A Season in the Sun

by Randy Roberts

  Drinking celebratory beers before departing, the Yankees considered the upcoming World Series. Stengel seemed unconcerned with the outcome of the close National League race. “Bring on the National League,” he cried. “Our club has been great at times and it has been lousy, but it’s a first class club and it’s in condition so we’re not afraid of anyone in the National League.”35

  The real celebrations came later. During the twenty-hour train ride back to New York, the Yankees guzzled champagne. Casey told them to go slow and conserve energy for a bash in the city. “They should have their wives with them when they celebrate,” he insisted. But not all the Yankees agreed with him. Whitey was only one win away from his twentieth of the season, Mickey had hit number fifty and broken out of his slump, and Billy Martin never needed much of an excuse to drink. Besides, they had won the pennant. That was worth several celebrations.36

  HE WAS DREAMING ABOUT the Triple Crown, or, more precisely, about losing it. Mickey was dreaming about it at night and thinking about it all day. He didn’t know how he got so wrapped up in the chase and hoped it would never happen again. “It’s too nerve-wracking,” he would say at the end of the regular season. But when the Yankees arrived in the evening of September 19 at Grand Central Station, he was in the race and determined to win it.37

  Going into the last ten days of the season, his Triple Crown bid was a three-horse race. Ted Williams threatened Mickey’s chances of winning the batting title, while Al Kaline encroached on Mantle’s RBI lead. Williams’s .355 batting average was five points ahead of Mantle’s, but the Splendid Splinter had only 372 official trips to the plate. He needed twenty-eight more in his eight final games to reach the required four hundred. Four at bats per game was not an unreasonable goal, but it meant that he would have to break his number one rule of hitting: “Get a good ball to hit.” At the beginning of Ted’s major-league career, the great Rogers Hornsby had impressed the point upon him. A good ball, Williams explained, was one in his “happy areas,” the spots in the strike zone where he could hit for the highest average. But now to reach four hundred he had to go after balls in his unhappy regions, especially ones low and inside and low and outside. He estimated that he could only bat .230 to .270 on balls headed for those portions of the strike zone.38

  The question was whether Williams would change his approach. “I can’t swing at a bad pitch,” he insisted. “If I go for a pitch that’s an inch to the outside, those pitchers will start feeding me pitches two inches outside and keep increasing the margins until I’m a bad-ball hitter. Then I’m just a bad hitter.” His fetish for swinging only at good pitches so dominated his thinking that many believed he just couldn’t give in to the creeping malady. Arthur Daley of the New York Times openly wondered, “Can Williams go counter to principles that are as much a part of him as his reflexes?” He doubted it.39

  Making matters worse for Williams, six of Boston’s remaining games were against the Yankees. Throughout the season Yankee pitchers had baffled him. In thirty-six at bats he had managed only eight hits, a miserable .222 average. Bill Dickey had devised a strategy for pitching to the Boston hitter. The rules were iron clad:

  Get ahead of Ted Williams—pitch to him.

  Get behind him—walk him.

  No ‘sucker’ pitches to the guy.

  Keep the ball low and inside if possible.

  Simple enough, but difficult to execute. Yet so far the Yankees’ throwers had gotten the best of him.40

  Not only did he have trouble hitting New York’s pitchers, but they now had an added incentive to throw him junk. They could eliminate Williams from the batting race simply by walking him. If Ted wanted to swing at bad pitches, all the better. New York Times sportswriter John Drebinger feared the possibility of a conspiracy. Certainly it would not rise to the level of the Black Sox Scandal, but, he commented, “this wouldn’t be a sporting thing to do.”41

  Meanwhile, Al Kaline was behind Mantle in the RBI contest, but he was on a tear. In Briggs Stadium, before fewer than 1,500 fans on a cold, windy September 19, he accounted for four RBIs on a home run and three singles against the Orioles. In the standings, the game advanced the Tigers to within one and a half games of fourth place, an inconsequential change. More importantly, Kaline’s 4-RBI performance drew him to within 1 of Mickey’s league-leading total of 123. For the remainder of the season, Kaline could swing freely, knowing that the Tigers were simply playing for personal statistics.42

