The National Pastime: An Alternate TL of Modern Baseball

THE FIRST MOVE

Starting in 1903, the sixteen teams of Major League Baseball had stayed in the same cities, but as the Second World War came to a close, the baseball world would begin to slowly but surely change.

At the end of the 1945 season, the Philadelphia Phillies were bankrupt. On the diamond, the club was a joke, while the American League Athletics, led by an aging Connie Mack, were only marginally better. The franchise had been in turmoil after the lifetime ban issued to previous owner William Cox at the end of the ’43 season. Unable to find a local buyer, the Phillies were eventually sold to Baltimore attorney Clarence Miles.

On October 23, 1945, Phillies fans woke to the newspaper article they feared the most; the National League granted Miles permission to relocate the Phillies to Baltimore for the 1946 season. Some folks in the baseball circles doubted that Baltimore could support a big league team, considering the fact that the city’s American League team had been replaced by the Yankees after the 1902 season.

Merely three weeks before Christmas, the Baltimore Sun confirmed that the Phillies would be rebranded as the Baltimore Orioles, a name that had been recycled by short lived baseball teams in the area going back to the 1880’s, the latest team to use this name was a AAA club in the International League. In the days before team merchandise became a hot commodity, Orioles tickets, pennants and caps were the hottest gift for Baltimoreans in Christmastime 1945.

The Orioles kicked off the 1946 campaign on April 16th and 17th in Pittsburgh, where the Pirates blew out the Birds, scoring a combined 28 runs spread over the 2 game series at Forbes Field. Despite the humiliation in the Steel City, the Orioles looked forward to their train ride back to Baltimore, after which they were greeted by hundreds of ecstatic fans in a parade through the city streets. The Orioles’ new nest on 33rd St would serve as the arena for their April 19th home opener against the Boston Braves, which the Orioles would win 5-4 in 11 innings.

For most of ’46, the Orioles were mostly the Phillies with feathers, finishing in second division 35 games behind Stan Musial and the eventual world champion St. Louis Cardinals.

As the late 1940’s gave way to the early Fifties, the transformation of the Philadelphia Phillies into the Baltimore Orioles would prove to other owners, particularly those in two-team cities, that somewhere out there, there were cities that were hungry for the national pastime.

The Major League alignment in 1946:

American League: Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Tigers, New York Yankees, Philadelphia Athletics, St Louis Browns, Washington Senators

National League: Baltimore Orioles (Formerly Philadelphia Phillies), Brooklyn Dodgers, Boston Braves, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, New York Giants, Pittsburgh Pirates, St Louis Cardinals

Looks really good so far. I wonder if having a more successful Baltimore pushes Calvin Griffith to move the Senators earlier.

THE BEN CHAPMAN FIASCO

By moving the Philadelphia Phillies to Baltimore and renaming them the Orioles in 1946, Clarence Miles gave baseball the wake up call it badly needed. The '46 season saw the team draw 1 million in attendance despite finishing 35 games back.

However, the '47 season for Baltimore was quickly overshadowed by the unsportsmanlike conduct of then-manager Ben Chapman who became the poster boy for the racist taunting hurled at Brooklyn Dodgers rookie first baseman Jackie Robinson.

Making his debut on April 15th of '47, Jackie Robinson had been called up to the Dodgers from the AAA Montreal Royals by general manager Branch Rickey, marking the beginning of the end for baseball's color barrier. One afternoon at Crosley Field, the fans in Cincinnati were downright vicious with their racist heckling of Robinson, promoting fellow Dodger Pee Wee Reese, a Kentucky native, to put his arm around Robinson in defiance of the hostile crowd.

As for Ben Chapman, the progressive and liberal crowd of the Charm City wrote angry letters to the editors of the Baltimore Sun, voicing their disapproval of Chapman's cheap shots at Robinson, and called on owner Clarence Miles to fire Chapman. After the Orioles' attendance shrank to 850,000 and the team finished 65 games back to end the '47 season, fans got their wish and Miles gave Chapman his walking papers.

