The LA Browns: Baseball without the war

[RMc]

On a bright day in Washington DC in August 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt leaned back in his chair in the Oval Office. “Tell me once again about this tube thing, Mr. Oliphant.”

“Tube alloys, Mr President,” said Mark Oliphant, head of Britain’s top-secret nuclear fission project. “We sent the recommendations to your man Lyman Briggs months ago, but…”

Roosevelt rolled his eyes. “He put it in a safe, Mr Oliphant. Yes, I know. Suffice to say Mr Briggs is no longer working for the federal government,” the President said with a chuckle. Then his expression turned grave. “Can such a terrible weapon actually be built? And what of the consequences?”

Oliphant cleared his throat and looked at his feet. “The bomb will cost 25 million dollars, Mr President, and Prime Minister Churchill tells me we do not have the money or the manpower, so it is up to America.”

FDR smiled weakly. “God help us all, Mr Oliphant. Build it.”

***

Two days before baseball’s Winter Meetings, and St Louis Browns co-owner Don Barnes was nervous. “You think they’ll approve the move, Bill?” he asked Bill DeWitt, his partner.

DeWitt gnawed on a cigar. “It’s in the bag, Don. The Chamber of Commerce in LA is guaranteeing an attendance of 500,000. Guaranteeing – hell, we haven’t drawn that many people since ’24. We’re buying the stadium out there –“

“Don’t remind me,” Barnes moaned.

“Money well spent, partner,” said DeWitt. “It’s gonna –“

Suddenly the secretary rushed into the office. “Turn on the radio! Turn on the radio!”

Barnes switched on his radio set and heard the voice of Franklin Roosevelt: “December 6, 1941,” he said evenly. “A day which shall live…in victory!”

***

“All those in favor, say aye!”

The eight owners of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs all raised their hands and gave their assent. Baseball had officially moved to the West Coast with the newly-minted Los Angeles Browns.

Moments later, Barnes faced the press. “First off, we’d like the Browns to play a charity game for the families of American soldiers lost in the bombing of Berlin,” he said. “Nearly a million lives were lost…”

“A million krauts, you mean!” called a voice from the crowd.

“And Hitler! And Goebbels! All of ‘em!” yelled another.

“Do you think it’s safe to play in LA?” asked a reporter. “What about the Japs?”

“You all read the paper this morning, gentlemen. The Emporer has spoken to his people, saying,” – he paused to read the article – “‘The enemy now possesses a new and terrible weapon with the power to destroy many innocent lives and do incalculable damage.’ They’re giving up. The war is over.”

“And the Browns are comin’ to LA!” shouted an excited Bill Dewitt.

[RMc]

If you're curious, nearly everything in the above post is historically accurate: the Browns were planning to move to LA for the 1942 season, and the Winter Meetings actually were held on December 8, 1941. Of course, the war was on and the Browns stayed in Missouri.

In this universe, though, the war ends before America can get into it: so, the Browns do move, and all the players who went to war stay home instead. (And how does this affect the Dodgers? Stay tuned!)

[RMc]

"I'm sorry, Mr. DeWitt, but we can't let any more people in," said the fire marshal. "There's gotta be 25,000 in there now."

Bill DeWitt looked out at the throng of people at Wrigley Field, which normally held only 22,000 fans. But it seemed everyone in LA was here to see his undefeated -- they had swept the Senators in Washington -- Los Angeles Browns meet the Boston Red Sox. "We never got these kind of crowds in St. Louis, that's for sure."

The marshal chuckled. "Bet ya didn't get this many movie stars, neither!"

***

Down on the field was Browns manager Luke Sewell with the biggest movie star of all, who was ready to throw out the first pitch. "Throw a strike, King!" Sewell implored.

Clark Gable grimaced and threw a perfect strike to Browns catcher Buddy Rosar. "This 'King of Hollywood' stuff is pure bull...I'm just a lucky slob from Ohio. I happened to be in the right place at the right time."

Rosar, traded to the Yankees for Browns stalwart Harlond Clift just the day before, trotted over to the owner's box. "How 'bout an autograph, King?"

Gable and Barnes just looked at each other and laughed.

Moments later, Johnny Pesky stepped to the plate as the first major league batter in California. "Nice weather out here, Buddy. You found a place to live yet?"

Rosar bent into his crouch. "Right here, Johnny. Right behind home plate!"

Pesky rifled Johnny Niggeling's first pitch down to second baseman Johnny Berardino, who threw Pesky out at first. "Welcome home, Johnny," Pesky said sarcastically, turning and trotting to the dugout.

Berardino smiled. He had been born in LA, and now he -- and the Browns -- were home at last.

