Their ballparks were less than 40 miles apart, but because they played in different associations the only time they faced off was an occasional exhibition.. or in the World Championship Series. So when the Washington Eagles and Baltimore Clippers got together for the 1913 Series, it was great for fans of both teams who could attend the away games with relative ease. That 1913 series was a bit of a downer (unless you were an Eagles fan) as Washington won it in surprisingly easy fashion. And when both teams repeated as pennant winners in 1914, the scene was set for one of the best Series thus far.
Both the Eagles and Clippers had to hold off strong challenges in their respective pennant races - the Boston Minutemen and Montreal Saints were both strong clubs (though in radically different ways).
For the Eagles, they had to climb out of a hole as they were buried in third place with half the season gone. They relied on the team's best player, pitcher Bill West, who finally got a quality sidekick as former Great Western Leaguer Al Bachman blossomed in his second season with Washington and went 29-9, 1.72, even better than West's 26-13, 2.16 season. Those two led the way for a club that allowed just 460 runs with a Fed-best 2.22 team ERA. The lineup did well too, finishing 2nd in runs scored, but just seven fewer than Boston's league-best 627. No one truly stood out, though CF Billy Porter (.294-2-63) and SS Mel Hancock (.290-0-64) were the best hitters on a solid, all-around cast. It added up to a 98-56 record and repeat pennant for Washington.
'Big Bad' Bill West
Boston posted a strong 93-60 record with their league-best offense led by CF Bill McMurtrie (.323-0-59) and 2B Frank Betts (.296-0-51). The pitching was 2nd-best to Washington (though by a fairly wide margin) and a lefty-centric rotation featured southpaws George Johnson (26-18, 2.47) and Bob Allenbaugh (24-9, 2.87). The New York Gothams were third, finishing strong with a league-best 20-11 record after September 1st, but doomed by a barely-over-.500 season prior to their stretch run. They featured the league's two top hitters in 2B Ed Ziehl (.338 - his fourth batting title and he also had his fifth straight season of 100+ walks as he had the league's most discerning eye at the plate) and RF Harry Dunn (.325 with a league-best 91 RBIs). Huck Lucas (17-10, 2.16) was the best pitcher on the Gothams, but he missed six weeks with a July shoulder injury.
Detroit placed fourth - they had the winningest hurler in the Fed with Jim Golden (31-15, 2.56) but also had a pitcher with the fourth-most losses in Bob Young (16-24, 2.79). Fifth-place Pittsburgh (74-78) had 1B Sam Egbert (.324-0-69) who was third in the Fed in hitting and two other .300 hitters in 2B Frank Roberson and C Dave Cokely, but were done in by mediocre pitching. The Keystones finished sixth with a 70-84 record, their best finish since their surprise runner-up performance in 1909 - they lacked pitching but did have a cornerstone player in 25-year-old 1B Ed Fisher (.320-10-64). St. Louis (62-91) was seventh and in full-on rebuild mode. The basement-dwelling Chicago Chiefs (56-98) had Jim Golden's older brother Rip as their ace, but the offense was so bad he posted a league-leading 27 losses with a 16-27 record despite a respectable 2.74 ERA.
The Clippers went 97-56 with Powell Slocum winning another batting crown, albeit with his first non-400 season since 1909 and his lowest batting average (.365) since 1908 when he hit .343 (and still led the league). In all, Slocum had now won seven of the last eight batting titles and boasted a lifetime average of .381 and had topped 2000 hits while only 27 years old. Mike Marner shook off arguably his worst season and came back with one of his best as he led the league in wins (33-12) and ERA (1.52) and was third in strikeouts (278). Despite all this, the Clippers entered September a half-game behind the surging Montreal Saints.
The longtime also-ran Saints posted their best season since a second-place finish in 1890 and were looking like they'd be a good time for a while thanks to some good, young talent. There was 3B Joe Ward, who hit .329 (but missed the last two weeks of the season with a hamstring injury), 1B Conrad Gardner (.308-4-66) and CF Hal Eason (.273-13-93) and a legitimate one-two pitching punch in lefty Charlie Firestone (28-11, 1.74, 362 Ks) and righty Bob Johnston (21-16, 2.43). Firestone was second in all three pitching Triple Crown categories. The Saints posted a 92-62 record - their first 90-win season - and ended up 5.5 games back... and had a serious what-if for the season because of Ward's injury.
