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1952 in baseball

Champions

Major League Baseball

Other champions

Winter Leagues

Awards and honors

Statistical leaders

Major league baseball final standings

American League final standings

National League final standings

All-American Girls Professional Baseball League final standings

Nippon Professional Baseball final standings

Central League final standings

Pacific League final standings

Events

January

February

March

  • March 1 – With the opening of spring training, MLB umpires are sent to the 16 clubs' camps to warn players against fraternizing with fans and opposing players. League presidents institute fines of $5 (initial offense) and $25 (repeat offenses) for violation of the rule. The warning, which is chiefly to combat gambling on game outcomes, is instituted in the wake of the 1951–1952 college basketball "point-shaving" scandal.
  • March 20 – Philadelphia Phillies manager Eddie Sawyer, who took a hard line with his players by imposing an "austerity program" at the club's spring training camp—banning wives, automobiles, clubhouse card games, and golf (among other things), and enforcing a strict curfew—is so pleased by the Phils' improved performance that he relaxes some (though not all) of the restrictions he had implemented. However, the club gets off to a sluggish 4–7 April start and Sawyer will resign before June is out.
  • March 24 – The Chicago White Sox deal third baseman Bob Dillinger, 33, a .306 lifetime hitter and three-time American League stolen base leader, but frequently scorned as an indifferent fielder, to the Sacramento Solons of the Pacific Coast League for a player to be named later and $10,000. He never plays in the major leagues again.

April

  • April 1 – The 49-year-old Pacific Coast League begins its 180-game regular season as a member of an experimental level within Minor League Baseball called the "Open Classification." Elevated from Triple-A status, the PCL's "Open" designation marks its first step in a bid to become the third major league. In addition, the ability of MLB teams to draft PCL players is restricted, and member clubs are discouraged from signing working agreements with big-league "parent" organizations.
  • April 4 – Pitcher Dave Hoskins, a 34-year-old veteran of the Chicago American Giants and Homestead Grays of the Negro leagues, becomes the first Black player in the Double-A Texas League when he takes the mound for the Dallas Eagles. Enduring death threats and Jim Crow laws during the season, Hoskins will post a 22–10 (2.12) record, leading the Dallas franchise to its first TL pennant since 1936.
  • April 8 – The Boston Braves trade stalwart veteran third baseman Bob Elliott to the New York Giants for pitcher Sheldon Jones and $50,000. Known in Boston as "Mister Team" and 's National League MVP, Elliott, 35, is one of the few remaining members of the 1948 NL champion Braves.
  • April 19 – In their second meeting of 1952, the Brooklyn Dodgers gain their second straight victory over the arch-rival New York Giants, 11–6, backed by five Brooklyn home runs. Despite giving up four homers today, Ralph Branca earns the complete-game triumph; it's the first time he's faced the Giants since giving up the pennant-deciding "Shot Heard 'Round the World" home run to Bobby Thomson on October 3, 1951. Thomson goes hitless in four at bats, with one base on balls, today.
  • April 22 – At Crosley Field, three members of the St. Louis Cardinals are ejected, including manager Eddie Stanky, in a 2–1 loss to the home-standing Cincinnati Reds. Stanky's third-inning eviction features a shoving match with home plate umpire Scotty Robb. NL president Warren Giles, present in the stands, rules two weeks later that Robb instigated the physical contact, issues a reprimand, and fines the umpire—and triggers Robb's immediate resignation.
  • April 23 – Bob Cain and the St. Louis Browns defeat Bob Feller and the Cleveland Indians, 1–0, in a game in which both pitchers throw a one-hitter. This was only the second double one-hitter in the modern era (since ).
  • April 29 – At Shibe Park, third baseman Al Rosen of the Cleveland Indians socks three home runs and drives in seven and his club lashes 25 hits in all—an MLB high for 1951—as Cleveland thrashes the Philadelphia Athletics, 21–9.
  • April 30
  • Veteran Negro leagues catcher Quincy Trouppe makes his major league debut with the Cleveland Indians. At 39 years of age, he is one of the oldest rookies in major league history. Three days later, Trouppe is behind the plate when relief pitcher Toothpick Sam Jones enters the game, forming the first black battery in American League history.
  • In the seventh inning at Fenway Park, Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox hits a game-winning, two-run home run off Dizzy Trout of the Detroit Tigers to break a 3–3 tie on "Ted Williams Day." It is Williams' final game of the season before he departs for the Korean War to serve as a Marine fighter pilot. He plays only six contests in 1952 and goes four-for-ten, with today's blast his only home run of the campaign.

