November 8, 1954: The Death of the Philadelphia Athletics

Connie Mack and Bobby Shantz, who turned out to be

the last living former player for the Philadelphia Athletics

November 8, 1954: The American League owners approve the shift of the Philadelphia Athletics franchise to Kansas City. Roy and Earle Mack, sons of the now-senile 88-year-old Connie Mack, sell the A's to Arnold Johnson, a Chicago-based trucking magnate.

Johnson's bid is $3‚375‚000 for the team and stadium‚ Shibe Park, recently renamed Connie Mack Stadium. He says he will sell the stadium to the Phillies for $1‚675‚000, although Phils owner Bob Carpenter, a very wealthy man as a member of both the Carpenter and the duPont families, says, "I need Shibe Park like I need a hole in the head."

One of the offers for the team is from a wealthy Texas group that proposes to move the A's to Los Angeles. This would have meant that the expansion team of 1961 that we currently know as the Los Angeles Angels would have been established elsewhere. However, given that the A's were in the American League, Walter O'Malley still might have moved the National League's Brooklyn Dodgers there.

But the A's did not go to L.A. Kansas City, long a hotbed of minor league and Negro League baseball, gets major league status for the 1st time since the Kansas City Packers of the Federal League in 1915 – or, if you don’t count that, since the Kansas City Cowboys of the old American Association in 1889.

The A's had won AL Pennants in 1902, 1905, 1910, 1911, 1913, 1914, 1929, 1930 and 1931. They had won the World Series in 1910, 1911, 1913, 1929 and 1930. Connie Mack had built 2 dynasties, then broke them up because he needed money.

Unlike in Boston, where the Red Sox stayed and the Braves left, and St. Louis, where the Cardinals stayed and the Browns left, in Philadelphia, the more historically successful team was the one that moved. But while the A's had 9 Pennants to the Phillies' 2, and 5 titles to the Phils' none, the Phils had money, and the A's didn't. And, since both teams couldn't survive in the city, the one without the money went.

Would Philadelphia have been better off if it had been the A's that stayed and the Phils that moved? Imagine, instead, that the Carpenters had bought the A's from the Macks in 1943, instead of buying the Phils from William D. Cox at that time. Here is what the teams won from 1931 to 1970:

Phillies: 1950 Pennant, plus that agonizing near-miss of 1964
A's: Nothing

Doesn't sound good for either team, but at least the Phils won something, right? Hold on, here's 1971 to 2006:

A's: 1971 AL West, 1972 World Series, 1973 World Series, 1974 World Series, 1975 AL West, 1981 AL West, 1988 Pennant, 1989 World Series, 1990 Pennant, 1992 AL West, 2000 AL West, 2001 AL Wild Card, 2002 AL West, 2003 AL West, 2006 AL West

Phils: 1976 NL East, 1977 NL East, 1978 NL East, 1980 World Series, 1981 NL East (1st half), 1983 Pennant, 1993 Pennant

Better for both, but now, it favors the A's. Now, check it out from 2007 onward:

Phils: 2007 NL East, 2008 World Series, 2009 Pennant, 2010 NL East, 2011 NL East, 2022 Pennant

A's: 2012 AL West, 2013 AL West, 2014 AL Wild Card, 2018 AL Wild Card, 2019 AL Wild Card, 2020 AL Wild Card

So, now, the A's have the edge. Here it is, overall, 1901 to 2014:

A's: 30 postseason appearances, 15 Pennants, 9 World Championships
Phillies: 15 postseason appearances, 8 Pennants, 2 World Championships

Definitely, the A's were the ones that should have stayed. At least then, they'd have been in a better stadium than either the Oakland Coliseum or Veterans Stadium by 2004.

Vic Power played until 1965, making him the last active Philadelphia Athletic.

UPDATE: On September 26, 2025, Bobby Shantz celebrated his 100th birthday. By that point, he was the last living Philadelphia Athletic, and the last living man who had played for Connie Mack.

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November 8, 1954 was a Monday. Baseball season was over. Football was in midweek: There would be no Monday Night Football for another 16 years. And the NBA and NHL seasons were underway, but no games were scheduled in either. So there were no scores on this historic day.

October 5, 1910: The 1st Father to Manage His Own Son In Major League Baseball

Earle and Connie -- well after 1910.

