Cornelius McGillicuddy
You may not be especially interested in baseball, but if you are interested in human beings and human values he would interest you. By his looks he might be a retired manufacturer and former Sunday School Superintendent, one of the thousands each winter in those havens of refuge for the aged along the West Coast of Florida. The sort of man who sits on a sidewalk in the morning sunshine, enjoys his daily game of shuffleboard, and hears Dr. William Lyon Phelps at the weekly meeting of the Iowa Club. After all, at seventyseven a man has a right to take things easy.
But at seventy-seven Mr. Cornelius McGillicuddy is still in the thick of life — in the thick of a young man’s game. Back in 1900 when the American League was starting, he hustled over to Philadelphia, interested a rich man named Benjamin F. Shibe in founding a club in the new organization, and set forth to collect a team. He’s been in Philadelphia ever since.
In 1902, before the majority of modern baseball fans were born, he won his first pennant. In 1905 he lost his first World Series to the Giants. In the 1910 Series he defeated Chance and the Cubs; in the 1911 and 1913 Series, McGraw and the Giants. Unexpectedly he lost to Stallings and the Braves in 1914. (We must ask him to explain that one.) He beat Joe McCarthy and the Cubs in the 1929 Series, conquered Gabby Street and the Cards in 1930, and lost to them in the 1931 Series. Nine pennants and five Series triumphs are his record in forty years of baseball.
Most of his contemporaries are no more. Stallings is gone, McGraw is gone, Street is gone. Of the men he helped to found the American League, Ban Johnson, the first president, is gone; Shibe, the owner of the Athletics, is gone; Comiskey of Chicago is gone. Only Connie Mack remains, still sitting each afternoon in summer on the bench, and looking almost the same as that tall, gaunt figure of 1900. But he isn’t merely the manager of a baseball team. The fans say, ‘Let’s go watch Connie this afternoon.’ He’s an institution. He’s the first citizen of Philadelphia today.
It was as a mittless catcher that he caught for East Brookfield in the Central Massachusetts League in 1883, the year he was first able to vote. Later that summer he signed with Meriden for the astounding sum of $90 a month, payable whenever he could collect. Then to Hartford, and in 1886 he was sent with four other players to Washington in the National League for the total sum of $3500. Connie was still catching them on the first bounce, still catching them meat-handed.
In 1891 he first became a manager, of the Pittsburgh Nationals; in 1897 he went as catcher-manager to Milwaukee, where he stayed until the American League was formed. Nearing eighty, he’s the greatest living example of the fact that a man is as old as his arteries, or that anyone who has a consuming interest in some phase of existence stays young despite the years. Connie Mack loves baseball. An oldtime player said, ‘He’d like to die out on that-there bench.’ He probably will.
Watch him at work in the morning behind the long glass-topped table in the Athletics’ office in Shibe Park. He looks — well, sixty-five at the most. With a quick gesture he snatches a letter from the table, or jumps up with the reflexes of a young man, stalking rapidly across to the door. He’s tall, six feet one, straight, with blue eyes, lots of gray hair parted in the middle, and a kind, mobile face. Catcher’s hands, all right — long, strong fingers. Even today his handshake is firm and warm. That’s really the amazing thing about this amazing man; not his youthfulness, but his warmth. You feel it in his handshake, see it in his smile — a wonderful smile that lights up his clear blue eyes. You can understand immediately the oldtimer who said, ‘If a man won’t play for Connie Mack he won’t play for anyone.’
By what magic has this gentle, warmhearted individual taken nine clubs to the top? How has he kept discipline for over forty years among those wild-eyed individualists, professional ballplayers? Because even in his younger days he was never tough or hard-boiled. How did he do it? Speaking of several of his youngsters recently, he complained of their failure to assume responsibilities. Then hastily he caught himself: ‘I wouldn’t have them any different. They’re young, and worries will come all too soon.’
