It was a beautiful May afternoon in Chicago with great weather for a ballgame. The weather was warm with a light breeze, a perfect spring day in the city of Chicago. The Cubs were playing an afternoon baseball game. It was 30 minutes before the game and Len and Bob, the Cubs announcers, were getting ready to do their pregame. It was the beginning of May and the Cubs were on a winning streak holding a tight lead for first in the central division, but the injuries were starting to take their toll on the Cubs. Ramirez the third baseman had a pulled shoulder and would be out for four to six weeks. Zambrano had pulled a hamstring, he would be out for about the same amount of time. Even though the Cubs were still hitting and their offense was still strong there were a few weak spots, but the Cubs were 16 and 8 holding a 1-game lead for first place.  Ryan Larson’s won/lost record so far was 4 and 0, 3 of those games being won at Wrigley Field.

Amy was listening intently to the Cubs pregame when her editor walked to her desk humming “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” She smiled and asked him what he wanted as if it was an inconvenience for her to talk to her boss. It kind of was because the Cubs game was on.  He said to her. “You know your piece about the last great championship team was good. We got a lot of letters because of it. “

“Glad everybody liked it.” Amy replied.

“I think you should write another one. People identify with you writing about your family and you are the best person for it because after all they are your family.”

“I thought this was going to be a one-time piece because it’s the 100^th anniversary since the Cubs’ last championship.”

“At first I thought it would be, but people liked it and they want more. And… we could use more sales.”

“I don’t want to exploit my family and what this year is.”

“No one is asking you to, and I’m not even telling you to. Write about your favorite stories of your family and the Cubs. You know the ones that most people don’t know about.”

Amy smirked at her editor. “You do want me to keep writing about my family and it’s not a little exploitation?”

“Well maybe it is, but I believe in giving our readers what they want because after all they buy our paper and advertise in it thus keeping us in business.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Talk about the Cubs’ near misses in the World Series.”

“That’s not depressing or anything.”

Her editor let out a small laugh and said. “You’re still seeing that lawyer from Texas, right, write about what you’ve been telling him about your family. I’m sure there’s a few interesting stories in there.”

Amy smiled at him and then paused. She was thinking of a good story, one that most people probably didn’t know about. Finally it came to her. It was the untold story of the 1938 World Series. She thought of the story about her great grandfather George Larson punching out two Yankee fans and the great Dizzy Dean. It was a story she hadn’t even told Chris yet, but she would that night over dinner.

The 1938 season for the Cubs was another heartbreaker, but more so for George Larson, the son of the Paul Larson who had played on the 1907 and 1908 championship seasons. He was just like his father, same build, same athletic skill, and he could play every position. He had come up with the Cubs in 1936 and after two seasons had proven to be an all-star player. It was probably his batting skill that did it for him. He had never battered below 300 just like his father. If he had any downside as a player it was his temper. George had a passion for the game and he hated to lose – he never took losing well.

1938 was a year much like 1908. The Cubs started out slow and would compete for first all the way to the last day of the season with Pittsburg. The Cubs played the Pirates for the last games of the season and barely pulled out a victory to get to the World Series. George was stunning in that series, but it wasn’t enough to get the Cubs over the top. In the last game against the Pirates while tied at five it took Gabby Hartnett’s “Homer in the Gloamin’” in the bottom of the ninth to win the game for the Cubs and send them to the World Series. The reason it was called “Homer in the Gloamin’” was because Wrigley didn’t have any lights back then and the sun was beginning to settle to the point that dusk was setting in when Gabby Hartnett stepped up to the plate and hit a home run into the bleachers, or at least that’s what the players and umpires thought. Nobody could see the ball because of not having enough light at the end of the field nor could they find it so it was ruled a home run as Hartnett ran the bases to home plate. Because of that play George’s performance in that series against the Pirates was overshadowed, but he was clearly the best offensive player of that series going 11 for 16 with two home runs and 9 RBIs. He would match that kind of play in the World Series, but it would be overlooked because they were playing the New York Yankees. The Yankees of 1938 were led by Joe DiMaggio and Lou Gehrig followed by other stars such as Gomez, Dickey and Ruffing. They were the best team in baseball and most people on the Cubs knew it. Of course the Cubs played well, but they were no match for the Yankees and it only took four games for the Cubs to lose the World Series.

George Larson had similar numbers for the Cubs in the ‘38 series as he did at the end of the season against the Pirates – he was the only bright spot the Cubs had even though the Cubs had the great Dizzy Dean pitching for them, but that wasn’t even enough for the Cubs to compete with the Yankees. Dizzy Dean had been acquired by the Cubs in 1937 after he had had a long and all-star career with the St. Louis Browns, but by the time Cubs got him his arm was shot and his career pretty much over. Everybody knew it, but P.K. Wrigley, the Cubs owner, didn’t see it that way and paid nearly 100,000 dollars, big money at the time, to get him. The way he saw it was that Dizzy could at least put fans in the seat because, well after all, he was Dizzy Dean. He was right, fans did come to see him, but that didn’t help the Cubs in their quest for another World Series.

