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171: Preacher Roe - MLB · Sports History Network

• 0:47
  This podcast is part of the Sports History Network, your headquarters for the yesteryear of your favorite sport.
• 0:52
  You can learn more@sportshistorynetwork.com Imagine for a moment.
• 0:58
  You win 127 games in the major leagues, lead the National League in winning percentage by going 22.
• 1:05
  3.
• 1:06
  In 1951, you helped pitch the Brooklyn Dodgers to three National League pennants.
• 1:13
  And along the way, you become one of the most colorful and entertaining characters in baseball history.
• 1:20
  Yet when baseball fans talk about the great pitchers of the 1950s, names like Robin Roberts, Warren Spahn, Whitey Ford and early Win usually come up first.
• 1:33
  But what about Preacher Row?
• 1:35
  The Arkansas native overcame injuries, setbacks, personal struggles and even a fractured skull to become one of the most successful pitchers of his era.
• 1:48
  Next on Sports Forgotten Heroes, we are going to dive into the remarkable life and career of one of baseball's most overlooked stars, Preacher Rowe.
• 1:59
  This is Sports Forgotten Heroes, a tribute to the stars who shape the games we love to watch and the games we love to play.
• 2:07
  Stars who provided us with many thrills, but when their time was up, they faded away.
• 2:12
  We'll take a look back at their spectacular careers, their moments of fame, even if it was just for one season or just one game.
• 2:19
  And now, here's your host, Warren Rogan.
• 2:22
  Hello and welcome to Sports Forgotten Heroes,.
• 2:25
  Episode 171 Preacher Row.
• 2:30
  Now, when baseball fans think about the great Brooklyn Dodger teams of the 1940s and early 1950s, they usually think of Jack Mackey Robinson and Roy Campanella, Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snyder and Gil Hodges, among others.
• 2:45
  But those teams also had a crafty left handed pitcher who quietly became one of the National League's most effective starters.
• 2:54
  Preacher Rowe.
• 2:55
  He learned the game from his father, battled through injuries, struggled early in his career, but found success with the Pittsburgh Pirates and ultimately became a star with the Dodgers.
• 3:08
  In 1951, Rowe won 22 games and helped lead Brooklyn into three World Series against the New York Yankees.
• 3:18
  For his career, Rowe won 127 games, was an all star, and became known for his intelligence, competitiveness and colorful personality.
• 3:29
  And there's so much more to the story.
• 3:31
  And while we will talk a ton about his career, my guest today, David Jerome, who authored the new book the Life of a Professional Baseball Great from the Ozarks, Preacher Rowe.
• 3:43
  Jerome will also share with us how he got the nickname Preacher, his journey through professional baseball, his years with the Cardinals, Pirates and Dodgers, the devastating head injury that nearly changed the course of his life, his work as
• 3:59
  a teacher, and why he deserves far more recognition than he receives today.
• 4:06
  Before we get there, though, a few reminders.
• 4:08
  Please follow Sports Forgotten Heroes on X@SportsFheroes.
• 4:12
  Look for the Sports Forgotten Heroes page on Facebook.
• 4:15
  And hey, you can watch Sports forgotten heroes on YouTube as well.
• 4:20
  Just look for the Sports Forgotten Heroes channel.
• 4:25
  Also, if you can, please subscribe to Sports Forgotten Heroes, give it a like a five star rating and if possible, a nice review as well.
• 4:35
  And as always, I thank you for your support.
• 4:39
  And my book, College All Stars vs NFL Champions is now available on Amazon and McFarlandBooks.com if you are a football fan, I really think you're going to enjoy this look back at one of the most unique sporting events
• 4:58
  in history, the College Football All Star Game, where a team of college Football All Stars played against the defending NFL champions every summer from 1934 through 1976.
• 5:15
  Again, you can get a copy of the book on Amazon or@mcfarlandbooks.com that's mcfarlaned books.com mcfarlandbooks.com and if you'd like a signed copy, please reach out to me at sportsfh.infomail.com, that's sportsfh.infomail dot com and I'll help you make those
• 5:43
  arrangements.
• 5:44
  Okay, let's get into today's show about Future Row and my guest, David Jerome.
• 5:50
  And back now on Sports Forgotten Heroes, David Jerome.
• 5:55
  David, thanks for joining again.
• 5:57
  I had a great time with you last time as we spoke about Bill Verdon, but this time a fun name, Preacher Rowe.
• 6:07
  Hey, how are you?
• 6:08
  And yeah, let's talk about Preacher Warren.
• 6:12
  I'm doing great and I just really appreciate you having me on again to talk about Preacher Row.
• 6:18
  I've been looking forward to this.
• 6:20
  Yeah, you wrote a terrific book, Preacher Row, very detailed.
• 6:26
  You go through a lot of games his entire career before he was a player.
• 6:32
  Afterwards, I mean, really, really a fun book to read.
• 6:37
  Like I said, really detailed and a lot of interesting, interesting topics you cover.
• 6:44
  So kudos to you.
• 6:46
  Well, I appreciate it.
• 6:47
  The reason I went into a lot of detail is I never met Preacher Rowe.
• 6:52
  I got to meet his son Elwin and I got to meet his son Tommy, who lives in West Plains where Preacher retired to moved to in the 51 season.
• 7:03
  But I wanted the reader to become familiar with Preacher Rowe and I wanted them to be able to picture him on the mound with the Brooklyn Dodgers especially, but also with the Pirates and not so much the Cardinals,
• 7:17
  but certainly the Pirates and the and the Dodgers.
• 7:19
  And I just wanted to Be able to put people in that frame of mine.
• 7:24
  To get to know Preacher, I had to cut 40,000 words out of this book.
• 7:29
  So I mentioned to someone yesterday that's like doing surgery on yourself when you cut that many words.
• 7:36
  But I just, I wanted people to read this book and I felt like if it was much longer that it would be a turn off for a lot of people.
• 7:46
  Yeah, 40,000 words.
• 7:48
  For some people, that's an entire book.
• 7:52
  It can be at least a short novel or whatever.
• 7:55
  Yeah, yeah, no doubt.
• 7:56
  Well, for listeners who may not know a lot about Preacher Row, who was Elwyn Preacher Rowan?
• 8:07
  Why do you believe that his story deserves such recognition today?
• 8:13
  Well, Preacher was born in Ash flat, Arkansas, on February 26, 1916.
• 8:20
  And I'm going to talk about the year a little bit more a little bit later.
• 8:26
  He was the son of a doctor, and about six months after he was born, they moved over to this little community called Wild Cherry, just to, you know, that's all out northeast of Little Rock, Arkansas, the state capital.
• 8:41
  And he was there until about 1923 and.
• 8:47
  And so he would have been about seven years old when they moved up to Biola.
• 8:51
  And that's where Preacher would graduate from high school in 1935.
• 8:56
  But the entire team were big baseball fanatics.
• 9:00
  His dad was a major, was a semi pro baseball pitcher.
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  He could have gone pro, but he chose to become a medical doctor.
• 9:09
  But they had their own team made up of the family, the boys, all the boys.
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  He had several brothers and his sister had a husband.
• 9:19
  And he became the ninth player on the team.
• 9:22
  And they would actually go around and play other town teams and did very well against him.
• 9:28
  And most notably, Doc Rowe was the pitcher.
• 9:32
  Preacher played the outfield until he's about 16 years old because Doc did want him to hurt his arm as a pitcher at a younger age.