Yes, but how has he maintained discipline? Not by force, but by commanding the respect of his players — ‘ My boys,’ as he likes to call them. Not by being hard-boiled, but by being human. All ballplayers like Connie Mack. Some managers enjoy slapping a fine on a recalcitrant star; Connie has other and possibly subtler methods. A player jumps from a taxi before the hotel, nods good-night to Mack, who is standing at the entrance, and goes up in the elevator. But Connie knows youth like the master of a boarding school. He merely walks round to the back entrance in time to catch the player scuttling out like a bad boy. Lots of managers would seize the moment to burst into a lecture, winding up with a fine. Connie doesn’t need to. The man sees him, turns round, and goes back to his room and bed.
Moreover, Mack plays no favorites. On the A’s, nobody ‘sits in the manager’s lap,’ as ballplayers like to put it. Once a very fine star made so much trouble that although he played heads-up baseball, and was of great value to the team, Connie thoroughly disliked him. After the season Connie asked him into the clubhouse. The player came, expecting to be sold up the river. Instead he was met with a contract for a raise. There was no more trouble with that gentleman.
Lucky man, Mr. Mack. He likes people and people like him. How did he build up pennant winners? By giving players his confidence; they in turn gave him their respect. That’s why he can handle those temperamental prima donnas. The hardest of the lot to manage?
‘ Oh . . . there wasn’t any of ‘em really hard. You could always talk with ‘em and reason with ‘em. Even Rube Waddell. Yes sir, though most of my gray hairs can be traced to wondering where he was when his bed was empty. And when he was right we’ve never had another could touch him!’
The easiest to manage in forty years? ‘All my great players, every one.’ He speaks with emphasis. ‘Eddie Collins, especially.’
His 1910 team, with the famous $100,000 infield of Baker, Barry, Collins, and Davis, is his favorite. He doesn’t say so, but you can see he thinks so. What was his greatest infield? ‘That 1910 bunch. You see, they could rise to heights in critical moments of a Series. You just couldn’t improve on those lads. My greatest outfield? Well, I guess that ‘29 bunch with Haas, Miller, and Simmons. They had power — they were hitters, those boys.’
Connie, himself a catcher, has had some great catchers: Ralphy (Cy) Perkins, Ossie Schreckengost, Wally Schang, Ira Thomas, Doc Powers, Jack Lapp, and the star of them all, Mickey Cochrane. But there’s a soft spot for Ossie. ‘Schrcck was the Harpo Marx of his time. He was the fizz powder in the pin wheel that made Waddell great. He was colorful, unpredictable, eccentric, erratic, and filled with baseball genius.’ The blue eyes twinkled. ‘Why, he used his gloved hand like a shortstop. Schrcck could do more with his glove than any catcher that ever stood behind the plate. I remember he roomed with Waddell. They used to sleep in one bed, to save money. One year, when I sent him his contract, Schreck wrote back: ‘The contract is all right, but before I sign it you got to put in a clause that if I have to room with Waddell he can’t eat animal crackers in bed.’ The clause was inserted.
No manager has had more great pitchers than Connie Mack — starting with Waddell, Coakley, and Bender, Jack Coombs, Eddie Plank, Bush, George Earnshaw, Lefty Grove, and Waite Hoyt. The greatest of the lot? ‘Everyone has his own “greatest.” I don’t like to use superlatives. But I think Chief Bender is the greatest one-game pitcher, the greatest money pitcher, that baseball ever had. He wasn’t a Rube Waddell, no, but he was the best money pitcher in the game.’
Yet it was Bender, with Plank, who was the disappointment of the 1914 Series which the Boston Braves won in four straight games from the A’s. According to Connie, there was a split in the club. The newly formed Federal League was out for players and naturally raided the Athletics, who had more than their share of stars. Some members of the club wanted to leave, others to stand by Mack. ‘The loyalists and rebels were engaged in a bitter fight. Players to whom I’d given a scouting assignment never left Philadelphia. Our players were more bitter against each other than interested in a baseball Series. We lacked the spirit to win. Stallings accomplished a baseball miracle by coming from last place on July Fourth to win the pennant and take the Series that fall; but I sincerely believe a team isn’t great unless it repeats. The Braves didn’t repeat in 1915.’
