If ever the Greater Cleveland area needed a break to take their mind off their troubles, July, 1954, couldn’t have come at a more opportune time.
The 21st annual All-Star Game took place at Cleveland Municipal Stadium off the shore of Lake Erie on July, 13, 1954. The last time Cleveland hosted an All-Star Game was in 1935.
What exactly was ailing the city? Let us count the ways.
The Indians final series before the All-Star break was held at Comiskey Park, where the Chicago White Sox swept the Tribe in four games. It was a miserable series for the Indians. They left 31 men on base with Al Rosen (last year’s AL MVP) stranding nine without picking up a single RBI. The Tribe star center-fielder, Larry Doby, also was without an RBI. What made matters worse, the New York Yankees ended the first half of the season sweeping the Washington Senators, winning nine in a row and 12 of their last 14 to slice the Indians once comfortable lead down to a half a game in the American League.
The deafening alarm bells were ringing in full force. Cleveland fans were fretting over yet another late season collapse.
Shirley Povich, columnist for the Washington Post, wrote on the morning of the All-Star Game, "The Indians, their hitting attacked defused by good White Sox pitching, have reason to be apprehensive. This was the year in which they weren't supposed to go into their customary fold-up routine, but you don't blow four straight to the White Sox at a time when the Yankees are charging in high gear, as the Yankees are doing....neither the Indians nor the White Sox have the depth to contest with the Yanks."
Al Wolf from the L.A. Times, echoed Povich’s sentiments: "Even the most ardent Cleveland rooters must be wondering if it's going to be the same old story. Three years in a row, the Indians have had to settle for second place. Something always seems to happen."
Outside of baseball, the All-Star Game was a welcome diversion to Clevelanders who were being flooded with press coverage, reporting a grisly murder case that gripped the city and quickly became a sensational national story.
Just nine days before the All-Star Game, in the early morning hours of July 4, 1954, Marilyn Sheppard, a 31-year-old housewife and mother (four months pregnant) was beaten to death in her bed (at their lakeside home of Bay Village) with an unknown instrument. Her body was splattered with blood, pools of blood were found throughout the home. The blood-soaked victim was the wife of Dr. Sam Sheppard, a 30-year-old osteopath, who claimed he was sleeping on the family’s downstairs couch when his wife was savagely murdered.
It wasn’t until July 30, that the Cleveland Press screamed with the front-page headline: "Why Isn’t Sam Sheppard in Jail?” that Sheppard was arrested and charged with murder in the first degree. On December 21, the doctor was found guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. The U.S. Supreme Court subsequently overturned his conviction in June, 1966.
Clevelanders, in fact, were accustomed to crime and colorful crime figures, such as Alex (Shonder) Birns, a mobster and racketeer from Cleveland, who was once labeled as the city's "Public enemy No. 1" by the local newspapers. Just a day before the All-Star game, Birns went on trial for income tax evasion. He was convicted and served three years in the federal penitentiary.
More bad news came during All-Star week when it was reported that Hall of Famer Tris Speaker, 66, suffered a heart attack. The local hospital (Lakeside Hospital) said he was in good condition. Speaker, the “Grey Eagle,” was the player manager for the 1920 World Champion Cleveland Indians.
By July 13, 1954, according to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, there were 32 cases of polio reported in Greater Cleveland, an increase from 23 cases reported at the same time last year.
So, Cleveland was ripe, to be sure, for the all-stars to roll into town and put on a show that would help them forget the doom and gloom weighing them down.
Many thought that holding the All-Star game in Cleveland was “altogether fitting and proper” considering the city’s deep roots to the national pastime.
As the Sporting News so eloquently wrote, "Rich is the history to which the 1954 All-Star game added another chapter. Charley Somers...Sunny Jim Dunn...Alva Bradley...Ernest S. Barnard...Billy Evans...Cy Slapnicka...Roger Peckinpaugh--all of them played major roles in making and keeping Cleveland a hotbed of baseball interest. The All-Star game will go to every city in both majors before it returns to Cleveland. But nowhere will it be more welcome, nowhere will visitors to the great mid-summer show feel more at home."
The manager for the American League was Casey Stengel; for the National League, it was rookie manager Walter Alston of the Brooklyn Dodgers.
The Cleveland Press reported that the betting along “Short Vincent” (a popular hub of activity in downtown Cleveland, between East 6th and East 9th streets) had the NL as 7-5 favorites to win the midseason classic. The Press also reported a moderate amount of ticket scalping in the lobbies of a number of downtown hotels.
Contrary to popular opinion, Jimmy Piersall, the Boston Red Sox center fielder, who was picked for the 1954 All-Star game and covered the 21st All-Star classic for the Boston Globe, wrote a column, predicting an AL victory. "I feel sure we'll beat those National Leaguers tomorrow," Piersall wrote, “but I think it's going to be a close game. I'd say about 5-4 for our side."
Despite the AL holding a commanding 12-8 All Star game advantage, there was good reason for the NL to be heavily favored.