• 9:40
  So he started pitching when he's about 16.
• 9:44
  And then he got recognized and went to Harding College down in Searcy.
• 9:49
  Arkansas.
• 9:50
  Was a phenomenal standout in not only baseball, but basketball as well.
• 9:57
  He had a really good college career.
• 9:59
  Put Arkansas or Harding College on the map with regard to baseball during the two years that he was there.
• 10:07
  Just to give you an idea how phenomenal he was as a pitcher at Harding.
• 10:12
  Harding.
• 10:13
  He struck on April 26, 1937, after he had been there for a year.
• 10:20
  He struck out 26 hitters in 13 innings in a game, but the game was still tied at 4, 4.
• 10:29
  But it got dark and they couldn't play anymore, so they had to suspend play.
• 10:34
  And then they met again on May 13th and Preacher struck out 15 more hitters that game.
• 10:43
  But.
• 10:43
  But Harding College lost 8 to 6 because Harding College baseball team committed about 12 errors which made the difference in the game.
• 10:53
  But Preacher caught the attention of a lot of major league baseball scouts in that game and in other games.
• 11:02
  But in 1938, I would say is when Branch Rickey, the general manager of the St.
• 11:08
  Louis Cardinals really started noticing him.
• 11:11
  He was invited to play in a tournament up in Kansas City.
• 11:17
  And so he went up there.
• 11:18
  A barber from Viola, Arkansas basically said, there's this guy down in my hometown that you're not going to believe.
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  And so they paid for him to go up there, brought his catcher with him and he won all three games.
• 11:32
  And that really caught the attention, like I said, of Branch Rickey.
• 11:36
  And so that was 1938 and early 1938.
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  And so he sends, Branch, sends his brother Frank down to Viola to spend time with Preacher just to see how good he was.
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  And Frank basically told Branch that he's the real deal.
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  And Branch told him to sign him.
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  He said, don't come back up here without signing him.
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  And so he did.
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  In July of 1938, he signed him, gave him a five thousand dollar signing bonus in 1938.
• 12:10
  That was a lot of money.
• 12:12
  Yeah, in 1938 he was able to buy.
• 12:15
  Him and Mazi, his wife were going to get married in September of 1938.
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  And so he bought a brand new Chevy for $750.
• 12:27
  He bought the Harding College basketball team brand new uniforms even though they were the wrong school colors.
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  And he was able to use most of the rest of the money to build a house for him and Mazzy when they got married.
• 12:43
  And so that's how he got into Major League Baseball.
• 12:48
  The only game he pitched for the Cardinals was on August 22, 1938 when the Cincinnati Reds came to St.
• 12:57
  Louis.
• 12:58
  The Cardinals were losing pretty bad and Frankie Frisch was the manager of the Cardinals at that time.
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  So he decided to put Preacher in the game just to see how he would do.
• 13:10
  And so he did.
• 13:12
  But the problem was just before that, Lon Wernicke, the Arkansas Hummingbird, had also a pitcher from Arkansas, kind of took Preacher under his wing, so to speak.
• 13:24
  He basically told Preacher, anybody from Arkansas has to chew tobacco.
• 13:29
  I mean, that's just a given.
• 13:31
  So he taught Preacher how to chew tobacco during that game.
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  Of course, most people, when they chew tobacco for the first time, get a little light headed and sick.
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  Well, that's what Preacher happened To Preacher.
• 13:43
  Well, that was the same time that Franken Frisch had Rogue get in there.
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  And so he goes in there and pitches two and about two thirds innings.
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  Just stinks up the place.
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  He comes, leaves the game with about a 13.5 ERA.
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  And so that was all he did for the big birds in St.
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  Louis.
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  And then they sent him down to the farm system for the next five years.
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  And he had an agreement with Branch Rickey that he got that he would be able to go back to Arkansas by September 1st of 38.
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  He got married to Mozzie on the 7th, and they both went back to Searcy to attend the fall semester of Harding College.
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  But then he would go to Rochester for a couple years and then Columbus, the AAA affiliate for the Cardinals, for three years.
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  That's kind of Cardinal history.
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  Before we move on.
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  That was a lot.
• 14:38
  Wow.
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  Thank you.
• 14:40
  We have to.
• 14:42
  We do need to establish the nickname Preacher, one of the most recognizable nicknames in baseball.
• 14:51
  I think he's one of three ballplayers who actually had the name Preacher.
• 14:58
  How did he get the nickname Preacher, and how did it mimic or reflect or match his personality?
• 15:10
  Well, that's a very good question.
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  When the family lived in Wild cherry in about 1919, when Preacher would have been about three years old, his Uncle Bathus, which was Doc Rose brother, had returned from the Great War, which of course would be later known
• 15:28
  as World War I.
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  And while in Wild Cherry, Preacher became rather enamored with a local Methodist minister and his wife.
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  And so he kind of idolized that, that pastor.
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  And so when.
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  When Uncle Bathurst came back, he offered.
• 15:44
  He asked him, so what's your name?
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  And pre.
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  And Preacher say anything.
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  And he said, I'll give you a nickel if you tell me what your name is.
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  Well, a nickel could buy some stick candy at the local store.
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  So he was going to jump all over that.
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  And he said, my name is Preacher.
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  And.
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  And that name stuck with him the rest of his life.
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  And then when he moved to viola in.
• 16:07
  In 2023, like I said, when he was about 7, he went through the school system there, and virtually all of his classmates through high school thought his name was Preacher Row.
• 16:18
  They didn't know it was what it was, Elwood, but one person did, and that was Mozzie, who would later become his wife.
• 16:29
  She was about two and a half years younger than Preacher in March of 1930.
• 16:36
  Back then, we didn't have annual yearbooks with our pictures in them and things like that back then.
• 16:41
  They had pieces of paper kind of laced together with a leather string.
• 16:46
  And every page was blank.
• 16:47
  And your schoolmates could sign, you know, write something on a page and then sign it, give it to you.
• 16:53
  Well, that's what Mazi did in March of 1930, keeping in mind he just turned 14 years old and she was 11 and a half.
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  She is the only one that really knew or seemingly knew his real first name.
• 17:07
  So she addresses this.
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  Dear Elwyn, the roads are wide and I can't help it.
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  I love you and I can't help it.
• 17:15
  Your friend Ma Zee Clay.
• 17:18
  And I just thought that was so touching because they were together, they were friends, and then they became husband and wife for almost 63 years.
• 17:28
  Wow.
• 17:29
  Wow.
• 17:30
  That's how he got the name.
• 17:32
  And I was talking to a local sportscaster here, Ned Reynolds, who grew up in the Philadelphia area, and he would go watch the Philadelphia Phillies play the Brooklyn Dodgers.
• 17:44
  And he asked, his dad said, how, how did he get the name Preacher?
• 17:47
  And his dad said, well, I think they gave it to him in the locker room.
• 17:51
  But, but Ned now knows a lot better than that.
• 17:55
  Let's go back to the Cardinals.
• 17:57
  You know, during that period, I believe the Cardinals, they signed a lot of talented players during that era, as far as a prospect is concerned.
• 18:11
  And you talked about what he did in college, but as far as a prospect is concerned, what separated Rowe from other pitching prospects in the Cardinals organization?
• 18:27
  What made him stand out versus the others?
• 18:31
  Well, like I said, Warren, he didn't.
• 18:33
  He only had that one game in a Cardinals uniform in St.
