Though he no longer was with the Cardinals, Mort Cooper prevented their elimination from the 1946 pennant race.
On Sept. 29, 1946, the Cardinals and Dodgers entered the final day of the season tied for first place in the National League.
The Cardinals lost to the Cubs at St. Louis that Sunday, but dodged elimination because Cooper, their former ace, pitched a four-hit shutout for the Braves and beat the Dodgers at Brooklyn.
The losses left the Cardinals and Dodgers tied for first place with 96-58 records, necessitating an unprecedented best-of-three playoff series to determine the league champion. The Cardinals prevailed and advanced to the World Series, beating the Red Sox for the title.
Big winner
A husky right-hander, Cooper got to the big leagues with the Cardinals in September 1938 and became a mainstay of their starting rotation. With his younger brother, Walker, doing the catching, Mort helped the Cardinals win three National League pennants and two World Series championships from 1942-44.
Mort earned the National League Most Valuable Player Award in 1942 when he was 22-7 with a 1.78 ERA. He followed that with a 21-8 record and 2.30 ERA in 1943 and 22-7 and 2.46 in 1944.
In 1945, Cooper got crossways with Cardinals owner Sam Breadon regarding salary. Breadon responded by trading Cooper to the Braves in May 1945.
After the season, manager Billy Southworth departed the Cardinals for a more lucrative offer from the Braves. Eddie Dyer replaced him and led the Cardinals through a season-long pennant fight with the Dodgers in 1946.
Tough task
On Sept. 26, 1946, Cooper pitched a three-hit shutout against the Giants, boosting his season record to 12-11. Boxscore
Three days later, on the morning of the season finale against the Dodgers, Southworth met Cooper for breakfast. According to the Boston Globe, Southworth asked Cooper, “How about pitching this last one?”
Though Cooper, 33, had just two days rest since beating the Giants, he replied, “Sure, I’ll pitch it _ and more than that. If the club will get me two runs, I’ll guarantee to win.”
According to the Associated Press, Cooper, well aware a Dodgers loss would enable the Cardinals to clinch the pennant if they beat the Cubs, sent a telegram to President Harry Truman, a fellow Missourian: “You try and pull the Cards in today. I will try to beat the Dodgers.”
Based on his season performance, Cooper’s task was formidable. He was 0-4 with a 6.48 ERA against the Dodgers in 1946. “We have taken him apart all year,” Dodgers manager Leo Durocher said to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.
Dyer told the Associated Press, “I didn’t see how Mort Cooper could beat the Dodgers with only two days of rest.”
Furthermore, the Dodgers chose as their starter Vic Lombardi, who was 3-0 with an 0.67 ERA versus the 1946 Braves.
Doing it all
A raucous crowd of 30,756 filled Ebbets Field nearly to capacity on an overcast afternoon.
“Money rode on each pitch, and the nervous tension, like the gray haze that hung over the field, could almost be cut with a knife,” Dick Young wrote in the New York Daily News.
Cooper took command with his pitching as well as his hitting. He singled and scored in the third, giving the Braves a 1-0 lead.
The Dodgers’ lone threat came in the eighth. With one out, Bruce Edwards reached on an error. After Cooper’s former Cardinals teammate, Joe Medwick, singled, moving Edwards into scoring position, “the reverberations from the stands were ear-splitting,” the Boston Globe reported,
Cooper, though, was “all icicles,” and retired the next two batters. In the ninth, the Braves scored three times against the Dodgers bullpen. Cooper contributed a RBI-single, then retired the Dodgers in order for the win. Boxscore
Cooper “pitched his most elegant nine innings of the entire season,” The Sporting News declared. “Mort applied himself with a determination and technical perfection.”
Durocher told the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, “We could have batted against Cooper until midnight and still wouldn’t have scored a run off him.”
As stunned Dodgers fans started what the Brooklyn Daily Eagle described as “a mournful procession” from the ballpark, the public address announcer invited them to stay, saying updates on the Cardinals’ game would be posted on the scoreboard.
“Many hundreds did, milling around the field and the stands,” the New York Daily News reported.
Just about then, the Cardinals collapsed.
Missed opportunity
On a crisp, sunny afternoon at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis, 34,124, the Cardinals’ biggest home crowd of the season, saw the Cubs erase a 2-1 deficit with a five-run sixth.
Eddie Waitkus started the Cubs’ rally with a double against starter Red Munger.
Complaining of a sore right elbow, Munger was lifted for Murry Dickson with two on and one out. The Cubs tied the score, 2-2, against Dickson and had the bases loaded, two outs, when starting pitcher Johnny Schmitz came to the plate.
Schmitz was “working with the discomfort of an infected left foot,” the New York Daily News reported. “He had the toe section of his shoe slashed to relieve pressure on the swelling.”
Schmitz smashed a Dickson delivery on the ground to the right of first baseman Stan Musial, who dived, gloved the ball and, while prone, made a wild toss to Dickson, who was racing Schmitz to the bag. The ball sailed high over Dickson’s head and, as the New York Daily News noted, “the Cubs ran around like rabbits with tails afire.”
Two runners scored on the play, putting the Cubs ahead, 4-2. After Harry Brecheen relieved Dickson, Stan Hack greeted him with a single, scoring two more for a 6-2 lead.
The Cardinals knew the Dodgers lost to the Braves, but they couldn’t rally against Schmitz, who pitched a complete game for the win. Boxscore
“We lost because we played bad ball,” Dyer said to the Associated Press. “Nobody can call it bad luck.”
Happy ending
Back in Brooklyn, the faithful who gathered around the Ebbets Field scoreboard “went into ecstasy” when the final from St. Louis was posted, the Boston Globe reported.
“Hearing how the Cubs went to work on the Cards was like getting a reprieve from the electric chair,” Durocher said to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.
According to the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Cardinals fans trudged out of Sportsman’s Park “wreathed in gloom.”
“They brought cowbells, horns, drums, tin pans and other jingle-jangle equipment to celebrate,” Sid Keener of the St. Louis Star-Times noted, but departed “without a single toot-toot.”
That night, President Truman sent a telegram reply to Mort Cooper: “Congratulations, Mort. You did a better job than I did.”
Two days later, on Oct. 1, the Cardinals beat the Dodgers, 4-2, in the opener of the playoff series at St. Louis. Howie Pollet pitched a complete game and Joe Garagiola contributed two RBI and three hits. Boxscore
The Cardinals clinched the pennant on Oct. 3 in Brooklyn with an 8-4 victory. Murry Dickson started and got the win. Boxscore
RetroSimba 
You could send a telegram to the president on a whim at the time. Mind-boggling. Ane he replied. My mind is officially blown.
Your Cards have won 16 in a row as of this post and I’m sensing a matchup with the Dodgers and perhaps Scherzer. Good times. Glad I don’t have a rooting investment in either team because those WC games are stressful as all hell.
Thanks, Gary. Many things to like about Harry Truman, including these two gems from Baseball Almanac: 1) Truman went to the ballpark more than any other U.S. president. He attended 16 games, all in Washington, as president; 2) He was the first U.S. president to throw a ceremonial pitch left-handed.
I’m just as excited about the resurgence of the Cardinals like everyone else. Still, though, the Pennant races of the past, when you had no choice but to finish in first place were very special. Just as a note of interest, Mort Cooper would never win another game against the Dodgers.
Thanks, Phillip. Very special indeed. The regular season was more meaningful when the team that finished with the best record in each league played in the World Series.