This Week in Baseball: 1903

This is the first of a weekly series in which I describe what was happening in Major League Baseball each week of a randomly chosen year. This week’s article chronicles the goings on during the week of March 24-31, 1903.

March 24:

“Say wouldn’t you like to go out this afternoon and see a lively game of baseball?” asks the Boston Globe. Shut up, you tantalizing bean eater!”—Denver Post

• American League president Ban Johnson denies a report that the AL and NL have agreed to enact a “blacklist” rule, which would banish all future contract jumpers in addition to team owners who tempted said players to jump. “The blacklist has never been discussed between the leagues since the Cincinnati conference,” Johnson told the Chicago Tribune. “At that time, as was announced then, we had a long discussion, and for a while it looked as if both (George) Davis and (Ed) Delahanty would be blacklisted, but we came to the conclusion it would not be just to the players unless we made a clean sweep of it and ruled out the whole crowd of double dealers, including (John T.) Brush and (John) McGraw.”

Davis had spent most of his career with the New York Giants, splitting his time between center field and third base, before becoming the Giants’ full-time shortstop in 1897. He became the best defensive shortstop in the league and was bettered at the plate by only Hughie Jennings and Bill Dahlen. Following the 1901 season, Davis jumped his contract to play for the Chicago White Sox and became the best shortstop in the American League, batting .299 and fielding at a league best .951 clip. But, after only one year in the AL, Davis wanted to return to the Giants. Unfortunately, the terms of the St. Nicolas Peace Pact, which brought an end to the player-raiding war between the leagues, stated that Davis was the property of the White Sox and would not be allowed to return to the National League. “Once an American League player, always an American League player; once a National League player, always a National League player,” Johnson insisted.

Davis contended that his 1901 contract legally bound him to the Giants and he announced he’d be playing for the Giants in 1903 or he wouldn’t be playing at all. He did, in fact, suit up for the Giants and appeared in four games before word of Davis’ insolence reached the newly formed National Commission, composed of Johnson, National League president Harry Pulliam and Reds owner Garry Herrmann. Herrmann, the Commission’s chairman, ruled that Davis was ineligible to play for the Giants and that he was legally bound to the White Sox. Davis refused to play for Chicago and took his case to court. He lost his case and sat out the rest of the ‘03 season, but returned to the White Sox in 1904 and played six more seasons for the Sox before calling it quits in 1909.

At the same time Davis jumped his contract, Delahanty jumped from the Philadelphia Phillies to the Washington Senators and became the AL’s best hitter. Rather than blacklisting him, the National Commission allowed him to remain with Washington in 1903. Delahanty met with tragedy on July 2, however, when the drunk and disorderly slugger was banished from a train heading from Detroit to New York, then fell from the International Bridge and into the raging Niagra River below. His body was found a week later.

• It’s announced that the New York Highlanders (Yankees) will pay a rent of $6,000 for the right to play at Hilltop Park in 1903, and that it will increase incrementally for 10 years until it reaches $11,000 in the final year of the deal.

March 25:

• The Boston Globe reports that the Americans (Red Sox) enjoyed some “fine batting practice” during a “scrub game,” during which Patsy Dougherty goes 6-for-8 with a double and a triple. Boston manager Jimmy Collins announces that he would not be surprised if Dougherty won the AL batting title, “as he can lay them down as well as hit out, and runs like a grayhound [sic] to first.”

Dougherty didn’t win the batting title that year (nor in any other), but he was as good as advertised, finishing third in hitting behind Nap Lajoie and Sam Crawford with a .331 AVG and leading the league in hits, runs, at-bats, and plate appearances. He also stole 35 bases, which was good for third in the AL. He, too, was a contract jumper, having come to Boston from Cincinnati in September 1901. He batted .342 in his first season in Boston and finished third in the batting race that year as well. He was also involved in a controversial trade in 1904 that was engineered by Ban Johnson and designed to strengthen the New York club. New York received Dougherty in return for a little-known and little-used infielder named Bob Unglaub, who was in the hospital being treated for blood poisoning. Dougherty never again reached the heights he’d achieved in 1902-03, while Unglaub had a relatively undistinguished six-year career.

• The Chicago Tribune reports that three Boston National Leaguers—Fred Tenney, Charlie Dexter and Malachi Kittridge—have refused to play on Sundays, making life difficult for manager Al Buckenberger. The Beaneaters are already without the services of Duff Cooley, who is suffering from a “lame foot,” and Ed Gremminger, who is battling a “bad stomach.”