October 5, 1910: Philadelphia Athletics manager/co-owner Connie Mack inserts his son Earle Mack behind the plate in a game against the New York Highlanders (forerunners of the Yankees) at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. This is the 1st time that a manager has put his son in a game as a player.

Earle‚ who hit .135 in 26 minor league games this year‚ belies that stat with a single and triple while catching Eddie Plank and Jack Coombs. The Highlanders beat the A's 7-4, but it was hardly Earle's fault.

Earle mopped up in late-season games the next year, and again in 1914‚ and served for 25 years as his father's coach, before moving into the front office. While Connie always wore a suit, and thus was limited to the dugout, Earle wore a uniform, usually Number 27, and could handle mound conferences.

The plan may have been for Connie to hand the managing duties over to Earle someday, and concentrate on running the team's finances and personnel as owner and general manager. Earle and his brother Roy, sons from Connie's 1st marriage, to Margaret Hogan, who died in 1892, seemed to be under the impression. Once the other owners, the Shibe brothers, died in the mid-1930s, that seemed like the reasonable thing to believe. And, when Connie had to step aside due to illness for a few days in 1937, and again in 1939, Earle stood in as manager.

But Connie Mack Jr., his son from his 2nd marriage, in 1910 to Catherine Holahan, thought he would be the heir. Catherine herself thought she would be the operating owner, while Connie Jr. managed.

But Connie Sr. wouldn't stop managing. He was the owner, so he had the ultimate job security. He would call out for pinch-hitters and relief pitchers he had long ago traded or sold. Finally, in 1950, at age 87, the team had a horrible season. The sons, who agreed on little else, decided it was time to gang up on "The Grand Old Man of Baseball," and bought out the Shibes' heirs -- bankrupting themselves in the process -- and had the votes to force Connie Sr. out. Catherine was furious, but there was nothing she could do.

Taking out a loan they couldn't hope to pay back in the near future, Earle and Roy bought Connie Jr. out, and finally sold the team in 1954, to Arnold Johnson, who moved them to Kansas City.

After 1914, no manager would again put his son into a game until 1985, when Yogi Berra played his son Dale with the Yankees. Cal Ripken Sr. would also manage Cal Jr. on the Baltimore Orioles, and Felipe Alou would manage Moisés on the Montreal Expos.

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October 5, 1910 was a Wednesday. This was also the day that a revolution toppled the monarchy of Portugal, never to return. I have a separate entry for that event.

There were 3 other major league games that day:

* The Boston Red Sox led the Washington Senators, 5-1 going into the bottom of the 9th at American League Park in Washington. The Senators tied the game. But they couldn't find the winning run, and the umpires called the game due to darkness.

* And a doubleheader was played at Bennett Park in Detroit. The Detroit Tigers lost the opener to the Cleveland Naps, 8-3, allowing 5 runs in the top of the 10th inning. The nightcap was called due to darkness after 5 innings, with the Tigers leading, 4-2. The Naps were named for their manager, 2nd baseman and best hitter, Napoleon "Nap" Lajoie. They would be renamed the Indians in 1915 and the Guardians in 2022.

This was the last week of the regular season, and Lajoie and the Tigers' Ty Cobb were in a feverish race for the American League battle title, with the Chalmers Auto Company offering a new car to the winner. Over the 2 games, Cobb went 3-for-6 with a walk, 3 stolen bases and 2 RBIs, while Lajoie went 3-for-6 with an RBI. "Shoeless" Joe Jackson went 3-for-7. Cobb ended up winning the batting title, but there were shenanigans (not his doing), and so Chalmers gave both men cars. (Cobb didn't mind: He got what he wanted.)

Bennett Park was torn down in 1911, and a new park opened on the site the next year, known as Navin Field from 1912 to 1937, Briggs Stadium from 1938 to 1960, and Tiger Stadium from 1961 to 1999.

Despite it being a Monday, there were 5 college football games played that day:

* Yale beat Tufts, 17-0 at Yale Field in New Haven, Connecticut.

* The University of Pennsylvania beat Franklin & Marshall University, 17-0 at the original Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* The Carlisle Indian School, with a sophomore two-way back named Jim Thorpe, beat Dickinson College, 24-0 at Biddle Field in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

* VPI -- the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, usually known as "Virginia Tech" now -- beat Davidson University, 16-0 at Miles Field in Blacksburg, Virginia.

* And the University of Mississippi, a.k.a. Ole Miss, beat Tennessee Medical College, now the University of Memphis, 2-0 in Oxford, Mississippi.