• 18:37
  Louis and that was it.
• 18:38
  But, but, but as a prospect though, what, what, what did they see?
• 18:45
  Well, his stamina, his control.
• 18:47
  He had, he had an absolute wonderful control of his pitching at that point.
• 18:54
  And I can talk about a little bit later, what changed.
• 18:56
  But at that point he was a fastball hurler.
• 18:59
  I mean, there was no question his fastball was hard to catch up with if you were at the batter's box.
• 19:08
  But he had good control with a curveball and other junk type pitches that people just could not handle at the college level.
• 19:18
  And so I think that that's what made him stand out.
• 19:22
  And he just won about every game he ever entered in college and in and in town teams and his dad was his mentor.
• 19:31
  There's no question that Doc Rowe helped him become the pitcher that he became, there's no question about that.
• 19:39
  But his just his absolute performance, his win loss record, his ERA in college, which I don't have at my fingertips, but just made him stand out.
• 19:49
  And I don't know how that compared to other Cardinal pitchers at the time that they would have recruited.
• 19:55
  But Preacher was an exceptional hurler for his time.
• 20:01
  You know, David, when we think back to that era of baseball, one of the pictures that many of us had is that many ballplayers were a lot more gruff during that time.
• 20:19
  Tougher.
• 20:21
  They really didn't take crap from anybody.
• 20:25
  No, they didn't.
• 20:27
  Yeah, you know, it was, it was a different time, it was a different game.
• 20:31
  And where I'm going with this is Frankie Frisch, he gave row one shot to make it basically as, as you said.
• 20:43
  And Ro was young and naive and took the char and, you know, got sick from it and didn't pitch too well.
• 20:53
  What kind of person, if you can, was Frankie Frisch?
• 20:58
  And how fair or unfair was it that Roe only got really that one opportunity with St.
• 21:05
  Louis?
• 21:06
  Well, I think that's a good question.
• 21:08
  I'm not sure my research went there.
• 21:09
  But I can tell you that I think Frankie Frisch was a very fair manager.
• 21:14
  The reason I say that is because later on Frankie Frisch would become the manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates.
• 21:21
  And he started noticing Preacher Rowe again when he was in Columbus pitching for the Columbus Triple A affiliate of the Cardinals.
• 21:32
  And he said, I need him in Pittsburgh.
• 21:35
  And so by the end of his fifth year in the farm system, and I can't answer for why, Frank, Frankie Frisch jettisoned him just after one game and never gave him another chance.
• 21:46
  I don't know the answer to that question, but I do know that after five seasons in the farms in the Cardinal farm system, the Cardinals had to either trade him or bring him up to the big team, big
• 22:00
  leagues and use it.
• 22:03
  That was a Major League baseball rule.
• 22:05
  Back then, as far as I know.
• 22:07
  That's correct.
• 22:08
  They had to either use him or lose him.
• 22:10
  And so Frankie Frisch, like I said, was now with the Pirates and he wanted him.
• 22:17
  And so that's what got him over to the Pirates.
• 22:20
  And Frankie Frisch was his manager there.
• 22:23
  And Preacher did a phenomenal job as a Pittsburgh Pirate pitcher until early 46.
• 22:30
  And he was a 45 all star.
• 22:34
  Of course, they didn't have an All Star game that year because of transportation constraints with World War II.
• 22:41
  But I always give him credit for being a five time All Star anyway, even though he didn't play that year.
• 22:47
  Nobody played that year.
• 22:49
  But I think Frankie Frisch was a very good manager, a Major League baseball manager.
• 22:54
  And for some reason in St.
• 22:57
  Louis, Preacher Road just fell victim to the fact that that One game seemed to doom him in St.
• 23:06
  Louis, and I don't know how else to explain that.
• 23:10
  Well, he ends up on the Pirates.
• 23:14
  How did going to Pittsburgh change the trajectory of his career?
• 23:22
  Well, I think with the experience that he gained in the Cardinal farm system, I mean, he, he really set a high standard for pitchers in Double A and triple or Triple A, especially in Columbus.
• 23:38
  And I think it seasoned him with other professional ballplayers.
• 23:43
  And he, in fact, became a major league baseball pitcher in the farm system, and he was of that high quality.
• 23:51
  And so by the time he goes and joins Frankie Frisch in Pittsburgh, I think that he has become seasoned and pretty much a veteran pitcher at that point.
• 24:02
  And he was able to hold his own on the, on the mound in Major League Baseball from that point on.
• 24:09
  Like I said earlier, in 46 and 47 are really the only two exceptions in his career where he had some bad time on the mound.
• 24:20
  It took him a long time to get to Pittsburgh.
• 24:22
  I mean, he pitched for the Cardinals that one game in 1938, and it wasn't until 1944 that he made his way to the Pirates.
• 24:34
  And, you know, his, his first couple of years, they, they weren't the worst.
• 24:38
  I mean, I'm looking at, at his records here.
• 24:41
  13 and 11, 14 and 13.
• 24:44
  And then, I don't know, did he fall on bad luck?
• 24:49
  You know, what, what was it that.
• 24:53
  That prevented him?
• 24:56
  Yeah, he was a.500 pitcher.
• 24:58
  Really, with, with the Pirates.
• 25:00
  Was it that the Pirates just weren't a good ball team?
• 25:04
  Was he still learning his craft?
• 25:06
  What was it that, that prevented him with Pittsburgh from becoming the pitcher he was with the Dodgers?
• 25:19
  Because when he went to Brooklyn, he was certainly, you know, a much more effective pick, a much more effective pitcher.
• 25:32
  Well, he, he had a.
• 25:34
  From a statistical standpoint, he had, he had pretty good stats with the Pirates.
• 25:38
  You know, for instance, in 45, when he was on the All Star team or voted to be an All Star, he led the entire league in strikeouts with 45.
• 25:48
  Excuse me, in 45 with 148 strikeouts.
• 25:52
  And so it's probably a combination of several things, Warren.
• 25:56
  I mean, I'm sure the, the offensive side of the, of the game for the Pirates could have been better to support a pitcher like Preacher Rowe.
• 26:04
  I don't think Preacher would ever accuse the other half of the equation of letting him down or anything else like that.
• 26:12
  That's just not who he was.
• 26:14
  He would always take responsibility for losses or anything else regarding his performance or the team's performance.
• 26:22
  So he was a leader.
• 26:24
  He was a true leader on that team and in every team he was on.
• 26:28
  But I would say probably the Pirates had a long dry spell between World series from the 1920s until they won again in 1960.
• 26:37
  So the Pirates had a long dry spell as a club.
• 26:40
  And I think that probably affected or included the time that Preacher was with the pirates in the 1940s.
• 26:48
  They just.
• 26:49
  They were trying to get it together and become more competitive, and they hadn't got there yet by the time Preacher was there.
• 26:55
  Well, let's discuss.
• 26:56
  One of the craziest stories that you talk about in the book, and I think it occurred during the Pittsburgh years, is when Preacher was struck by an official during a high school basketball game.
• 27:17
  And the craziest part about it is he suffered a fractured skull.
• 27:25
  What happened?
• 27:27
  Well, Preacher, during the off season, taught school, he taught math, and then he also coached basketball.
• 27:35
  This happened to be the event you're talking about.
• 27:39
  Happened to be a girls basketball tournament in Evening shade, Arkansas, on February 9, 1946.
