December, 1919.
"Colonel, colonel! Great news! I just got word that Harry Frazer wants to break up the Red Sox! He's willing to sell off most of the team to you—and all he wants is a few benchwarmers and a lot of money, of which you have all there is in the world. Why, he's even willing to sell us Babe Ruth!
"Easy, easy liebkind. Why would we do such a thing? What does this Babe Ruth do, anyway?
"Well, he's the best left-handed pitcher in the majors. And he set the home-run record this year—as a hitter, in a shortened season!"
"Think, liebkind! Why would we need such a player? What team led the majors in home runs last year?"
"Well, we did. With 45. But—"
"Exactly! Our team is nicknamed "Murderers' Row. We even have a third baseman called Home Run Baker. What more do we need with more of these home runs? Besides, this Ruth is known is as quite the carouser. How long before he eats and drinks his way out of the game? How old is he, anyway?"
"He'll be 25. Next February."
"And in any case, where would we put him? I hear he likes to play the outfield. But already out there, we got the Duffy Lewis, we got the Ping Bodie, we got the Sammy Vick. This Vick is only 24, too. I think he's quite a comer."
"But don't you see the potential here, sir? With Ruth and the other Red Sox stars, we could have a champion ball team overnight! Why we could take over this town—take over the whole sports world! We could even move out of the Polo Grounds, and build a stadium of our own! Why, I bet we could draw one million fans on a season!"
"Patience, patience, my anonymous little subordinate! Are we doing so bad right now? No one is ever going to draw a million fans in a season. But we did over 600,000 this year—third best in the league. And we finished third—just 7 1/2 games behind the White Sox! That great Boston team with their great Babe Ruth came in sixth."
"But sir—"
"Look, liebkind, right now, we play in the best ballpark in the majors. The Giants charge us a very reasonable rent to be play here when they're not at home. Why should we want to risk building our own stadium? Or grabbing up the stars on some other team? What would our fellow owners think?
"Money doesn't grow on trees, you know. What do you think I make for a living, anyway?"
"Beer, sir."
"That's right. And with this terrible Prohibition coming in, the whole, wonderful business my father left to me is kaput. No Constitutional amendment has ever been repealed, you know. Nobody will ever drink beer again in this country!
"We have to hold on to what we got. You know what they say: no guts, no sorry. In another five years, your Babe Ruth will be a wreck, and maybe we can scrape out a pennant. We'll fill the Polo Grounds, then! On Sundays, anyway.
"Why, I can see us drawing as many as 700,000 fans in a season. And won't we feel better having done it all on our own, without making the fans of some other team feel bad? And you know, I bet Sammy Vick will be leading that fine team!"
It would be funny if it weren't so horribly true, Horace.
ReplyDeleteAs always, great stuff. Thank you for making my miserable self feel less alone as I ponder the future of our once great New York Yankees.
You know, old Jake sounds so reasonable. He makes a lot of good points.
ReplyDeleteHoss, this is like the movie "This is Spinal Tap". It comes so close the truth that it's not funny, at least for those in the know.
ReplyDeleteI met her on Monday
It was my lucky fun day
Big Bottom, Big Bottom
How could I leave this behind?
Short-sighted, complacent, fat cat kind of thinking. Like Tolstoy asking "how much land does a man need?", I got a question for everybody, how fat do you think HAL can get?
ReplyDeleteWord on the NY Post is that the Yanks only got to 300 Mil for Yamamoto. They did not match the Mets' offer. Pretty pathetic. I understand that Yamamoto would most likely have gone to LA LA Land regardless of how much the Yankees offered, but hell, I would've liked to have seen HAL pony up with an offer of at least 360-375 Mil. Then the Dodgers would've been forced to match that offer, which would've weakened their finances even further. Without weakening the Yankee financial picture. It'd be playin' dirty, but all's fair in love and war.
Thanks, guys, and great points all around.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, it struck me in writing that, how likely a scenario it was. Jake Ruppert got everything handed to him on a silver spoon: highly profitable business, East Side mansion—even four terms in Congress. Anyone else might have been content to indulge himself in owning the Yankees, simply collect a tidy profit every year and spend more time with his mistresses.
For Ruppert—who was really a cold-hearted son-of-a-bitch much of the time—it wasn't enough. He had a bigger dream, and he had the guts and the wherewithal to make it happen. If he and the guys he hired, Ed Barrow and George Weiss, were around today, Hal and Bri would be their prime pigeons.