• The White Sox’s regulars defeat the reserves 6-1 during wintry conditions in Mobile, Alabama. Four hundred fans pay 40 cents each to watch a contest played “in the breath of a belated blizzard from the north.” The reserve squad recruits three local amateurs to fill out its lineup. “As a result,” reports the Chicago Tribune, “the second team had only one outfielder, Hallman, to support them, as the two local men who played center and right have yet to learn the rudiments of the game.”

• Ed Delahanty arrives late in Washington because of a railroad accident in Georgia, then declares that he’s hoping to be traded to the Giants, who have offered him a contract worth $4,500, which is $500 more than he’s making with Washington. The contract is allegedly for three years, after which Delahanty intends to retire.

Delahanty also expresses a desire to play for the Highlanders if they’ll match the Giants’ offer, but insists he’ll remain in Washington and continue to play ball if that’s what the National Commission decides. “I do not intend to remain idle,” Delahanty avers, “for ball playing is a good profession, and I will do the best I know how here.” Delahanty does, indeed, remain with the Senators and bats .333 in 42 games before falling to his death in July.

March 26:

• A day after Ed Delahanty says he’ll play for the Senators if a deal with either New York team cannot be consummated, he insists that he’ll refuse to play if the Senators don’t match the Highlanders’ “advance” of $4,000 in addition to paying him a yearly salary of $4,500.

• On the same page, the Chicago Tribune reports that the Senators have canceled a meeting with Giants’ manager John McGraw that was scheduled for April 7 and was intended to finalize a deal that would have sent Giants catcher Frank Bowerman and an unnamed player to Washington for Delahanty.

• White Sox manager Nixey Callahan announces that he expects his team to win every single exhibition game during the spring. “The boys are now in fair shape to show their true form. We want to return home with a full string of scalps.”

The White Sox promptly lost to Montgomery, 10-9 in 10 innings. Montgomery’s manager and first baseman, Lew Whistler, went 4-for-5 and belted two home runs to lead his team to victory.

• It’s reported that the Washington Heights Local Board of Improvement is attempting to have streets cut through the property being leased by the Highlanders. They insist that 166th and 167th Streets should dissect the parcel because Washington Heights residents have claimed that walking two or three blocks to get from one side of the property to the other is too arduous.

It’s been speculated that Giants owner John T. Brush, with the help of former owner Andrew Freedman, was trying to stick it to longtime rival and nemesis Ban Johnson by using their connections to alter the land on which Hilltop Park sat. Freedman was a board member of New York’s Interborough Rapid Transit Company and he’d been able to keep Johnson from buying or leasing land throughout most of New York. He failed to protect property above 155th Street in Manhattan, however, which allowed Johnson to secure land in the Washington Heights area, leasing property from the New York Institute for the Blind. When Freedman learned about the transaction, he and Brush charged the institute with executing an improper lease, then filed a petition to have 166th and 167th Streets dissect the property. In the end, their plot failed and Hilltop Park was erected in time for Opening Day.

March 27:

• The Boston Beaneaters’ regulars defeat the reserves 21-5 in a game played in weather cool enough that manager Al Buckenberger commands his pitchers to lay off breaking pitches and throw nothing but fastballs. Shortstop Harry Aubrey is forced to leave the game early with a charley horse, but has impressed Buckenberger so much, he thinks the infielder has the makings of a star.

Aubrey missed the first four games of the season (or at least didn’t play in them) before debuting on April 22. Not only did he not become a star, but he turned out to be horrible, batting only .212 and slugging a pathetic .249 in 325 at-bats. His 49 OPS+ was by far the worst on the team and, to make matters worse, he committed 74 errors in 94 games at shortstop, fielding at a clip of .868. No National League shortstop created fewer runs, nor fielded as poorly as Aubrey in 1903. He was sent to Providence in May 1904 and never appeared in the majors again.

March 28:

• The Boston Globe reports that the Beaneaters’ exhibition game against Stanley College had to be canceled because the Stanley captain and three of its best hitters were sent on a butterfly hunt and couldn’t return in time to play.

