A Historical Headache-The Case of Wally Pipp

Lou Gehrig is undoubtedly one of the greatest baseball players ever. Part of the New York Yankees "Murderer's Row," Gehrig tallied dozens of records, including most consecutive games played(Broken by Cal Ripken Jr.) and most grand slams in a career, with 23(Still unbroken).

Gehrig, of course, also gave his name to a disease, ALS, and his "Luckiest Man in the World" speech is one of the great moments in American history.

But, all of this could have been for naught, if not for a guy named Wally Pipp.

Pipp was a first baseman for the Yankees, and by all accounts, a pretty good player. However, on June 2, 1925, Pipp was removed from the lineup by Yankees manager Miller Huggins(According to apocryphal stories, it was due to a headache; In reality, Huggins had decided to remove Pipp to shake up his lineup).

So, if Wally Pipp isn't removed, does Lou Gehrig still become Lou Gehrig? Is his consecutive start streak still there? Are the Yankees as good?
 

Caspian

Banned
Wally Pipp simply was not hitting at all - he was batting .244 when he was replaced in the lineup by Gehrig, with no on-base ability and no power. If it wasn't June 2, it would have been another day soon enough.

Gehrig, meanwhile, was a highly-regarded prospect who had dominated the minor leagues the previous two seasons - in 1924, he had hit .369, with 37 home runs and 40 doubles for Hartford of the Eastern League (imagine today's AA). As, at that time, veterans who were clearly not performing and who were past the age of 30 were generally replaced pretty quickly, I don't see that Gehrig wouldn't have taken the job sooner rather than later.

I also don't see how another week or two on the bench would have dramatically affected Gehrig's career. I think the worst case scenario for Gehrig would be that he finishes with very slightly smaller career totals.

As for the consecutive games streak, that's just something that happened, and once it reached a certain length, continued through inertia. Anything can happen to it as a result of this scenario, but I see no reason to assume that it won't happen or that it'll be "butterflied away." I also see no reason to assume that this will change Gehrig's disease or popularity.

Ultimately, I see slightly smaller career statistics for Gehrig - 490 home runs, 1990 RBI, whatever - and maybe a slightly shorter consecutive games streak, and possibly no streak at all (though I think this winds up being unlikely). Nothing really happens with Pipp - he gets traded away after the season, as actually happened. The Yankees are just as good - they're going nowhere in 1925 anyway, and the future should be basically unchanged.
 
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