May

June

  • June 16 – Colorful, well-traveled, 44-year-old right-hander Bobo Newsom changes uniforms for the final time, when he's released by the Washington Senators and signed by the Philadelphia Athletics. Since he first arrived in the majors in , Newsom has pitched for nine different franchises, playing multiple stints for four of them (the Senators and Athletics included). Retrosheet and Baseball Reference list 23 different transactions over Newsom's long career, which will finally end in November 1953 with him posting a 211–222 record in 600 MLB games, including three 20-victory and three 20-loss seasons.
  • June 19 – Carl Erskine of the Brooklyn Dodgers tosses a 5–0 no-hitter against the Chicago Cubs at Ebbets Field. Erskine will pitch his second career no-hitter on May 12, against the New York Giants, 3–0, also at Ebbets Field.
  • June 20 – In a night game at Sportsman's Park, the St. Louis Browns and Washington Senators play to an 18-inning, 5–5 tie before a curfew halts the game. Satchel Paige of the Browns, age 46, throws ten shutout innings in relief. Each team has 14 hits. While the statistics will count for the players, the game will have to be replayed from scratch.
  • June 22 – The Boston Braves' Sid Gordon hits a two-run homer over the left-field fence at Braves Field and wins a 100-pound bear cub as the prize for being the first Boston player to homer on "State of Maine Day". After the game, Gordon is presented with the animal in the Braves' clubhouse.
  • June 23 – The fan attendance crisis suddenly plaguing minor league baseball is dramatized when the Toledo Mud Hens of the Triple-A American Association—facing bankruptcy—transfer to West Virginia in midseason and change their name to the Charleston Senators. A Toledo institution since 1916, the Mud Hens have consistently finished among the bottom three teams in the Association's standings during the post-war period and their attendance has plummeted from 234,000 in 1946 to only 99,000 in 1951.
  • June 25 – At Comiskey Park, Chicago White Sox shortstop Chico Carrasquel fractures his little finger during a 9–6 loss to the Washington Senators‚ which drops Chicago four games out of first place. Carrasquel will reinjure it on July 9 and be out of the lineup until August 19. The injury to Carrasquel will prove to be a key factor in the team's disappointing third-place finish. The White Sox will reacquire slick-fielding shortstop Willy Miranda from the Browns on June 28—thirteen days after they traded him—in an effort to plug the gap.
  • June 27 – Eddie Sawyer, who managed the "Whiz Kid" Philadelphia Phillies to only the second pennant in club history (and first since ), resigns after the club's 6–0 triumph over the New York Giants at Shibe Park. Sawyer, 41, remains with the Phils as special assignment scout for owner R. R. M. Carpenter Jr. In all or parts of his five seasons as their skipper, Sawyer's Phillies went 296–292 (.503). His replacement is veteran former American League pilot Steve O'Neill, 61, who last managed the 1951 Boston Red Sox. Under O'Neill, the 1952 Phillies (now 28–35) will rally to go 59–32 (.648) to finish 87–67 and in the National League's first division.

July

  • July 1 – After 18 innings of play, the Cleveland Indians and visiting St. Louis Browns remain knotted 2–2. Then, in the top off the 19th, the Browns break through to take a 3–2 lead on Jim Delsing's RBI single. But in the bottom of the 19th, the Indians re-tie the game on Al Rosen's double, then win it 4–3 on recently acquired Hank Majeski's pinch single. The decisions go to two notable pitchers: the winner, left-hander Lou Brissie, is a World War II combat veteran who wears a brace to support his badly wounded left leg; the loser, eventual Baseball Hall of Famer Satchel Page, is a 46-year-old veteran of the Negro leagues. Brissie throws ten innings of one-run relief, while Paige goes 10<small></small> and allows just two runs on eight hits and eight bases on balls.
  • July 4
  • The standings at the end of today's holiday doubleheaders, which mark the midpoint of the MLB season, show the arch-rival Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants again fighting for supremacy of the National League, with Brooklyn (49–21) three games in front of the Giants (46–24). In the American League, the New York Yankees (43–28) hold a 2½-game advantage over the Chicago White Sox (43–33).
  • Not even two years removed from battling for the 1950 AL pennant, the Detroit Tigers (23–49) languish in last place in the Junior Circuit, 20½ games behind the Yankees. In response, the Tigers fire manager Red Rolfe, and replace him with an active player, 32-year-old pitcher Fred Hutchinson, who has won 95 games for Detroit over his nine years with the team. The move launches Hutchinson's 12-year career as a big-league skipper, which will include recognition as MLB Manager of the Year () and a National League pennant-winning season ().