• 27:48
  This was for a championship at a tournament.
• 27:50
  This was the championship game.
• 27:52
  Well, Preacher, like most coaches, you know, he squats along the sideline and he coaches the team.
• 27:57
  And he may take exception to maybe some of the calls that made by the ref.
• 28:02
  Well, the ref knew each other, and I guess the ref had had enough.
• 28:08
  And he comes over and tells Preacher to shut up.
• 28:12
  And Preacher thought he told him to stand up.
• 28:14
  So Preacher stands up and the ref punches him right in the face.
• 28:19
  And the basketball floor itself was elevated and on the edge.
• 28:28
  There was about a three or four foot drop off to a concrete walkway.
• 28:33
  And there was a metal pipe running along the wall, probably a heating pipe.
• 28:38
  And Preacher fell back over that and hit his head on that pipe.
• 28:42
  And that's what caused about a 6 inch fracture to his skull.
• 28:46
  Well, it just so happened that there was an emergency room doctor in the stands with his medical kit, and he was able to administer an adrenaline shot to Preacher that kept him alive for enough time to get him
• 29:00
  that 25 miles from evening Shade down to Batesville to Graves Hospital.
• 29:05
  Well, he was unconscious for many hours, but also sitting in the stands was the county sheriff.
• 29:11
  And he arrested the referee for assault.
• 29:14
  And that referee had to post a $500 bond to get out of jail.
• 29:18
  Well, $500 in 1946 was a lot of money.
• 29:22
  But Preacher was asked later about that incident and whether he held anything against that ref or not.
• 29:29
  And Preacher said, absolutely not.
• 29:31
  I can't remember any of it, so why would I want to hold anything against somebody for something I know nothing about.
• 29:38
  So that's kind of how he dealt with it.
• 29:40
  But that affected his 1946 season significantly with the Pirates.
• 29:46
  He didn't do well that year, obviously, during the regular season.
• 29:49
  He was late getting his spring training in Southern California.
• 29:53
  Yeah, he only went 3 and 8, and he had an ERA of 5.14.
• 29:58
  And they sent him home, I believe, in August of that year, because they wanted him to get recouped there.
• 30:05
  Yeah.
• 30:05
  What about, what about the official?
• 30:08
  After, you know, after all had happened, was there.
• 30:14
  Did he ever approach Preacher and apologize?
• 30:18
  I mean, was there ever a relationship between the two?
• 30:20
  Did.
• 30:21
  Do you know anything about that?
• 30:24
  As far as I know, and I think I asked Tommy, his son, this quote, that same question.
• 30:28
  As far as I know, there was never any further.
• 30:30
  Further contact because after the 40, after that incident, Preacher never coached again in high school.
• 30:37
  He just taught mathematics from that point on.
• 30:39
  So he would never have probably encountered that referee again because he moved over to Harding.
• 30:48
  He was at Hardy when this happened, but he.
• 30:51
  He was not coaching basketball.
• 30:53
  And Tom indicated that.
• 30:55
  I don't think there was ever any contact between the two after that.
• 30:59
  But Preacher never held a grudge against him.
• 31:02
  And not sure about if the referee apologized to him or not in any way, like in the press or in a letter or anything.
• 31:10
  Let's.
• 31:12
  Let me ask you this.
• 31:16
  Back in the day, 99.9% of professional athletes had to have a side job, right?
• 31:24
  They couldn't support themselves on their.
• 31:27
  On their baseball or football or whatever sport they played.
• 31:31
  Salary.
• 31:32
  They couldn't support themselves on that salary alone.
• 31:36
  But, but how do you balance the role of a, of a teacher in Arkansas while you're playing baseball in, in Pittsburgh?
• 31:49
  How did the school year and the baseball season not overlap or did it, or how did that work?
• 31:56
  Well, I asked that same question too.
• 31:58
  And they just made an accommodation for Preacher to only be there part of the year.
• 32:05
  They wanted him to be on that staff.
• 32:07
  And he never graduated from college.
• 32:09
  He never got a degree from.
• 32:12
  From Harding College, now Harding University, he got a he, but he had enough hours to have a teaching certificate.
• 32:20
  And the schools, the public school system in Arkansas really wanted more men in the classroom.
• 32:27
  I mean, there were a lot of women in the classroom, but they really wanted a lot of.
• 32:30
  They wanted more men in the classroom.
• 32:32
  And there was Preacher Rowe who's willing to do that.
• 32:35
  And so I think they made accommodations for him and his schedule with major league baseball, first of all, with minor league system, and then the minor league system.
• 32:44
  The season ended earlier so he could get there in time for the fall semester.
• 32:49
  But sometimes it'd be a little touchy getting there when he joined the Pirates and the Dodgers, but they accommodated it.
• 32:59
  And also his brother Roy ended up becoming a school administrator.
• 33:04
  And I think he also was able to help Preacher in that way.
• 33:08
  Getting that accommodation for only part of a year.
• 33:11
  Understood, but a big part of the year.
• 33:14
  Did, did the injury have any long lasting effects on him?
• 33:22
  Oh, yes, he went to the Mayo Clinic.
• 33:25
  Branch Rickey sent him up to the Mayo Clinic before he actually pulled the trigger on bringing him over to Brooklyn in the fall of 47.
• 33:36
  I think preacher had gone up there before, but anyway, he goes up there and the doctors at the Mayo Clinic says, now, Preacher, you're not going to be able to throw that fastball anymore.
• 33:47
  He said if you do, your brain is fused to the inside of your skull.
• 33:54
  If you have hard jerking motions that could tear loose and you could bleed to that.
• 34:00
  Wow.
• 34:00
  So he had, he had to basically give up his fastball to the degree that he was throwing it before then and come up with some other pitches.
• 34:12
  You know, he had to perfect his curveball, the slider, the cutter, and all those sinker, all those other junk type pitches that he threw it through so well.
• 34:22
  So in a, in a roundabout way, in an odd way, that injury sort of helped Preacher become a more complete pitcher.
• 34:37
  I would say it did, yes.
• 34:38
  I think that's a good way to look at it.
• 34:41
  And Bert Shotten, who would later become his manager in Brooklyn, was his manager in Columbus.
• 34:50
  And Bert Shotten made a comment to the fact that in Columbus he was the wildest, craziest, fastest pitcher I ever saw.
• 34:59
  And he didn't give him credit for having a lot of control, but he was effective in Columbus.
• 35:05
  But when he moved over to Brooklyn after Leo Durocher had left and Bert Shotten kind of stepped in, he, he, he gave Preacher credit for becoming a more complete pitcher, which is, I think, what you were alluding to.
• 35:20
  So, you know, his years in Pittsburgh.
• 35:23
  Overall, he was 34 and 47 with a 3.73 ERA.
• 35:31
  Like I said, his first year with with the Pirates goes 13 and 11 with the 311 ERA.
• 35:38
  Second year really good 14 and 13.
• 35:41
  A 287 ERA leads with.
• 35:45
  Leads the league with 148 Ks.
• 35:48
  Then the, the, the unfortunate incident happens and he goes 3 and 8 in 46.
• 35:56
  Doesn't really do all that well in 47 either.
• 36:00
  You know, those 4 and 15.
• 36:03
  So what prompted his trade from the Pirates to the Dodgers.
• 36:12
  Well, I believe in 47, Branch Rickey was taking notice of him from Brooklyn.
• 36:19
  Branch Rickey is the one that signed him originally in Major League Baseball, as you.
