McGraw, Russell and the money don’t matter for this discussion. Mays, a 27-year-old Kentuckian with a righthanded "submarine" delivery -- think 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates World Series hero Kent Tekulve, and 1980s Kansas City Royals closer Dan Quisenberry -- had already helped the Red Sox win the 1915, 1916 and 1918 World Series.
But he was a rotten guy, what we would now call "a clubhouse cancer." One teammate (I can't find a record of which one) said, "He has the disposition of a man with a permanent toothache."
Mays himself couldn't explain it: "I always have wondered why I have encountered this antipathy from so many people, wherever I have been. And I have never been able to explain it, even to myself."
While he was at Spring Training in 1919, his farm house in Missouri burned down. He believed it was arson. He began the 1919 season with a 5-11 record. In a game in Philadelphia, home fans at Shibe Park pounded on the roof of the visitors' dugout, and Mays reacted to this by getting up and throwing a ball into the stands, hitting a fan in the head.
On July 13, against the Chicago White Sox at Comiskey Park, Eddie Collins tried to steal 2nd base. Catcher Wally Schang tried to throw him out, and hit Mays in the head by mistake. When the inning ended, Mays walked off the field, walked into the clubhouse, changed his clothes, went to the train station, and headed back to Boston. He told Burt Whitman, a Boston sportswriter:
I’m convinced that it will be impossible for me to preserve my confidence in myself as a ballplayer and stay with the Red Sox as the team is now handled. The entire team is up in the air and things have gone from bad to worse. The team cannot win with me pitching, so I am getting out…
Maybe there will be a trade or a sale of my services. I do not care where I go.
His teammates had turned against him. Sox management were eager to get rid of him. The Yankees, needing pitching, were happy to make the trade.
But, because he had "jumped the club," Mays had been suspended by Red Sox owner Harry Frazee. And Byron Bancroft "Ban" Johnson, President of the American League, ruled that Mays could not be traded while he was suspended.
"Baseball cannot tolerate such a breach of discipline," Johnson said. "It was up to the owners of the Boston club to suspend Carl Mays for breaking his contract, and when they failed to do so, it is my duty as head of the American League to act."
This move by Johnson split the League. On one side: Johnson, one of its co-founders, and the "Loyal Five": The Philadelphia Athletics, owned by Benjamin Shibe and manager Connie Mack; the Cleveland Indians, owned by James Dunn; the Detroit Tigers, owned by Frank Navin; the St. Louis Browns, owned by Phil Ball; and the Washington Senators, owned by former pitching star Clark Griffith.
On the other side, the "Insurrectos," the other 3 teams: The Red Sox, owned by Frazee; the Yankees, owned by Jacob Ruppert and Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston; and the Chicago White Sox, owned by the AL's other co-founder, Charlie Comiskey, once Johnson's best friend, and now a bitter enemy.
The Yankees went to court, and got an injunction against Johnson's ability to prevent the trade. Mays went 9-3 the rest of the way, finishing the season 14-14. He would win 80 games for the Yankees, helping them win their 1st Pennants and their 1st World Series.
He would also -- unintentionally, he always insisted -- become the only pitcher ever to kill an opposing batter with a pitch: On August 16, 1920, at a time when there were no batting helmets, he hit Cleveland shortstop Ray Chapman in the head. Chapman died the next day.
But the implications of this trade went beyond that. After this, the Loyal Five refused to make any deals with the Insurrectos. Those 3 teams could now only make deals with each other. And Comiskey was famously cheap, which resulted in the Black Sox Scandal. So if Frazee had to make a deal, he had to make it with Ruppert. (Huston more or less stayed out of it.)
But the implications of this trade went beyond that. After this, the Loyal Five refused to make any deals with the Insurrectos. Those 3 teams could now only make deals with each other. And Comiskey was famously cheap, which resulted in the Black Sox Scandal. So if Frazee had to make a deal, he had to make it with Ruppert. (Huston more or less stayed out of it.)
