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Casey Stengel’s Inside-the-Park Home Run Wins Game One of the 1923 World Series!
“It’s a good thing I didn’t hit three homers in three games, or McGraw would have traded me to the Three-I League!” –Casey Stengel commenting after he hit two home runs in the 1923 World Series and then was traded to the lowly Boston Braves.
Ninety-four years ago this week, Casey Stengel’s inside-the-park home run wins Game One of the 1923 Wolrd Series. His second roundtripper, October 12, 1923, proves to be the game-winner when Giants’ hurler Art Nerf out duels Yankees’ starter Sam Jones in Game 3 of the Fall Classic, 1-0.
The 1923 World Series pitted the Yankees against the Giants for the third consecutive year. The three consecutive matchups between the Yankees and Giants marked the only time that three straight World Series featured the same two clubs. The Giants won the first two meetings, but the third time proved to be the charm for the Yankees, as they prevailed against John McGraw crew four games to two.
The first game was also the first World Series game to be nationally broadcast on-site, a huge milestone in baseball history. The games were played in alternate parks between Yankee Stadium (the first year of its existence) and the Polo Grounds, not the 2-3-2 format that became the norm in later years. Babe Ruth had a great series, as he batted .368 and hit three home runs.
Casey Stengel’s Memorable Heroics:
The few highlights of the 1923 World Series for the Giants included Casey’s two home runs to win Games One and Three. The first was an inside-the-park homer off the Yankees’ Joe Bush in the top of the ninth of a game tied 4-4. Casey legged out the long drive after hitting it into deep left-center field of cavernous Yankee Stadium. The Giants held on to win the game 5-4 and took an early 1-0 lead in the Series.
In typical Stengel eccentric fashion, Casey’s shoe came loose while streaking around the bases! (See the featured photo above).
The third game started out as a scoreless pitching duel between the Giants’ Art Nehf and the Yankees’ Sad Sam Jones. There was no score until the seventh when Casey struck again, this time with a homer that left the park, giving the Giants a 1-0 victory and a 2-1 Series lead.
A quarter century later, Stengel became the Yankees manager, and guided them through one of their most successful eras. In 12 years as the Yankees skipper (1949-1960), Stengel won 1,149 games and led them to ten American League pennants and seven World Series titles.
Gary Livacari
Photo Credits: All from Google search
Information: Excerpts edited from the 1923 World Series Wikipedia page.
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“This is the way old Casey Stengel ran running his home run home when two were out in the ninth inning and the score was tied, and the hall still hounding inside the Yankee yard.
“This is the way—
“His mouth wide open.
“His warped old legs bending beneath him at every stride.
“His arms flying hack and forth like those of a man swimming with a crawl stroke.
“His flanks heaving, his breath whistling, his head far back. Yankee infielders, passed by old Casey Stengel as he was running his home run home, say Casey was muttering to himself adjuring himself to greater speed as a jockey mutters to his horse in a race, saying: ‘Go on, Casey, go on.’
“The warped old legs, twisted and bent by many a year of baseball campaigning, just barely held out under Casey until he reached the plate, running his home run home.
“Then they collapsed.” (Damon Runyon)