RetroSimba

The career paths of pitcher Curt Davis and outfielder Ernie Koy intersected in two prominent ways for the Cardinals.

The first occurred on Aug. 24, 1938, when Davis pitched a one-hitter for the Cardinals against the Dodgers. Koy produced the only hit, a bunt single.

Two years later, on June 12, 1940, Davis and Koy were part of a blockbuster trade between the Cardinals and Dodgers. The Cardinals sent Davis and slugger Joe Medwick to the Dodgers for Koy, third baseman Bert Haas, pitchers Carl Doyle and Sam Nahem, and $125,000.

It was the second time Davis was part of a major Cardinals trade. On April 16, 1938, the Cardinals dealt pitcher Dizzy Dean to the Cubs for Davis, pitcher Clyde Shoun, outfielder Tuck Stainback and $185,000.

Though Davis wasn’t the caliber of future Hall of Famers Medwick and Dean, he was a successful starting pitcher who achieved 11 double-digit win seasons after getting a late start to his major-league career.

Late bloomer

Davis was born in Greenfield, Mo., and moved with his family to a farm near Salem, Ore., when he was 3. As a young adult, Davis held a variety of jobs, including picking apples, lumberjacking and driving a truck at a logger camp, according to a biography by the Society for American Baseball Research.

A right-handed pitcher, Davis played semipro baseball and signed his first minor-league contract when he was 24. He made his major-league debut with the 1934 Phillies at age 30 and had an impressive rookie season, with 19 wins and a 2.95 ERA for a seventh-place club.

Davis had 16 wins for the 1935 Phillies, was traded to Cubs for slugger Chuck Klein in May 1936, and won 11 for the Cubs in 1936 and 10 in 1937. When the Cubs had a chance to get the sore-armed Dean on the eve of the 1938 season, they jumped at the chance. Cardinals fans were disappointed to see Dean depart and took out their frustrations on Davis, whom they viewed as an inadequate replacement for the colorful ace.

Tough to handle

Davis, 34, took a 9-6 record and 4.48 ERA into his start against the Dodgers at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis. He’d started two days earlier, Aug. 22, 1938, against the Reds and yielded five runs and eight hits in 3.2 innings.

The Cardinals and Dodgers both had losing records and the Wednesday game on a sweltering afternoon drew a paid crowd of 1,403. Another 1,183 boys and girls were admitted for free, putting the total attendance at 2,586.

With one out in the second inning, Koy, a rookie, pushed a drag bunt between the first-base line and the pitcher’s mound. As Koy, a former running back for the University of Texas football team, barreled toward the bag, first baseman Johnny Mize fielded the slow roller and tossed the ball to Davis, who was covering first.

“I hesitated an instant on my way over to first to let Mize get the ball out of his glove,” Davis said to the St. Louis Star-Times. “For a split second, I was afraid the throw would go behind me.”

The throw was on target, but Davis fumbled the ball as Koy streaked across the base and was called safe by umpire George Magerkurth.

Davis disagreed with the call, telling the Star-Times, “I thought I had Koy beat … Just as I caught the ball, I felt a thud behind me and naturally I thought it was an out.”

According to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, “Davis never did get his hands on the throw,” and both the New York Daily News and The Sporting News reported Davis mishandled the ball.

Magerkurth said Koy beat Mize’s throw to the bag and would have been safe even if Davis caught the ball cleanly, so the official scorer ruled the play a hit and not an error.

High quality

Medwick led off the bottom half of the second with a home run against Luke Hamlin, giving the Cardinals a 1-0 lead. It was all the support Davis needed.

The Dodgers’ only other baserunner, Cookie Lavagetto, drew a walk with one out in the fifth and was picked off first by Davis.

The Cardinals got a two-run double from Stu Martin in the fifth, a RBI-single by Davis in the seventh and a final run driven in by Lynn Myers in the eighth, winning, 5-0, in a game played in 1:40.

Davis’ line: nine innings, one hit, one walk, four strikeouts and 28 batters faced. Boxscore

Two months earlier, on June 15, 1938, the Reds’ Johnny Vander Meer pitched a no-hitter against the Dodgers and walked eight. Davis’ gem on one day’s rest “was a far better pitching performance than the no-hit game,” the Daily Eagle declared.

That’s a winner

Davis finished with a 12-8 record and 3.63 ERA for the 1938 Cardinals. In 1939, he was 22-16 for the Cardinals.

The Cardinals got off to a dismal start in 1940 and by June the club was looking to deal veteran players for cash. Davis was 0-4 with a 5.17 ERA and Medwick was sulking and losing fan support when the Dodgers offered to take them.

Davis pitched the last seven seasons (1940-46) of his career with the Dodgers and was 66-54 for them. In 1941, when the Dodgers won the National League pennant, Davis was 13-7 with a 2.97 ERA.

In 13 seasons in the major leagues, Davis had a 158-131 record.