• 36:23
  As you know.
• 36:24
  And I think Branch Rickey did not give up on him.
• 36:28
  He thought that that Preacher still had a career.
• 36:32
  And at that point, Dixie Walker didn't want to play on the Brooklyn Dodgers team anymore in 47 because he was from the south at that time.
• 36:42
  And he didn't.
• 36:44
  He didn't necessarily hold it against Jackie Robinson personally, but he felt like he would have a hard time.
• 36:50
  He had a.
• 36:51
  He was a business owner in Alabama, I believe it was, and he would have a hard time explaining it to some of his customers, why he's on that team with Jackie Robinson.
• 37:01
  So Dixie Walker and others were in a trade deal for Preacher Row and his good buddy Billy Cox, third baseman.
• 37:12
  But Branch Rickey just didn't give up on him.
• 37:15
  He felt like there was a future for him in Brooklyn and he took.
• 37:18
  And he brought him over.
• 37:20
  But he did send Frankie Frank Rickey, his brother, over down to Arkansas to spend time with him.
• 37:29
  I think it was three weeks maybe again or for the first time to visit with Preacher.
• 37:36
  He wanted to know if he had stamina.
• 37:38
  And Frank goes down there and he lets his brother know after about three weeks that he's good to go.
• 37:44
  And so go ahead and pull the trade.
• 37:47
  What?
• 37:48
  What.
• 37:52
  I guess in a way, his trade to the Dodgers was viewed as a turning point in his career.
• 38:02
  How did.
• 38:03
  How did the.
• 38:05
  The move to the Dodgers benefit Preacher's career?
• 38:09
  And how did it benefit the Dodgers?
• 38:13
  Well, kind of like what we talked about before.
• 38:16
  During the 1940s and before in the 30s, the pirates were struggling as a team to be competitive and to get to the big games in the fall, Fall Classic, the Dodgers had a.
• 38:28
  Had a remarkable all star team by the time Preacher goes over there.
• 38:34
  So he had a good supporting staff in the infield and the outfield.
• 38:40
  We had.
• 38:40
  He had people that could hit.
• 38:43
  They just had a remarkable team which would later be known as the Boys of Summer that Roger Kahn would write right about.
• 38:52
  And included in that course would be Preacher Rowe.
• 38:55
  But he had a good competitive.
• 38:57
  He went from a team that wasn't so competitive to one that was competitive.
• 39:02
  And so I think that made a big difference in his career as well.
• 39:06
  And his catcher, Roy Campanella, eventually, he just loved Roy Campanella.
• 39:11
  Roy Campanella helped him a lot as a Dodgers pitcher.
• 39:16
  And, you know, his team Was always positive.
• 39:19
  Peewee race at short.
• 39:20
  I mean just all kinds of, you know, Gil Hodges, the list goes on.
• 39:24
  Duke Schneider, they're all good friends.
• 39:27
  Well, the Dodgers were a good team.
• 39:28
  I mean they, they, they contended, they won a couple of National League pennants when he was there his first year.
• 39:35
  He goes 12 and 8 follows that going 15 and 6, 19 and 11.
• 39:41
  I mean preacher row was pretty darn good.
• 39:44
  And then along comes the 1951 season, which statistically speaking, you would have to say was the best season of his career.
• 39:55
  Talk about 1951 season.
• 39:57
  And you know, 22 and three.
• 40:02
  Wow.
• 40:02
  A 304 era.
• 40:05
  I mean it was an outstanding season.
• 40:10
  Talk about it.
• 40:11
  Well, that was a heartbreaking season.
• 40:13
  Of course, like you said, he had an 88% win loss percentage.
• 40:16
  You know, that was, that was a record for a while.
• 40:19
  I'm not sure exactly when that was eventually broken but, but that stood for quite a while.
• 40:25
  That was phenomenal.
• 40:29
  And keeping in mind also back in that day, pitchers usually went complete games.
• 40:36
  You take a look at that number.
• 40:38
  He's, he started, you know, he had, he, he had 19 complete games, started 33 games.
• 40:52
  There are the pitchers today might not pitch.
• 40:56
  Not more than 90% of the pitchers today aren't going to throw 19 complete games in their 10 year career.
• 41:06
  We're talking 140 to 160 pitches in some cases.
• 41:10
  Yeah.
• 41:12
  And not to take any way anything away from our current pitchers because they're phenomenal.
• 41:21
  But those pitchers back in that day, kind of like what you said earlier, they were kind of gruff and they didn't take anything off anybody.
• 41:27
  They played hurt a lot and because they needed that money, I mean they weren't getting paid big bucks back then.
• 41:35
  And so they knew they needed to perform and they did, they did perform, often hurt during a game.
• 41:41
  And Preacher was certainly no exception to that.
• 41:44
  But he has that phenomenal year with the Dodgers and then they get into the final few games of the season and things kind of go south.
• 41:53
  They blew a 13 game lead in August and September.
• 41:58
  They finished in a tie with the Giants and lost the three game playoff with the Giants.
• 42:04
  So Preacher would have much rather Just.
• 42:08
  So everybody knows the shot heard around the world, Bobby.
• 42:11
  Yes, right, exactly.
• 42:13
  Preacher would have probably been glad to have trade his phenomenal pitching season for a chance to go to the World Series that year.
• 42:21
  There's no question about that.
• 42:26
  So that was, you know, just a phenomenal season.
• 42:31
  And he has at this point established himself as one of the most reliable, dependable, better Pitchers in the National League.
• 42:41
  But when he pitched, there was this awful hole in the lineup.
• 42:48
  Preacher Row, with a bat in his hands, was anything but a surefire major league ball player.
• 42:59
  And you, and you just, you discuss some of this in the book.
• 43:03
  His.
• 43:04
  His struggles as a hitter.
• 43:06
  How poor of a hitter was he?
• 43:08
  And are there, is there anything in particular you can point out that really paints a great picture of how much he struggled with a bat in his hands?
• 43:21
  You know, it's funny thing about Preacher.
• 43:23
  He actually pitched really well as a youth and in college.
• 43:26
  He.
• 43:26
  I mean, he batted very well as a youth in college as well.
• 43:32
  For some reason, he had a hard time hitting.
• 43:34
  I don't know what was 100, 111 batting average, lifetime is, or maybe 101.
• 43:39
  I can't remember what it was.
• 43:40
  But to give you an idea how poorly he hit Jackie Robinson right here, he hit.110.
• 43:50
  His career batting average was 110.
• 43:54
  He hit.
• 43:55
  He had one RBI, no one home run in his career, three doubles.
• 44:01
  I mean, he was not a good hit.
• 44:03
  Well, Jackie Robinson would normally be on base when Preacher came to the plate, went to the plate, and sometimes he would be on third.
• 44:14
  And Preacher would look at him and says, jackie, why are.
• 44:18
  Why do you always steal home plate when I'm at bat?
• 44:21
  He said, because, Preacher, I can't rely on you to hit me in.
• 44:25
  So Jackie had no choice but to try to steal home.
• 44:29
  The funny thing about that relationship is 1947, when Preacher was still with the Pirates, the Dodgers were visiting Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.
• 44:40
  And there's a photograph.
• 44:42
  And you may have seen, I think it's in the book, there's a photograph with Preacher tagging Jackie Robinson out at home.
• 44:49
  The problem is, you know, Preacher's a southpaw.
