Latest / Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History / 1952 • Baseball Clip • Leo Durocher and Casey Stengel - Radio Interview

Transcript

1952 • Baseball Clip • Leo Durocher and Casey Stengel - Radio Interview · Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History

• 0:00
  This is Retro Sports Radio. Visit RetroSeasons.com for more sports history.
• 0:11
  From Day to DeRosier to Stengel, it's double play with DeRosier and Day.
• 0:17
  With our guest Casey Stengel, here's another chapter of double play with DeRosier and Day.
• 0:22
  Welcome to another visit with baseball's most exciting and controversial couple, Lorraine Day and Leo DeRosier.
• 0:34
  With our guest for today, Casey Stengel.
• 0:37
  Fans, we have a very touchy subject to settle here today.
• 0:41
  The rumor that Leo talks too much, made by some irresponsible people, whom we suspect to be Dodger fans, has reached Leo's sensitive ears.
• 0:50
  This hurts Leo's feelings.
• 0:53
  Now he wants to bring this issue out in the open with his guest for today, Casey Stengel, another quiet, soft-spoken, well-mannered baseball figure.
• 1:04
  Casey, do I talk too much?
• 1:06
  Well, Leo, to tell you the truth, you talk too much and you've got the loudest voice of anybody that I ever heard that was managing on a ball field.
• 1:13
  Well, maybe Leo shouldn't have mentioned the subject at all, but here's a subject well worth mentioning.
• 1:25
  And now back to double play with Leo DeRosier and Lorraine Day and their guest for today, Casey Stengel.
• 1:33
  Let me ask you a question, Case. You've won three American League pennants. You've won three World Championships.
• 1:39
  How about me next year? You going to give me a chance?
• 1:41
  Well, to tell you the truth, Leo, I should say that we'll give you a great chance. It's a big city, you know.
• 1:48
  You must have a chance when your club can win two games in a World Championship.
• 1:53
  In other words, that's outstanding because what other club in the other two World Series win two games?
• 1:59
  Why, Casey Stengel, how could you say a thing like that?
• 2:03
  What other clubs? Oh, I won two games, you figure I'm lucky.
• 2:05
  Well, no, I said that maybe the dark, you know how the days were there in the fall and then we had a rainy day. Maybe the rainy day helped me.
• 2:15
  You were lucky with that rainy day.
• 2:17
  Well, maybe so. Maybe Leo knows something about it.
• 2:21
  Let me tell you something. I got one thing on my mind. I've had it ever since the series. I'd like to see Mantle in right field instead of Fowler. That's all I know.
• 2:29
  How do you know what I'd do if I had Mantle still out there? You know, Mantle broke records too for distance and Fowler only hit his ball 410 feet, you know, that day.
• 2:40
  But Mantle hits him 460. Maybe he'd have hit one 460. You guess so.
• 2:44
  Maybe he'd have hit a grand slam home run against us and that ball hit by Yvar's with this menacing even if it hadn't been coming.
• 2:51
  What do you mean? Are you on Stengel's side or are you on my side?
• 2:53
  Well, I'm on the sofa with Stengel, okay?
• 2:55
  You're on the sofa. Let me ask you one thing.
• 2:56
  I need a little help here. I'll tell you.
• 2:59
  That Rizzuto with shortstop, of course, he covered the infield like a tenth. Of course, you'd get along without him too. You didn't need him.
• 3:04
  Well, I'll tell you, Leo, you know how you used to play shortstop. You used to go and catch the ball and throw the ball.
• 3:11
  And you know, that's the way Rizzuto is. And after that little man that you have playing second base.
• 3:18
  Who are you talking about? Stanky?
• 3:20
  That's all. Let me second.
• 3:21
  He just tagged the man, I mean just gently, and he happened to slide in and the ball was there. It was an accident, Casey.
• 3:27
  Well, to tell you the truth, I thought he broke his rip and then it flew back in place and that's why the rain helped us on Sunday.
• 3:34
  Now, you say it didn't help us. That's why it helped the young boy to come back and be a great shot.
• 3:38
  And how about that fellow you had pitching for you, that left-hander who throws up that soft curve and the screwball and once in a while accidentally he may let you hit a fast one.
