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1920

The Senators were dealt a blow in the offseason as Pete Alexander, the longtime Washington ace, signed a 2-year contract with the New York Giants. Alexander became New York’s number one starter and put them back into the NL pennant mix with Chicago, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and the emerging Philadelphia Phillies. The Reds won the pennant by one game. Wally Schang hit .338 for the Reds, who got a boost from former pitcher Smokey Joe Wood midway through the season in a trade with Cleveland. Wood, won 141 games before throwing his arm out and converting to first base.

Detroit’s Harry Heilmann paced the Tigers who earned a 10 game lead halfway through the season and held on to win their first AL pennant since 1911. Detroit got good seasons also from Carson Bigbee (.337), Sam Rice (.326) and rookie Joe Sewell (.314), the seventh overall pick in the previous fall’s draft.

The Reds took the World Series, five games to one. Schang took home the National League MVP, while Babe Ruth broke his own home run record with 47, adding 126 RBI and hitting at an impressive .369 clip.

1921

The year 1921 went down as the Year of the Bambino. Ruth signed a three-year contract with Cleveland and responded with a .382 batting average, 69 home runs and 180 RBIs. It was good for his second Triple Crown in the American League and the MVP. His presence in the Cleveland lineup also gave Cy Williams lots of good pitches to hit, as he mashed 32 homers, a distant second to the Babe.

All that offense wasn’t enough to overcome a sub-par pitching staff, and the Indians finished two games under .500. The Washington Senators defied the experts and finished the regular season tied with Chicago for first place. The Senators pulled out all the stops in the playoff, winning 17-3 to earn the right to face the NL champion Pittsburgh Pirates.

The Pirates had returned to the NL pennant picture over the last three seasons. 1921 was Rogers Hornsby’s breakout year, as he hit .386 with 28 homers and 139 RBI to win the NL MVP. The Pirates also shrewdly acquired catcher Bubbles Hargrave from the New York Yankees. The Pirates cruised in the World Series, sweeping the Senators in five games.

Jeff Tesreau won the Cy Young award in the American League, going 20-10 with a 3.79 ERA. Ty Cobb proved he had something left in his 34-year old tank, hitting .405 and hitting a career-high 11 home runs. Tris Speaker also hit .372 as a new era of lively-ball hitting appeared to be setting in.

Hornsby left the Pirates for the St. Louis Browns as a free agent in the offseason. His three-year deal made him the highest-paid player in the major leagues.

1922

As expected, the defending champion Pirates faltered without their star shortstop. The New York Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers battled much of the season in the National League, while the White Sox, led by ace Urban Shocker, and the Indians, led by the powerful Ruth-Williams duo were tops in the American League. The Dodgers faded down the stretch and the Giants took the NL by seven games on the strength of a league-best pitching staff which posted a team 3.30 ERA. The White Sox won the pennant by 3 games, posting the league’s best batting average and ERA. The Giants had never lost in a World Series, while this was the White Sox first trip. The Giants made short work of Chicago, winning the series in 5 games.

Jack Fournier of the Reds took home the NL MVP, as he hit .408 with 25 homers. Babe Ruth walked away with another MVP award in the AL, hitting .377 with 56 home runs.

1923

Cleveland and Chicago were again at the top of the American League, but were joined by several other teams, including the Athletics, Tigers, and Browns. Cleveland held a decent lead late in the season until the final stretch, where they lost 10 of their last 13 games, losing the pennant to the White Sox.

In the National League, Brooklyn was the team to beat early, with the Cubs not far behind and the Giants a few games over .500. Brooklyn had a dominant home stretch and finished with 98 wins. But the White Sox were ready this year, and thanks to a couple of great outings from Urban Shocker, Chicago swept the Dodgers in four games.

