This Mistake Cost a Team a Trip to The World Series

Merkle's Boner, or if you're under the age of 13, Merkle's Blunder, literally costed the New York Giants the National League Pennant. If you are not familiar with this crazy play, I don't blame you, it happened over 100 years ago, so no one made a tik tok version of it to be understood in less than a minute.

Background Knowledge

1908, last week of September. The Giants and Cubs are in a heated race to see who will win the National League for a trip to the World Series, with 6 games left to play the 2 teams tied for first. The Cubs were visiting the Giants at the Polo Grounds and the Giants had their ace, and world famous checkers player, Christy Mathewson on the mound for the big game.

Before we go any further, let's talk about the main character of this story, Fred Merkle. A year prior, he made his Major League debut at the age of 18 making him the youngest player in the NL and this was on the New York Giants, managed by the great John McGraw who had won 2 NL Pennants and a World Series in the last 4 years. Merkle was also recovering from not 1 but 2 foot surgeries in July from blood clots. Merkle was a backup first baseman to Fred Tenney, who started every game in the 1908 season but one. Care to guess which one?

Thats right, on September 23rd, Fred Tinney woke up with lumbago which is basically a lot of pain in his lower back and he could not start so Fred Merkle got the call to start in his place for his first start of the year. Already in a big game, the Giants were without their anchor over at first and Merkle was put into the spotlight in what will be the biggest game of the year.

Back to the game. Christy Mathewson threw a complete game gem giving up only 1 run which was an inside the park home run that split a gap at the Polo Grounds. Hell, even I could get an inside the parker at the Polo Grounds if I split a gap. The Giants squeaked a run across on a sac fly, and we head to the bottom of the 9th all tied up at 1.

Before we go any further, one last time, Johnny Evans, captain of the Chicago Cubs, warned umpires at the start of the 4 game series to be weary about players not touching the next bag on a walk off hit with 2 outs. The Cubs got screwed over on a play like that a few weeks earlier when the Pirates walked off the Cubs and when the fans swarmed the field, all of the players ran off the field after the run was scored. The batter and man on first never touched the bases in front of them with 2 outs.

GET YOUR HANDS OFF YOUR KNEES FRED

The Boner

Back to the game. In the bottom of the 9th, man on 1st and 3rd, 2 outs. Batter Al Bridwell laced a ball into the outfield scoring the winning run and the fans swarmed the field and so did Merkle who was on first, in celebration of beating the Cubs and moving to 1st in the National League. Johnny Evers was yelling amongst the chaos to direct the outfielders to get the ball to second base as he saw Merkle was celebrating with the team and never touched second. Christy Mathewson, who just threw a complete game, saw what was happening and attempted to grab Merkle and get him to touch second base before the ball gets there. This is why he is a world renowned checkers player. The Giants 3rd base coach, Hall of Famer, Joe McGinnity, also recognized what was happening, and ran to second base to try and stop the force out. More and more fans were storming the field and as the ball was coming towards Evers, Merkle, Mathewson, and McGinnity, a fan came by and scooped up the ball and chucked it into the stands where it disappeared forever.

Aftermath

After all of that happened, the umpires were smart, never made the signal that a run was scored. The umpires got together with encouragement from Cubs player/manager and Hall of Famer, Frank Chance. The Giants fans, who were all over the place, and had gathered information of what was happening started to get hostile towards the Cubs players and umpires. I mean this is just classic New Yorker, getting mad for jumping the gun and refusing to admit that they were wrong. The cops came and escorted the Cubs and umpires out of the stadium and a decision was made the next day and the game was announced a tie and to be replayed from the beginning at the end of the year.

This is just bullying

On October 8th the game was replayed. The standings were once again tied at the top with the Giants and Cubs. The Cubs won 4-2 and went on to win the National League, and the World Series. That was the last World Series that the Cubs would win until 2016. Maybe it was the Curse of Fred Merkle and not the billy goat.

Merkle would go on and play another 8 years with the Giants and had a pretty decent 16 year career in the big leagues. He would be known as "bonehead" or "boner" for the rest of his career. He would play in 5 total World Series throughout his career, losing all 5 of them. I like to believe that there are people born with good luck, and those born with bad luck. I think Fred Merkle was born with bad luck. He avoided baseball like the plague once his playing career was over. He played in the 1950 New York Giants old timers game and was welcomed with a standing ovation.

Al Bridwell, the player who hit the ball that started Merkle's Boner, said in multiple interviews that he wish he had struck out that at bat. Bridwell stated that if he could change one thing in baseball history, it would be that he struck out instead of getting a hit. Another thing to state that proves that Merkle was not as dumb as the play he was known for, was that Manager John McGraw, known for his toughness on his players, never blamed Merkle for his mistake. McGraw blamed the umpires for making a call in which they never saw happen.

Was it Fred Merkle's fault that the Giants only scored 1 run the entire game? No. Was it Merkle's fault that Fred Tenney had lower back pain? No. Was it Merkle's fault that the Giants lost the makeup game to win the National League? No. Fred Merkle was a 19 year old that was excited to be a part of one of the greatest teams of his era and wanted to celebrate with his boys. Can you really blame him?

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P.S. I had to humble the Giants fans after blogging about one of their best moments in franchise history by blogging about their worst moment.

And that, once again Giants fans, is the Tea, with T