• 44:51
  He's got his glove on Jackie at the plate, but he's holding the ball in his left hand.
• 44:58
  And the game stopped for about an hour or more for to dispute that call.
• 45:03
  But they still called Jackie Robinson out, even though obviously he was not holding the ball in his glove.
• 45:11
  So anyway, but they became.
• 45:13
  They were very close friends.
• 45:16
  Preacher had a lot of respect and he enjoyed Jackie Robinson very much.
• 45:20
  But he did have one shining moment at the plate where he finally connected with one and knocked it out of the park.
• 45:29
  Why don't you tell us about it?
• 45:32
  Well, again, he hit his only home run, and it was against a pitcher by the name of Bob Hall.
• 45:39
  It was in the top of the third inning.
• 45:41
  There was nobody on base, not even Jackie.
• 45:44
  Well, it wouldn't have been Jackie Robbins.
• 45:46
  I guess it could have been, but it wasn't at that time.
• 45:48
  And Preacher sure enough hits a home run.
• 45:52
  I'm not sure what over, over what fence he hit that home run, but he slumped his shoulders and just kind of ran around the bases, kind of embarrassed and shy because he knew that that was out of the
• 46:05
  ordinary for him.
• 46:06
  And he gets, by the time he gets back to home plate, his Dodger teammates had taken white towels and from home plate clear to the dugout, they laid him down for him to walk on back to the dugout.
• 46:20
  And of course he's embarrassed.
• 46:21
  He slumped over and.
• 46:23
  But it's kind of ironic.
• 46:25
  He hit that home run at Forbes Field, his former team, where his former team was.
• 46:30
  And so, excuse me, later on, the team awarded him about an eight foot bat at a, at a special ceremony.
• 46:40
  And Preacher hung that bat over his meat counter at his grocery store for the entire time he owned that grocery store.
• 46:50
  And there's this young man down in West Plains by the name of Jaden Wiley.
• 46:55
  He's a big collector of everything, Preacher Row.
• 46:58
  And he's finally been able to locate where that bat is.
• 47:01
  Apparently an attorney in Brooklyn has that bat.
• 47:05
  Oh, yeah, Jaden's trying to do everything he can to get that back, to purchase it from him or whatever and get it back home to West Plains, Missouri.
• 47:15
  That's cool.
• 47:16
  That's, that's, that's a great story when you, when you hear stories like that.
• 47:21
  You know, I immediately thought of Bartolo Cologne hitting that home run for the Mets, you know, about.
• 47:27
  Right, right ago.
• 47:29
  You know, it just completely blew everybody away.
• 47:33
  Every once in a while, somebody's gonna, gonna connect with one.
• 47:37
  And I.
• 47:37
  And Preacher had his moment.
• 47:39
  Yes, he did.
• 47:40
  And I think, I think that, I think that really made.
• 47:44
  Made his day, if not his career as a hitter.
• 47:47
  There's, you know, at least they could say, you got a homer.
• 47:50
  Yeah, there you go.
• 47:52
  Yeah, yeah.
• 47:54
  I was gonna ask you, what was his reputation with his teammates like and how did they view him?
• 48:01
  Was he a competitor, a prankster, a leader, a combination of all three?
• 48:05
  What kind of person was he around his teammates?
• 48:10
  Well, I couldn't have had a better source for answering that question than Carl Erskine.
• 48:16
  Carl Erskine wrote the forward to this book.
• 48:19
  I was able to interview him in May of 2023 about his teammate.
• 48:26
  And Carl Erskine basically told me the same story Preacher Row's future Little League teams would tell me over in West Plains after he retired from Major League Baseball.
• 48:37
  He said, david, everybody loved Preacher Row.
• 48:40
  In fact, when we went out to dinner as a team, we'd go in cars, but everybody would try to get in the car with Preacher Row because they loved his stories, they loved the way he told stories.
• 48:51
  And so.
• 48:52
  And that's the same thing Preachers Little League team members would tell me later on.
• 48:58
  But no, he was a team player.
• 49:00
  He was humble.
• 49:02
  He was very disarming on the mound because he kind of had this laid back attitude, but he would surprise a hitter.
• 49:12
  But Pee Wee Reese and all those guys were behind him and they all loved him and he loved them, quite frankly.
• 49:20
  They were a good cohesive type, a tight team, not unlike the Pittsburgh Pirates were in 1960 when they won the World Series against the Yankees.
• 49:29
  It was very similar those years that Preacher was with the Brooklyn Dodgers from 48 to 54.
• 49:36
  I mean, they were just a tight, cohesive team.
• 49:39
  And I think Roger Khan probably painted that pretty well.
• 49:44
  You know, it's a shame when you think of how long it took him to really make it to the majors and establish himself.
• 49:54
  I mean, he was 28 years old when he finally broke through with.
• 49:59
  With the Pirates.
• 50:02
  And in those.
• 50:04
  In those 11 years that most we'll call it, because I wouldn't consider 1938 much of a season.
• 50:12
  So he really played about 11 seasons.
• 50:15
  And we pinpointed that 1951 was probably.
• 50:22
  Well, it was his best season, 22 and three.
• 50:27
  So we say that 51 was his best season.
• 50:31
  Is there any game in particular that stands out?
• 50:36
  And you could say that game was the best game of his career.
• 50:42
  And if you can, which game would that be and why?
• 50:47
  Well, I would have to say it's probably the 1949.
• 50:53
  The second game of the 1949 World Series against the Yankees.
• 50:57
  That's my.
• 50:58
  And I'll tell you why I think that game stands out to me.
• 51:02
  Don Newcomb had lost that first game, oh, to one against the Yankees.
• 51:07
  And now is.
• 51:08
  The second game was Preacher's time on the mound.
• 51:11
  He would end up winning that game 10 against the Yankees.
• 51:16
  But somewhere along the line, I don't know, around the fourth inning or whatever, John Lindell hit a line drive back to the pitcher's mound.
• 51:25
  And back then, the gloves were not as cushioned or padded as they are to now today.
• 51:32
  And that line drive hit Preacher's glove right on the end of what is, you know, the ring finger.
• 51:39
  And it just, you know, I mean, it just was a phenomenal hit.
• 51:44
  And.
• 51:45
  But Preacher was able to throw him out and.
• 51:48
  But when he went to the dugout.
• 51:50
  The team doctor stuck a needle in what was left of his fingernail, and that blood shot up and hit the top of the dugout.
• 52:00
  There was so much pressure coming out of that, and they wanted to take the fingernail off.
• 52:04
  Well, Doc Roe and his mother were there watching.
• 52:07
  That was the first time his mother ever watched him pitch in a major league baseball game.
• 52:12
  And Doc Rowe said, don't let him take that fingernail off, whatever you do.
• 52:17
  Well, Branch Rickey got really mad at Preacher Row for not allowing that to happen, because if it did happen, later on they found out that that finger was broken in two or three places.
• 52:28
  If they would have taken that, you know, completely off, he could have lost that finger.
• 52:33
  So he insisted not to do that.
• 52:35
  And of course, he.
• 52:36
  That was it for that, for the World Series that year, because he couldn't pitch anymore.
• 52:39
  And Branch Rickey was not happy about that.
• 52:42
  But he goes back out there after that happens, that inning and still wins 10 against the Yankees.
• 52:49
  I thought that was a phenomenal demonstration of his stamina and courage and everything else.
• 52:54
  Yeah, I have the numbers here.