• The Chicago Cubs play an exhibition game against the Deming “Yellow Kids” in Deming, New Mexico and defeat the amateurs 18-4. Seven Cubs homer at the diminutive grounds, including Frank Chance and Joe Tinker. It’s the first professional baseball game in Deming, which declares the day a holiday and closes its schools and local shops. The players are treated to a rodeo and are scheduled to attend a banquet after the game, but Cubs skipper Frank Selee advises his players to board their train for El Paso so they can get there early.

• The Chicago Tribune reports that Ban Johnson has acquired a new typewriter for his office. “The former typewriter, while of the same make, was old fashioned and had outgrown its usefulness, some of the keys being bent badly by the American League leader’s vehement denunciations of belligerent players and treacherous magnates.”

• Giants manager John McGraw responds to reports about George Davis and Ed Delahanty. “If the prevailing powers in baseball decide that I can play these two men on the New York team, I will be delighted. But if the magnates decide to send Davis back to Chicago and Delahanty to Washington, I will take my medicine without a whimper and leave it to club owners to fight it out.”

• Christy Mathewson fans seven Birmingham batters, including four in a row, in five innings in a 7-1 Giants victory. Joe McGinnity tosses the final four frames and allows only two hits, thanks to “excellent control, plenty of speed and a large assortment of curves.”

• The Washington Post reports that the new owners of the Phillies have ordered the removal of all signs from the Baker Bowl which warn the spectators against the use of profanity or uncomplimentary remarks to the players and umpire. “The magnates will consider all spectators gentlemen until it is proven otherwise, when they will be taken by the collar and removed from the grounds.”

• It’s reported that A’s hurler Rube Waddell fans 14 Jacksonville batters and allegedly sends his fielders to the bench in the ninth inning with the exception of catcher Ossee Schreckengost, then proceeds to strike out the side to end the game.

March 29:

• Boston Beaneaters pitcher Wiley Piatt’s finger is so sore that a hotel physician cuts into it to drain the blood to avoid blood poisoning. Piatt is scratched from his scheduled start against Montgomery.

Piatt is one of only seven pitchers Boston uses that season and goes 9-14 with a 3.18 ERA. The 1903 season proves to be his last in the big leagues, capping off a six-year career in which he posts a record of 86-79 with an ERA of 3.61.

• The Boston Globe’s Tim Murnane objects to the new foul strike rule implemented by the American League in 1903 (the NL had been using it since 1901), insisting that batting averages will plummet so much that .250 will be considered a “fair average when .300 should be the mark…The batsman should have more freedom, and the foul strike rule should go.”

Murnane had a point. The AL batted .277 and .275 in 1901 and 1902, respectively, but only .255 in 1903. It wasn’t until 1911 that the league average crept back over .270 (.273), but that was an anomaly. It dropped again in 1912 and stayed between .248 and .268 until the end of the Dead Ball Era, when it climbed to .283 in 1920. The NL suffered the same fate, batting .285 in the six years prior to the rule change, but only .254 in the 20 years after the change.

• The Chicago Tribune reports that Cleveland appears to be the favorite to win the American League pennant, but that prognostications are only as good as a “guess” at that point, especially in light of the fact that the Davis and Delahanty cases had yet to be finalized. Boston, St. Louis and Philadelphia are expected to compete for the AL flag, but the White Sox and Highlanders are deemed to have infield problems, while the Tigers are a complete mystery.

• The Tribune runs a piece on White Sox hurler Frank Owen in which it calls him a “promising young pitcher,” despite his 1-3 record and 4.34 ERA in a brief trial with the Tigers in 1901.

The paper was right. Owen starred at Michigan Agricultural College, but went to Cuba with his father, who was a surgeon in the thirty-first regiment, when the Spanish-American War broke out. Upon his return, Owen signed with Detroit and spent two years in the minors before being picked up by Chicago. He went 8-12 with a 3.50 ERA in 1903, before enjoying three straight fantastic seasons during which he won 21, 21, and 22 games and posted ERAs of 1.94, 2.10, and 2.33. But his success came to an abrupt end in 1907.

First he was arrested in San Antonio in March for carrying a concealed weapon when he pulled a revolver from his pocket to explain to a crowd how he’d narrowly escaped death in an earlier accident in which he merely suffered a flesh wound. Then he came up lame during Spring Training. He started three games in April and went 2-1, but he caught Malaria in May and didn’t recover from his illness until July. He started one more game on July 8, but lost to Philadelphia. He appeared in seven games in relief and posted a nifty 2.49 ERA on the year, but tossed only 47 innings.

