 |
| Gil Hodges |
| by John Saccoman |
|
"Not getting booed at Ebbets Field was an amazing thing. Those fans knew their baseball, and Gil was the only player I can remember whom the fans never, I mean
never, booed." --Clem Labine
"...epitomizes the courage, sportsmanship and integrity of America's favorite pastime."--back of a 1966 Topps baseball card
"Gil Hodges is a Hall of Fame man." --Roy Campanella
"If you had a son, it would be a great thing to have him grow up to be just like Gil Hodges." --Pee Wee Reese
"Gil Hodges is a Hall of Famer; he deserves it, and it's a shame his family and friends have had to wait so long." --Duke Snider
"He [Hodges] was such a noble character in so many respects that I believe Gil to have been one of the finest men I met in sports or out if it." --Arthur Daley, The New York Times
"Kids could sneak into Ebbets Field if they were inside a player's car. We used to wait outside the gates and ask the players to let us sneak in. [Carl] Furillo would take one, Campy would take a couple, but Gilly would always have a carload. He couldn't say 'no' to a kid..." --Brooklyn Dodgers fan
The bridge that spans the East Fork of the White River in northern Pike County, Indiana, has been named the Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge. The stone monument dedicating the bridge reads as follows:
This bridge is named in honor of Gil Hodges. Born at Princeton, Indiana, April 4, 1924. Graduated from Petersburg High School, 1941. Played Major League Baseball, 1943-1963. Brooklyn Dodgers, 1943-1957. Served in US Marines, 1944-1945. Los Angeles Dodgers, 1957-1961. New York Mets, 1962-1963. Managed Washington Senators, 1964(sic)-1967. Managed New York Mets, 1967-1971, including World Series Championship, 1969. As a player, Hodges played in seven World Series. Played on eight National League All Star squads. Hit 14 grand slams. Hit 22 or more home runs in 11 seasons. Had 100 or more RBI in seven seasons. Was sixth player to hit four home runs in one game. Has World Series record for most games by a first baseman. Above all, he was dedicated to God, family, country, and the game of baseball. Died April 2, 1972. Buried in Holy Cross Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.
Gil Hodges was born Gilbert Ray Hodge on April 4, 1924, in Princeton, Indiana, in the state's southwestern corner, just north of Evansville. The origin of the discrepancy between his birth name of Hodge and the name by which he became well known is unclear. His parents were Irene and Big Charlie. When Hodges was seven years old, the family moved from Princeton 30 miles north to Petersburg. Big Charlie did not want his two sons, Gil and Bob, to work in the coalmines as he did. Big Charlie lost an eye and some toes in various mining accidents, and while recovering from a knee injury in the hospital, died of a heart embolism in 1957.
Big Charlie taught his sons how to play sports, and Gil was a four-sport athlete in Petersburg, running track and playing baseball, basketball, and football, earning a combined seven varsity letters. In 1941, like his brother before him, Hodges was offered a Class D contract by the Detroit Tigers, but he declined it and instead enrolled at St. Joseph's College outside Indianapolis on an athletic scholarship. St. Joseph's had a fairly well regarded physical education program, and Hodges had designs on a college coaching career.
After two years, he found himself a full-time drill press operator and playing on the company team. He was bird-dogged by local sporting goods storeowner and part-time Dodgers scout Stanley Feezle, who also would later sign hurler Carl Erskine for the Dodgers. Although Hodges was originally scouted as a shortstop, General Manager Branch Rickey noticed a hitch in Hodges' throw from short and suggested he try catching. [New York Times, April 3, 1972]
Hodges had the proverbial "cup of coffee" with the 1943 team, making his debut on August 23, wearing uniform #4 instead of his customary #14 and playing third base instead of first. [Boys of Summer] A member of the Marines R.O.T.C., he was drafted into the Marine Corps and spent much of the next 21/2 years stationed on Pearl Harbor, Tinian and Okinawa as a gunner in the 16th Anti-Aircraft Battalion. Discharged as a sergeant in early 1946, Hodges was a recipient of the Bronze Star for his deeds in the South Pacific. Don Hoak, a future Dodgers teammate, said, "We kept hearing stories about this big guy from Indiana who killed Japs [Japanese soldiers] with his bare hands." [New York Times, April 3, 1972]
He finished his college degree in the winters at Oakland City College in Indiana on the GI Bill. [The Quiet Man]
Hodges was a solidly built 6'11/2 " tall and weighed 200 pounds. He batted and threw right-handed, and was considered large for baseball players of the era. However, Hodges was a gentle giant, often playing the role of peacemaker during the frequent on-field brawls of the time. His hands were so large that teammate Pee Wee Reese once remarked that he could have played first base barehanded but wore a mitt because it was fashionable.