Brooklyn’s Red Faber took home NL Cy Young honors with a 22-11 season and a 3.09 ERA. Journeyman Win Noyes won 21 games for Chicago and won the AL Cy Young award. Babe Ruth hit a career-best .392 with 48 home runs and 131 RBI to win the AL MVP, while Ike Boone got the award for the Boston Braves in the National League.

1924

The Chicago Cubs made a series of offseason moves that figured to improve the team. They signed future Hall of Fame second baseman Eddie Collins and veteran third baseman Buck Weaver to contracts and traded for Riggs Stephenson, who had posted a .341 batting average in his first three seasons.

It didn’t work out so well for the Cubs, however, as the Philadelphia Phillies got off to a phenomenal 46-15 start. Rookie Jim Bottomley (.371-18-98) led the Phillies’ offense and Dazzy Vance (23-10, 2.77) anchored the pitching staff, and Philadelphia finished with a league-record 103-51 record.

In the American League, Cleveland again proved to be a contender, but faced opposition from Rogers Hornsby and the St. Louis Browns. Hornsby and Ruth had begun a friendly rivalry since Rogers moved over from the National League, and the Indians and Browns emerged as the class of the American League in 1924. St. Louis’ 97-win season included an MVP win for Hornsby (.412-29-109) and a Cy Young award for Joe Shaute (21-2, 3.44), but was spoiled by Cleveland’s 99-55 effort, which came with Babe Ruth out of the lineup for three months due to a fractured cheekbone. Jesse Barnes won 19 games as the ace of the Cleveland staff.

It was the first time for the Phillies in the World Series, and the Cleveland franchise hadn’t won a pennant since the league’s opening season in 1901. The series went to seven games, and the Phillies exploded for an 11-1 win to take their first World Series crown as Ruth watched hopelessly from the bench.

1925

Cleveland came back with a healthy Babe Ruth in 1925 and took first place in early May and never looked back. Ruth hit 38 homers and Harry Rice hit .356 to lead the AL’s top offense as the Indians finished at 90-65 depite a September swoon that nearly allowed the Washington Senators to sneak away with the pennant.

The NL saw a right race as the defending champion Phillies fought with a suddenly frisky Boston Braves team which was spurred by 22-year old Lou Gehrig. The Braves faded, but the Pittsburgh Pirates surged with an 18-9 record in August while the Phillies, who lost Jim Bottomley for the entire season in spring training, could only muster .500 ball in the final two months of the season. Pittsburgh won it’s 6th NL pennant with an 88-66 record.

The Indians were favored in the World Series, but Pittsburgh’s George Kelly hit .385 with a pair of homers and seven RBI as the Pirates shocked the Indians by winning in seven games. Regular season MVP Babe Ruth hit just .222 in the series.

Boston’s Lou Gehrig won the National League MVP, and his teammate Freddie Fitzsimmons won the Cy Young as a rookie, going 21-7 with a 3.60.

1926

Cleveland continued to improve, as they signed future Hall of Famer Joe Jackson in the offseason. It paid off early as the Indians held first place for nearly the entire season and Jackson was among the leaders in batting average and won the AL MVP. The Washington Senators had a strong second half but finished two games out of first.

It was the Phillies returning to the top of the National League, boosted by the return of Jim Bottomley and the breakout season of Al Simmons making up for Ty Cobb’s season-ending injury in early May. The Boston Braves also were in contention in the first half, but dropped out of the race in the second half as the Phillies cruised – winning 101 games and finishing 22 games ahead of the Braves.

The Braves were led by Lou Gehrig who won his second consecutive MVP at age 23. Philadelphia’s Dazzy Vance won the Cy Young award for his 21-8, 2.04 season, but the Phillies lost the World Series to Cleveland in 6 games.

