ON THIS DAY: Dog steals Babe Ruth's glove so he makes barehand grab
Did this REALLY happen? Can't prove it didn't!
By
Dave Brown
•
2 min read
This is one of those Babe Ruth stories that sounds too good to be true, like it was a scene cut from the historically dubious William Bendix biopic about Ruth's life. But -- to paraphrase a movie about journalism in another sport -- baseball historian and Rotisserie baseball co-founder Daniel Okrent wrote about this. It's got to be true!
On Aug. 20, 1923, the Yankees were pounding the snot out of the White Sox in the ninth inning at Comiskey Park, when Chicago manager Kid Gleason sent rookie pitcher Paul Castner to the plate. Via Castner's Sabr bio, which quotes Okrent's book, Baseball Anecdotes:
With the outcome of the 16-5 game no longer in doubt, manager Gleason allowed the good-hitting Castner to bat for himself in the ninth. Meanwhile, bored Yankee left fielder Babe Ruth had begun playing with a dog that had somehow gotten loose in the outfield. Seconds after Ruth had tossed his fielding glove to the mutt, Castner lifted a fly ball to left -- which the Babe nonchalantly caught barehanded, much to the amusement of spectators.
Oh, come on! Are we sure the ball didn't hit the dog, and that Ruth carried it off the field, into a taxi and to the nearest veterinarian? We, as a baseball-loving public, can't even agree if he really called his shot in the 1933 World Series in the way Ruth said he did. And that was in the World Series, with everyone in the ballpark paying attention to Ruth, including all of the cameras.
Is it feasible that Ruth caught a fly ball with his bare hands? Sure. He had big ol' hands, and he was Babe Ruth! Would he play with a dog because he was bored in a blowout? Based on everything we know about Ruth's personality, sure he would. Would he be careless enough to use his own glove to play fetch with a random mutt? You know what? Ruth probably would. It's odd, though, that writer Irving Vaughn of the Chicago Tribune apparently made no reference to Ruth playing with a dog. The anecdote in Bill Lamb's post comes instead from Okrent's book.
Now, it's possible Vaughn didn't happen to see Ruth playing with the dog. There was no TV replay in those days. Maybe he was writing, or looking elsewhere -- who knows? But, something slightly different could have happened instead:
Back in those days, players had a curious and casual tradition of leaving their gloves on the field, at or near their position. Infielders probably would toss them on the foul side of the line, but outfielders, heck, sometimes they'd just plop 'em down wherever. What IF... Ruth picked up the glove of the White Sox left fielder Bill Barrett, and used it to play fetch with the dog? That makes much more sense, doesn't it?
Unless Daniel Okrent was mistaken, and there was no Babe Ruth.
CBS Sports wink of the Eye: The Chicago Sun-Times