And that's why so many of the Red Sox champions of the 1910s went to the Yankees, and helped to make their Dynasty of the 1920s. Mays was the first, and Babe Ruth would be the biggest. Pretty much everybody who has studied this period of baseball history knows that.
What they tend to overlook is what happened to the Loyal Five. Sure, the moves wrecked the Red Sox for a generation. But what did it do to the other teams? The downfall of the White Sox can be traced to the banning for life of the "Eight Men Out" during the Black Sox Scandal.
But from 1921 (after the Indians won the 1920 World Series) through 1964, while the Yankees were winning 29 Pennants in 44 years, how many did the Loyal Five win? The Tigers 4, the Athletics (moving to Kansas City in 1955 and Oakland in 1968) 3, the Senators (becoming the Minnesota Twins in 1961) 3, the Indians 2, the Browns (becoming the Baltimore Orioles in 1954) 1.
And even that wasn't the end of it. The injunction unblocking the Mays trade, combined with the Black Sox Scandal, led to the replacement of the command structure of what we would now call Major League Baseball.
Previously, the game was run by a National Commission, consisting of each League's President and a 3rd man, allegedly impartial (but still doing what the owners wanted.) Afterward, the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball was created. The League Presidents would still have power, particularly in the area of discipline, until Commissioner Bud Selig eliminated their offices in 1999. But they would never be so strong again.
And even that wasn't the end of it. The injunction unblocking the Mays trade, combined with the Black Sox Scandal, led to the replacement of the command structure of what we would now call Major League Baseball.
Previously, the game was run by a National Commission, consisting of each League's President and a 3rd man, allegedly impartial (but still doing what the owners wanted.) Afterward, the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball was created. The League Presidents would still have power, particularly in the area of discipline, until Commissioner Bud Selig eliminated their offices in 1999. But they would never be so strong again.
The Carl Mays trade was huge, above and beyond leading to the Babe Ruth sale.
*
July 30, 1919 was a Wednesday. These baseball games were played that day:
* The New York Yankees split a doubleheader with the Chicago White Sox at the Polo Grounds, and both games went to 10 innings. The Yankees won the opener, 6-5, on a suicide squeeze bunt by James "Truck" Hannah that scored Del Pratt. Bob Shawkey went the distance for the win. Wally Pipp hit a home run.
The South Siders won the nightcap, 5-3. Buck Weaver doubled home the winning run. Over the 2 games, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson went 4-for-5 with 3 walks and an RBI, and Eddie Collins went 3-for-10.
* A doubleheader was split at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The New York Giants won the 1st game, 9-0. Jesse Barnes pitched a 3-hit shutout. Hal Chase went 4-for-4 with an RBI and a stolen base, unaware that, due to getting caught throwing games, he was in his last 2 months as an active player. The Pittsburgh Pirates won the 2nd game, 6-1.
* The Brooklyn Robins beat the Chicago Cubs, 6-0 at Weeghman Park in Chicago. Jeff Pfeffer allowed 9 hits, but kept the shutout. Zack Wheat went 3-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. (The Dodgers were named the Robins while Wilbert Robinson was their manager, from 1914 to 1931. Weeghman Park was renamed Cubs Park in 1920, and Wrigley Field in 1926.)
* A doubleheader was split at Fenway Park in Boston. The Detroit Tigers won the 1st game, 3-1. The Boston Red Sox won the 2nd game, 3-2. Over the 2 games, Ty Cobb went 4-for-7 with 2 walks and a stolen base, and Babe Ruth went 0-for-6 with 2 walks.
* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Cleveland Indians, 2-1 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Tris Speaker went 0-for-4.
* The Washington Senators beat the St. Louis Browns, 1-0 at Griffith Stadium in Washington. With 1 out in the bottom of the 9th, Sam Rice hit a triple, and Robert "Buzz" Murphy singled him home. Jim Shaw pitched a 4-hit shutout. George Sisler got 1 of those hits.
* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Boston Braves, 7-6 at Redland Field in Cincinnati. (It was renamed Crosley Field in 1934.)
* And the Philadelphia Phillies beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-1 at Robison Field in St. Louis. Rogers Hornsby went 0-for-4.
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