Hilly Layne
Poosh 'Em Up Lazzeri
Bevo LeBourveau
Tom Letcher
Dario Lodigiani
Lucky Lohrke
Charlie Loudenslager
Peanuts Lowrey
Con Lucid
Memo Luna |
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Do you have some favorite baseball
names? Contact: |
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You could say Feller
had his number
It was while playing with Detroit in 1938 the Chet Laabs had the season's most famous strikeout.
It happened on Oct. 2 against Cleveland ace Bob Feller (below), who set what was then a major league record by striking out 18 hitters in one game.
Laabs struck out five times that day and it was his fifth strikeout that gave Feller the record.
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In 1901 they called
him the Dominator
Napoleon Lajoie's .422 batting average in 1901 doesn't receive the respect it may deserve because that was the American League's first season and National League fans, especially, were reluctant to applaud a player who jumped their league to play with the upstarts. Lajoie was so dominant in 1901 that the second-best batting average, by Boston's Buck Freeman, was 77 points lower, at .345.
Lajoie had spent his five-season National League career with the Philadelphia Phillies, who were angry when the player not only left the team after 1900, but joined the Philadelphia Athletics of the new league. The Phillies sued to get Lajoie back, and after a lot of legal wrangling the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 1902 ruled that all Phillies players who had jumped to the new league had to rejoin the National League team.
American League president Ban Johnson outwitted the Phillies by transferring Lajoie from the Athletics to the Cleveland Blues. Johnson also ordered Lajoie to stay out of Pennsylvania, which forced him to hide away in New Jersey each time Cleveland had a road game against the Athletics.
Lajoie remained with Cleveland until 1914, managing the team from 1905-1909. He was so popular that the team changed its nickname from the Blues to the Naps.
He returned to Philadelphia in 1915 and finished his career with the Athletics. |
Cookie doubles,
Yankees crumble
Seldom have so many people rooted so hard for a no-hitter to be spoiled as they did during the fourth game of the 1947 World Series, on October 3, in Brooklyn.
For one thing, most people were pulling for the home team, the Dodgers, who hadn't gotten a hit through eight innings.
For another, New York Yankee hurler Bill Bevens had pitched an incredibly sloppy game, walking ten batters (still a World Series record), even giving up a run without a hit in the fifth inning.
In the 9th inning, still working on a no-hitter,, Bevens walked two more batters, one intentionally, but also he had gotten two batters out.
Up stepped pinch hitter Cookie Lavagetto, who not only spoiled the no hitter, but drove in two runs with his double, giving the Dodgers the victory, 3-2.
Thus Brooklyn evened up the series, two games apiece, but the Yankees would prevail, winning the series, four games to three. Lavagetto left the major leagues when the series ended. |
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| Part 1 |
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| Chet Laabs (1912-1983) |
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| It's the outfielder's unusual last name that stayed with me – plus memories of him tearing up International League pitching when he played for Buffalo after his 11-season major league career was over.
Chester Peter Laabs was a short slugger (5-foot-8) who for awhile seemed the second coming of Hack Wilson. He had his best year in 1942 when he had 27 home runs and 99 RBI for the St. Louis Browns. At one point in July Laabs hit eight home runs in eight games. He was second in the league in homers that season to Ted Williams' 36.
Williams went off to World War II in 1943, but the 31-year-old Laabs remained with the Browns, making the All-Star team. A season later Laabs helped the Browns win their only pennant. He played just 66 games in 1944 and going into the final game had hit only three home runs. But he closed out the season with a bang, hitting two home runs against the Yankees. The win clinched the pennant for the Browns, who finished one game ahead of Detroit.
It was an all-St. Louis World Series, the Cardinals winning in six games. Laabs played in five of those game, batted .200 and struck out six times.
When he retired he moved to Detroit where his major league career had started in 1937. He worked several years for a trophy company, retired, and died in Warren, Michigan, in 1983 at the age of 70. |
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| Doyle "Porky" Lade (1921-2000) |
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| I didn't know about the 'Porky' nickname until I looked him up. To me, Doyle Lade was memorable enough.
Doyle Marion Lade was a right-handed pitcher who was a switch-hitter during part of his career. He spent five seasons with the Chicago Cubs (1946-50), appeared in 126 games, about half of them as a starter.
