The 1949 regular season is over and it is now time for the replay World Series. Boston (AL) and St. Louis (NL) both dominated their leagues this year and the expected struggle between these two baseball behemoth's is causing quite a buzz. The games will be televised, although it is not certain exactly how many people in either of these markets actually have televisions. It is expected that bars and department stores that have them will both draw a pretty good crowd though.
Obviously, neither of these teams truly made the 1949 World series, so I am going to make some accommodations:
- Neither team had to fight down to the last day of the season to determine their fate and in fact, both teams clinched the respective pennants well ahead of the season's end. I am going to assume that both teams had ample opportunity to provide some rest and to get their pitching aligned the way they wanted.
- The 1949 World Series didn’t have any off days because both teams were located in the same city. I am going to build in a pair of travel days to allow the teams to travel half-way across the country and back.
- Both teams have pretty set lineups and I will just follow their lead. Each team will have a starting pitcher go in games one, four and seven (as needed).
Wednesday, October 5, 1949 (Game One)
St. Louis (NL) 9 Boston (AL) (H) 1
Ted Williams hit a homerun in the bottom of the first to get Boston a 1-0 lead, but Harry Brecheen didn’t allow Boston's second and final hit until the seventh inning and St. Louis romped easily in game one. The Cardinals responded with two runs the third and then exploded for five runs in the fourth to knock Red Sox starter Mel Parnell out of the game. It was Parnell's throwing error that got the excitement started and all of the five runs in the fateful fourth were unearned. The big hit in the inning was Enos Slaughters' two-run triple as Slaughter went 2-for-3 on the day with a double and a triple and two walks. Rocky Nelson drove in two late insurance runs with a pinch-hit single in the eighth, but by then the fate of this game was pretty much decided.
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| 1949 World Series Game One |
Thursday, October 6, 1949 (Game Two)
St. Louis (NL) 5 Boston (AL) (H) 2
Once again Boston took a first-inning lead as Dom DiMaggio doubled, advanced to third on an infield out, and then scored on a Ted Williams single. And once again, St. Louis quickly responded, this time with a three run homerun from third baseman Tommy Glaviano in the top of the second. Starters Ellis Kinder and Howie Pollet tightened down from there, with Boston pulling close with one in the fifth. Finally, the St. Louis offense awoke and Stan Musial hit a solo homerun in the seventh, and then in the eighth Joe Garagiola added a solo homerun of his own to further pad the lead. Boston outhit St. Louis 8-7 on the day (and Garagiola had four of the St. Louis hits) but the crafty Cardinal lefty kept the Red Sox off the scoreboard and took home the game two win and the Cardinals can now return to their home field in St. Louis with a 2-0 World Series lead.
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| 1949 World Series Game Two |
Saturday, October 8, 1949 (Game Three)
Boston (AL) 11 St. Louis (NL) (H) 2
In the first inning Johnny Pesky lined a single to right that skipped past Ron Northey and Pesky came all the way around to score and once again Boston had a 1-0 lead after the first. They didn't give up the lead this time though as Vern Stephens hit a three run homerun in the third and the rout was soon on. Al Zarilla added a two run homerun in the four-run seventh which really salted this one away. Joe Dobson started for Boston and went all the way for the game three victory, plus he went 3-for-5 on the day with a run scored. St. Louis committed four errors on the day, a rare occurrence for this Cardinals team.
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| 1949 World Series Game Three |
Sunday, October 9, 1949 (Game Four)
Boston (AL) 7 St. Louis (NL) (H) 6
This time it was St. Louis' turn to score first (and lose) as Enos Slaughter tripled in the second and soon scored the give the Cardinals a 1-0 lead. In the third inning, Chuck Diering tripled to lead off the inning and scored on a Stan Musial triple, but the Cardinals couldn’t score another one and led 2-0 after three. Bobby Doerr had taken a curveball off the ankle in the first and had to be replaced, so Lou Stringer was called upon and Stringer doubled to lead off the fourth and eventually came around to score, cutting the St. Louis lead to 2-1. That lead was gone when Ted Williams hit a two run homerun in the fifth. Undeterred, the Cardinals came right back when Musial hit his second triple of the game and then scored on a Nippy Jones triple. Jones scored on a Marty Marion single and at the end of five St. Louis led 4-3.
In the top of the sixth Dom DiMaggio drove home two runs with a single and the Red Sox had their lead back, 5-4, although the Cardinals tied it back up at 5-5 when Red Schoendienst tripled home Diering in the bottom of the sixth (yes, six triples for the Cardinals. I had to go lay down for a moment myself). In the top of the seventh Stringer hit his second double of the game and with the help of a Musial error in right field the Red Sox eventually pushed across two runs to take a 7-5 lead. St. Louis scored one more run to make it close, but Mel Parnell held on for the game four win over Harry Brecheen and the series was tied at 2-2, with the road team has won all four games.