  Mantle’s dilemma was whether to swing much at all. Now that the pennant was won, Stengel had lost interest in the remainder of the team’s games. “I don’t care about the other clubs in the league and whether they’re playing for second or third money,” he told reporters. Late September was a time to bring up some promising minor leaguers, a chance to see how they handled big-league pitching. He also wanted to rest Bauer, Slaughter, and a few other senior players. And of course, Casey planned to protect Berra and Mantle for the Fall Classic. “Think I wanna go into another series without Mantle or Bauer? And how would it be if Berra was hurt catching in these remaining games?” Such catastrophic possibilities boggled his imagination, disturbing his sleep as much as the Triple Crown did Mantle’s.43

  New York had nine contests remaining in the season, including the two three-game weekend series against Boston. With Mantle and Williams vying for the batting title, even Casey hesitated to put his slugger on the bench. The first series at Fenway Park might determine the victor. Almost 25,000 spectators passed through the turnstiles to witness the Friday-afternoon duel between Mickey and Ted. A frosty slugfest, the game dragged on for three hours and twenty-three minutes before Boston won 13–7. Fans witnessed two records: the Yankees set a new American League mark for home runs in a season (183) and a dubious major-league standard for stranding players on base in a single game (20). But the records and the game’s outcome were secondary to the encounter between Williams and Mantle.44

  Ted walked only once and registered four official appearances at the plate, slapping two singles and raising his average from .355 to .356. It was a fine game. Mickey, however, was magnificent. He went 3–5, batted in two RBIs, and hit a towering 450-foot homer into the center-field bleachers. Joe Looney of the Boston Herald wrote that it “soared majestically until it struck a foot from the top of the center field wall at the section 36.” On contact, center fielder Jimmy Piersall took two quick steps back and stopped in his tracks, admiring the ball as it caromed off the wall toward the outstretched hands of a group of spectators. It was Mantle’s first home run at Fenway that season and number fifty-one overall. Only seven players in the history of the game had hit fifty-one or more homers in a year. In addition, his three hits raised his average from .350 to .353, only three points behind Williams.45

  Fittingly, Saturday’s contest was televised nationally on CBS’s Game of the Week, and though it had none of the fireworks of the previous contest, it had even more drama. After eight innings, Yankee pitcher Don Larsen had surrendered only four hits, and his team led 2–1. But in the bottom of the ninth he ran into trouble. A Boston player reached first on an error, and Larsen walked two others. With two outs and Williams coming to the plate, Stengel sent in reliever Tommy Byrne. His first pitch was a fastball over the heart of the plate in the happiest of Williams’s happy areas. He hit it flush. “The torpedo-like smash,” wrote Looney, struck Byrne on the inside of the left ankle and ricocheted over to “the almost unsuspecting Bill Skowron” at third base. Moose fired the ball to first to finish the 1–5–3 game-ending putout.46

  “I don’t think I fooled Ted a bit,” Byrne confessed after the game. “It was a fast ball right down the middle, but it came back twice as fast. First thing I knew my ankle was stinging.” So was Williams as he kicked the dirt on the way to first. Perfect ball, hit hard up the middle—and an out on the scorecard. Ted went 0–4, and his average tumbled to .353. Mickey finished the day 2–3, bumping his average to .354. By a thousandth of a point he was back on top.47


  CASEY WAS NOT A worrier for nothing. Ballplayers get hurt during games. Byrne had a nasty ankle bruise after the contest. It could have been worse. The night before, infielder Andy Carey was beaned sliding into third base. He was taken to a local hospital. On his release the next day, doctors told him to take it easy for a while. And then in the meaningless 2–1 game, Mickey hit a ball to right field, rounded first, and sprinted toward second for a double. He felt a tick of a pull in the groin of his left leg. Not too bad. But bad enough for Casey to pull him out of the game a few innings later. It could have been worse. That’s what Casey always said. It could be worse, and sometimes it was.48

  Triple Crown or no Triple Crown, Stengel wanted Mantle healthy for the World Series. Yet he was sympathetic to Mickey’s ambition to accomplish a feat that not even Babe Ruth had. Only one Yankee, Lou Gehrig, had won a Triple Crown, and it had been a decade since Ted Williams had completed one. And no one had won a Triple Crown and hit fifty home runs. Mantle had a shot at baseball immortality, and Casey did not want to completely take the bat out of his boy’s hands. So he devised a strategy. He would remove Mantle from the starting lineup, allowing him to rest his legs on the bench, and pick choice spots to pinch-hit him. If there was a chance to get him in the game with runners in scoring position, Casey would send him to the plate.

