As Cardinals manager, Branch Rickey either was ahead of his time or hopelessly out of step with the times. Take your pick. Either way, Cardinals owner and president Sam Breadon decided Rickey no longer should be manager.
One hundred years ago, on May 30, 1925, Breadon changed managers, replacing Rickey with Rogers Hornsby. Rickey remained with the club in a front-office role.
The shakeup turned out to be good for the Cardinals. Player-manager Hornsby led them to their first National League pennant and World Series championship in 1926. Focused on baseball operations, vice president Rickey built the Cardinals into a perennial contender.
On shaky ground
After managing the St. Louis Browns (1913-15), Rickey joined the Cardinals and became their manager in 1919. In his first six years, he piloted the club to three winning seasons: 1921 (87-66), 1922 (85-69) and 1923 (79-74). Then the Cardinals took a big step backwards, finishing 65-89 in 1924 and drawing a mere 272,885 at its home games.
Knowing Breadon was considering a change, Rickey offered to resign during 1925 spring training but reconsidered, according to St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist John Wray. “I look at this team I have put together and I can visualize it winning the flag,” Rickey told Breadon. “I have the stuff here and I want another chance. I think I deserve it because I assembled all this talent.”
Breadon wasn’t convinced. In his autobiography, “My War With Baseball,” Hornsby said Rickey sought his help with Breadon. “I went to Breadon and said that Rickey was the smartest man in baseball,” Hornsby recalled. “Breadon suggested I take the job as manager, but I wasn’t interested.”
Before spring training ended, Breadon formerly offered Hornsby the job, but he declined. “I recommended that Breadon keep Rickey,” Hornsby said in his autobiography. “I also told Breadon that if the Good Lord himself were to … manage this club, he couldn’t do any better. It was a lousy team.”
Decision time
The 1925 Cardinals won five of their first eight, then nosedived, losing seven in a row at home before mostly small crowds.
When the Cardinals were in Pittsburgh for a series with the Pirates, Breadon showed up. On Friday, May 29, Hornsby was having breakfast at the Hotel Schenley when traveling secretary Clarence Lloyd approached him and said Breadon wanted to meet. In his autobiography, Hornsby recalled that as he passed by the table of Rickey and coach Burt Shotton, Rickey said to him, “Breadon wants you to manage the team.”
Hornsby replied, “I don’t want to manage. He knows that.”
“Then will you ask Breadon to give me another chance?” Rickey said to Hornsby. “If he won’t, see if you can get him to let Shotton here be the manager.”
Hornsby said, “OK.”
(In addition to coaching, Shotton managed the Cardinals on Sundays, because Rickey promised his mother before signing his first professional contract that he would abstain from baseball activities on Sundays.)
Hornsby met in Breadon’s room and was offered the job. Hornsby said no.
According to the book “Branch Rickey: A Biography” by Murray Polner, Breadon barked back, “I won’t have any goddamned Sunday school teacher running my team. You’re going to run it.”
In his autobiography, Hornsby said he and Breadon had the following exchange:
Hornsby: “You mean, Rickey’s through?”
Breadon: “That’s exactly right _ as manager.”
Hornsby: “What about Shotton as manager?”
Breadon: “I don’t want any Rickey man either.”
It was agreed Hornsby should think over the proposal and inform Breadon of the decision the next day. “I went back down and told Rickey what Breadon had said,” Hornsby recalled in his autobiography. “Rickey didn’t cuss or anything, but he got pretty mad and said he would sell all his stock in the Cardinals.”
According to the Rickey biography, Rickey said to Hornsby, “Judas priest, the man (Breadon) is stabbing me in the back.”
At the ballpark that day, Hornsby slugged a two-run home run, but the Cardinals lost, dropping their record to 13-23. It turned out to be the last game Rickey would manage. Boxscore
Making the switch
According to his autobiography, Hornsby went to Breadon on Saturday, May 30, and told him “the only way I would be interested in becoming manager would be if I could buy Rickey’s stock … Then baseball could be my business for life.” Breadon assured him that would be arranged. The two agreed Hornsby would become player-manager, effective Sunday, May 31. “I expect him to put new fight into the Cardinals,” Breadon told the Associated Press.
In reporting on the managerial switch, James M. Gould of the St. Louis Star-Times wrote, “The pupil succeeds the master.”