Why wasn’t he able to meet the prices offered to his men by the Federal League? ‘We simply couldn’t afford to. As it was, we were paying the highest salaries in the circuit. We had no Sunday ball, and a large number of cheap seats in our park. When Bender and Plank signed up with the Federals, I decided to try to save something. So I sent out word my players were for sale, and the offers rolled in.’
Had he refused to sell his players, it would have hurt those who stayed. ‘The boys who were left felt we’d be down in the cellar, and they wanted to go where the future was brighter.’ Some managers never think about the players when they leave a club. Still others take good care to see that a star doesn’t go to a serious contender. Not Connie. He thinks of the players. Mickey Cochrane, for instance, was sold to Detroit and later won a pennant for them.
To Mack’s annoyance, people still ask him what happened to his 1910 and 1932 teams. Why did he break them up? No mystery, for Connie never sells players unless he needs cash. The story runs round Philadelphia that he has invariably made money with tail-enders and lost with pennant winners. He almost admits the truth of this.
‘Yes, I’ve made money coming up, and lost with world champions. When your club is fighting to the top, the fans take an interest and come to the park. Philadelphia’s a right good ball town; folks now are loyal and turning out when we are in last place, but pennant winners get to be an old story. With a tail-end club this year we’re doing real good. When the club is behind, salaries are low; so are expenses. Champions cost money. In boxing, a manager has one champion; in baseball, twenty-five. We had almost the highest-priced club in history in 1932, not barring the Yanks with Babe Ruth’s $80,000 salary. I had five men who drew more than $100,000. Yet attendance fell away that year. When you win, you have a general rise in all expenses; more gatemen, ticket takers, ushers, and so on, are necessary.’
Yet the fans in Philadelphia say there’s a reason he sold those men which Connie won’t ever mention. They believe that when the A’s were winning one man connected with the club took out large profits for other business ventures. The rumor also persists that Connie, in common with several others, got pretty well clipped in the market in 1929 and 1930. One fact is true: whenever he sold players he needed money. ‘You don’t make money by selling players in baseball. Half my 1932 team cost me more than I got by selling my entire 1914 team. If I hadn’t sold some of my players I should have had to leave baseball.’
He won’t leave baseball. Baseball is his love and his life. Save for indispositions such as the gallstone attack which benched him in the summer of 1937, he appears each day at the park. At seventy-seven he still runs the team, still travels on the road, still climbs into the dugout every afternoon in his blue suit and high choker collar, a handkerchief wrapped round his neck if it’s very hot. Removing his coat, he hangs it on a peg in the dugout, puts the team on the field, takes his scorecard in hand, places his outfield, and proceeds to run his show.
Does he ever make mistakes?
‘Yep, I’ve made hundreds. Make ‘em almost daily. Every manager does. The worst mistake of all? Let me see . . . well, to my way of thinking the worst mistake I ever made was back in 1907 when we were running nip and tuck with Detroit. I had a pitcher, name of Jimmy Dygert, who could beat anyone for seven innings. Then he was finished. I could have pitched him seven innings any day in the week. If I’d a found this out in time, I could have won that pennant. Instead, I didn’t realize it until after the season. We finished second, and Detroit won the League.
‘Another time we were playing the Yanks and Ruth came to bat. I waved my outfield round and they moved where I motioned, but still I wasn’t satisfied, and finally had to climb out of the dugout to place them and direct the defense. Meanwhile the pitcher was waiting in the box and Babe was standing at the plate. After about three minutes’ wigwagging, I got everyone set. You can guess what happened. Babe hit the first pitch over the fence.