THE BIRD BOYS OF SUMMER

Out of the ashes of the Ben Chapman fiasco, Orioles owner Clarence Miles wasted no time following the lead of the Dodgers, Indians and Browns who were the first teams to racially integrate during the '47 season. Under Miles' watch the Orioles would become the next team to integrate, at the beginning of the 1948 season, luring Negro League outfielder Monte Irvin, then with the Newark Eagles.

Meanwhile in Brooklyn, Leo Durocher continued to support Jackie Robinson in the face of racial prejudice from opposing teams and a few Dodger players. However, at the first half of the '48 season, the Dodgers fired the very man who had coached them to the '47 National League pennant following a rather childish falling out with Branch Rickey.

Shortly thereafter, the Orioles dumped the incompetent Dusty Cook, who held the Birds back by as many as 36 and a half games by Memorial Day weekend, for the chance to hire Durocher. The new boss, along with the clutch run driving of Monte Irvin and the reliable Richie Ashburn guarding center field, salvaged the Orioles' 1948 campaign by clawing and scratching their way into first division, bringing them up to within 19 games behind the eventual World Series runner up Boston Braves.

Within the next couple of years, the Orioles' win total would continue to rise, and their attendance would bounce back from 850,000 in 1947 into slightly past the one million mark in '48 and '49. Finally in 1950, the Orioles, through shrewd moving and shaking of their roster, squeaked past a Brooklyn Dodger squad devastated by injuries to bring the National League crown to the Charm City. The pitching trio of Bubba Church, Jim Konstanty and Robin Roberts, Richie Ashburn guarding center field, and the clutch hitting of RBI ace Monte Irvin carried the Orioles to a shocking World Series upset of the New York Yankees in 7 games.

OldNavy1988 said:

THE BEN CHAPMAN FIASCO

By moving the Philadelphia Phillies to Baltimore and renaming them the Orioles in 1946, Clarence Miles gave baseball the wake up call it badly needed. The '46 season saw the team draw 1 million in attendance despite finishing 35 games back.

However, the '47 season for Baltimore was quickly overshadowed by the unsportsmanlike conduct of then-manager Ben Chapman who became the poster boy for the racist taunting hurled at Brooklyn Dodgers rookie first baseman Jackie Robinson.

Making his debut on April 15th of '47, Jackie Robinson had been called up to the Dodgers from the AAA Montreal Royals by general manager Branch Rickey, marking the beginning of the end for baseball's color barrier. One afternoon at Crosley Field, the fans in Cincinnati were downright vicious with their racist heckling of Robinson, promoting fellow Dodger Pee Wee Reese, a Kentucky native, to put his arm around Robinson in defiance of the hostile crowd.

As for Ben Chapman, the progressive and liberal crowd of the Charm City wrote angry letters to the editors of the Baltimore Sun, voicing their disapproval of Chapman's cheap shots at Robinson, and called on owner Clarence Miles to fire Chapman. After the Orioles' attendance shrank to 850,000 and the team finished 65 games back to end the '47 season, fans got their wish and Miles gave Chapman his walking papers.

THE BIRD BOYS OF SUMMER

Out of the ashes of the Ben Chapman fiasco, Orioles owner Clarence Miles wasted no time following the lead of the Dodgers, Indians and Browns who were the first teams to racially integrate during the '47 season. Under Miles' watch the Orioles would become the next team to integrate, at the beginning of the 1948 season, luring Negro League outfielder Monte Irvin, then with the Newark Eagles.

Meanwhile in Brooklyn, Leo Durocher continued to support Jackie Robinson in the face of racial prejudice from opposing teams and a few Dodger players. However, at the first half of the '48 season, the Dodgers fired the very man who had coached them to the '47 National League pennant following a rather childish falling out with Branch Rickey.

Shortly thereafter, the Orioles dumped the incompetent Dusty Cook, who held the Birds back by as many as 36 and a half games by Memorial Day weekend, for the chance to hire Durocher. The new boss, along with the clutch run driving of Monte Irvin and the rapid fire pitching of Richie Ashburn, salvaged the Orioles' 1948 campaign by clawing and scratching their way into first division, bringing them up to within 19 games behind the eventual World Series runner up Boston Braves.