He signed a contract to play for the White Sox in 1908 and was supposedly in the best health he’d been in in more than a year, but he continued to struggle on the mound, going 6-7 with a 3.41 ERA in 140 innings. He started only two games in 1909, going 1-1, and posted a 4.50 ERA in 16 innings, before he was sold to Toledo in May. At the age of 29, Owen’s big league career was over.

• James “Ducky” Holmes finally joins the Senators after being purchased from the Tigers in February. He is reported to be in excellent health after a “good season of training” in Hot Springs, Arkansas.

Holmes is a controversial figure, who is most famous (or infamous) for making anti-Semitic remarks in 1898 about then Giants owner Andrew Freedman, who was Jewish. Holmes, a former Giant who was playing for the Baltimore Orioles at the time of the infraction, responded to taunts from former teammates by shouting “Well, I’m glad I’m not playing ball for a ‘Sheeny!’” Freedman, who was in attendance and heard the epithet, demanded that umpire Tom Lynch eject Holmes from the game but when he refused, claiming that he hadn’t heard Holmes’ remarks, the Giants owner pulled his team from the field, forfeited the game, and refunded the fans’ money.

The league fined Freedman $1,000 for his actions and suspended Holmes for the remainder of the season. Most sided with Holmes. Sporting Life called the suspension for a “trifling offense” such as insulting the Hebrew race a “perversion of justice.” John T. Brush criticized the National League board of directors for “exceeding their authority” and claimed that it “had no right to convict Holmes on the evidence of the New York club alone…It is like sentencing a man to two years in the penitentiary with a promise that he will be allowed to prove his innocence after he gets out. The whole affair is the worst I ever saw.”

Holmes filed an injunction against the league and served his manager, Ned Hanlon, with papers that prohibited Hanlon from keeping him out of the lineup. Meanwhile Freedman paid his fine under protest and asked for a remission. The Washington Post reported on August 15, 1898 that “A decision against Freedman would meet with the popular approval of the public and players. At least that is the impression prevailing in major league baseball circles.” An unnamed manager echoed the Post’s sentiments. “If the fine is remitted Freedman will have achieved a downright victory, and the public will diagnose the board as so many possessors of jellyfish backbones.”

The board of directors did, in fact, decide against remitting Freedman’s fine, then on August 25, the board of directors overturned Holmes’ suspension and reinstated him. Ten days later the bigoted outfielder leveled another racially insensitive comment, this time in the direction of Louisville’s fire chief, which prompted president Pulliam of Louisville to file charges against Holmes.

Almost two years later, on March 7, 1900, the National League voted to return Freedman’s $1,000 to him with six percent interest.

• The Washington Post reports that Jesse Burkett is in the best shape of any of the St. Louis Browns and has promised to do “some effective work with the stick this season.”

Burkett batted “only” .293 in 132 games in 1903, his lowest mark since batting .275 in 1892. Burkett’s slump brought an end to a 10-year string of success, during which he batted .369 with a .445 OBA and a .483 slugging percentage in more than 5,500 at-bats. Only Ed Delahanty was better over that 10-year stretch.

March 30:

• Boston Americans owner Henry Killilea releases Charles Baird from his contract so that he may resume his duties as Athletic Director at the University of Michigan. Baird was to act as Boston’s business manager, but Killilea was convinced to release him after the Michigan student body filed a petition on Baird’s behalf.

• Senators manager Tom Loftus benches Ed Delahanty prior to an exhibition game against Georgetown and insists Delahanty will not play until his status with the club has been officially decided by the National Commission.

March 31:

• The New York Times reports that laborers leveling the grounds at Washington Heights refused to work on March 30 unless the contractor increased their wages. Contractors scramble to find replacements and work is continued. The report claims that 200 carpenters’ helpers struck after they were paid only $1.50 a day instead of the $2.00 they were promised. Highlanders president Joe Gordon denies there was any strike and that the typical work day has been completed without incident. He also insists that his workers are being paid fairly, earning 25 more cents per day than average while working an hour less than a typical laborer.

• The Times also reports that a counter petition has been signed by Washington Heights residents who feel a ballpark will be beneficial to the neighborhood. This petition is in response to one signed by residents who want the property dissected by 166th and 167th Streets.