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Facing elimination in game six of the 1926 World Series, the St Louis Cardinals get a jump on the Yankees in the top of the first inning scoring three runs. In this photo Jim Bottomley is rounding third base on a Les Bell’s single and heading home for the final run of the frame and crossing home plate with the second run is player/manager Rogers Hornsby.
Now with a 3-0 lead the Cards cagey veteran 39-year-old Pete Alexander would keep New York in check as well as enticing Babe Ruth to ground out to first baseman Bottomley in his first two times at bat. Up 4-1 going into the seventh St Louis would break the game wide open with a five-run rally giving them a quite comfortable lead of 9-1. The big inning was aided by a costly error by Yankees second baseman Tony Lazzeri and it was capped off with a Bell two-run home run. From there Alexander closed the door for the complete game win and a tied series at three games a piece.
In the decisive seventh game the Cardinals would once again shock the Yankees winning a squeaker 3-2 and securing St Louis their first World Series title in their franchise history. The hero of the game was a unlikely one in a weak hitting shortstop by the name of Tommy Thevenow, his third-inning single knocked in two runs, and in an inning once again abetted by a Yankees costly error, this time by fellow shortstop Mark Koenig.
If they named MVPs in World Series play in 1926, it wasn’t done for the first time till 1955, it very well could have been Thevenow achieving the honor. A career .247 hitter who would hit only two home runs in 4,164 at-bats over 15 years, Thevenow would finish the series with a .417 average and his home run in game two was crucial in that 6-2 win. It should be noted that his home run was of the inside-the-park variety. Not that it mattered.