August

  • August 3 – The woeful (28–76) Pittsburgh Pirates deal the second-place New York Giants a shocking Sunday doubleheader setback at the Polo Grounds, taking the twin bill by scores of 7–0 and 10–8 (six innings, called due to darkness). Pittsburgh's winning pitchers, Murry Dickson and Howie Pollet, are both veterans of the St. Louis Cardinals' contending teams of the 1940s. The two losses, coupled with Brooklyn's doubleheader sweep of the Chicago Cubs, drop the Giants (60–37) to 6½ games behind the front-running Dodgers.
  • August 5 – Hall-of-Fame hitter Rogers Hornsby, whose departure from the St. Louis Browns' managerial job in June was controversially celebrated by his former players, gets another chance to manage in the major leagues. The Cincinnati Reds, who are 42–61 and seventh in the National League, name Hornsby, 56, the replacement for former skipper Luke Sewell, who was fired July 30. Hornsby, considered the greatest right-handed hitter in NL history (.358 lifetime batting average), coaxes the 1952 Reds to a 27–24 record through season's end. Cincinnati will be the seventh and final stop in Hornsby's MLB managerial career.
  • August 8 – United States Air Force Major Bob Neighbors, a former shortstop who played six pro seasons (1936–1941)—including seven September 1939 games with the St. Louis Browns—before becoming a USAAF pilot during World War II, does not return from a bombing mission during the Korean War. Missing and presumed killed in action, Neighbors, 34, is believed to be the only MLB player who lost his life during the Korean conflict. (See Deaths entry for this date below.)
  • August 10 – In his first MLB appearance, 20-year-old minor-league phenom Ron Necciai, called up by the Pittsburgh Pirates, gives up five runs in the top of the first inning to the Chicago Cubs before settling down to work six full frames. He's tagged with seven earned runs and the 9–5 loss. Necciai had gained fame May 13 by striking out 27 batters in a nine-inning game in the Class D Appalachian League, and 281 hitters in only 169 innings pitched through August 1952. He will win only one of seven MLB decisions in 12 appearances, then, plagued by ulcers, be out of baseball by 1956.
  • August 14 – The two tail-enders in the American League, the seventh-place St. Louis Browns and eighth-place Detroit Tigers, exchange eight players in a late-season waiver deal. The four-for-four trade sees St. Louis send pitchers Bud Black, Ned Garver (a 20-game-winner in 1951) and Dave Madison, along with outfielder Jim Delsing, to Detroit for hurlers Dick Littlefield and Marlin Stuart and outfielders Don Lenhardt and Vic Wertz.
  • August 16 – In a game that lasts only 6<small></small> innings before it's halted by rain, the Brooklyn Dodgers pile up 15 runs and 15 hits, put up "crooked numbers" in four innings, and blank the visiting Philadelphia Phillies, 15–0.
  • August 18 – The second-place Cleveland Indians, only two games out of the American League lead, acquire relief pitcher Ted Wilks and shortstop George Strickland in a waiver deal with the Pittsburgh Pirates for infielder John Beradino, $50,000, and a "PTBNL." Wilks is one of the National League's premier relievers. Beradino, an actor as well as a ballplayer, is destined to become a daytime television star as Dr. Steve Hardy of General Hospital.