Within the next couple of years, the Orioles' win total would continue to rise, and their attendance would bounce back from 850,000 in 1947 into slightly past the one million mark in '48 and '49. Finally in 1950, the Orioles, through shrewd moving and shaking of their roster, squeaked past a Brooklyn Dodger squad devastated by injuries to bring the National League crown to the Charm City. The pitching duo of Richie Ashburn and Robin Roberts, and RBI ace Monte Irvin carried the Orioles to a shocking World Series upset of the New York Yankees in 7 games.

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Uh...Richie Ashburn as a PITCHER? What's the POD for turning perhads the best CF in Phillies history to a moundsman? Did you perhaps mean Jim Konstanty, or Bubba Church? And why didn't the sale to the Carpenter clan during the war go through?

1940LaSalle said:

Uh...Richie Ashburn as a PITCHER? What's the POD for turning perhads the best CF in Phillies history to a moundsman? Did you perhaps mean Jim Konstanty, or Bubba Church? And why didn't the sale to the Carpenter clan during the war go through?

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You're right about Ashburn. I apologize. I will tweak that last chapter ASAP.

For this timeline, perhaps William Cox might have wanted too much money from Bob Carpenter, and perhaps Cox's gambling addiction might have been worse than reported in OTL.

As a Phillies fan, as soon as I saw the POD, I must admit I got a little nauseous.

The only thing I can hope for here: the Athletics remain in Philadelphia, either because their fiscal situation stabilizes as the only Philadelphia team, or because Mack sells to the Carpenters instead of Charlie Finley.

dilbert719 said:

As a Phillies fan, as soon as I saw the POD, I must admit I got a little nauseous.

The only thing I can hope for here: the Athletics remain in Philadelphia, either because their fiscal situation stabilizes as the only Philadelphia team, or because Mack sells to the Carpenters instead of Charlie Finley.

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Connie Mack's sons sold the team to Arnold Johnson who then moved the team to Kansas City. It was in Kansas City that Charlie Finley bought the Athletics.

You have me wondering what the next shoe to drop will be. Do the Braves still head to Milwaukee or do the Browns hop across the state to Kansas City? Who leaves New York? Can the Senators stay in DC or will they head west too?

Thought this was gonna be a slightly different TL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbrUzJlTffs

Merried Seinor Comic said:

Connie Mack's sons sold the team to Arnold Johnson who then moved the team to Kansas City. It was in Kansas City that Charlie Finley bought the Athletics.

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Ah, yeah, fair point. The team had been in Oakland for years by the time I was born, so my brain just kind of elided directly from Mack to Finley.

Either way, I can't imagine an MLB without Philadelphia, so I expect some form of butterflies to flap that will keep the A's (or an expansion team) in Philly.

dilbert719 said:

Either way, I can't imagine an MLB without Philadelphia, so I expect some form of butterflies to flap that will keep the A's (or an expansion team) in Philly.

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Yes, in my book "If Baseball Integrated Early" too fast expansion in the early '20s leads to some teams folding a la the NFL during the Depression - includ9ing the Phillies. I not only have the Athletics staying there, bought by the Carpenters, but from what I've heard (including from older fans who remember it) until the Whiz Kids and for some even Mack's move Philadelphia was more of an A.L. city; my good friend knows someone, now deceased, who told me that a number of his friends became Yankee fans rather than Phillie fans when the A's moved. (This man had been in Baker Bowl in the late 1930s, though he didn't remember much more than that huge Lifebuoy sign in right, he was probably 7-8 at the time.)

Now: where in Baltimore would you have the transplanted team play? By 1946, Oriole Park (at 31st Street and Greenmount Avenue) was two years gone IOTL, having burned in '44. IOTL, the IL Orioles played then in a concrete monstrosity called Municipal Stadium on 33rd Street. It was demolished and Memorial Stadium was built on the same plot in time for the '54 season.

One thing to point out: it was the Little World Series in (I think) '52 that demonstrated Baltimore would come out in sufficient numbers for major league baseball. That minor league playoff drew crowds of more than 50,000 to aforesaid Municipal Stadium.