The senior circuit was simply billowing with currents of power. Dodger center fielder Duke Snider was scorching the league in the first half of the season, batting .367 with 20 home runs and 70 runs batted in. Stan Musial (appearing in his 11th All Star game) was hitting .331 with 82 RBI's and 26 home runs. The Cincinnati Reds burly first baseman, Ted Kluszewski, was batting .312 with 22 home runs and 66 RBI's. And Willie Mays entered the All-Star game with a robust 31 home runs. Baseball statisticians, in fact, were buzzing whether the "Say Hey Kid" might very well surpass Babe Ruth's single season home run record of 60 set in 1927. Mays was 11 games ahead of the Babe’s pace in 1927.
Additionally, the NL hitters combined for 230 home runs compared with 152 for the AL.
Despite a mediocre 7-6 record, Casey Stengel opted to use his own 25-year-old southpaw Whitey Ford to start the game. The Yankee manager thought he would be the best man for the job to face Duke Snider, Stan Musial, and Ted Kluszewski of the NL, all left-handed hitters.
Walter Alston, named Robin Roberts (11-8) of the Philadelphia Phillies as his starter for the NL, making it the fourth time in five years, the fireballing right-hander started for the senior circuit in an All-Star game.
The first pitch was set for 1:30 pm.
The television announcers were Mel Allen and Gene Kelly for NBC. Jimmy Dudley and Al Helfer handled the radio play by play for WHK and WERE in Cleveland. The Chicago Tribune reported that a "Cleveland's summer orchestra entertained early arrivals with hit songs from recent Broadway musicals."
July 13th was a hot day with a blazing sun beating down on the field; a soft breeze drifted through the stadium, making the game barely comfortable for the 68,751 fans who poured through the turnstiles. It was the second largest crowd in All-Star game history.
And Indians fans were thrilled to discover Stan Coveleski, celebrating his 66th birthday, was in the house. Coveleski won three games for the Indians in the 1920 World Series.
The first two frames of the game were quiet. It wasn’t until the bottom of the third inning when the American League exploded for four runs. With runners on second and third, the Cleveland Indians third baseman Al Rosen (penciled in at first base) who was mired in a slump with an injured index finger, cracked a home-run to left-center, the ball carrying 380 feet and putting the AL up 3-0. The very next batter, Ray Boone, a former Indian no less, smacked a solo home run to practically the same spot of Rosen’s mighty clout. This marked the first time in All-Star history back to back homers took place in the same inning.
In the 4th, the senior circuit was equal to the task. Sandy Consuegra, the Cuban-born right-handed pitcher for the Chicago White Sox, took the baton from Whitey Ford and proceeded to give up five consecutive hits (after retiring Alvin Dark of the Giants). Ray Jablonski, the Cardinals third baseman, slapped a hard single to center, scoring Duke Snider and Stan Musial. With runners on second and third, Jackie Robinson stepped inside the box and crashed a double off the right center field fence, scoring Kluszewski and Jablonski with the tying runs. Consuegra was lifted for Bob Lemon. With Robinson stationed on second, Don Mueller (Giants), pinch hitting for Roberts, drove a long double into the alley in right center, scoring Robinson to put the NL up 5-4.
The American League came roaring back to tie the score in the bottom of the 4th. After Chicago White Sox shortstop Chico Carrasquel lined a single to left, Minnie Minoso sliced a ball to left center field for a long single with Carrasquel scampering to third. Willie Mays (who just replaced Snider in center, with Snider moving to right) skillfully handled Minoso's hard smash to prevent extra bases. Cleveland Indians infielder Bobby Avila lifted a fly ball to medium left, deep enough to score Carasquel for a sac fly, and tying the score at 5.
The hitting assault continued in the 5th
With Snider on base, Ted Kluszewski crushed a towering drive over the right field fence, for a two-run home run, putting the Nationals back on top, 7-5.
Cleveland's Al Rosen is greeted at home plate by the Yankees' Yogi Berra after Rosen hit his second home run for the AL in the 1954 All-Star Game. Photo Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
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In the bottom of the 5th, Al Rosen, who prior to the game practically begged Casey Stengel to bench him because he didn't think he would help the AL, walloped his second home run of the game, a two-run shot (traveling 400 feet) with Yogi Berra on base. Rosen’s majestic blast gave him five runs batted in, tying an All-Star record set by Ted Williams in 1946.
The game was tied at 7 after 5 innings.
The AL tacked on another run in the 6th (with Warren Spahn on the mound) when Avila singled home Ted Williams who was planted on third, giving the junior circuit an 8-7 advantage.
In the top of the 8th, with Mays on base, Cincinnati outfielder Gus Bell put the National League up again, 9-7, when he smashed a home run over the fence in right center. Dean Stone, the rookie southpaw (Washington Senators) replaced Bob Keegan to become the AL's sixth pitcher of the game.