George honestly thought the Cubs could beat the Yankees and he was about the only one who thought that even on the Cubs team. Part of it was a sense of being young and naïve while being truly competitive. He wanted to win no matter what and always played the hardest in order to win. He hadn’t been around long enough in the big leagues to understand that some teams are just plain better than yours and there’s nothing you can do to win. None of that stopped him from playing hard in the series and giving the Cubs plenty of chances to win a game.  Larson went 8 for 14 in the Series and he hit two home runs, but the thing that killed the Cubs and won it for the Yankees was pitching. The Cubs had some decent pitchers, but the Yankees had better pitchers and the Cubs also relied on Dizzy Dean whose fastball had long since disappeared.

The first game that Dizzy pitched and couldn’t produce got a violent reaction from Larson who was playing in the infield for the World Series. Even though he could play 7 or 8 positions he mostly played the outfield because of his throwing arm and speed, but for the series they needed him in the infield. Late in the game when Dizzy was getting lit up by Yankee batters George did something that he had never done before. He actually cursed at one of his players for lousy playing. He knew Dizzy could do better and after four runs had scored in the 6^th inning George walked over to the mound to have words with Dizzy. It was unprofessional and caused a delay in the game. He even got a warning from the umpire that if he continued he would be thrown out of the game. George ignored all of that and yelled at Dizzy.

“What the hell Dizzy…where’s the hard stuff?”

“Get back on second,” Dizzy replied. “I don’t need some rookie telling me how to play.”

“I’m not a rookie, been with the team for two years.”

“Then quit acting like one. Let me pitch.”

“I’ll let you pitch when you start pitching like ‘Dizzy Dean’ and not some woman who just picked up the ball for the first time.”

Dizzy got into George’s face and bumped him a little bit. Then he said to him. “If you don’t get back to second, I’m gonna wallop you.”

“Just try it Dean and see what happens.”

By that time the manager came to mound to see what was going on. One of the radio announcers commented, “Well folks you don’t see that every day, one of your own teammates threatening if you don’t pitch better.” The Cubs manager got in between George and Dizzy before they started fighting.  He told Dizzy to focus on the game and he told George to get back to second and mind his own game or he would be out of this one. George responded back. “Well either he starts pitching better or you put me in because I know that I can do better.” Dizzy tried to come after George and hit him when he said that, but he was stopped by the manager before anything could happen. Any normal manager especially in the modern game would have pulled the pitcher and gotten someone from the bullpen, but that didn’t happen here. Dizzy was left in for another inning before he was pulled. After the last home run was hit off Dizzy Dean he solemnly walked backed to the dugout but yelled over to the Yankees dugout on his way and replied, “If I had had my fastball this would have never happened.” Quite a few Yankees including DiMaggio and Gehrig nodded in agreement. Finally Dizzy Dean was pulled and the Cubs manager decided that since there was no way they were coming back to win this game in the last two innings he would put George Larson in as a relief pitcher. He had pitched before in semi pro ball and had fared pretty well.  George was shocked to say the least. After a moment’s pause, not believing what the manager had just said, he grabbed his glove and headed for the mound. The manager shouted to him as he ran out to the mound, “Let’s see if your mouth can pitch any better.” They were all in for a surprise.

George Larson had a unique talent for pitching that no one really knew about except for the boys back in Iowa. It must have been something that he inherited from his uncle. While the Cubs were a little surprised at his ability to throw strikes and get people out it was the Yankees who were even more baffled. In the eighth inning he faced the bottom of the lineup and they went three up and three down. The first two batters he struck out on 8 pitches. The third took a little longer because he kept fouling off pitches, but he finally got him out when the Yankee batter hit a line drive right over Larson’s head and he somehow managed to catch it by sticking his glove up and ducking his head. It was as lucky a catch for anybody else, but George Larson was one of the best defensemen to play the game and rarely let anything get by him.

As the Cubs were walking back to dugout the Yankee skipper shouted back to Gabby Hartnett the Cubs manager, “Gabby, you should have put this guy in instead of Dizzy…you might have actually won the game.” Nobody on the Cubs team seemed to disagree. After the next three batters for the Cubs were went down at the beginning of the inning the last of the 9^th inning was finally here. Larson was sent back out to pitch and he was going to face the heart of the Yankees lineup, DiMaggio and Gehrig. While he wouldn’t strike everybody out and the Yankees would even get a hit off him, getting a man on base, he was still spectacular on the mound. The first two batters went down on strikes. Larson, who had never really learned to throw a curve, found one of the deadliest in the game. Nobody could hit it, not even DiMaggio. Smokin’ Joe would get on base after having swung over two of Larson’s curveballs, but it was only because the Cubs shortstop bobbled the ball and committed an error to what should have been an easy out.  Larson would face Gehrig next and it took only one pitch to make him pop up the ball for an out to the end the game. The Cubs may have lost, but they discovered a relief pitcher in Larson and another deadly weapon on the mound.  He truly could play all positions.