1927

The Indians celebrated their first World Series win – some a little too hard. The great Babe Ruth, who’d ushered in a new era of baseball with his home run hitting prowess, had always been a bit of a partier. His championship celebration continued well into the 1927 season and it began to affect his play. The Babe was only hitting .285, though he was on pace to eclipse 50 home runs for the third time in his career. A particular rowdy night on the town saw Ruth wake up with blurred vision that did not improve with time. Doctors determined that a risky surgery was necessary for Ruth to have any chance of playing baseball again, however, the surgery did not improve his vision enough and the “Sultan of Swat” was forced to call a short end to a brilliant career at the age of 32. He retired with a career .343 batting average, 406 home runs, and 1225 RBI.

The loss left a gaping hole in the Indians lineup. Cleveland had traded away the likes of Cy Williams and Kiki Cuyler and now counted on 38 year-old Shoeless Joe Jackson heavily for offense. Cleveland was able to hang around in the pennant race, but Washington led most of the way and finished with a four game lead on Cleveland to win the pennant.

In the NL, the Phillies were not as dominant as a season before, but still managed to hold off the Reds, who had a promising young core of hitters in Jimmie Foxx, Mel Ott and Chick Hafey, and win the NL pennant by nine games. Ott would win Rookie of the Year for Cincinnati as an 18-year old, and Jimmie Foxx finished third in MVP voting at just 19.

Washington on paper looked like no match for Philadelphia. The Phillies featured veteran stars Ty Cobb, Ross Youngs and Zack Wheat, as well as young talent like Jim Bottomley, Al Simmons and Gabby Hartnett. Their pitching staff was old but effective. Late bloomer Dazzy Vance had won two straight Cy Young awards and was about to win his third. Urban Shocker had two himself, and Dutch Leonard was approaching 250 career wins and would finish second in Cy Young voting this year. But the better team on paper doesn’t always win, and sometimes, as in 1927, the better team on paper loses the World Series in five games.

Joe Jackson won his second straight MVP, giving him five for his career. Lou Gehrig had already won two for the Braves in the NL, and was only getting better. His .345-37-127 campaign as a 24-year old won him his third straight MVP award.

1928

Dazzy Vance jumped from the Phillies to Cincinnati Reds, giving the Reds an ace pitcher to go with their potent offense. But Vance struggled, and it was the Brooklyn Robins who came out of the gate as a contender to Philadelphia for the NL crown. The Phillies faltered, and the Robins, led by shortstop Travis Jackson and pitcher Jack Russell took the pennant by 12 games.

In the American League, Cleveland and Washington battled early, but Chicago’s pitching tandem of Lefty Grove and Eppa Rixey made them a contender, and a 19-4 record in August gave then a 10 game lead into September that would increase to 12 as the Sox finished with a 100-54 season.

Chicago’s Tony Lazzeri drove in 11 runs for the White Sox in their 4-2 World Series win over the Robins. It was the franchise’ second World Series win and third pennant of the ‘20s. Lou Gehrig won another MVP in the National League, with 41 homers, while Rogers Hornsby returned to the top of his game posting a .336 average and 28 homers after a couple sub-par seasons.

1929

A multi-team race shaped up halfway through the American League’s season. Washington, Cleveland, St. Louis and an emerging Yankees franchise challenged Chicago for the pennant. It was an incredibly tight race, and as late as September 9, only one game separated the top four teams, with Cleveland lurking just four and a half back. Washington played best when it counted, going on an 11-game winning streak in late September to win the title.

In the National League, Brooklyn saw Pittsburgh challenge them in a tight race as well. The Pirates’ offense was tops in the NL, while the Robins hung their hats on pitching. It went down to the last day of the season but the Pirates defeated the Cubs while Brooklyn fell to Philadelphia.

The Pirates went on to beat Washington in 6 games in the World Series. It was their third championship of the decade and 6th in franchise history. Pittsburgh was led by pitcher Charley Root (24-10, 3.47), who won the Cy Young award. Lefty Grove won his second straight Cy Young for the White Sox in the AL while Rogers Hornsby had a phenonmenal .368-38-126 campaign to win the AL MVP. Lou Gehrig won his fifth straight MVP but remains stuck on the last place Boston Braves.