• 3:47
  Leo, didn't somebody say that you could put all pitchers against him and win?
• 3:52
  Well, I just made the remark. I'd rather put nine pitchers in. I think we'd have a better. Lopat, that's his name, Lopat. Two five-hitters beat us both games.
• 4:01
  Well, I'll tell you about Lopat. He's such a small boy. He started, you know, as a first baseman and he found out the easiest thing to do is to go in there and pitch and use four curves.
• 4:11
  He's got one that way, one this way and then he gives you that and then he stands and makes you guess who you're coming.
• 4:18
  He says, oh, you're a New York giant. You're a New York giant. And that's what I say. He wasn't used to his rhythm.
• 4:23
  Rhythm? I don't know. He had my club crazy. Everybody trying to pull him in at a home run and then we're bouncing him back to him in a short stop in the third baseman. Out, out. He's a great guy. Why don't you keep him on first base?
• 4:34
  Well, I'll tell you, you could have kept Koslow out of there for a long time too, Leo.
• 4:37
  Well, he's pretty good. I'll say that. But I think the best team won in the World Series, Casey. You had a great ball, a glove and you played great. And we did the best we could. Just wasn't good enough. That's all.
• 4:49
  All right. Now that you're through handing out the bouquets and you have collected them, would you answer a question that I want to know about?
• 4:55
  Because I was in New York. The team was on the road and naturally I wasn't helping Leo manage that day. He was on his own.
• 5:00
  But anyway, I was watching a game and it was raining and you were playing the White Sox. And if there wasn't the biggest rhubarb, because it seems to me that you, Mr. Casey Stengel, were stalling. At least that's what it said in the paper. Now I want to know all about this.
• 5:16
  Well, you have a little argument there. Mr. Richards was playing very good with his ball club as he was the outstanding manager the first two months of the season with the White Sox. And naturally when you have a club playing good, you have everybody pulling for that ball club.
• 5:34
  So they came into the Yankee Stadium after a successful trip east and unfortunately the weather got cloudy and the rain started down and they started to make a few runs.
• 5:47
  They were ahead at this time, weren't they?
• 5:49
  Oh yes, they got ahead often there and it looked like they might win the game. But I'll tell you, because of my age, I had to go out and take the pitcher out. You know how old I am. I'm around 60.
• 6:01
  How long it takes you to get to that mound.
• 6:04
  And when it's rainy weather, I get sort of rheumatism and I just go.
• 6:09
  Even longer.
• 6:11
  That's it. Slowly out to the mound and I made four or five switches of the pitcher and of course Mr. Richards switched four or five hitters. And then I would have to say that the man above had the rain come.
• 6:24
  And of course I wanted to finish the game. You know how I feel.
• 6:28
  Oh yes, you could hardly win. We had to sit in the clubhouse and take the game. So that's my story.
• 6:35
  Double play takes time out now for this message.
• 6:42
  And now back to double play with DeRosha and Day.
• 6:45
  Don't you think, honestly and aside of all this, that maybe the rules should be changed? I read so much about that that they should not allow a game to be called and have to forfeit the game because of rain.
• 6:55
  That it should be postponed to the next day or the next time the club meets. What do you two managers think about that? Would you like?
• 7:02
  I know to answer Casey, I know that in 1941 when we won the pennant and I was managing the Brooklyn baseball club, we were playing in Cincinnati and Larry Goetz was behind the plate and the score was nothing to nothing in the 16th inning.
• 7:18
  And we scored five runs in our half of the 16th inning and it was pitch dark and in those days they weren't allowed to turn the lights on.
• 7:26
  And McKechnie started to stall and I know that in the last half of the 16th inning I couldn't see my out-feelers.
• 7:32
  And I put Hugh Casey in the pitch to finish up the 16th inning and he walked three men in a row.
• 7:38
  And I went all jittery and jumpy and nervous and I run out there and I said, come on Hugh take your time, get the ball over there.
• 7:43
  And Larry Goetz said to me, we're going to finish this game if we have to put lights on our caps.
• 7:50
  He said they stall and we're going to finish it if we play it till midnight. And we did finish it and we beat them 5 to 1.