Rickey had him learn catching in the minors at Newport News, Virginia. He spent part of 1947 as the third-string catcher for the Brooklyn club, but with Roy Campanella on the way and soon to be ensconced at the position by the middle of 1948, a position change for Hodges was in order. Dodgers manager Leo Durocher recalled that coach Clyde Sukeforth told him "this Campanella...is the best catcher in baseball right now." So, Durocher "put a first baseman's glove on our other rookie catcher, Gil Hodges...Three days later, I'm looking at the best first baseman I'd seen since Dolf Camilli." [Nice Guys Finish Last]
In his first full year with the Dodgers, 1948, Hodges played 96 games at first base. With 13 errors, his fielding percentage was .986, the only year he played regularly that he fielded under .990. In addition, he contributed 11 home runs and 70 RBI to the Dodgers 84-win, third-place season. He would not drive in fewer than 100 runs over the next seven seasons, nor would the Dodgers finish lower than second place over the next eight.
That same year, Hodges met and married the former Joan Lombardi, a Brooklyn girl from the Bay Ridge section. The Hodges couple made a permanent home in Brooklyn, one of the few Dodgers to do so, and raised four children, Gil Jr. (who would spend some time as a player in the New York Mets minor league system), Irene, Cynthia and Barbara. This no doubt made Gil "one of them" in the eyes of the fans. Walter O'Malley, the Dodgers' owner, stated, "If I had sold or traded Hodges, the Brooklyn fans would hang me, burn me, and tear me to pieces." Brooklyn fans had to curb that impulse in 1957 when O'Malley engineered the club's move to Los Angeles. [The Quiet Man]
By 1949, the Brooklyn Dodgers were poised for the most productive period in the franchise's history. The fabled lineup was in place: Roy Campanella at catcher, Hodges at first, Jackie Robinson at second, Pee Wee Reese at short, Billy Cox at third, Duke Snider in center and Carl Furillo in right with a rotating cast of characters in left. The team finished in first place with 97 wins, edging the St. Louis Cardinals by one game. Hodges appeared in his first all-star game and went 1 for 3 with a run scored. He tied with Snider for the team lead in home runs with 23, and his 115 RBI were second on the team to Robinson, the eventual league MVP. However, the Dodgers lost the World Series to the New York Yankees in five games. Hodges drove in the only run in the Dodgers' only win in Game 2 and drove in four of the team's 14 runs in the Series.
The next two years brought consecutive second-place finishes, with the 1951 season burnished in history by the three-game playoff series with the New York Giants that culminated in Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard 'Round the World." Hodges' power numbers continued to improve, as he averaged 36 home runs and 108 RBI for the two seasons while batting .276. He established his career high in runs scored in 1951 with 118, one of three seasons in his career in which he topped 100. Defensively, he exceeded 100 assists each year, one indication of exceptional fielding ability at first base. In the 1951 All-Star Game, Hodges went 2 for 5, including a two-run homer. However, his biggest day came on August 31, 1950, when he became the sixth player to hit four home runs in a single game. In fact, he went 5 for 6 and had nine RBI that day, hitting the home runs off four different Boston Braves pitchers, including future Hall of Famer Warren Spahn.
The next two seasons saw the Dodgers win the NL each year, only to fall to the Yankees in the Series again each time. In 1952, Hodges hit 32 home runs and drove in 102, slugging .500, while in 1953, his numbers were 31-122 with a .550 slugging percentage despite a .187 average in May.
The slump with which he began the 1953 season actually carried over from the 1952 World Series and, incredibly, cemented the legendary bond between Hodges and the Brooklyn fans. In the seven-game series, he went 0 for 21 with five walks, and this slump continued into the 1953 season. Instead of booing their first baseman, the Ebbets Field faithful embraced him, cheering him warmly, sometimes with standing ovations, before each at bat.
