RetroSimba

With or without a hypnotist, the 1950 Browns played like they were in a trance.

Seventy years ago, two months into the 1950 season, the Browns fired Dr. David F. Tracy, a psychologist and hypnotist who they’d hoped would help turn the American League club from losers to winners.

The 1950 Browns slumbered to an 8-25 record before cutting ties with Tracy. They stayed in a stupor, finishing 58-96.

In the 21st century, professional sports teams commonly invest in helping athletes with the mental side as well as the physical. For instance, Bob Tewksbury, who pitched for the Cardinals in the 1990s and earned a master’s degree in sports psychology and counseling from Boston University, became a mental skills coach for the Red Sox and mental performance coach for the Giants.

Not so in 1950.

Brothers Bill DeWitt Sr. and Charles DeWitt, the Browns’ owners, were among the first to hire a psychologist to work with a big-league club. Looking back, their decision might be lauded as bold and innovative, but at the time many viewed it as desperate and gimmicky. The Browns needed better pitching, hitting and fielding, but Tracy offered hypnosis, psychology and metaphysics.

A self-promoter, who often seemed more P.T. Barnum than Sigmund Freud, Tracy generated skepticism as well as curiosity.

Mind games

Tracy grew up in Gloucester, Mass. He attended Tufts College for two years and became intrigued by the use of hypnosis to treat battle shock during World War I. Tracy transferred to the University of Southern California and earned a degree in psychology, he told The Sporting News.

While in Los Angeles, Tracy said, he became an ordained minister in the Divine Church of Metaphysics.

He moved to New York, married his wife, an associate editor of a medical journal, became a lecturer and founded the American School of Modern Hypnotism. In 1937, Tracy became a practitioner in New York and charged $20 an hour for his sessions, according to The Sporting News. He wrote a book, “How to Sleep Without Pills,” hired a press agent and charged admission for demonstrations.

The St. Louis Globe-Democrat described him as “a one-man medicine show.”

Tracy was a sports fan, and in December 1949, when the baseball winter meetings were held in New York, he met the DeWitt brothers and convinced them to hire him to help the Browns, who suffered 101 losses that year.

Deep breaths

Browns fans who hoped the DeWitts would return from the winter meetings with upgrades to the roster might have suspected hocus-pocus when they learned the major acquisition was a 50-year-old hypnotist.

“This is no gag,” Charles DeWitt said. “We have several fellows on our club who have an inferiority complex. We feel sure the doctor will instill in them a winning spirit, the same type of spirit that has made the Yankees famous.”

Tracy, described by The Sporting News as “a registered doctor of metaphysics, a hypnotist and a consulting psychologist,” said, “After I teach the players emotional stability, they will automatically climb higher in the league race. With my treatment, the club should finish fifth and maybe even climb to fourth.”

Regarding hypnosis, Tracy said he would teach the players to “talk themselves into a state of confidence.”

“I will teach the Browns players to talk to their arms, so they will feel more limber and strong, and to talk to their legs, so they will feel more speedy and supple,” Tracy said. “When I have a player under hypnosis, I will tell him the next time he feels nervous he should take two deep breaths, allow his shoulders to slump and he then will feel relaxed. I’ve noticed a certain tenseness among the Browns.”

In an interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Tracy said, “Don’t laugh about hypnotism. I’ll use it only in individual cases, but I’ll teach the players to hypnotize one another.”

The Browns hired Tracy to work for them until April 1, 1950, with the understanding an assessment would be made then on whether to continue. The agreement called for him to be paid more than $200 a week, The Sporting News reported, with the possibility of a bonus. The St. Louis Star-Times reported the Browns would pay Tracy $1,000 a month.

Join the club

Tracy accompanied the Browns to spring training in Burbank, Calif.

“Dr. Tracy will work with the boys during the hours they are not in uniform,” Browns manager Zack Taylor said.

Player meetings with Tracy were held at a hotel and attendance was voluntary.

“I don’t interfere with Dr. Tracy and he doesn’t interfere with me,” Taylor said. “Our players don’t have to go to him, but he already has helped some, I believe.”

Said Tracy: “I’ve been encouraged by the players’ interest and application.”

Browns players referred to Tracy as “The Eye,” the Star-Times reported, because of the way he peered at them during sessions.

When he wasn’t working with the players, Tracy was giving media interviews, making speaking engagements and, at every opportunity, urging people to buy tickets to Browns games.

Near the end of spring training, the DeWitts said Tracy would be retained indefinitely, “probably throughout the 1950 American League season.”

“We’re satisfied Dr. Tracy has been received favorably by most of our players and that he already has helped some of them,” Bill DeWitt Sr. said. “We’re fully aware of the publicity value that has resulted.

“If he can help us sell tickets as well as relax our kids and make them more confident, that’s what we want.”

Costly experiment

The Browns opened the 1950 season with wins in their first two games at Chicago against the White Sox.

Tracy “drew more newsmen and broadcasters to his corner of the bench before the season opener in Chicago than the entire Brownie team attracted,” The Sporting News reported.

Tracy “wasn’t a bit bashful about taking some of the credit for the fast getaway,” according to The Sporting News.

The good vibes faded quickly. Positive suggestion couldn’t overcome bad baseball, and the Browns lost 13 of 15.

On May 29, with their record at 8-23, the Browns informed Tracy his contract would be terminated May 31.

“This experiment was an expensive proposition,” said Charles DeWitt, “and it is our feeling we can’t continue to enjoy these luxuries unless we draw bigger crowds.”

The Browns were 3-5 in April and 5-20 in May, but Charles DeWitt noted, “The Browns feel Dr. Tracy has helped several of our players. He has taught them a lot about relaxation.”

DeWitt concluded, “This experiment has convinced us there is a definite place for a psychologist in sport.”

Pointing fingers

Tracy put the blame for his dismissal on Zack Taylor, claiming the Browns’ manager didn’t fully embrace his ideas.

“From the start, he displayed no interest in my work,” Tracy said. “He neither helped nor hindered me. Had he stepped in and gone along with me, I think I could have helped him win some games.

“When I joined the Browns, I had an idea I’d have the status of a coach, with authority to call the players together, possibly once a week for meetings,” Tracy said. “Also, I thought I’d be given the privilege of talking to certain players just before they took the field for a game, so I could cement in their minds the theories transmitted to them earlier, but the Browns didn’t approve of my plan.”

In a parting shot, Tracy added, “The Browns got a million dollars worth of publicity, but they failed to get the benefits of my work.”

Asked to analyze the Browns’ problems, Taylor, who had been in the big leagues since joining the Dodgers as a catcher in 1920, said, “This team has possibilities, but it’s awfully green. Every day, somebody makes a vital mistake and that generally costs us the game.”