1940LaSalle said:

Now: where in Baltimore would you have the transplanted team play? By 1946, Oriole Park (at 31st Street and Greenmount Avenue) was two years gone IOTL, having burned in '44. IOTL, the IL Orioles played then in a concrete monstrosity called Municipal Stadium on 33rd Street. It was demolished and Memorial Stadium was built on the same plot in time for the '54 season.

One thing to point out: it was the Little World Series in (I think) '52 that demonstrated Baltimore would come out in sufficient numbers for major league baseball. That minor league playoff drew crowds of more than 50,000 to aforesaid Municipal Stadium.

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With the Oriole Park having burned down in '44, the Orioles of this scenario would play at Municipal Stadium starting in '46, as a temporary facility while the civic leaders try to decide whether to rebuild the park or build a completely new facility. It would also be home to the original Colts, part of the AAFC along with the 49ers and the Browns during the late 1940's. With the Orioles catching on in Baltimore, the city would eventually transform Municipal into Memorial in phases starting in '49.

A FAMILY TRADITION

From their humble beginnings in 1901 until the mid point of the 20th century, the Philadelphia Athletics had only one owner, and one manager, Cornelius Alexander McGillicuddy, better known to baseball fans everywhere as Connie Mack. After the metamorphosis of the Philadelphia Phillies into the Baltimore Orioles in 1946, Mack opened his heart to the distraught former Phillies fans. As a result, A's attendance at Shibe Park in the late 1940's increased to its highest levels since the A's glory days of the 1910's and 1920's.

By the 40's, Mack had already been showing his age. Athletics fans young and old knew that Mack would one day retire, but for a short while, it was a day they initially dreaded. In fact, many Philadelphians feared that after Mack retired, the A's would relocate and leave the city without any baseball at all.

Connie Mack and his sons, after a few years of disputes over control of the team, announced in November of 1949 that the Athletics were up for sale. The increase in attendance due to the Phillies leaving helped Mack pay the bills, but not enough for him and his family to stay in charge.

Just when it was rumored that Mack would sell the team to outside interests, R.R.M. "Bob" Carpenter, Jr., came to Philadelphia's rescue. An heir to the DuPont fortune, Carpenter had the deep pockets needed to fuel the Athletics into winners. The sale was approved by the American League on December 4, 1949, and Mack would retire as field manager at the end of the 1950 season. With Carpenter's purchase of the Athletics, baseball in the City of Brotherly Love was safe at home.

BRAVES NEW WORLD

In the 1950's, baseball would see more teams take off for greener pastures. To be a second team in a two team market gave teams like the Boston Braves and the St Louis Browns no hope in capturing the imaginations of their respective cities. As for the lowly Washington Senators, being the only team in the nation's capital didn't mean they were safe from debt, years of mediocre play, disappearing sponsorships, or fed up fans switching allegiances to the newborn Baltimore Orioles.

In Boston, the Braves' 1948 National League pennant proved to be their last hurrah in Beantown. The next four years saw the Braves sink deeper and deeper into the National League abyss. The 1952 season would see the Braves finish in 7th place and draw only 281,000 for the whole year. Braves owner Lou Perini, a construction tycoon, finally realized he was fighting a losing battle. Unable to compete with the more popular Red Sox in Boston, Perini decided after the '52 season to relocate his Braves.

The city of Milwaukee had become a prosperous blue collar town in the wake of the Second World War. Milwaukee was also no stranger to baseball, having hosted a few short lived teams in the 1880's and 1890's. Up until the midpoint of the 20th century, Milwaukee had been without big league ball since the Brewers of the American League took off after only one season in 1901, only to move to St Louis and become the Browns in 1902.

Finally in 1950, the city of Milwaukee decided to roll the dice and build a new state of the art stadium at a price tag of $5 million in 1950's dollars, despite the lack of a predetermined major league tenant. The city initially planned to open County Stadium for the AAA Brewers to move in from the tiny and outdated Borchert Field for 1953, but before that could happen, major league teams came a knockin'.

The St Louis Browns, the very team who left Milwaukee for St Louis after the 1901 season, came very close to moving into County Stadium. At the time, the Browns were owned by the game's most brilliant maverick Bill Veeck, who had briefly owned the AAA Brewers before going off to fight in World War II. To his credit, Veeck was a true genius when it came to recognizing the city's potential to become big league.