  Mantle loved to watch Ted Williams hit, and on Sunday, September 23, he got a chance to do just that. Resting in the shade of the dugout, he spent most of the game as a spectator, admiring Williams’s swing. Ted went 0–3. His average fell another three points to .350.49

  Mickey got his opportunity in the ninth inning. With runners on the corners, Stengel sent him in to pinch-hit. Mantle responded with a line-drive single into right field, scoring the runner on third. The hit raised his batting average to .356, giving him a more comfortable lead over Williams, and kept him ahead of Kaline in the RBI competition by 127–123. Although Boston sportswriter Bill Cunningham complained that Stengel had “been wanting to wrap Mantle in cotton” and suggested that Mickey’s “injury” might be an excuse to keep him off the field, Casey’s strategy seemed sound. Limiting his star’s plate appearances would effectively freeze his batting average near the mid-.350s, making it almost impossible for Williams to catch him. But it would also reduce his opportunities to drive in runs, which might give Kaline hope.50

  Sandwiched between the two Boston series were three road games against Baltimore. Sitting in the dugout, Mantle had time to reflect on his circumstances. “Kaline was healthy and I wasn’t,” he said years later. “He could have a big day or two and pass me in RBIs. Williams could get hot and pass me in batting. My home-run lead was safe, but I was in danger of not getting the Triple Crown I wanted so badly.”51

  Once again, he felt betrayed by his body. He was so close to the end of an incredible season. To stumble now would be difficult to endure. But it seemed to be happening. Casey sent him to pinch-hit in all three games in Baltimore. Mickey drew a walk in the first, fouled out in the second, and popped out in the third. Since a walk does not count as an official at bat, he went 0–2 in the series, and his average ticked down to .354, still four points higher than Williams. Kaline had only inched closer in RBIs. Mickey led 127–124. Both races would be decided in the last weekend of play.

  WILLIAMS HATED YANKEE STADIUM late in the season. Mostly it was the afternoon sun, the way it created long shadows and knifed into the eyes of left-handed hitters. For a man who took everything personally, the sun seemed to conspire against Theodore Samuel Williams himself. He thought that the Yankees’ management should turn the lights on during afternoon games in late September, but he knew why they didn’t: they wanted to give an edge to their pitchers. Not that they needed the advantage. Mantle and Berra and the other Yankee hitters were accustomed to the sun and shadows. “But Williams, purest that he was,” wrote David Halberstam, “thought that anything that diminished a hitter’s ability subtracted from the game.”52

  Mickey didn’t care about the hitting conditions. He only wanted to play. And he would, because Casey had said so. “He ought to be ready,” the Professor announced. “Those four days off shoulda done him some good… an’ I know the other fella [Williams] didn’t hurt him much while he was out.” That settled it. On Friday, September 28, the two finest hitters in the game, the two most celebrated players in baseball, would begin the series that would determine the batting championship.53

  On a chilly afternoon before 16,760 spectators, Yankee pitcher Don Larsen kept the ball low and Williams off balance, making the brilliant hitter look ordinary. Three times he got Ted to hit ground balls at Billy Martin, and two of them led to double plays. Williams hit the ball hard but finished the day hitless and frustrated, his average falling from .350 to .348 and his chances of catching Mantle fading into the shadows of Yankee Stadium.54

  In four appearances at the plate, Mickey only managed one hit. In the third inning with no one on base, former Yankee pitcher Bob Porterfield got careless and grooved a pitch. Mantle caught it perfectly, driving the ball into the lower right-field seats for his fifty-second home run. Although his batting average dropped to .353, the homer gave him 128 RBIs for the season. In Cleveland that afternoon, Kaline failed to knock in a run during the Indians 2–1 win over the Tigers.

