October 7, 1933: Ott Homers Giants to Title

October 7, 1933: Prior to Game 5 of the World Series‚ at Griffith Stadium in Washington, flags are lowered to half-staff to honor William L. Veeck‚ president of the Chicago Cubs, who died suddenly. He is not well remembered with the passage of more than 80 years, but his son, Bill Veeck, already working in the Cubs' front office by 1933, will become one of baseball’s most remarkable men.

In the meantime, the Series comes to a close when Mel Ott homers in the top of the 10th inning, for a 4-3 New York Giants victory over the Washington Senators. Adolfo "Dolf" Luque, Cuban but light-skinned enough to play in the majors of the time, gets the win in relief. The Giants are World Champions for the 4th time, tying the Yankees and the Philadelphia Athletics for the most all-time.

However, it was the 1st title for the Giants with a manager other than John McGraw. The previous year, he had handed the job over to his 1st baseman, Bill Terry. Terry, Ott, shortstop Travis Jackson and pitcher Carl Hubbell would all be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Terry retired as a player after the 1936 season, having led the Giants to another Pennant. He led them to another in 1937. However, on both of those occasions, the Giants lost the World Series to the New York Yankees. They would win one more World Series in New York, in 1954, before moving to San Francisco for the 1958 season. And then, they wouldn't win another until 2010.

Because the Giants didn't have a Roger Kahn to write a book about them, the way the Brooklyn Dodgers did in The Boys of Summer, their achievements tend to get forgotten. Few people are alive today who remember the 3 Pennants and the World Series that the Giants won in the 1930s. Fans not old enough to remember them in New York at all tend to overlook Ott, Terry, Hubbell, and earlier stars like Frankie Frisch, Ross Youngs and Christy Mathewson. Because of the clips we've seen on TV, time and time again, we tend to limit our thinking of the New York baseball Giants to only the Bobby Thomson home run of 1951 and the Willie Mays catch of 1954.

And that's not fair: The Giants achieved a great deal in New York, and should be remembered.

For 86 years, this was the last World Series game played by a Washington team, and the last one played in the District of Columbia. The Washington Nationals finally put an end to that in 2019.

The last surviving member of the 1933 Giants was left fielder Joseph "Jo-Jo" Moore, who lived until 2001. 

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October 7, 1933 was a Saturday. This was also the day that the Depression-themed film Wild Boys of the Road premiered. I have a separate entry for that event.

The only other scores on this historic day were in college football:

* The University of Michigan, with future President Gerald Ford as center on both their offensive and their defensive line, beat Michigan State, 20-6 at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor. The Wolverines would go on to be Big Ten and National Champions.

* Ohio State beat Virginia, 75-0 at Ohio Stadium in Columbus.

* Notre Dame and Kansas played to a 0-0 tie at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana. It was the 1st game of a bad season for Notre Dame: They went 3-5-1, although they did close the season with a win over Army at Yankee Stadium.

* The University of Pittsburgh won their annual "Backyard Brawl" with West Virginia, 21-0 at the old Mountaineer Field in Morgantown, West Virginia.

* Alabama and Mississippi played to a 0-0 tie at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama. 'Bama would end up winning the Championship of the Southeastern Conference, in this 1st season of SEC history.

* Most SEC schools had previously been members of the Southern Conference, which was also a progenitor of the Atlantic Coast Conference. Duke won the Southern Conference, including, on this day, beating Wake Forest, 22-0 at Duke Stadium in Durham, North Carolina. In 1967, the stadium would be renamed Wallace Wade Stadium, for Duke's coach at this time, and previously a National Championship winner at Alabama.

* Arkansas beat Texas Christian University (TCU), 13-0 at The Hill in Fayetteville, Arkansas, their home field before Razorback Stadium was built in 1938. They finished 1st in the Southwest Conference, but it was discovered that they had unknowingly used an ineligible player. The SWC did not recognize a champion for that season, but since intentional misrepresentation on the Razorbacks' part could not be proven, that denial was the only punishment they received.

 

* Nebraska beat Texas, 26-0 at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, Nebraska. The Cornhuskers went on to win the Big Six Conference, which would become the Big Eight (and, later, most of the Big Twelve).

* Stanford beat Santa Clara, 7-0 at the old Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto, California. Stanford and Oregon were named Co-Champions of the Pacific Coast Conference, forerunner of the Pac-12, but Stanford was selected as the league's Rose Bowl participant.

* Army beat Virginia Military Institute (VMI), 32-0 at Michie Stadium in West Point, New York.

* Navy beat Mercer University, 25-6 at Thompson Stadium in Annapolis, Maryland.

* In New York City, Columbia beat Lehigh, 39-0 at Baker Field in the Inwood section of Upper Manhattan. The Lions went 8-1, and were invited to play Stanford in the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day. Columbia won, 7-0, in a great upset. It remains the last time that any of the teams now in the Ivy League participated in a bowl game.

* New York University lost to West Virginia Wesleyan, 3-0 at Yankee Stadium. Located in Buckhannon, West Virginia, WVW now plays in NCAA Division II. Even at that time, this was considered an upset.

* City College of New York had an embarrassing loss of their own, 33-0 to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, at (Class of 18) '86 Field in Troy, New York, across the Hudson River from Albany. RPI now play in NCAA Division III.

* Fordham beat Muhlenberg, 57-0 at Murphy Field in The Bronx. Muhlenberg now compete in NCAA Division III.

* In New Jersey, Princeton beat Amherst, 40-0 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton. Amherst now compete in NCAA Division III.

* And Rutgers beat Providence College, 21-0 at Neilson Field in New Brunswick. Providence suspended their program after the 1941 season, due to World War II, and have never restarted it.