Authors: Glenn Stout
But there was more to Wood's troubles than scented envelopes and blushing babes. The problem came down to Wood's fastball—his command of the pitch and his faith in it. Unless he found both, and soon, both his season and Boston's would slip away. During the road trip Wood was somehow going to have to find a way to harness his ability.
Pitchers are creatures of habit, and some of Wood's difficulty so far in the 1912 season seemed to stem from his inability to get into a rhythm, a comfortable routine on the mound that would allow him to block out everything but throwing to the glove. The weather had made it difficult to get in work on a regular basis, and pitching in Fenway Park had proven to be a challenge. As Wood's last two outings had demonstrated, Fenway could be a dangerous place for a pitcher to work, particularly on warm days with a southerly wind, which seemed to push every fly ball hit to left field up onto Duffy's Cliff. He was also adapting to the change in his motion with men on base that Stahl had forced him to implement in spring training. When he took the mound he was often thinking about everything but getting the batter out, and he found it difficult to stay in a groove.
Even the mound was a distraction. At the time the rules stated only that the pitching rubber, then called the "plate," "shall not be more than 15 inches higher than the base lines or home plate." That left plenty of room for interpretation, and each pitcher had his preference. Wood had become as accustomed to the mound at Huntington Avenue as if it were an old shoe, but in Fenway Park, although the sod had been transferred from the old park, the soil was different. For most of the month of May Red Sox pitchers had consulted almost daily with Jerome Kelley and his crew, some of them preferring the mound to be low and flat while others asked for it to be higher and steeper. Kelley was accommodating to a point, but the weather had made his job even more difficult: after each game played in a downpour the mound had to be rebuilt.
The mound was important to Wood because it affected his ability to throw and control his best pitch, the fastball. Baseball writers of the era noted that Wood threw what they called a "jump ball"—an overhand, rising fastball that on good days had a "jump" or "hop" at the end of it. Although the phenomenon is an illusion—no ball thrown overhand truly rises on its way to the plate—a hard, high fastball like Wood's dropped less than hitters were accustomed to seeing and therefore appeared to rise as it reached the plate. When Wood was on his game, hitters could not resist swinging at a pitch that appeared to be coming in just above the belt. Yet as they whiffed they often discovered that they had actually offered at a pitch that crossed the plate at the letters. A higher mound helped Wood get on top of the ball and increase the downward angle of the pitch, which gave him more leverage and increased the illusion.
Like Pedro Martinez many years later, Wood had unusually long fingers that he used to impart terrific backspin on the pitch to help it move, and he delivered the ball with a unique and pronounced snap of the wrist that drew comment from everyone who saw him throw. "The wrist comes down and the ball leaves my finger quickly," Wood once explained, "thereby giving the ball the extra speed they say I have." He also threw each pitch, as he once said, "with all the energy I have," a habit that caused old-timers to shake their heads and wonder what was keeping his arm from falling off. Wood complemented his fastball with a so-called 12-6 curveball that did not curve so much as drop straight down, from twelve o'clock to six o'clock, a pitch that he could throw at various speeds. Wood occasionally claimed that he never threw what was then called a "slow ball" or a changeup, but that was a ruse. Smart hitters knew better.
Yet unless Wood could command his fastball, his other pitches were ineffective, and he knew it. His pitching philosophy was uncomplicated and direct and built around his best pitch. "When you stop to think of it, good pitching is only the knack of throwing the ball accurately so it will pass the batsman in a way that queers the sure eye," Wood once said. "That's why I believe in the fastball." It was that simple. In order to succeed Wood needed confidence in his ability to throw the fastball whenever and wherever he wanted.
That was what made Wood's catcher so important him. Despite the earlier report indicating that Wood had asked to pitch to Carrigan, as the season continued the two men, who were not close anyway, did not see eye to eye. Yet Wood's growing discontent with Carrigan as a receiver went beyond any personal animosity. Before breaking his leg in 1911, Carrigan had been one of the quicker and more active backstops in the game. But the broken leg had slowed him down. He did not move as well behind the plate anymore, either receiving the ball or throwing it. That affected Wood more so than Boston's other pitchers. Not only did Carrigan have a bit of trouble handling Wood's fastball—particularly when Wood missed location and Carrigan had to react quickly—but Wood, who still struggled to hold runners on base despite throwing from the stretch, needed a good-throwing catcher to keep base runners close and allow him to concentrate on pitching. The problem was that no matter how close Wood held runners to first base, Carrigan could no longer get rid of the ball fast enough to prevent most players from stealing. As a result Wood was forced to pay more attention to men on base and to pitch differently to hitters, both to keep them off base in the first place and then to hold runners close when they did reach first.