  With his slugger gaining some breathing room, Stengel decided to return Mantle to pinch-hitting duty for the final two games. The first of the contests decided the batting title. In thirteen innings, the Red Sox won 7–5, and Williams reached the four hundredth at bat he needed to be eligible for the batting title. But to do so he chased bad pitches, and he paid the price. Once again, Yankee pitching frustrated him. His 1–6 performance lowered his batting average to .345, too far behind Mantle to catch up.

  Still, he didn’t concede a “damn” thing when it came to skill with the bat. As far as he was concerned, Mantle had two advantages. First, he didn’t have to hit Yankees pitching. Second, he had the speed to bunt and reach first on slow infield grounders. “If I could run like that son of a bitch,” he said, “I’d hit .400 every year.”55

  Casey picked the perfect time to pinch-hit Mantle. In the bottom of the eighth inning, the Yankees loaded the bases, and Stengel sent him into the game to drive home a few runners. Enjoying the best season of his young career, reliever Ike Delock was on the mound. He tried unsuccessfully to tempt Mantle into swinging at a bad pitch. Mickey held his ground. If Delock wanted to be coy, he was happy to accept a walk and a cheap RBI. It was his 129th.

  Before fewer than 3,000 spectators in Cleveland that afternoon, Kaline had knocked in his 125th and 126th, staying within range of Mickey and guaranteeing that their race would go down to the final game of the season.

  ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1956, war was brewing in Egypt, and President Gamal Nasser vowed to fight to the bitter end if the West forced its plan for the Suez Canal on his nation. General Anastasio Somoza Garcia, president of Nicaragua, had just died from bullet wounds. At home, Americans were still talking about Elvis Presley’s recent television appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Some 54 million people—82.6 percent of the television audience—had watched Elvis sing “Hound Dog,” “Love Me Tender,” and several other selections. But on the last day of the month, there was even more chatter in New York about baseball. That day would determine whether Mickey won the Triple Crown and whether the Brooklyn Dodgers would get the chance to defend their World Series title. Up one game against the Milwaukee Braves, the Bums sent power pitcher Don Newcombe to the mound against the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Vernon Law.

  At Yankee Stadium, the center of attention was a player who might not even participate in the game. Bob Cerv, who had come up to the Yankees the same year as Mickey, took Mantle’s place in center field. Spectators sat listlessly on the chilly, overcast afternoon, watching a game that didn’t matter. In the first half of the contest, the lead went back and forth. Then, with the Red Sox ahead by a run, the Yankees struggled even to get a man on base. Starting in the si
xth, the crowd began to chant, “We want Mantle! We want Mantle!”

  Mickey sat silently in the dugout. Casey was not about to send him in to pinch-hit unless there was a chance to knock someone home.

  In the ninth inning, with the Yankees trailing 4–3, Jerry Lumpe singled to center field and advanced to third on an error. Casey waved Mickey to the plate to replace pitcher Jim Coates. Immediately, a roar erupted from the 18,587 spectators in the stands. Stiff from sitting for several hours, Mickey took his place on the left side of the batter’s box. Rookie pitcher Dave Sisler threw a pitch that fooled him. He began to swing, then tried to check it. Too late. His bat made contact with the ball, rolling it slowly toward short. On contact, Lumke broke hard for home. Shortstop Billy Klaus fielded the ball cleanly, saw he had no play at home, and fired it for the putout at first. Mickey was nowhere near the bag when the ball smacked into the first baseman’s glove. Rather than risk aggravating his pulled groin, he moved toward first almost as slowly as he had walked to the plate.56

  Neither the putout nor the game-tying score mattered. Mickey’s off-balance hit had driven in a run. He had gotten RBI 130, increasing his lead over Al Kaline, who was playing that afternoon in Cleveland.

  “KALINE GET ANY YET?” asked Yankee pitcher Tommy Byrne.57

  Boston had won the game; yet there were no losers in the Yankees’ clubhouse, though there was some nervous chatter. No one seemed to care that Brooklyn had beat the Pirates in a thrilling contest and that there would be another Subway Series. For the Yankees, the story of the moment was in Cleveland. The Tigers and Indians were still on the field. Mantle and his teammates only knew that the game was moving into the late innings and that in the sixth Kaline had tripled, knocking in two runs and raising his RBI total to 128, two behind Mickey. He was bound to get another crack at the plate, maybe a couple.