September

October

November

December

Movies

Births

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

Deaths

January

  • January 6 – Frank Oberlin, 75, pitcher who played for the Boston Americans and Washington Senators over four seasons spanning 1906–1910.
  • January 8 – Art Evans, 40, pitcher for the 1932 Chicago White Sox.
  • January 10 – Bones Ely, 88, one of the top defensive shortstops of his generation and also a versatile two-way player, whose 19-season professional career included stints with eight major league teams in three different leagues in a span of fourteen seasons between 1884 and 1902.
  • January 14 – Rube Sellers, 70, outfielder who played for the Boston Doves in its 1910 season.
  • January 15 – Ben Houser, 68, first baseman who played with the Philadelphia Athletics during the 1910 season, and for the Boston Rustlers and Braves from 1911 to 1912.
  • January 17
  • Walter O. Briggs Sr., 74, industrialist and co-owner of the Detroit Tigers from 1919 to 1935, and sole owner from 1935 until his death.
  • Solly Salisbury, 75, pitcher who played in 1902 with the Philadelphia Phillies.
  • January 20 – Ollie Pickering, 81, outfielder for six major league clubs in three different leagues between 1896 and 1908, who entered the record books as the first ever batter in American League history, when he faced Chicago White Sox pitcher Roy Patterson as a member of the on April 24, 1901.
  • January 24
  • Ángel Aragón, 61, third baseman for the New York Yankees in three seasons from 1914 to 1917, who was also the first Cuban and Latin American player to wear a Yankees uniform.
  • Dick Wright, 61, catcher who made four game appearances for the Brooklyn Tip-Tops of the outlaw Federal League in 1915.

February

March

April

May

June

July

  • July 3 – Fred Tenney, 80, first baseman and manager whose career lasted 17 seasons from 1894 to 1911, who was ranked behind only Hal Chase among first basemen of the Deadball Era, being also considered the originator of the 3-6-3 double play, while leading the National League in putouts in 1905 and 1907–1908 as well as in assists each year from 1901 through 1907, setting a major-league record with 152 in 1905 that lasted until Mickey Vernon topped it in 1949, hitting over .300 seven times and retiring with a .294/.371/.358 slash line, including 2,231 hits, 1,134 runs scored and 688 runs batted in.
  • July 11 – Dutch Leonard, 60, left-handed pitcher for the Boston Red Sox and Detroit Tigers over eleven seasons from 1913 to 1925, who earned two World Series rings with Boston in and , while leading the major leagues with an earned run average of 0.96 in 1914, setting a modern-era season record that still stands.

August

September

October

  • October 4 – Bill Zimmerman, 65, German outfielder who played for the Brooklyn Robins in 1915.
  • October 8 – Joe Adams, 74, pitcher for the 1902 St. Louis Cardinals, who later became a successful manager in the minor leagues, being a mentor for future Hall of Famers Frank Chance and Ray Schalk, among others, while earning the nickname of Godfather of the Eastern Illinois League, according to the 1908 Spalding Guide.
  • October 11 – Roy Beecher, 68, pitcher for the New York Giants from 1907 to 1908.
  • October 14 – Jim Banning, 87, 19th century catcher who played for the Washington Nationals of the National League in parts of two seasonsd from 1888 to 1889.
  • October 17 – Vince Shields, 51, Canadian pitcher for the 1924 St. Louis Cardinals.
  • October 22 – Howard McGraner, 63, pitcher who played with the Cincinnati Reds in 1912.
  • October 26
  • Tom Angley, 48, backup catcher for the Chicago Cubs in its 1929 season.
  • Mike Murphy, 64, catcher who played with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1912 and for the Philadelphia Athletics in 1916.
  • October 28 – Bob Lawson, 77, pitcher who played with the Boston Beaneaters in 1901 and for the original Baltimore Orioles in 1902.

November

December

  • December 6 – Don Hurst, 47, first baseman who played from 1928 through 1934 for the Philadelphia Phillies and Chicago Cubs, leading the National League with 143 RBI in 1932.
  • December 14 – Frank Hansford, 77, pitcher for the 1898 Brooklyn Bridegrooms.
  • December 28 – Deacon Jones, 60, pitcher who played from 1916 to 1918 for the Detroit Tigers.
  • December 29 – Bob Meinke, 65, shortstop who appeared in two games for the Cincinnati Reds in 1910.

Sources

External links