‘Fortunately for a manager it doesn’t always work out that way. I’ll never forget the first game Ty Cobb played for us after twenty-two years with Detroit. He’d been manager six years with the Tigers and knew the weak and strong points of all players in every club. One of the first batters was a man I knew would hit the ball I signaled my pitcher to feed him, to Ty’s left. I stood up in the dugout and waved him over with my scorecard. Even the pitcher turned in the box to look. What’d he do? He saluted, like the good sport he was, and trotted over to the new position. Believe me, I felt relieved a few seconds later when the batter lined a drive so close he hardly had to move a step to grab it.’
Ask him how Cobb and the old-timers compare with the modern player, and watch his straight back in the stiff chair grow more erect. ‘Oh, the old-timers were wonderful. Wonderful. they didn’t have the advantages the player has nowadays. The equipment is so much better, the gloves and the bat. He has material to work with that Cobb and Schreck and those boys never had. Then, too, they’ve got another asset today — they have the experience of those old-timers to assist them. They’re making plays a little easier because they know how to do it. But they aren’t any smarter, no sirree.’
He believes the great difference between baseball today and baseball forty years ago lies in two things. ‘First, this improvement in all the equipment used. Second, the change in batting and pitching. In the old days we used to throw in four or five balls a game. Nowadays they use a couple of dozen. The pitcher has been handicapped and the hitter has a great advantage. That’s the chief change in baseball to my way of thinking.
‘Yes, the most important position on a club was always the pitcher, still is. But, outside the battery, short and second have become vital in recent years. A club that has a double-play combination that can pull them out of hot spots has a big advantage in a close race. By the way, the Cleveland club has a dandy pair, those boys Boudreau and Mack. They can throw, and throw hard and straight, from any position. You watch ‘em.’
Since the death of Charles J. Comiskey in Chicago, the Mack family is the last dynasty left in baseball. One son, Roy F., is vice president and secretary of the club, while Earle, another son, is due some day to succeed his father on the bench. Connie could retire right now to his Germantown home if he so desired. But, as one of his former stars put it, ‘He’d die if you took him away from Shibe Park.’
Some major-league clubs have had twenty to twenty-five different managers in their existence, and the average number in the forty years of the American League is about fifteen per club. But Philadelphia has had only one man, Connie Mack. Today he’s an institution — not merely in the game, where he was one of the five men named as Builders of Baseball in the Baseball Museum in Cooperstown, New York, but in his home town, where he was presented the Bok Award of $10,000 in 1929. The fans talk about the A’s, but they turn out to see Connie Mack. In fifteen minutes while I was sitting in the outer office at Shibe Park recently, a dozen telephone calls came reserving seats for the next day’s game. The club may be in last place, but Connie is an institution.
Since 1933 he hasn’t finished in the first division, but it’s unlikely that this worries him much. For he’s been in the game a long while and has plenty of patience. He waited from 1902 until 1905 for another pennant winner, then started to climb again until he was victorious in 1910. From 1915 to 1921 he was in eighth place, waiting and building for the future. By 1929 he had his championship club once more. In 1932 he sold them to raise cash, and at the age of seventy started the long slow road to the top for the fourth time in his life. Some day he’ll win another pennant.
You’ll hear it whispered round that he pays poor salaries. Yet he gave $45,000 for young McCoy of Detroit, who was declared a free agent last winter, and pays Johnson, his outfielder, $18,000. Today he has a team of youngsters, a team with possibilities. Lacking firstclass pitching, he has nevertheless the nucleus of a good ball club. ‘I think next year we’ll make trouble for any of them,’ he declares.
You have to know Connie — to know his life, to see him, watch him on the bench, and talk with fans in Shibe Park — to appreciate what a character he is. There he sits before you, erect and straight, arms folded, discoursing in his slow, kindly way about baseball, life, or anything you like. ‘Roosevelt?’ His face lights up, the wrinkles in his forehead vanish in his smile. ‘Say, did you hear him last night? He was wonderful. A wonderful American.’ Yes, and so is Mr. Cornelius McGillicuddy.