• 7:56
  Well all right, now that rule has been changed. Now they can turn on the lights.
• 8:00
  You can't stall the game because of darkness. Well don't you think that the same rule should apply to rain?
• 8:04
  Well it could but that's an act of God when you have a rain come down like that and it's something that the ball clubs or ball players have nothing to do with.
• 8:11
  Well darkness is an act of God too. I mean but still you postpone the game and play it off another time.
• 8:18
  No you turn the lights on now, we change the rule.
• 8:21
  That's right, well so why can't you change the rule here? Why suddenly does that happen?
• 8:24
  Well I don't think they will because then you take all the fun out of the game.
• 8:27
  I remember a few years ago, Frankie Frisch, when he was managing the Pittsburgh club, he built a fire on the bench because it got so dark.
• 8:34
  He built a bonfire, naturally they threw him right out of the ballpark.
• 8:36
  Another time during a rain like Casey had against Richard at the stadium, he took his shoes and stockings off and rolled up his pants and borrowed an umbrella and went out to coach with an umbrella.
• 8:48
  Naturally he got thrown out of the park.
• 8:50
  Haven't you ever been thrown out for any of those high jinks? I hear that you're quite a character on the ball diamond with those things.
• 8:55
  Well I had to change my ways. It seemed that I was catching up with the umpires before they could catch up with me and finally the umpires went past me so many times that with me out being on the ball field that really and truly I used to be the best spectator on my club and I was managing it.
• 9:15
  I never got to sit on the bench often. I generally sit in the grandstand and they decided that they'd prefer me to run the club from the bench so I'm a changed man.
• 9:25
  Now you have dignity.
• 9:27
  I'll tell you another thing Casey, you must have had a really good scouting report on my ball club in the World Series because I don't know how you pitched so well against us.
• 9:35
  What about that Dodger report? I've asked you a million times how come that Dodger report on the Yankees was so good? How come we didn't beat them?
• 9:45
  Very good. Thank you very much.
• 9:47
  Just a minute. There was nothing wrong with the report. Andy High gave us a great report. It was thorough and we read it and frontwards and backwards.
• 9:55
  You didn't believe it? Well we believed it but we just couldn't get the ball in the right place and after all as Casey tells you, you know, he has it on his neck tie here Yankees and it was one of those things and maybe we got the ball low and it should have been high.
• 10:08
  But I don't know what it was. They just defeated us but we did have a good report on it. I know Casey. He must have had a better one on our club.
• 10:15
  Tell me Casey, did your scouts scout our club or did they scout the Dodgers?
• 10:18
  Well to be honest with you Lorraine, we scouted the Dodgers because they had such a good lead we didn't look for the New York Giants to win the pin.
• 10:28
  I know I saw in the program, you know in the World Series program it said Yogi Berra, this is his third time playing against the Dodgers in the World Series and here we were in it.
• 10:38
  Did I hear you right? You scouted the Dodgers and not the Giants?
• 10:42
  That's true.
• 10:43
  What happened? I mean you didn't think we had a chance?
• 10:45
  Well of course the last week we started to fall on your club Leo.
• 10:50
  Naturally we figured that you had gone a long way for two months in the quarter and we thought you were going to blow the kite but you didn't.
• 10:56
  And after you made your last appearance and win then we really got serious. We had to wait three days in the playoff and then get down to business.
• 11:05
  Well now let me tell you something Casey, we snuck in there a little bit didn't we? We sort of fooled you.
• 11:10
  Hey fellas.
• 11:11
  Well yes.
• 11:12
  I know it's one of those things Casey but just because Magley didn't win.
• 11:17
  Well now.
• 11:18
  You didn't think that he.
• 11:19
  Fellas listen.
• 11:20
  How about Reynolds?
• 11:21
  Oh what Reynolds?
• 11:22
  I'll never be able to break this up. This is the way they keep on training for those umpires.
• 11:26
  Anyway it's time for us to say goodbye now and don't forget to continue writing to me. Tell me about the questions you'd like me to ask.
• 11:33
  That is if anyone on this hot stove league session will listen for a couple of minutes. So long, see you next week, same time, same station.