In his classic The Boys of Summer, Roger Kahn writes:
The fans of Brooklyn warmed to the first baseman as he suffered his slump. A movement to save him rose from cement sidewalks and the roots of trampled Flatbush grass. More than thirty people a day wrote to Hodges. Packages arrived with rosary beads, rabbits' feet, mezuzahs, scapulars.
In his book, The Game of Baseball, Hodges recalled that slump in his typical humble fashion:
The thing that most people hear about that one is that a priest [Father Herbert Redmond of St. Francis Roman Catholic Church] stood in a Brooklyn pulpit that Sunday and said, "It's too hot for a sermon. Just go home and say a prayer for Gil Hodges." Well, I know that I'll never forget that, but also I won't forget the hundreds of people who sent me letters, telegrams, and postcards during that World Series. There wasn't a single nasty message. Everybody tried to say something nice. It had a tremendous effect on my morale, if not my batting average. Remember that in 1952, the Dodgers had never won a World Series. A couple of base hits by me in the right spot might have changed all that.
Undoubtedly, his experience of the slump helped him later in his managerial career, when he took over struggling expansion teams.
The 1954 season saw the Dodgers finish in second place and Hodges post career highs in home runs (42), RBI (130) and slugging (.579). Twenty-five of those homers came at Ebbets Field, establishing a new club mark. On Aug. 8, he tripled and homered in the eighth inning as the Dodgers scored 13 runs on their way to a 20-8 win over the Cincinnati Reds.
The 1955 season is the one most fondly remembered by Brooklyn fans. Hodges, now thirty-one years old, contributed 27 homers, 102 RBI and a .500 slugging percentage to the Dodgers' 98-win campaign. For the fifth time in nine years, they met the Yankees in the World Series. Hodges drove in the only two runs scored in the seventh and deciding game of the Series, and recorded the final clinching out on a throw from Reese.
Hodges would play in two more World Series, 1956 and 1959, and the Dodgers would win in 1959. He continued to play as a regular over the span of these years, averaging more than 26 home runs and 82 runs batted in each season. Hodges homered once in each Series; in the 1956 seven-game series loss to the Yankees, he had a hand in 12 of the Dodgers' 25 runs, and he batted .391 in the 1959 Los Angeles Dodgers series win over the Chicago White Sox. In the '59 Series, he won Game 4 with a solo homer in the bottom of the eighth that snapped a 4-4 tie.
Hodges played for parts of four more seasons, but knee and other injuries slowed him down; he hit only .198 in 197 at-bats in 1960. Despite the Dodgers' move to Los Angeles, the Hodges family maintained the home in Brooklyn, and in 1961, the newly formed Mets selected Hodges in the first National League expansion draft. He hit the first home run in Mets history, and though he began 1963 as an active player, he retired after his trade to the Washington Senators of the American League (for outfielder Jimmy Piersall) to be their manager. Gil Hodges hit his 370th and final home run on July 6, 1962. Until April 19 of the next season, when Willie Mays hit his 371st, Hodges had the most home runs by a right-handed hitter in NL history.
Each year after Hodges' arrival, the expansion Senators improved on their record from the previous year, peaking with a 76-85 record in 1967. Among their top players were four the Senators had pirated from the Dodgers in a 1964 trade: Hodges' former teammate, fellow gentle giant and slugging outfielder Frank Howard, pitchers Phil Ortega and Pete Richert, and third baseman Ken McMullen. The rules of the expansion draft were much less liberal than those of recent baseball expansions. In the expansion from eight to ten teams in each league, the new clubs were allowed to select from a very small pool of players. Thus, when Hodges was traded back to the Mets for $100,000 and pitcher Bill Denehy, he was to manage another young expansion team.
However, his reputation preceded him. His teams improved every year, "and because of his image-he has been the quiet hero, the humble, gentle giant ever since his Dodger days-he is secure as a losing manager can be." [The Year the Mets Lost Last Place]
Despite that job security, he suffered a "mild" heart attack during a game in Atlanta on September 24, 1968, at the age of 44. Besides the stress, which he seems to have always kept bottled up, he also had developed a smoking habit on Okinawa, two contributing factors for such an attack so early in life. [Boys of Summer]
His first winning season as manager, of course, came with the 1969 Mets, a team that went 100-62, or 27 wins over the previous year. They were led by rising star pitchers Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman and a promising fireballer named Nolan Ryan, as well as home-grown everyday left fielder Cleon Jones and center fielder Tommie Agee, whom Hodges knew from the American League. The Mets beat the Atlanta Braves in three straight games in the NL Playoffs, and defeated the heavily favored Baltimore Orioles in five games in the World Series. Hodges was voted Manager of the Year for his efforts in earning his third World Series ring.