Earlier in the season Wood had successfully lobbied Jake Stahl to have Les Nunamaker catch on the days he pitched, but in truth Nunamaker wasn't a dramatic improvement over Carrigan. The two other catchers on the team, Hick Cady and Pinch Thomas, were on the roster primarily to keep them from playing for anyone else. Neither had major league experience, Stahl had no faith in either man, and they had hardly played.
Wood was not the only Boston pitcher struggling. Although Hall was pitching well and Bedient was gaining confidence, Eddie Cicotte remained awful, and Buck O'Brien was maddeningly inconsistent. Perhaps they all needed some time away from Boston.
Unfortunately, Cleveland was not the cure. Although the Indians were only playing .500 baseball, they took three of four from Boston, giving Hall his first defeat of the season and also beating Bedient and O'Brien. Wood won his eleventh game, but still gave up four runs and had to pitch ten innings to earn the victory. The only good things that happened in Cleveland were that lefty Ray Collins of Vermont, a stalwart of the staff in 1911, made his first appearance in relief and, after weeks of inactivity, Jake Stahl finally made a brief appearance. He had been out for so long with the bad ankle that some had questioned his fortitude. Indeed, according to some baseball historians, the phrase "jaking it," which refers to an injured player milking his recovery, was first used in reference to Stahl. He knocked in three runs in one game against Cleveland before returning to the bench, having turned a sure home run into a triple because he still couldn't run. Still, he would soon return to the lineup full-time and send Hugh Bradley and his anemic bat back to the bench. With each passing day Bradley's blast over the left-field wall seemed more and more an anomaly. In fact, a little more than a month after the Yankees had wanted Bradley as part of a deal for Hal Chase, the Red Sox put Bradley on waivers and found no takers. The Sox left Cleveland for Detroit down another game to the White Sox.
When they arrived in Detroit on June 5 they got their first look at Detroit's new ballpark, Navin Field, named after Frank Navin, who owned half the club. The other half was owned by Bill Yawkey, who inherited his money from his father, who had made his fortune in the logging and deforestation of Michigan's great north woods. When Bill Yawkey's sister's husband passed away, he would eventually adopt his nephew, Tom Austin. Bill Yawkey would give young Tom both the Yawkey name and, eventually, the Yawkey fortune, which in 1933 Thomas Austin Yawkey would use to purchase Fenway Park and the Red Sox. Although Yawkey was as responsible for the new park as Navin and could have had his name attached to it had he wanted, he deferred to his partner. He liked owning the Tigers because he liked palling around with ballplayers and was uninterested in leaving behind a monument bearing his name.
Because of the rain that had delayed the opening of Fenway Park, Navin Field had opened for business on the same day. Built on the same site as its precursor, Bennett Park, Navin Field was in many ways Fenway Park's spiritual and architectural cousin, albeit a bit more spacious. That was no accident, for both clubs utilized the services of Osborn Engineering in Cleveland in the building of their parks. Like Fenway, the concrete-and-steel ballpark in Detroit featured a single-deck grandstand with a similar configuration and pavilions that stretched down not just the first-base line, as in Fenway, but down the third-base line as well. And just like Fenway, center field was occupied by a section of bleachers. The twin scoreboard on the left-field fence was identical to that at Fenway Park and had been built by the same manufacturer. The field even mimicked Fenway Park's orientation to the sun. In 1926, however, a second deck would be added to the original single-deck structure, and any similarity to Fenway Park would be obliterated.
The construction of so many concrete-and-steel ballparks in such a brief time period provided evidence of just how deeply the game of baseball had become ingrained into the fabric of American life and how important it had become. Prior to the concrete-and-steel era ballparks had been less permanent, wooden structures that after only a few years were destined to decay. Although investments in concrete-and-steel structures were made primarily because of insurance and safety concerns, the decision to invest in such a durable structure was also emblematic of baseball's permanence. Baseball franchises like the Red Sox had come to represent the character of their city and were now worthy of homes that reflected their place in the hearts and minds of their people. The concrete-and-steel ballpark era provided evidence that baseball was a lasting part of the culture. Like public buildings, they were built to last. The game was here to stay and so, presumably, were its structures. These ballparks became homes for the aspirations of the game, and they would evolve to fit their cities and grow in importance to the fabric of the surrounding communities.
