Pitching in relief just two days after making a start, Dizzy Dean got the win and a walkoff home run for the surging Cardinals.
Dean delivered four innings of hitless, scoreless relief and slugged a three-run homer in the bottom of the 10th inning, carrying the Cardinals to a 6-3 triumph over the Reds at St. Louis on Aug. 6, 1935.
The win was the Cardinals’ fifth in a row (they’d extend the streak to eight) during a torrid month when they swaggered into the thick of the National League pennant chase with Gashouse Gang bravado.
Rough and ready
The Depression Era Cardinals looked rough and played hard. In the book “Diz,” Dean biographer Robert Gregory described the Gashouse Gang during an August 1935 road trip: “With matching mud-caked shirts and socks, their pant legs stiffened by grime, they looked like sharecroppers after a day in the fields on their hands and knees.”
New York Sun columnist Frank Graham observed, “They don’t shave before a game and most of them chew tobacco. They have thick necks and knotty muscles, and they spit out of the sides of their mouths and then wipe the backs of their hands across their shirt fronts. They fight among themselves and use quaint and picturesque oaths. They are not afraid of anybody. They don’t make much money, and they work hard for it. They will risk arms, necks and legs _ their own or the other fellow’s _ to get it, but they also have a lot of fun playing baseball.”
Though the Cardinals had a good record (59-39), they were six games behind the front-running Giants (65-33) and two back of the Cubs (64-40) entering their Tuesday afternoon home match against the Reds. The game attracted 2,900 cash customers and 4,700 Knothole Gang youths admitted for free. “That’s a great big crowd for a weekday here,” the Cincinnati Enquirer noted.
With the score tied at 3-3 after six, Dean relieved, following starter Bill Walker (one inning, two runs) and Jesse Haines (five innings, one run).
Haines, 42, was hoping for his 200th career win that day, but the Cardinals failed to score after loading the bases with one out in the sixth, and Dean became the pitcher of record when he entered with the score knotted in the seventh. In his syndicated column, Dean, 25, said, “A few old-timers, what we calls veterans, is a good asset to any team. Look at Pop Haines, who is 42 and stopped the Reds dead yesterday. I hope I’m still pitching in the World Series when I am 42. That’ll give me 60,000 victories.”
Bloop and a blast
Dean, who went five innings in a start two days earlier against the Pirates, retired seven Reds in a row before issuing a walk to Jim Bottomley with one out in the ninth. Then he got Lew Riggs to ground into a double play.
After Dean retired the Reds in order in the 10th, Bill DeLancey was first up for the Cardinals in the bottom half of the inning. DeLancey’s long home run to center in the fourth had given St. Louis a 3-2 lead. This time, he lifted an ordinary fly to short right, but outfielder Ival Goodman couldn’t see the ball in the sun. Second baseman Alex Kampouris raced over to help “but the ball rolled off the ends of his fingers,” according to the Cincinnati Enquirer, and DeLancey was safe at second with a bloop double.
After Emmett Nelson, a rookie from South Dakota, gave an intentional walk to Charlie Gelbert, Leo Durocher executed a sacrifice bunt, moving the runners to second and third. Next up was Dean.
Dizzy swung at Nelson’s first pitch and socked it far up into the seats in left, giving the Cardinals a walkoff win. The Reds lost 10 of 11 games at St. Louis in 1935. “There is a hoodoo for our boys about this field,” the Enquirer noted. Boxscore
Since 1900, Dean and Ferdie Schupp are the only Cardinals pitchers to hit walkoff home runs, according to David Vincent of the Society for American Baseball Research. Schupp did it in the rarest of ways _ an inside-the-park home run _ on Aug. 28, 1919, against the Dodgers’ Leon Cadore for a 4-3 St. Louis victory. It would be Schupp’s only hit in 20 at-bats for the Cardinals that season. Boxscore
Who needs the DH?
Dean produced 21 RBI for the 1935 Cardinals. That rates as the single-season high for a Cardinals pitcher. He drove in those 21 runs on 30 hits. For the season, Dean went 30-for-128 (a .234 batting average), with two home runs and four doubles. During his Cardinals career, he had 74 RBI.