• 52:56
  Nine innings, gave up six hits, won the game one nothing, struck out three, face 34 batters.
• 53:03
  And as you were talking earlier, he threw 136 pitches.
• 53:08
  I mean, that's just.
• 53:10
  That's just crazy talk today.
• 53:13
  You know, in the 40s and the early 50s, the Dodgers were loaded.
• 53:18
  I mean, they had some great ball players on that.
• 53:23
  How important was Creature Row to the success of Brooklyn during that period?
• 53:30
  Well, I would consider him and, you know, certainly others.
• 53:35
  I'm not going to take anything away from the likes of Don Newcomb or others, but he was a pitching ace as far as I'm concerned.
• 53:42
  I mean, when.
• 53:44
  When I think hitters kind of feared Preacher, not so much for his fastball, because he really didn't have one anymore at that point, but he could throw a ball that could just catch a batter off guard.
• 53:58
  And so he was hard to hit against.
• 54:01
  Of course, the likes of Stan Musil didn't care what he threw at him.
• 54:04
  He was going to hit anything that came his way.
• 54:06
  But most hitters have trouble hitting against Preacher Row in.
• 54:11
  In the.
• 54:11
  In the major leagues in the National League at that particular time.
• 54:16
  So I think he was certainly a key component of that pitching staff for all the years that he was.
• 54:23
  That he was in Brooklyn.
• 54:25
  You know, I will tell you that 53 probably wasn't his best year, and 54 wasn't his best year, but.
• 54:30
  But he still held his own, I think.
• 54:33
  In the National League, and people still did not look forward to hitting against him.
• 54:38
  So the fear factor, I think, is one thing that hitters had with regard to Preacher, of course, that wasn't.
• 54:44
  That's not uncommon today about hitters kind of dreading facing certain pitchers.
• 54:52
  What did happen to preacher after the 51 season?
• 54:58
  He goes out, he has this great year.
• 55:00
  He's 22 and 3.
• 55:01
  Like you said, he wins 88% of his games.
• 55:04
  And then from there it really started to decline.
• 55:08
  I mean, he didn't pitch in as many games in, in 51, he threw in 34 games.
• 55:15
  That was reduced 27 and 52, 25 and 53.
• 55:20
  And then his final year, 1954, he only pitched in 15 games.
• 55:27
  He was still effective.
• 55:28
  I mean, he was 11 and 2, 11 and 3 and then 3 and 4.
• 55:32
  What happened?
• 55:32
  Was it age?
• 55:34
  Was it wear and tear on the arm?
• 55:36
  What, What, Why this, the dramatic drop?
• 55:43
  Well, I think Preacher, you know, Preacher.
• 55:45
  The press had Preacher two years younger than what he actually was.
• 55:50
  That all started in college.
• 55:51
  He was kind of conscientious about going to Harding College.
• 55:55
  He was about two years older than his teammates on the baseball team.
• 56:00
  And so the sports information director down at Harding College told me that Harding University now told me, he said, david, I think he shaved a couple of years off his age age, because he wanted to fit in age
• 56:13
  wise with everybody else.
• 56:15
  Well, that stuck just like his name for the rest of his career.
• 56:19
  And if you go back and read sports releases and everything in newspapers during that time, he was in Brooklyn and even in Pittsburgh, you'll find out that he's two years younger than what he really was.
• 56:32
  They haven't been born in 1918.
• 56:34
  I've got a trading card of his right here that basically said, born February 26, 1918.
• 56:42
  He was born February 26, 1916.
• 56:45
  So by, by, by 53, he was 37 years old that season.
• 56:52
  He really wanted to retire at the end of the 53 season.
• 56:56
  I mean, he wanted, he wanted to do that.
• 56:59
  Well, Walter o' Malley was now and yeah, his performance had declined, but he was still formidable on the mound.
• 57:05
  There's no question about that.
• 57:06
  That.
• 57:07
  But he wasn't the preacher of 1949 through 1952 and that type of thing.
• 57:13
  But he wanted to retire.
• 57:15
  Walter o' Malley approached him, said, preacher, if you come back one more year, in other words, in 54, I will pay you $28,000 because I've got this young southpaw that's coming up that we really would like to see,
• 57:29
  develop and we'd like for you to kind of mentor him.
• 57:32
  I'm paraphrasing racing.
• 57:33
  He said he's from Brooklyn and when we have home games, he'll come over to the field and maybe you can work with him a little bit.
• 57:40
  Well, that, that southpaw was Sandy Koufax.
• 57:44
  And so that's, that's right there.
• 57:47
  And so that $28,000 really impressed Preacher Rose said, yeah, I'll come back for that.
• 57:53
  So 54 wasn't the best years from a, from a performance standpoint or statistics standpoint point for Preacher.
• 58:00
  But at the end of the 54 season, he told his teammates, this is it.
• 58:04
  I'm retiring.
• 58:06
  I'm not coming back for the 55 season.
• 58:09
  Well, for his career, he won 127 games.
• 58:13
  He lost 84.
• 58:14
  Very, very respectable.
• 58:17
  Had a 3, 4, 3 era.
• 58:19
  I mean, he was, he was a solid major league pitcher.
• 58:22
  Well, like, like you said earlier, he pitched complete games too, and that kind of factors in his career.
• 58:28
  We already had 101 complete games.
• 58:30
  I mean, you know, that's, that's, that's a lot of complete games.
• 58:39
  But you know, like many of the players, doesn't matter what sport, whether it's baseball, hockey, football, basketball, golf.
• 58:50
  Part of the reason why I do this podcast sports forgotten heroes.
• 58:57
  When his career was over, he sort of started to fade away from, from everybody's memory, their collective baseball memory.
• 59:07
  Despite being one of baseball's, or at least the National League, one of the best pitchers in the game during his, his time there.
• 59:18
  Why do you think he sort of faded away, especially with a name like Preacher Row?
• 59:26
  Well, when Preacher retired, he wanted to retire and move on with his life and do something else.
• 59:31
  And his wife's family were, they were in the grocery business big time.
• 59:35
  And so that's what Preacher chose to do.
• 59:37
  Go into the grocery business in West Plains, Missouri and just kind of look back, you know, at baseball as a, as a wonderful experience that gave him a lot of opportunities going forward.
• 59:50
  And so he wouldn't really get back and be, be much involved in baseball for many, for a couple of decades because he was in the grocery business for, for 20 years.
• 1:00:00
  Well, that was one part of it.
• 1:00:02
  The other part of it was the fact that he got tied up in a Sports Illustrated article that came out in July of 1955 talking about him and the spitball.
• 1:00:14
  A lot of people look at Preacher Row and the first thing they think about is a spitball for thrower.
• 1:00:19
  I think that whole idea was overblown I think Preacher may have, from time to time, thrown a spitball.
• 1:00:28
  In the book, I talk about three, I think three umpires that.
• 1:00:32
  That officiated several games where Preacher was on the mound.
• 1:00:36
  And virtually all three of them were saying, I never.
• 1:00:40
  We never saw a Preacher throw a spitball.
• 1:00:42
  This one umpire was adamant, said, I know what a spitball looks like, and Preacher never threw one.
• 1:00:49
  And back then in the 1940s and 50s, and I'm certain sure before that, baseball was a big entertainment event for families going to the ballpark, and the players were wanting to make it as entertaining as possible.
• 1:01:05
  And the people that often complained about Preacher throwing a spitter was the opposing manager.