Hornsby, 29, became the youngest manager in the National League. He was a few months older than player-manager Bucky Harris, 28, of the American League’s Washington Senators. Other player-managers in the majors in 1925 included Dave Bancroft of the Braves, Ty Cobb of the Tigers, Eddie Collins of the White Sox, George Sisler of the Browns and Tris Speaker of the Indians.
“I feel that with Rickey as vice president and business manager, and Hornsby as playing manager, we have one of the greatest combinations in baseball,” Breadon told the Post-Dispatch.
He also said to the Associated Press, “Rickey is a valuable man and we want to utilize his knowledge of baseball and his great judgment of players. He is a great organizer and a builder, and that is his sphere.”
Breadon’s words, though, didn’t appease Rickey, who resented being ousted as manager. According to Rickey’s biography, he described Breadon’s action as “clumsily brutal.”
According to author Murray Polner, Rickey felt betrayed and considered leaving the Cardinals to become athletic director at Northwestern University, but his wife Jane talked him out of it.
In his book “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds,” author Mike Mitchell wrote that Rickey later said, “My fault as a manager … was due to my apparent zeal. I discussed the game every day … as if the game coming up was the game of the year.”
With Rickey out and Hornsby taking over effective May 31, coach Shotton was tasked with managing the Cardinals in the May 30 Saturday doubleheader at Pittsburgh, according to “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds.” The Pirates won both, totaling eight triples in Game 2. Boxscore
Rickey’s reviews
Reaction to the managerial move mostly was favorable:
_ J. Roy Stockton, Post-Dispatch: “The Cardinals should do well under Hornsby. He will not overmanage the team. If there was any just criticism of Branch Rickey’s regime, it was that he burdened the team with too much management. He tried to pitch for the pitchers and to catch for the catchers … He lacked poise when directing his men … He decided on a plan of action and then … he hesitated, pondered over the danger and changed the plan.”
_ Tommy Holmes, Brooklyn Eagle: “Some attribute the failure of the team to Rickey’s attempt to mastermind the Cardinals. He wanted to do all the thinking that was to be done on the team … Branch exercised his managerial authority by requiring the batter to keep in constant touch with his wagging from the bench. A hitter up there with the bases full, to bust it and nothing else, had to strain his neck getting the signal on every ball pitched.”
_ Henry Farrell, United Press: “Rickey had a lot of trick ideas about handling of a ballclub that made some of the older athletes feel like they were being treated like children. He not only had blackboard talks on baseball but he extended his skull practice to include arithmetic and the grammar school arts and sciences.”
_ John B. Foster, Dayton Daily News: “The greatest weakness of (Rickey) was … his lack of playing instinct. He usually managed to change pitchers at the wrong time … Almost every manager in the National League figured upon his doing the wrong thing at the wrong time … Opposing managers figured they would get away with games if they forced Rickey to change pitchers.”
_ The Sporting News: “The elevation of Hornsby to the management was the most popular choice that could have been made for the fans.”
Different approach
Indeed, fans gave Hornsby a big reception when he was led to the plate by St. Louis mayor Victor Miller and presented with several floral pieces before the start of his managerial debut on Sunday, May 31. During the game, the Post-Dispatch noted “a new spirit exhibited by the players” and “a dash that had been missing for some time.” Hornsby contributed two hits, two walks, two runs scored and a RBI in a 5-2 Cardinals victory over the Reds. Boxscore
The next day, Hornsby started Jesse Haines against the Reds. In four starts for Rickey in 1925, Haines was yanked from the games and lost all four. In his first start for Hornsby, he pitched a complete game and won. Boxscore
A week later, Hornsby bought 1,167 shares of Rickey’s Cardinals stock at $43 a share, a total investment of $50,181, the St. Louis Globe-Democrat reported. As author Mike Mitchell noted, “Upset about being removed as manager, Rickey made an emotional and short-sighted decision.”
Meanwhile, Hornsby canceled the daily team meetings and daily morning workouts that had been the norm when Rickey managed. “You can’t drill for two hours and then get out in the afternoon with all your pep and play some more,” Hornsby explained to the Star-Times.
The Cardinals won 15 of their first 19 games with Hornsby as manager and finished at 77-76. Hornsby’s hitting helped, too. In 1925, he was named recipient of the National League Most Valuable Player Award and led the league in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage for the sixth year in a row.