***

The game was a thriller -- and a marathon. With Rosar on second in the bottom of the fifteenth, George McQuinn nailed a 3-2 pitch from Mace Brown into center field. Rosar motored around third and beat Dom DiMaggio's throw to the plate by a hair: Browns win, 5-4.

As Buddy's teammates mobbed him, he thought, "You're not the only lucky slob in the right place at the right time, Mr. Gable..."

[RMc]

July 6, 1942: Polo Grounds, New York

Things didn't go as well for the LA Browns on the field after winning their first four games, especially for their pitching staff. Johnny Niggeling, who got a no-decision in the home opener, was the Browns only reliable starter, with a 8-1 mark by the All-Star break. However, the rest of the staff, especially the bullpen, was awful, last in the AL with a 4.47 ERA; and LA was in fifth place, 35-42, fifteen games back of New York.

But 1B George McQuinn, 3B Roy Cullenbine and RF Tony Criscola made the American All-Star Team...and the Browns had sold out every game at Wrigley Field, leading the league in attendance, with nearly double the customers of the mighty Yankees.

***

Bill DeWitt sat in the Polo Grounds press box with AL president Will Harridge, hours before game time. "I hear Roosevelt's going to desegregate the Army in Europe," DeWitt said.

Harridge shrugged. "If a bunch of darkies want to wipe up what's left of Germany, why should I care?"

"My club needs pitching, Will," said DeWitt. "It's a new world. It's time we...turned a page."

Harridge's eyes popped open. "You're crazy. The old man won't allow it."

"Landis won't be commissioner forever," DeWitt said. "He's not even here in New York."

Harridge bolted up. "Never. Not even in California. He'll never let him play. Forget it, Bill...if you want to keep your team."

"It's already done," DeWitt said, taking a piece of paper from his briefcase. "All it needs is your signature."

Will Harridge could literally not believe his eyes. There it was in black and white, an official American League contract made out to Robert Leroy Paige.

[sflcat]

Good stuff so far! Looks like the Dodgers will either have to make the best of their situation in New York or look elsewhere to move.

[RMc]

Good stuff so far!

Thanks!

Looks like the Dodgers will either have to make the best of their situation in New York or look elsewhere to move.

Yeah, because they certainly can't have two MLB teams in Los Angeles...oh...wait...

***

Lieutenant Jack Robinson of the 761st Tank Battalion just stared at the dust that was once a great city. He shook his head. "Hell has been relocated, Sergeant."

Sergeant Warren Crecy just grunted. "Now we're here, sir. Wherever...whatever here is."

Eight months after it was leveled by the A-Bomb, Berlin was still a maelstrom. Fires were still burning in many places. Ex-Nazi soldiers still wandered around, many with pieces of flesh discoloured and hanging from their bodies. Robinson ordered his men to shoot them on sight -- not out of hatred, but pity.

"Excuse me, sir, but there's a message for you." Jack snapped his head around and saw a smartly-dressed corporal with an envelope in his hand. He took the note from the corporal's hand and opened it.

"What's it say, Jackie?" Crecy teased. "You going home?"

Robinson's expression said it all. "Yes, Warren. I am. Home. To Los Angeles."

[RMc]

And now a program note...

As you can see, I planned to bring Satchel Paige and Jackie Robinson to the Browns in 1942, but for the life of me I can't figure out how to create new players in OOTP8. (I can't even get a handle on what their ratings will be; I was going to use the Garlon DB, but the thing doesn't want to load.)

Li'l help?

[RMc]

Ok, never mind. (Does anyone actually read these dynasty posts except me?)

My original idea was to end WW2 before it began (for America, at least) and thus change baseball history in at least two fundamental ways: a team other than the Dodgers claims LA, and blacks enter the majors before 1947.

However, had there been no WW2, would blacks have actually entered MLB earlier? The war provided a lot of impetus for the civil rights movement: if they can fight for America, why doesn't America give blacks proper respect? If the war hadn't happened, it's quite possible that desegregation of the majors (and other institutions) would've happened later, not earlier. But I'll appeal to our better angels and assume that Jackie Robinson joins the big leagues the same time he really did, in 1947.

But with which team? Ah, well...stay tuned!

[RMc]

The 1942 All-Star Game proved to be the wildest in history, as the Americans scored 13 runs in the fourth inning en route to a 19-6 win. The Browns' George McQuinn was named the game's MVP, driving in five runs.