His best season was 1947 when he had an 11-10 won-lost record. He walked more batters than he struck out. For a pitcher, Lade was a pretty good hitter, batting .220 for his career. |
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| Napoleon Lajoie (1874-1959) |
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| I love saying his last name a bit differently each time, sometimes dragging out the last two syllables – jooooo-weeee. Yet, for all I know, the proper pronunciation is la-JWAH. You know how those French are.
There's not a whole lot you can say about the Woonsocket, Rhode Island, native without getting into a long discussion of the early days of baseball. He was one of the greats. Describing him as a superstar is an understatement.
He was called Nap, for short, also Larry. A Hall of Fame second baseman, Lajoie originally played first base. His lifetime batting average was .338. He had 3,244 hits. Lajoie was a right-handed hitter and had below-average speed, which prompted sportswriter Grantland Rice to say that if he hit left-handed and had Ty Cobb's speed, Lajoie probably would have batted .500. |
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| Apples Lapihuska (1922-1996) |
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| Andrew Lapihuska, usually called Andy, was an outstanding pitcher and outfielder for Millville (New Jersey) High School. Upon graduation he signed with the Philadelphia Phillies who determined Lapihuska should concentrate on pitching. He was just 19 when he made his major league debut in 1942, appearing in three games. He started two of them and was charged with a loss each time. He pitched in only one game the next season and that was the extent of his big league career, thanks to World War II. Lapihuska joined the Army and was with the 103rd Infantry Division which had its own baseball team in 1945. Lapihuska was one of the pitchers. After the war Lapihuska played just one more season – winning five games, losing 14 for Utica (New York) or the Eastern League – before retiring. |
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| Tacks Latimer (1877-1936) |
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| Tacks. Makes him sound like a Damon Runyon character. Unfortunately, life for Clifford Wesley Latimer was more like a James Cagney movie.
After the catcher left baseball (which included just 27 major league games in five seasons, 1898-1902), he became a policeman with the Pennsylvania Railroad. In 1924, he clashed with a superior, Lt. Charles Mackrodt, and challenged him to a duel. When they faced each other, Mackrodt tried to back out, but Latimer shot and killed him.
Latimer was sent to prison and proved a model prisoner; he was pardoned in 1930.
I don't know the origin of his nickname. |
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| Cookie Lavagetto (1912-1990) |
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| Lavagetto played third and second base with the Pittsburgh Pirates and (mostly) the Brooklyn Dodgers in a 10-season major league career that spanned 1934-47, with four years lost to World War II. He is best remembered for breaking up what seemed sure to be the first World Series no-hitter when, in 1947, he hit a double with two outs in the 9th inning against New York Yankee pitcher Bill Bevens.
Harry Arthur Lavagetto was born and raised in Oakland, California, and was a baseball star at Oakland Technical High School. After graduation he played with a local minor league team, the Oakland Oaks, earning the nickname "Cookie's Boy" because he'd been signed by the team's president, Victor "Cookie" Devincenzi.
In 1948 Lavagetto returned to Oakland and played third base. When he retired from playing in 1950 he became a coach for Chuck Dressen, his Oakland manager who took over the Brooklyn Dodgers. In 1955 Dressen left the Dodgers to manage the Washington Senators, taking Lavagetto with him. When Dressen was fired by the Senators in 1957, Lavagetto replaced him, and in 1960 moved with the team to Minnesota where they became the Twins. In 1961 he was fired and went on to coach with the New York Mets and the San Francisco Giants. |
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| Roxie Lawson (1906-1977) |
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Alfred Voyle Lawson was an American League pitcher who spent all or parts of nine seasons in the major leagues, with Cleveland, Detroit and the St. Louis Browns.
His best season was 1937 when he won 18 games for Detroit.
How or why he got his interesting nickname I do not know. Like Tacks Latimer, Roxie Lawson puts me in mind of writer Damon Runyon, especially the musical, "Guys and Dolls," which was based on Runyon's works.
Sing along with me:
"What's playing at the Roxy?
I'll tell you what's playing at the Roxy.
A picture about a Minnesota man falls in love with a Mississippi girl
That he sacrifices everything and moves all the way to Biloxi.
That's what's playing at the Roxy."
(From the title song, "Guys and Dolls," by Frank Loesser.) |
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