the final six innings. All told, Phillingim allows two runs, one earned, on seven hits and one walk for the win. Jesse Barnes surrenders five runs on eight hits in eight innings, and Phil Douglas yields a run in the ninth. The Giants lose three of four against the Braves and fall another half-game in the standings. They must now scurry to Philadelphia for a doubleheader tomorrow at Baker Bowl.
- FINAL: BOS 6; NYG 2
- RECORD: 80-54 (.597); second place, 1.5 GB of Pittsburgh
⚾
GAME #128
Fenway Park
Red Sox Take Rubber Game; Waite Hoyt Take Loss
A fine pitcher's dual unfolds at Fenway Park. Waite Hoyt toes the slab for New York and is opposed by Bullet Joe Smith. After three scoreless frames, Mike McNally singles home Wally Pipp in the fourth, and Roxy Walters answers with a run-scoring hit for the Red Sox. The score remains unchanged through the sixth. But in the seventh, Nemo Liebold singles home the go-ahead run from which the Yankees do not recover. Hoyt allows two runs on nine hits in the loss, and Bullet Joe Smith holds New York to only one run on six hits and no walks for the win. Boston takes the rubber game to win the series two games against one.
- FINAL: NYY 1; BOS 2
- RECORD: 80-48 (.625); First Place, 0.5 GA of Cleveland
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