LA's second half was scarcely better than its first: they went 37-40 after the ASG to finish 72-82, 21 back of the surprising Red Sox, who beat out the Yankees by four games, then tackled the Cardinals in the World Series, four games to two. The Brownies were third in league in runs scored (718) and second in homers (67) as McQuinn and Vern Stephens each blasted fourteen. But pitching continued to be a sore spot: their team ERA of 4.34 was next-to-last, ahead of only the woeful A's. Johnny Niggeling, 8-1 at the break, promptly pulled a back muscle and was lost for the season. Stubby Overmire stepped in and wound up LA's best starter (12-4, 3.04). Denny Galehouse was a huge disappointment, putting up a 5.72 ERA to go with a 10-15 record.

None of this mattered much to the fans, though. The Los Angeles Browns sold out every game in 1942: an incredible 1.8 million fans stuffed Wrigley Field to the brim, over 23,000 a game.

***

"It won't work."

"Sure it will."

"It's nutty. The damn field won't fit."

"Oh, it'll fit, all right," said a grinning Bill DeWitt, looking out the vast, empty Coliseum. And ninety thousand people will fit in here, too!"

Don Barnes sighed. "We own Wrigley Field, and you want to abandon it already?"

"Ninety thousand people, Dan! Think of it! Hell, that's more than half the people we drew our last year in St. Louis...for the whole year!"

"But the field," Barnes protested.

"Hang up a Chinese screen in left field, then."

"Didn't think there was much of China left these days."

DeWitt grunted. America stayed out of the war, all right, but it was far from over: the Japanese had just made a surprise attack on Peking, leveling it just as the Allies had wiped out Berlin. And what if the Japs got the A-Bomb? What then?

"Look, Bill," Barnes said, clapping his partner on the back. "If you wanna try it, I'm with you. But one thing's for sure: you're not gonna get ninety thousand people to come to a baseball game!"

***

As it turned out, Barnes was right. The Browns 1943 opener against the Washington Senators drew a mere 88,734 paying customers.

[ifspuds]

I'm reading! I just didn't have any help to offer you on your question.

[Kelric]

I'm reading along.

[RMc]

Los Angeles Times, July 11, 1943

PENNANT RACE IN THE CITY OF ANGELS!

The Browns knocked off the White Sox in Chicago, 5-3, to remain two games back of the league-leading Cleveland Indians going into the All-Star break.

Pitchers Dizzy Trout, who came over from Detroit in a deal last winter, and second-year sensation Stubby Overmire will remain in Chicago to play in the All-Star Game to-morrow. LA's Vern Stephens, Walt Judnich and George McQuinn will also represent the junior circuit in the game, being played in Chicago's Wrigley Field.

Meanwhile, LA's own Wrigley Field is feeling a bit lonely these days, now that the Brownies have shifted their home contests to the cavernous Coliseum.

"I know people are complaining about the 'cheap' homers," said Browns pilot Luke Sewell, "but only when the other team hits 'em!"

No-body seems to be complaining about the Browns these days: in second place, and drawing crowds of 50,000 and more, all of Hollywood seems ga-ga over the club. Film stars Bud Abbott and Lou Costello drew laughs before last week's Browns-Tigers game with their "Who's On First" routine.

"I love the Browns, but this place is just awful for baseball," said Costello, whose new film with Abbott is called Buck Privates Meet The A-Bomb. "They oughta find a place more suited for a ballfield. Here, I keep waiting for USC's football team to come out!"

***

City May Build Public Housing In Ravine

Frank Wilkinson, deputy head of the Housing Authority of Los Angeles, announced today that the city may build a new public housing project in the Mexican community of Chavez Ravine. The new development, to be called "Elysian Fields Heights", could be open by 1946.

"With the population of Los Angeles expanding," said Wilkinson, "Chavez Ravine is viewed as a prime, underutilized location. I know that are those who are looking at the area for redevelopment, but the people who live here now have a right to stay, and a right to live like human beings."

[RMc]

September 16, 1943

BROWNIES SWEEP YANKS, PULL INTO TIE FOR FIRST

Stubby Overmire scattered thirteen hits and picked up his 21st win of the year as the Los Angeles Browns beat back the New York Yankees, 6-4, sweeping a three-game set and moving into a first-place tie with the idle Cleveland Indians. Overmire helped his own cause with a two-run double in the sixth, in front a record crowd of 91,534.

The Browns and Tribe both sit at 82-55, with defending world champs from Boston two-and-one-half out and the struggling New Yorkers five games off the pace.

***

"Reach, mister!"

The man in the black cowboy hat turned around slowly. "Y'know who yer messin' with, pard? Ah've killed forty men!"

The marshal smiled. "Your career is through, Dirty Dan Magee! Now, draw!"

Magee drew his weapon, but too slowly; he heard a popping noise, then saw a trickle of red fluid running down his chest. And then he...burst out laughing.