Unfortunately for Veeck, the Browns would never make that return to Milwaukee. In fact, by the early 50's, the AAA Brewers had become part of the Boston Braves farm system, giving Lou Perini territorial rights to city under the game's operating agreements of the period. After blocking the Browns' attempted move, Perini quickly requested permission from the National League owners to move his Boston Braves to Milwaukee. The NL unanimously approved the move less than a month before the '53 season began.

Upon leaving Boston, Perini convinced Tom Yawkey and the Red Sox to take over stewardship of the Jimmy Fund, starting a strong connection that continues today.

THE GOLDEN STATE

In 1951 in the nation’s capital, Clark Griffith, the Washington Senators’ owner since 1920, had become deeply embittered by the unexpected success of the upstart Baltimore Orioles. The National Leaguers, formerly of Philadelphia, were enjoying the spoils of upsetting the Yankees in the 1950 World Series while Clark’s Senators were left in the dust. Senators’ attendance for 1951 sank to all-time lows as more and more fed up fans switched allegiances in favor of the Orioles.

Sadly, the elder Griffith’s tenure as Senators would come to a tragic end on May 18, 1952. During what was supposed to be the first game in a doubleheader versus the Detroit Tigers at Briggs Stadium, Clark complained of sharp chest pains at the top of the fourth inning. Accompanied by his adopted son Calvin, the 82 year old Clark was rushed to Henry Ford Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival from a massive heart attack. Out of respect for Clark’s memory, the Tigers forfeited both games of the planned doubleheader.

After his adoptive father’s death, Calvin Griffith unceremoniously took over as Senators owner, but questions began to swirl if whether he would keep the team in Washington. Almost immediately, offers from Kansas City, Los Angeles and Minneapolis-St Paul began to pour in. On May 26th of ’52, the Senators took on the Boston Red Sox in their first home stand after Clark’s death, holding a moment of silence before the game. For the remainder of the ’52 season the Senators would wear a black armband on the left sleeves of their jerseys in remembrance of Clark.

Meanwhile in St Louis, the Browns were the Cardinals’ landlords at Sportsman’s Park, but the Redbirds were way better. The Browns had come over from Milwaukee in 1902 and missed an opportunity to retain the Brewers moniker with then team president Ralph Orthwein having been a Busch inlaw. The few bright spots in the Browns’ history were first baseman George Sisler setting the record for base hits in a season during the 1920’s, and their 1944 American League pennant.

In the early 1950’s, Bill Veeck bought the Browns vowing to “…run the Cardinals out of town,” despite the Cards having had far greater success. Veeck wasted no time coming up with ideas to get more people to come to Browns games, like Grandstand Managers’ Night in 1951 to give fans a chance to coach the team. Veeck would top that stunt in less than a week by having 3 foot 7 inch Eddie Gaedel burst out of a cardboard birthday cake to mark the American League’s 50th anniversary. Gaedel would step up to the batters box where he would walk on four pitches and be substituted for a pinch runner.

While Browns’ attendance did pick up from where it left off all the way back in 1908, Veeck wasn’t satisfied. In 1952, the Redbird kingdom was thrown into near chaos when Cardinals’ owner Fred Saigh faced jailtime for tax evasion. Just when it looked like the Cards were headed for Houston, Saigh sold the Cardinals to Anheuser-Busch for a lower price, and as a consequence, Veeck and the Browns were toast.

With his attempted 1953 move to Milwaukee blocked, Veeck kept in the Browns in St Louis while looking for a buyer, with the American League wanting Veeck completely out of the picture. By season's end, Veeck sold the Browns to Charlie O. Finley. Upon his purchase, Finley quickly announced his intentions to move the team to California.

First, the American League insisted that Finley have a moving buddy to make his western trek possible. After lengthy discussions in most of October and November of '53, Finley found one in Calvin Griffith and the Senators. With Griffith already talking to Los Angeles officials for almost a year, Finley agreed to stake his own claim in San Francisco.