The Sox were impressed. Navin Field was much like Fenway, only bigger in scale, including a 125-foot flagpole in deep center field and a few other interesting features, such as a dark green backdrop in center field for the benefit of hitters, which batters loved but pitchers detested. That feeling became even more pronounced among Boston pitchers after the Red Sox dropped two of the first three contests to the Tigers. Since beating Washington in the first game of a doubleheader on Memorial Day, the Sox had now lost five of eight.
Yet there was still some reason for optimism. Although Hall lost again, Buck O'Brien pitched well to earn a win, and in his first start of the season Ray Collins, his bum knee finally healed, pitched relatively well in defeat as he replaced Eddie Cicotte in the rotation. And fortunately for the Red Sox, the first-place White Sox had gone into a tailspin. Instead of falling further behind in the race, the Red Sox remained only two games behind Chicago, although Washington, which had not lost since that same Memorial Day doubleheader against Boston, was closing fast.
Wood pitched the series finale, and after the Sox erupted for four runs in the top of the first, he made it stand up and salvaged a split for Boston with an 8–3 win. He still wasn't the best pitcher in baseball, but he had been able to get outs when he needed them. Tim Murnane noted that "Wood never worked more earnestly in a game. Several times Ty Cobb was in position to make trouble with a safe drive, but the Kansas Cyclone cut the Georgia Peach off without the semblance of a hit." Chicago lost again, and with their next stop St. Louis, Boston now trailed by only a game.
The Red Sox arrived in St. Louis knowing there was nothing like a series against the Browns to cure the ills of a flailing ball club. Boston's batters relished the opportunity to feast on the Browns' pitching staff, and Boston's hurlers looked forward to throwing in the steamy heat of the old river town, which made the arm feel loose and free. Even better, the Browns had gotten off to a slow start and were now lurching to a complete halt. About the only thing about the club that did not reek of ruin and decay was their ballpark, Sportsman's Park. An earlier wood structure had been rebuilt in steel and concrete in 1909, the third such park in the majors. It was, in a way, the kind of park Fenway was first intended to be: the grandstand featured a double deck with single-deck wings extending down each line. But of all the concrete-and-steel ballparks of the era, Sportsman's Park, like the Browns themselves, was rather dull and uninteresting. Although later renovations would give the park some charm, as first constructed it was as colorless as the team that called it home.
St. Louis fans were accustomed to watching the Browns lose, and they were not disappointed when Boston came to town. In the first game things got so bad that St. Louis fans spent most of the game cheering Tris Speaker, and with good reason. He hit for the cycle, and Duffy Lewis also chipped in with a home run as Bedient scattered ten hits in a 9–2 win. But the big news was in Chicago, where the White Sox, playing at home, were falling apart. All of a sudden Boston was closing on Chicago.
They could smell it, and the next day, for perhaps the first time all year, the Red Sox came alive and through pure effort won a game they should have lost. Trailing the Browns 2–1 behind O'Brien, Boston tied the game in the eighth when Carrigan knocked in Larry Gardner. Then, in the ninth, Steve Yerkes singled. After Speaker made an out, Stahl called for the hit-and-run play. Yerkes broke for second base, and Duffy Lewis complied by bouncing a slow ground ball to Browns third baseman Jimmy Austin. He fielded the ball cleanly and threw to first as Lewis gamely raced down the line.
But Lewis's hard run caused Austin to make what Paul Shannon described as a "lurid throw" that sailed high and careened against the stands. In Fenway Park, where the pavilion was angled toward the field, such overthrows usually bounced back at a sharp angle toward the field of play, making it difficult to advance more than one extra base. But in St. Louis the pavilion was parallel to the foul line, and the ball bounded along the barrier into foul territory far down the right-field line. As Steve Yerkes, hardly a speed demon, rounded second base he saw manager Jake Stahl waving madly in the coach's box. Yerkes kept running, and when Stahl sent him around third base, he headed home and barely beat the throw to the plate. When Yerkes made it to the dugout he was swept up in the arms of his teammates, a rare expression of public camaraderie on a team that still struggled to pull together as one. Meanwhile the White Sox were losing again, and when Duffy Lewis gathered in a fly ball at the base of the left-field bleachers for the final out of the game, the Red Sox were in first place in the American League for the first time since April 23.