The Mets finished with identical 83-79 records in each of the next two seasons. For Hodges, there would be no more championships.
The spring of 1972 saw the first modern players strike. On April 2, Easter Sunday, Hodges played golf at the Palm Beach Lakes golf course in Florida with coaches Joe Pignatano, Rube Walker and Eddie Yost. The first two were old Brooklyn Dodger pals, while Yost had been with Hodges since the Senators days.
As they walked off the final hole of their 27-hole day toward their rooms at the Ramada Inn, Pignatano asked Hodges what time they were to meet for dinner. Hodges answered him, "7:30," and then he fell to the pavement. He was pronounced dead of a coronary at 5:45 p.m. in West Palm Beach [New York Times, Monday, April 3]. The Mets were scheduled to open the season in Pittsburgh on April 7, the day of the funeral, but the players agreed to forfeit the game to attend. The Pirates graciously canceled the game, which was not played anyway because of the lingering strike.
Coach Yogi Berra took over the stunned Mets as Hodges' replacement and led the Mets back to the World Series in 1973.
In the years since Hodges' death, some attention has been given to his absence from the Hall of Fame. He has received more votes than anybody else, elected or not.
Hodges was eligible for the Baseball Writers Association of America vote from 1969 until 1983. In each year, he received more votes than at least four and as many as ten men who would ultimately be elected to the Hall.
In an op-ed piece in the New York Times on Christmas Day, 1977, Bishop Francis Mugavero of the Diocese of Brooklyn, the main celebrant at Hodges' funeral mass, made a case for Hodges' enshrinement. He discussed his on-field playing and managerial feats, and then cited his character. "There was never a more religious man in sports... From his first day in the major leagues, he recited a "Hail Mary" and an "Our Father" during the playing of the National Anthem." Mugavero continued, "He would never accept a fee [for speaking at public functions]."
One time, when his team was flying on a Friday, the in-flight meal was a steak. Hodges refused to eat it. When reminded there was a dispensation for such circumstances, Hodges said, "I know, but we're a little too close to headquarters up here." [The Quiet Man]
Hodges led all first basemen of the 1950s in the following categories: home runs (310), games (1477), at bats (5313), runs (890), hits (1491), runs batted in (1,001), total bases(2,733) and extra-base hits (585). He made the All-Star team eight times, every year from 1949-55 and again in 1957, the most of any first baseman of the time. In addition, Hodges won the first three Gold Gloves at his position and was considered the finest defensive first baseman of the era as well. Also, he was second among all players in the 1950s in home runs and runs batted in, third in total bases and eighth in runs.
Hodges' funeral Mass could have been held at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan, but that would have not been in keeping with his unassuming ways. During his funeral Mass, held at his Flatbush parish church, Our Lady Help of Christians, the Reverend Charles Curley said, "Gil was an ornament to his parish, and we are justly proud that in death he lies here in our little church." Repeating the story of Father Herbert Redmond's concern for Hodges' slump, Father Curley said, "This morning, in a far different setting, I repeat that suggestion of long ago: Let's all say a prayer for Gil Hodges." [New York Times, April 8, 1972]
A space was left at the bottom of the monument at The Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge to include the wording of Hodges' Cooperstown plaque. Perhaps it is time to fill in the rest of the monument.
Sources
Roger Kahn, The Boys of Summer, Signet, 1971.
Joe D'Agostin, personal communication.
Rob Edelman, personal communication
Marino Amoruso, Gil Hodges: The Quiet Man, Eriksson, 1991
Leo Durocher, Nice Guys Finish Last, Pocket Books, 1975
Gil Hodges, The Game of Baseball, Crown, 1970
Paul Zimmerman and Dick Schapp, The Year the Mets Lost Last Place, Signet, 1969
New York Times, April 3-8, 1972
Photo Credit
The Topps Company
|
|
|
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