They didn’t use him the next game even though they should have because he was needed in the infield and it wouldn’t make a difference anyway. The Yankees had the third game won by the fourth inning, although George Larson did get his second homerun of the series to help the Cubs in their cause to win the game. The Cubs would lose by eight runs in game three.  Game four should have been different for the Cubs, they should have had a different game plan, and it was like they had already lost. Dizzy Dean started the game and once upon a time that would have guaranteed a victory, but the Cubs were never that lucky in those days. Many wanted George Larson to start because at that point they really had nothing lose, but he was needed in the infield. Dizzy started out good for the first two innings holding the Yankees to four hits and only one run, but he couldn’t hold it for any longer. The third inning was brutal. The Yankees scored five runs and when Dizzy should have been pulled he was left in the game.

The fourth inning was when the wheels came off for the Cubs, as if it could get any worse. They still kept Dizzy in the game when he should have been pulled. Many of the Cubs players wanted Larson to pitch the rest of the game so they might actually have a chance to win. Dizzy gave up two hits and allowed a man on first and third. He wasn’t even trying to use trick pitches, things like the changeup or screwball. He kept trying the fast ball that had disappeared long ago. George Larson had finally had it. Dizzy may had given up on the game and the series on the mound, but he hadn’t. He was too much of a competitor and giving up or losing wasn’t something he could do especially if someone wasn’t even trying anymore.  After Dizzy gave up third hit allowing another run with no outs in the inning Larson threw down his glove and stomped off towards the pitcher’s mound cursing at Dizzy. No one could believe it, a teammate marching off to hit one of his own teammates for not playing well and much less a second time in three days. Even the sports announcer commented, “Here we go again, George Larson is off to the mound to have words with the great Dizzy Dean.” The announcer was a little excited and his calming voice seem to disappear – the same calming voice that sounded like a father who knew best when he address the United States on TV as the President of the country fifty years later. The other announcer said.  “Ronny, don’t get too agitated, it will just be a small argument before they pull Larson for bad sportsmanship.” The announcer was right about one thing, Larson would get ejected, but not for having words with Dizzy.

George Larson charged up to the mound cursing at Dizzy Dean for not playing hard and for throwing the same lousy pitches over and over. Everything in the game seemed to stop and players on both benches were on their feet waiting to see what would happen, but mainly waiting to see if both teams were going to end up fighting on the field. This was an unusual circumstance because usually a member of the opposing team would was the one that charged the pitcher’s mound. As Larson was walking up to the mound Dizzy shouted at him.

“George, get your ass back to second, I’m the one pitching.”

“Then start acting like a pitcher and not a tall pile of shit.”

Dizzy pushed Larson back when he stepped on the mound and said. “Screw you rube, this is my game not yours. Quit acting like a whiny child.”

Larson didn’t even say anything he just charged Dizzy and pushed him down sitting on top of him and hitting him in the face. Dizzy got a few licks in before George was pulled off of him by Gabby Hartnett and some of the other players. They separated Dizzy and George, but George was hard to contain and kept trying to get at Dizzy. He was hard to hold because he was 6’3” and weighed a solid 225 lb. George kept shouting back at Dizzy, “Come back here you chicken shit.”

Dizzy didn’t do anything except try and keep away from George. Gabby kept saying to Larson, “He’s not worth it and there are eight other guys out here who are losing this game as well.”

Larson replied back. “But he’s the only one deliberately giving the game to the Yankees.”

After that enough was an enough, the umpire threw George Larson out of the game and Gabby told him to hit the showers. While walking away George picked up his glove and threw it at Dizzy hitting him in the side of the face with it – it was the best pitch of the entire game. As fans were yelling at George while he was walking off the Yankee players shouted insults to him as he walked into the visitor’s club house, all except Gehrig, he was too nice for that. George Larson got cleaned up and walked out of Yankee Stadium. It was the last time the Cubs would play there in the post season and George Larson left a dark cloud over the house that Ruth built. While walking out he didn’t turn around to look back at the stadium, he couldn’t bring himself to. He did however find a tavern across the street and attempted to console himself with a bottle of Canadian whiskey, remnants of prohibition when good Canadian whiskey was smuggled over the border around Niagara Falls.