• 1:01:11
  And so when the manager would yell at the ump, he'd say, he's getting ready to throw a spinner.
• 1:01:17
  Well, the ump said, all right, Preacher, let's see it.
• 1:01:19
  Well, Preacher would roll it back to Pee Wee Reese, and then maybe he'd throw it over to Duke Snyder.
• 1:01:24
  Then maybe they'd eventually throw it into Roy Campanella, and Roy would hand it to the umpire.
• 1:01:30
  And by that time it was dry.
• 1:01:33
  And so it was probably always dry.
• 1:01:36
  I think there was a threat of Preacher throwing the spitter, as opposed to him actually throwing the spitter.
• 1:01:44
  I just don't think he had to rely on that type of an approach very often in his career, because I think he was a much better control pitcher than that.
• 1:01:53
  Stan Musil basically didn't care what he threw at him.
• 1:01:55
  He was going to hit it anyway.
• 1:01:58
  Bill Verdon made a comment in 1956 about the spitter because they were both residents of West Plains at that time.
• 1:02:05
  Of course, Bill was in.
• 1:02:06
  In the National League as well with the Pirates after Preacher had retired.
• 1:02:11
  And he said, I don't see any problem with the spit at all, because it's a pitch or whatever.
• 1:02:16
  You have to be able to control that.
• 1:02:18
  And a lot of pitchers that tried to throw a spitter couldn't control it.
• 1:02:22
  But from what I understand, the league president let him know, said, as long as I'm the league president, you'll never be considered for the hall of Fame.
• 1:02:34
  And.
• 1:02:34
  And I think that really disappointed Preacher because of that.
• 1:02:38
  Now, Carl Erskine did tell me, he said Sports illustrated offered him $2,000 for that article in the fall of 54, and it came out the following July.
• 1:02:49
  And the other team member said, why not Preacher take the money and run that $2,000?
• 1:02:53
  And Preacher said, yeah, I can use that to asphalt my driveway back home.
• 1:02:58
  And Carl Erskine was more thoughtful.
• 1:03:00
  He Followed him out of a restaurant.
• 1:03:02
  He said, preacher, don't do that.
• 1:03:04
  It'll tarnish your career.
• 1:03:06
  Don't do it.
• 1:03:08
  Well, he did it, and I think Preacher regretted that.
• 1:03:12
  But I think Preacher would be first.
• 1:03:14
  The first to admit in hindsight, certainly, that was far more overblown because he just didn't throw it that off.
• 1:03:21
  So I think between that and just basically moving on with his life, if you saw preacher row in west plains and you were a young person in 1965, for instance, when he was still running his grocery store, you
• 1:03:33
  would never have known that Preacher Rowe is a major league baseball player unless somebody pointed him out to you on the street.
• 1:03:40
  So he just never bragged about himself.
• 1:03:43
  He didn't want to call attention to himself, but he certainly wanted to help other people.
• 1:03:47
  He got more involved with fantasy camp starting in 1984, after he completely retired from the grocery business and the banking business at that point.
• 1:03:56
  And he would stay involved in fantasy camps, him and his wife, Mazi.
• 1:04:01
  And she passed away in 2002, in April of 2002.
• 1:04:06
  And that summer in 2002, I just want to.
• 1:04:10
  Not everybody forgot who Preacher Rowe was.
• 1:04:15
  The Dodgers call him up and said, preacher, are you able to come down to Vero beach this fall, in November, and maybe pitch a couple innings for fantasy camp?
• 1:04:25
  And Preacher said, well, yeah.
• 1:04:26
  Well, Preacher's 86 years old.
• 1:04:29
  He calls up his son Tom.
• 1:04:32
  They had owned a sporting goods store at one time, but he said, bring up your catcher's mitt.
• 1:04:37
  The Dodgers want me to pitch this this fall down in fantasy camp.
• 1:04:41
  You think you can catch my curveball?
• 1:04:42
  And Tom said, well, yeah, I did.
• 1:04:44
  I caught it before.
• 1:04:46
  So Preacher has this long driveway.
• 1:04:48
  I think a picture of it's in the book.
• 1:04:50
  And so while Tommy's en route to come up to catch his dad, Preacher goes out there, measures out 60ft, 6 inches, gets a five gallon bucket, turns it upside down for Tommy to sit on.
• 1:05:02
  So when he comes up there and catches him.
• 1:05:04
  So Tommy gets there, and Preacher said, now put your.
• 1:05:07
  Put the mitt on your left knee and don't move it.
• 1:05:11
  And Tommy said, okay.
• 1:05:13
  And he said, don't move that glove.
• 1:05:16
  And Tom said, you're okay, dad.
• 1:05:18
  So here comes the ball.
• 1:05:18
  He gets about six feet from his chest.
• 1:05:21
  Tom goes into the defensive motion.
• 1:05:23
  He thought he was going to hit him right in the chest.
• 1:05:25
  And it hits him on the left kneecap.
• 1:05:29
  And Preacher says, I told you not to move your glove.
• 1:05:32
  And he says, okay, dad, now put it on your right knee and don't move it.
• 1:05:36
  Do you hear me, dummy?
• 1:05:37
  Don't move it.
• 1:05:39
  And here comes the ball.
• 1:05:40
  It's going to hit him in the chest.
• 1:05:41
  Tommy goes like this and it hits him on the right kneecap.
• 1:05:45
  It's amazing to me that an 86 year old man had that kind of muscle memory that could still have that kind of control.
• 1:05:52
  That's awesome.
• 1:05:53
  But when they get down to Fantasy camp in 2002 in November, his teammates, a lot of them still Duke, Schneider, Carl, Erskine, I mean, they're all down there and they're just loving on Preacher Row.
• 1:06:09
  Tom said they just made a big deal about my dad for all the days we were down there.
• 1:06:15
  He said I had to sit back in the cheap seats and watch all that because they were, they just swarmed my dad for the whole time and there they loved it.
• 1:06:23
  That's awesome.
• 1:06:24
  Well, for anybody watching or listening, I suggest you pick up a copy of David's book, the Life of a Professional Baseball Great from the Ozarks.
• 1:06:37
  Preacher Row, you certainly did your research and your homework and this book is filled with great stories and I would encourage anyone to pick up a copy.
• 1:06:49
  David, I want to thank you once again for joining me on Sports Forgotten Heroes.
• 1:06:54
  You're a terrific guest and I really enjoyed our conversation.
• 1:06:58
  Warren, I enjoy being with you again.
• 1:07:01
  It's really appreciative and I can't thank you enough.
• 1:07:05
  You got it.
• 1:07:06
  Anytime.
• 1:07:08
  Preacher Rowe's career is one of those stories that reminds us that greatness comes in many forms.
• 1:07:15
  He wasn't the hardest thrower or the most famous player on those great Brooklyn teams, but he won 127 games, including 22 in 1951.
• 1:07:26
  He pitched for pennant winners and help helped lead Brooklyn into three World Series appearances against the New York Yankees.
• 1:07:34
  He became one of the most dependable pitchers in baseball and perhaps most importantly, his story is about perseverance.
• 1:07:43
  From small town Arkansas to the major leagues, through injuries, disappointments, personal challenges and triumphs, Preechero built a remarkable baseball life.
• 1:07:56
  I'd like to thank my guest today, David Jerome, for joining me once again and thanks to all of you for tuning in and I'll see you next time on Sports Forgotten Heroes.