Finally, on December 4, 1953, the American League granted Finley and Griffith permission to bring their teams to the Golden State for the '54 season. In Los Angeles, the Senators would be reborn as the Angels, setting up shop at the Memorial Coliseum as a temporary facility during negotiations for a permanent arena. Up in San Francisco, the Browns would be renamed the Seals, their colors changed to green and gold, and would play at Seals Stadium before breaking ground on a stadium at Candlestick Point.

Baseball Alignment for 1954

American League Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Tigers, Los Angeles Angels (formerly Washington Senators), New York Yankees, Philadelphia Athletics, San Francisco Seals (formerly St Louis Browns)

National League Baltimore Orioles, Brooklyn Dodgers, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, Milwaukee Braves (moved from Boston in '53), New York Giants, Pittsburgh Pirates, St Louis Cardinals

Excellent! It's fun to see California getting baseball with different teams. It'll be ironic if the Brooklyn Dodgers play L.A. in the 1965 Series. Also ironic will be the first L.A. superstar, if the scouting remains the same, will be slugger harmon Killebrew, not a pitcher.

DTF955Baseballfan said:

Excellent! It's fun to see California getting baseball with different teams. It'll be ironic if the Brooklyn Dodgers play L.A. in the 1965 Series. Also ironic will be the first L.A. superstar, if the scouting remains the same, will be slugger Harmon Killebrew, not a pitcher.

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In this scenario, Killebrew is indeed the Angels' first superstar.

Meanwhile in Milwaukee, the '54 season would see the debut of a 20 year old outfielder from Mobile, Alabama, who would go on to become the all time home run king.

The next year, the Seals would call up an 18 year old third baseman from Little Rock, who would go on to win multiple Gold Gloves.

A GIGANTIC STEP FORWARD


Once upon a time, the New York Giants were the most popular baseball team in New York City. However, this gigantic love affair was too good to last. The upstart Yankees would eventually purchase Babe Ruth’s contract from the Red Sox, giving birth to the Yanks’ dynasty of the Roaring Twenties. By the late 40’s, the Dodgers would bury the Giants deeper into the New York baseball totem pole with Branch Rickey’s signing of Jackie Robinson.

After the Baltimore Orioles took Leo Durocher off the Dodgers’ hands midway through the 1948 season, the Giants were in disarray on the diamond. As the 40’s drew to a close, the Giants would snooze while Baltimore’s Durocher enticed second baseman Eddie Stanky and shortstop Alvin Dark away from the Boston Braves, as well as signing outfielder Monte Irvin away from the Negro Leagues.

By the early 50’s, the only good players the Giants had were Wes Westrum, Hank Thompson, Bobby Thompson, and Willie Mays. However, those men would not be enough to get the Giants over the hump in their final years in New York.

As teams like the Braves, Senators and Browns blazed their trails west in the mid 50’s, both New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham and Brooklyn Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley realized their respective teams were in trouble.

With Ebbets Field showing its age, and O’Malley’s desired relocation destination of Los Angeles snatched up by Calvin Griffith and his born again Angels in ’54, O’Malley was unable to work things out with New York City Parks Commissioner Robert Moses, who denied O’Malley’s requests for the necessary plots of land for a domed stadium in the Atlantic Yards section of Brooklyn.

In 1957, after entertaining an offer from Kansas City businessman Ewing M. Kauffman to buy the Dodgers and move them to the mighty Midwestern metropolis, O’Malley sold the club to New York City attorney Bill Shea to ensure the Dodgers would remain in the Big Apple for years to come. Shea, to O’Malley’s dismay, accepted Moses’s counteroffer of the Flushing Meadows site that would also house the 1964 World’s Fair.

In 1958, Stoneham moved the Giants to Minnesota, where Metropolitan Stadium built just two years before, awaited a major league franchise. For the first time in their history, the Giants would introduce a mascot, basically Paul Bunyan in the Giants' orange and black. For their home opener in Bloomington, the Giants would duel with the defending world champion Milwaukee Braves. A thriller to the finish, the Giants would win 8-7 on a controversial collision at the plate between rookie Orlando Cepeda and Braves catcher Del Crandall.

Who are the World Series winners so far?