George Edward "Rube" Waddell was one of the zaniest characters ever to play baseball. The legendary Connie Mack, who saw quite a few cards during his nearly seven decade stint in the majors, once observed that no other screwball he ever saw could hold a candle to Rube. Mack also said that Rube's curveball was the best he'd ever seen. Indeed, Waddell was one of the greatest pitchers in the history of the game. Rube won 191 games in 13 seasons, had four straight 20-win seasons for Mack and the Philadelphia A's, and claimed six consecutive strikeout titles. In 1904 he struck out 349 batters, a record that held for six decades. This biography traces his early life in western Pennsylvania, the fits and starts of his first years in professional baseball, his big years with the A's, and his subsequent fade into obscurity and his early death in a sanatorium on April Fool's Day, 1914.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Pregame
1. Throwing Rocks at the Crows
2. A Cup of Coffee and Off to College
3. Wake Up, Mr. Clarke, I'm Here
4. A Second Cup of Coffee
5. Tiger Rube
6. The Senator from Ohio
7. The Prodigal
8. My New Kentucky Home
9. Back Home
10. Punxsutawney Rube
11. Beer Town
12. Back to the Burgh
13. That Poor Pig
14. World Series
15. Get Him the Hell Off My Ball Team
16. Life in the Big City
17. The Theater Type
18. Last Place
19. The Great Mathewson
20. A Big Toad
21. Loo-Loo Land
22. The Planets Shrink in Fear
23. Goodbye, John McGraw
24. A Blaze to Glory
25. If He Does That Again, I'll...
26. Animal Crackers
27. A Rocky Start
28. Summer of Chaos
29. Unhand That Woman!
30. Coon Hunts and Straight Baseball
31. The Cy Young Series
32. Mardi Gras
33. When the Breaks Fall Your Way
34. Cy Young Again
35. Pennant Drive
36. A Fatal Straw Hat
37. Usual Spring High Jinks
38. Bum Thumb
39. Hitless Wonders
40. Mule Fritters
41. Turkish Bath
42. Oh, That Ty Cobb!
43. Divorce, Rube Style
44. McAleer's Gamble
45. Rube's Gonna Pitch
46. He Who Laughs Last
47. The Browns in a Pennant Race
48. Winter Games
49. Disappointment and Pathos
50. A Fateful Day in Boston
51. New Jersey
52. The Minors 27153. Rube on the Mississippi
54. Minnesota Rube
55. Levees and Whiskey
56. Floods
57. The Crease in His Nose
Postgame
Rube Waddell's Lifetime Statistics
Bibliography
Index