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| 1949 World Series Game Fout |
Monday, October 10, 1949 (Game Five)
St. Louis (NL) (H) 3 Boston (AL) 2 (15)
St. Louis didn’t want to go back to Boston at all as they were hoping to close out the 1949 World Series at home but failing that, they really didn't want to go back to Boston down 3-2 in the series. On the other hand, after their 0-2 start, the Red Sox were happy to head back home to finish the series, but their preference was to go back with a 3-2 series lead.
Ron Northey got the scoring started with a solo homerun in the second to give St. Louis a 1-0 lead, but Boston tied the score at 1-1 in the fifth when Al Zarilla drove home Billy Goodman with a two-out double. Boston then took the lead in the top of the eighth when Dom DiMaggio hit a two-out single to score Zarilla, but the Cardinals came right back to tie the score when Stan Musial and Nippy Jones hit back-to-back doubles in the bottom of the inning. And there the score stayed until the bottom of the fifteenth when Tommy Glaviano hit a two-out single to drive home Chuck Diering with the game-winner.
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| 1949 World Series Game Five |
Wednesday, October 12, 1949 (Game Six)
Boston (AL) (H) 13 St. Louis (NL) 3
There were yells of excitement in St. Louis when Enos Slaughter hit a three run homerun in the top of the first, but that excitement died down quickly when Boston responded with a ten-run first. The inning started with a Vern Stephens grand slam and then ended with a Ted Williams three run homerun. No more runs were scored until the eight when Williams and Stephens welcomed Cardinals reliever Gerry Staley into the game by hitting back-to-back homeruns. Joe Dobson picked up his second win of the series as he shrugged off his first inning mistake and held the Cardinals scoreless the rest of the way. This ties the series at 3-3 and sets up the deciding game tomorrow.
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| 1949 World Series Game Six |
Thursday, October 13, 1949 (Game Seven)
Boston (AL) (H) 7 St. Louis (NL) 6 (14)
It's all come down to this. The two best pitchers from the two best teams in a one-game winner take all. Both teams have seen plenty of heroes and heroics all season long and now all series, but in a one-game playoff like this, it isn’t always the biggest stars that shine the brightest. Who will be the hero - or the goat - of the 1949 World Series?
St. Louis didn’t score in the top of the first and then in the bottom half Vern Stephens crushed a three run homerun and the Red Sox fans were ecstatic. Mel Parnell was at his best today and as the innings passed the home team hopefuls started to reach fever pitch. But then in the seventh, the Cardinals came alive as Marty Marion, Del Rice, and Tommy Glaviano hit back-to-back-to-back doubles and regained the lead, 4-3. That lead didn’t last long as Dom DiMaggio drove home Birdie Tebbetts in the bottom half of the inning to knot the score at 4-4.
In the eighth, Nippy Jones doubled and was immediately doubled home by Marty Marion's second double of the day, and the Cardinals led again
The Cardinals regained the lead in the eleventh when Tommy Glaviano reached second on an error by Johnny Pesky and was then singled home by pinch-hitter Ron Northey. This time it was Al Brazle who got the first two outs only to give up yet another homerun to Ted Williams to keep the game going (I needed to go lay down again).
Both teams had their opportunities but there was no scoring in the twelfth and thirteenth, Chuck Stobbs pitched a 1-2-3 top of the fourteenth and then in the bottom half of the inning Vern Stephens blooped a two-out single to keep the inning alive and then Bobby Doerr lined a rocket off the center field wall, allowing Stephens to come all the way around from first with the game-winner.
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| 1949 World Series Game Seven |
Conclusion
Wow! What a series! If this had of actually happened it might be talked about as the greatest World Series. World Series MVP Ted Williams (.433, 10 runs scored, 12 RBI's, six homeruns) hitting not just one, but two homeruns that extended the game and eventually led to a Red Sox World Series win is the kind of thing that books would be written about, documentaries would be produced over, and really would be the one thing that Williams needed that would move up his standing in the discussion of the greatest baseball players of all time.
The advantage St. Louis had over Boston was in the depth of their bullpen, but Cardinals relievers blew two save opportunities, had two losses and finished with a 5.04 ERA. Of course, Stan Musial hitting .185 for the series didn’t help either. The thing that would be remembered in St. Louis would have been the Cardinals hitting six triples in Game Four but still managing to lose a game that would have otherwise given them a 3-1 advantage in the series. Wow! What a series!
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