Dizzy was kept in the game for another inning before he was finally done and by that time the game was already over. The Cubs did try to spur on a comeback scoring four runs in the 7^th and 8^th innings, but it wasn’t enough. The Cubs lost game four and were swept by the Yankees in four games. The city of New York seemed to erupt in a million strong celebrations including the patrons in the tavern that George Larson was hiding in while consoling himself with whiskey. Everybody in the bar stood up and cheered as the announcer over the radio said with great enthusiasm, “The Yankees have done, they are the World Champs.” Everybody cheered except Larson. A couple of the patrons took notice of this as Larson was sitting in the corner with his bottle and small glass.

They walked over and asked George why he wasn’t cheering and he told him that he just wanted to be left alone. They asked him if he was a Yankees fan or a Chicago fan. He replied again that he didn’t want to talk to them, but that’s when one of the gentlemen recognized him and shouted so that everybody in the tavern could hear, he was George Larson, the player that got thrown out of the game for hitting his own pitcher. Larson was in no mood and told them to shut up, but the two gentlemen started laughing and calling him names – that got everybody in the tavern making comments about Larson as well. Finally he had had enough, he leaped out of his chair and punched one of the guys standing before him and then he sucker punched the other one in the stomach when he wasn’t paying attention. That’s when three or four other patrons came after George for starting a fight in the tavern. Larson took all of them on and since he was big it wasn’t that easy to get him down. He got a few licks in and roughed up quite a few guys before someone hit him with a whiskey bottle breaking it over his head. It stopped George a little bit but he still kept throwing punches and nailing a few of the patrons in the process. The bartender and a few guys finally got him out of the tavern and roughed him up pretty good outside of the bar. All in all George had a couple of black eyes, a couple of broken ribs, and was bleeding from the nose — that was broken too.

Some of the other Cubs players found him across the street trying to stop the bleeding from his nose and they quickly gathered him up and got him to the train station where the Cubs were leaving to go home. News had already gotten around that George Larson after punching out Dizzy Dean during the game also tried to take out a few Yankee fans after he was tossed from the game. Some of the players thought it was funny because it just proved how much of a competitor he really was, but Gabby Hartnett, the Cubs manager was furious and didn’t know if he wanted someone like Larson on the team for next year.

The truth was George Larson was a fiery competitor and he hated to lose. He was always the one guy on the team that would do anything to win. And that also meant hitting one of his own teammates if it meant he wasn’t playing his best or was trying to give the game away as in the case of the great Dizzy Dean. But what was sadder than that was he was still young and didn’t know who the better team was or when his was outclassed. Larson wouldn’t even accept such a thing if his team wasn’t that team and as far as he was concerned the team he played on was the best team around. Maybe that is just the sense of being young and an athlete, but sometimes a small few are blessed with such wonderful delusions.

As Amy was finishing the story Chris asked her. “What happened to your great-grandfather after that? Seems to me that’s the kind of thing that teams do not look too favorably upon.”

“No,” she replied back. “P.K. Wrigley was mad as hell and during the offseason started to see who would be interested in George Larson. He didn’t want a player like that no matter how good he was.”

“Did they trade him?”

“A few months later they almost had a deal with the New York Giants, but one phone call convinced P.K. that the Cubs needed a player like that.”

“Who made that call, some famous player like his father Paul Larson?”

“No, actually, it was Charlie Grimm, the Cubs former manager the year before. He told P.K. that he was ready to come back as the Cubs manager and if he did one of the conditions was George Larson remained on the team and that they retire Dizzy Dean. P.K. Wrigley had a lot of respect for Grimm and anything he wanted he pretty much got.”

“Sounds like a hell of a manager.”

“He was, he kept the Cubs winning which brought people to the ballpark and that’s what really made P.K. happy. So of course he could pretty much get what he wanted. Besides he was right, my great-grandfather was exactly what the Cubs needed and the sad truth was Dizzy Dean was done in baseball. And that made him disappear.”

Chris smiled as he poured Amy another glass of wine. He said to her. “My father always told me that the true champion was the one who had the right heart — he gave all that he had during the battle and if he was going to lose he would go down fighting. Those guys are rare because they only come along so often.”

Amy paused for a moment taking in everything Chris had just said. He was right and so she thought about all the stories she had been told of George Larson trying to win the game all on his own. Then she remembered that he was one of the brighter moments for the Cubs during the 40’s and early 50’s.

Chris asked Amy what happened with the story after that. She chuckled to herself and said. “He became a legend — the man who hit Dizzy Dean and tried to take on Yankee fans. As a result he always had death threats when he went to New York, but then the Cubs played the Dodgers and the Giants, they never took him lightly, and nobody ever took a swing at him. “

Chris laughed and said. “Sounds like it was a legend that never died!”

Amy grabbed his hand from across the table to let Chris know that he had no idea what he was getting himself into with her family. The she said. “You have no idea, but that’s the way it tends to be with my family. However, that’s a story for another time.”