Bob Gibson produced 144 RBI as a Cardinal, including 20 in 1963. Gibson also had 19 RBI in both 1965 and 1970. Bob Forsch had 79 RBI as a Cardinal, with a season high of 12 in 1986.
The last good run producer among Cardinals pitchers was Adam Wainwright. He had 75 career RBI for St. Louis, including 18 in 2016.
The 1935 Cardinals went 22-7 in August and ended the month in first (77-46), a game ahead of the Giants (76-47). Dean was 6-1 in August.
Neither the Cardinals nor Giants, though, won the pennant. The Cubs, who went on a 21-game winning streak and were 23-3 for September, were National League champions at 100-54. The Cardinals (96-58) placed second.
RetroSimba 
Oh man, I miss pitcher’s batting. I used to love to watch the Cubs/Brewers game when Yovani Gallardo faced off against Carlos Zambrano – both excellent hitters.
Anyway, great research as always Mark. I stopped reading two times when reading this, in awe, first after reading the graphic descriptions of what it was like to be a ballplayer back then, the grit and not making much money, that toughness missing from today’s game.
And then when I came across the name Ival Gooodman. I’ve never heard that first name so I looked it up and it says for Ival – “of life and vital” which seems apt to describe players during the Depression and beyond.
I appreciate your comments, Steve.
Dizzy Dean had other big games as a hitter in 1935, too. He clouted a home run versus Ed Brandt of the Braves, had 3 hits, including 2 doubles and 3 RBI, in a game against the Cubs, and 3 hits, 2 RBI and 2 runs scored in a game at Brooklyn.
I’m glad you liked the descriptions of the Gashouse Gang Cardinals. I think people suffering through the Great Depression then could relate to a team like that.
Thanks much for the info on the meaning of the name Ival. A good man, indeed.
Makes me long for the days when pitchers took a turn at bat. What was more exciting than having your pitcher drive in the winning run?
Indeed. The Mets had their share, including Tom Seaver (17 hits, 10 walks, 10 RBI in 1970) and Dwight Gooden (21 hits, 5 walks, 9 RBI in 1985).
And no Met fan can ever forget 42-year-old Bartolo Colon’s 2016 homer in San Diego.
Oh, yes! Thanks for bringing up that miracle. Bartolo Colon was shaped like Babe Ruth but typically swung the bat like I would.
On May 7, 2016, at Petco Park in San Diego, Bartolo Colon drove a pitch from James Shields over the wall in left for a two-run home run. At 42 years and 11 months old, Colon became the oldest player to hit his first big-league homer. “The impossible has happened,” Mets broadcaster Gary Cohen told listeners in describing the clout.
Padres manager Andy Green said to the Associated Press, “Certain things leave you speechless.”
Colon told the Hackensack (NJ) Record, “I don’t even know how to explain it.”
According to the New York Daily News, Colon “took just about 2 minutes to trot around the bases.” https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/2016/B05070SDN2016.htm
Thanks Mark for another interesting and informative post. Dizzy Dean hit only 8 career homeruns but he knew when to hit them in clutch situations. Two in the 8th inning and two in extra innings. The people running MLB keep depriving the game of more and more strategy and chess move managing with all the new rules. The sudden death homerun derby at the All Star Game could be the next stupid innovation. Dizzy talked about winning 60,000. That’s a big exaggeration. But I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that he would have won 300 if not for the freak injury.
Good stuff, Phillip.
You are correct about Dizzy Dean having eight career big-league home runs. He liked to say the total was nine because of the time he “bunted for a home run” and scored the winning run against the Giants.
On May 8, 1932, at St. Louis, Dean drove in two runs with a second-inning double. In the fourth, he batted with Charlie Gelbert on first and none out. According to Dean biographer Robert Gregory in the book “Diz,” here’s what happened next:
“The Giants’ infield expected a bunt and third baseman Johnny Vergez charged in with the pitch. Diz half-swung and punched the ball over his head. When Len Koenecke loafed after it in shallow left, Dean flew into second and didn’t slow down when Koenecke’s return wild throw rolled all the way to the grandstand. Gelbert scored and Dizzy loped in behind” with the sixth run of a 6-5 Cardinals’ victory.
Dean was credited with a double, but, from then on, the Dean family referred to it as the time “Diz bunted a home run.” https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1932/B05082SLN1932.htm