The New York Stars were a distant third with a 79-75 record while the Philadelphia Sailors made a rare first-division appearance, tied for fourth with Chicago at 73-81. 38-year-old Tom McCarthy turned in a solid season with a 2.19 ERA, but the Sailors offense was so inept that his record was 21-23. The Cougars looked like a shadow of their former pennant-winning selves and rebuild looked to be in their near future. Toronto was similarly lackluster, turning in a sixth-place finish and 70-83 record. Brooklyn was a half-game back of Toronto in seventh. The last-place Cleveland Foresters posted a 61-93 record but still felt pretty good about themselves as they had a drafted a star-in-the-making in the 1913 draft, first overall, a true two-way player named Max Morris who came up from the minors and posted a 4-9 mark with a 2.29 ERA in 15 games. He also appeared in 41 games as a hitter (playing in the outfield) and had a .324-1-13 line in 111 at-bats.
The World Series lived up to its expectations this time around as the teams alternated victories and the battle went the full seven-game distance. Mike Marner outdueled Billy West in a 2-1 Baltimore win in game one (Marner actually helped his own cause with a leadoff double in the third, coming around to score what would turn out to be the winning run). Game two had an identical score with the teams flipped and Washington winning on a walk-off single by Jim Smith after the Eagles entered the ninth down 1-0 to John Jones. And why break up the pattern? Game three was another 2-1 classic with the Clippers winning as they had in game one. Jim Williams outpitched Washington's Sam Alexander and the Clippers scored the winning run in the home eighth with the rally started by Powell Slocum who singled, stole second and scored on Jim DuShane's single.
Game four was a bit of a surprise - it was still a one-run game, but not the pitching duel one would expect with Marner and West as the starters. West was battered for 14 hits and six runs and didn't make it out of the sixth, but Marner couldn't hold the lead and was out of the game after the eighth in a 7-7 tie. Washington scored the winning run in the top of the tenth off Len Rush with a pair of singles and a walk. Both Powell Slocum and Washington's Billy Porter recorded two triples in the game. Game five was the first game not to be a one-run affair as the Clippers won 5-2 to take a three-two series lead to Washington's Capital Park for game six.
The Eagles fell behind 2-0 in the first inning of game six but Sam Alexander shut down the Clippers after that and the Eagles' hitters scored four times off Jim Williams to earn a 4-2 win and set up a winner-takes-all game seven the next day.
Game seven set up as another match between Marner and West. The teams had split the previous meetings (though neither Marner nor West got a decision in game four). Game seven was over almost as soon as it began - West's team mates let him down with a pair of errors - the first on a leadoff single by Jim Hoskin that sent Hoskin to second and then allowing the very next batter to reach on an error bringing Powell Slocum up with two on and none out. He naturally took advantage with a double to score Hoskins. Things got worse when the next hitter, Henry Whitney, hit a home run to plate three more runs for a 4-0 lead. That was more than enough for Marner who allowed just two runs while his team mates scored seven in total and the Clippers won game seven 7-2 to take the Series. It was the third title for the Slocum/Marner-led Clippers and first since 1908.
Slocum won yet another Whitney Award as the Continental's MVP - this was his third straight win. Similary, Ed Ziehl again captured the Federal's Whitney Award - it was his third win as well. The award had only been around four seasons and each player had only failed to win it once apiece.
Federal Association
Code:
Team W L WPct GB R RA
Washington Eagles 98 56 .636 - 620 460
Boston Minutemen 93 60 .608 4½ 627 514
New York Gothams 82 71 .536 15½ 670 596
Detroit Dynamos 78 75 .510 19½ 552 536
Pittsburgh Miners 74 78 .487 23 579 571
Philadelphia Keystones 70 84 .455 28 533 605
St. Louis Pioneers 62 91 .405 35½ 497 628
Chicago Chiefs 56 98 .364 42 423 591
Continental Association
Code:
Team W L WPct GB R RA
Baltimore Clippers 97 56 .634 - 597 443
Montreal Saints 92 62 .597 5½ 630 530
New York Stars 79 75 .513 18½ 554 546
Chicago Cougars 73 81 .474 24½ 573 597
Philadelphia Sailors 73 81 .474 24½ 488 540
Toronto Wolves 70 83 .458 27 549 573
Brooklyn Kings 70 84 .455 27½ 568 602
Cleveland Foresters 61 93 .396 36½ 478 606