"Cut!" shouted the director. "You just got shot, Johnny! You're not supposed to laugh!"

"Sorry!" called out Magee, also known as Browns shortstop Johnny Berardino.

The director, Arthur Rubin, had to chuckle. He'd made Buck Privates with Abbott and Costello, and Lou was a huge Browns fan, so he recommended Berardino for this grade-B western Rubin was making. Johnny wasn't all that bad, he just needed a little seasoning: how to hit your marks, where to look...and how not to laugh when you get shot.

"I gotta go," said Berardino, "If I'm late for practice again, skip'll skin me alive."

"Ok, Johnny, we'll get it tomorrow. Just get a hit tonight!"

"GO BROWNS!" a key grip shouted.

[RMc]

Unfortunately, that's as good as it got for the '43 Browns. The Indians immediately got hot, winning six of seven and taking a 1 1/2 game lead into a three-game showdown in the Colliseum -- and Cleveland won all three games, 4-3, 5-2 and 6-4, bursting LA's pennant balloon. The Browns skidded into a tie with Boston, nine games back. Meanwhile, the Indians went on to dominate the Giants in the World Series, 4 games to 1, winning a wild fifth game, 9-7 in fifteen innings.

Ted Williams took two-thirds of the Triple Crown, batting .369 and hitting 40 homers, but finishing second to LA's Vern Stephens in RBI. Walt Judnich, Roy Cullenbine and George McQuinn also fueled an offense that led the AL with 769 runs. Stubby Overmire and Dizzy Trout each won 23 games, while Denny Galehouse rebounded nicely with a 13-8 mark. And Frank Biscan recorded 15 saves, second in the league.

And the Browns drew 2,552,858 fans, by far the most in the history of baseball.

[RMc]

In real life, the 1944 Browns won the pennant (their only one in St Louis)...not so in this reality.

They came out of the gate red-hot: 10-2 in April and 19-11 in May. But they fell out of first place by mid-June, wilting to a 10-19 record in August, ending up 83-71, fourth place, 14 back of the Red Sox. Again, the offense was stellar: a league-leading 811 runs, lead by Al Gionfriddo's .327 average, Walt Judnich's 19 home runs and Vern Stephens' 105 RBI. The pitching was only mediocre, a 3.80 ERA (near league average); Stubby Overmire went 18-14, Hiram Bithorn spot-started his way to a 14-9 mark, and an oft-injured Denny Galehouse was disappointing again (10-11).

Also disappointing -- relatively speaking -- were the Brownies attendance figures. After dropping out of the pennant race by mid-summer, crowds in the cavernous Colliseum dropped to under 10,000 for many games; one contest against the seventh-place White Sox drew just 5,226 (which led one wag to say there was "52 on this side of the stadium, and 26 on the other!"). They still drew over a million fans on the year, but it was a bit embarrasing to see all those empty seats. So Bill DeWitt announced that the club was going to expand and refurbish old Wrigley Field -- renamed DeWitt Field -- and use the Colliseum only for "special events" against teams like the Yankees and the Red Sox.

***

The day after the Red Sox won a thrilling Game 7 of the World Series over the Giants -- falling behind 5-0 before they even got to bat, then rallying to win, 8-7 -- a man named Cornelius Alexander McGillicuddy stepped into Bill DeWitt's office in LA.

"The Tall Tactician" gingerly sat down in a comfy chair in front of DeWitt's desk. "Here's a piece of advice, William," Connie Mack said by way of introduction, "Don't ever be eighty-one years old!"

DeWitt laughed. "I'm sure you'll outlive me, Mr. Mack."

"No, I won't," he replied sharply. "Sometimes I think I won't last another day in this business. My Athletics finish second, first pennant race we've been in since '32, and we can't draw flies. The damn Phils finish seventh, and they draw better than us!" He shook his weary head. "I want something left of this club to leave to my son, Earle."

"What do you have in mind, Mr. Mack?"

"I'm moving the ballclub to San Francisco. Already have a lease on Seals Park. You're going to have competition out here, William."

DeWitt's expression didn't change, but inside he was thrilled. It seemed half the teams in the major leagues were threatening to come west, hoping to mimic the Browns' success, but old man Landis had forbid it. Now Kenesaw Mountain Landis was dead; Will Harridge was named the new interim commissioner, and the former AL prexy wanted another team in California.

"The A's by the bay..." DeWitt mused. "I'm sure it'll be a great rivalry, Mr. Mack."

Mack painfully rose from his chair and shook DeWitt's hand. "A rivalry I plan on winning, William. Look to your laurels, young man."