March 28, 2005
BASEBALL: Hauling Down The Jolly Roger
John at Iberian Notes wonders if the 1921 Pirates threw the pennant race.
If you look at the schedule, the Bucs were 76-40 and led the second-place Giants by 7.5 games on August 22, but went 14-23 thereafter, including losing their next 7 straight meetings with the Giants, a very efficient way to blow a lead. Only one of those games was decided by one run; the Pirates' pitchers got clobbered, allowing 5.4 runs/game in those meetings, while scoring just 7 runs in 7 games. By September 19, when they won their last meeting with the Giants, the Pirates were 3.5 games back. Corruption? Not that I know of, but it was certainly a dramatic collapse.
It seems like I remember reading in Asinof’s book (Eight Men Out) that while Rothstein never showed any outward concern of getting fingered in the 1919 fix, the ordeal spooked him enough to stay away from baseball games after that. I want to say that was also mentioned in Ken Burns’ Baseball documentary. Of course, AR could have just been more careful afterwards.
Very interesting and maybe worth a casual weekend investigation. I can’t remember off the top of my head who of note was with the Buccos at the time though I know the Waner’s didn’t arrive until the mid-20’s. (Paul in 1926 I think)