Arguably, the most controversial play of the game was triggered when second sacker Red Schoendienst of the Cardinals attempted to steal home plate but was gunned down on close play at the plate to end the inning. Third base coach Leo Durocher stormed up to home plate umpire Bill Stewart and administered a severe verbal lashing as only the demonstrative Giants manager can, arguing vehemently that Stone never came to a complete stop before rifling the ball to home plate. Stone, according to the fuming Durocher, should have been called for a balk. After the game, Lippy Leo was still furious, telling reporters "Ed Rommel, the third base coach umpire saw it [the balk] and told me so, said Leo, "but he was helpless to do anything about it because Stewart refused to ask him for an opinion. I simply can't understand how this game of baseball is played today”, Durocher roared.
In the bottom of the 8th, down a run, the AL managed to put the score in double digits with a three-run outpouring. Another Cleveland Indian, Larry Doby, pinch hitting for Stone, tied the game with a solo home run over the left center fence. Later in the inning, with the bases loaded and two outs, the tobacco chomping Nellie Fox (White Sox) managed to send a bloop single just out of the reach of Giants shortstop Alvin Dark on the edge of the outfield grass, scoring Berra and Mickey Mantle, and putting the AL up 11-9 heading to the 9th.
Before the Chicago Cubs Randy Jackson popped up to Berra to end the game, there were some nervous moments and high drama in the final frame when Stan Musial came to the plate with Snider on first base. The NL’s clean-up hitter laced two long drives that just went foul in the right-field stands, just missing tying the game.
The AL held on with an 11-9 victory for their first win in the All-Star game since 1949 when the junior circuit beat the NL, 11-7 with manager Lou Boudreau.
Dean Stone was credited with the win despite throwing only three pitches. Prior to the 1954 All-Star Game, Casey Stengel, the “Ol' Perfessor” had lost four consecutive All-Star games.
Many questioned NL skipper Walter Alston's decision to leave pitcher Jimmy Wilson with a 6-0 record on the bench with no action. The Milwaukee Braves right-hander was the only one of 8 pitchers never to throw a pitch.
Seven records were broken in the 54' All-Star game, including 17 hits by the AL, 31 hits for both the NL and AL; while the AL’s 4 home runs tied the record set by the NL in 1951.
The gross receipts for the game totaled $292, 678 or $259,204 after taxes, a record for an All-Star Game (another $110,000 from television and radio), with sixty percent of the proceeds going toward the players pension fund.
The post-game mingling among reporters at the Hollenden Hotel was appreciably dampened, when it was learned that sportswriter Grantland Rice , considered the dean of the nation's syndicated sports columnists (whose columns were carried in more than 100 newspapers) died after suffering a stroke while working in his downtown office. Granny was 73.
A striking irony of the 1954 All-Star Game centered on how Casey Stengel may have helped his chief American League rival, the Cleveland Indians, as both teams prepared for their second half of the season quest to clinch the pennant.
In a New York Times column published two days after the All-Star Game (July 15, 1954) with the headline: "A Pyrrhic Victory?" written by Arthur Daley; the Times prized columnist wondered if Casey Stengel may have inadvertently breathed new life into the Tribe.
Daley writes, "He [Stengel] used the ailing Al Rosen and that invalid cured his troubles with two homers (he hadn't one in seven weeks) and five runs batted in; the slumping Bobby Avila broke forth with three hits and two runs batted in; Larry Doby belted a game-tying pinch home run." "As a moral builder," Daley continued, "for the wilting Indians, the All-Star game was perfect...so it will be with the renewed vigor and spirit that the Tribe resumes its regular operations today."
Despite their uncharacteristic swoon just prior to the All-Star break, the Indians ended the season strong, finishing an impressive 111-43 (.721 winning percentage), which included an 11-game winning streak (September 8-20) 8 games ahead of their chief rival, the Yankees, to advance to their first World Series in six years and claim their third American League championship in franchise history.
The Tribe, of course, were unceremoniously swept by the New York Giants in the World Series.
One of the advantages of hosting an All-Star game is being surrounded by a swarm of reporters with a mission to fill their notebooks. Indians GM Hank Greenberg took full advantage of the abundance of journalists in town to press his case for interleague play. The former Tiger slugger was convinced interleague play wouldn’t diminish, one iota, the uniqueness and novelty of the All-Star game. Greenberg told Hal Lebovitz of the Sporting News, “In a schedule providing for inter-league play, the curiosity would remain and the competitive angle would be even stronger because the games actually would count in the standings."
A Footnote:
Though the All-Star game in Cleveland witnessed an abundance of future Hall of Famers, July, 1954, was the month and year another future Hall of Famer was born, only it would take a few years for many to realize it.
It was in July, 1954, that a 19-year-old truck driver from Memphis Tennessee, Elvis Presley, entered the Memphis’ Sun Studio to record “That’s All Right” (Mama), an up-tempo blues song written by Arthur Crudup. The young, financially strapped musician fused the rhythm and blues song with a shade of country music. It quickly became Presley's first smash hit, sending him on the fast road to international fame and fortune.
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NOTE: A heartfelt thanks to my friends at Proquest who allowed me to access the archives of the Chicago Tribune and L.A. Times.
–Bill Lucey
November 29, 2018
