Ty Cobb

Ty Cobb
Outfielder
Born: December 18, 1886 Narrows , United States
Died on: July 17, 1961 Atlanta , United States
Suggested: Left	Threw: Right
Debut in Major League Baseball
August 30,  1905  with the  Detroit Tigers
Last MLB assignment
September 11,  1928  with the  Philadelphia Athletics
MLB statistics (until end of career)
Batting average	.376
Hits	4.189
Runs Batted In	1.939
Home runs	117
Teams
Detroit Tigers (1905-1926) Philadelphia Athletics (1927-1928)
Awards
Chalmers Award (MVP) 1911 Major League Baseball All-Century Team
member of
Baseball Hall of Fame
Recorded	1936
Quota	98.2%

Tire "Ty" Raymond Cobb (born December 18, 1886 in Narrows , Georgia , † July 17, 1961 in Atlanta , Georgia) was an American baseball player and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). His nickname was The Georgia Peach .

Life

Early years

Ty Cobb was born in Narrows, Georgia, the oldest of three children. His father, who bought a farm to supplement his teacher's salary, was a respected man who was also elected to the Georgia Senate. Ty was already playing baseball with teams in Royston, Georgia (Royston Rompers and the semi-professional Royston Reds) when he was away from his home farm. Although his father wished that Ty should have a job as a lawyer or doctor, but agreed when he aged 17 years with a team from the South Atlantic League in Augusta in minor league baseball wanted to play. With this team he was taken out of the squad in 1904 after two days in the season. Cobb was then with the Anniston Steelers in the Tennessee Alabama League. During the season he returned to Augusta. In August 1905 he led the league on average . It was then sold to the Detroit Tigers in the American League for $ 750 .

Shortly before Ty's first appearance, Cobbs' father was killed. He suspected his wife of infidelity and explained to her on August 8, 1905 that he was leaving the city for that day. In the evening he wanted to see whether his allegations were true. He climbed the roof to watch his wife's bedroom. This mistaken him for a burglar and fired two shots at him, which killed him. Ty's mother was charged with manslaughter and acquitted.

Major League

Ty Cobb in 1917

On August 30, 1905 , Cobb made his debut with the Tigers against the New York Highlanders . Against Jack Chesbro he managed a double in his first punch. In another 41 games he came to a batting average of 24%. Despite these not outstanding values, he got a contract for the following season, which was endowed with 1500 $. In 1906 the outfielder then indicated his punching qualities. In 91 games he came to a batting average of 32%. That was a brand that would never undercut Ty for the rest of his career. In 1907 he was the youngest player to win the title for the player with the best batting average.

That year, the Tigers fought a four-way battle for the title with the Chicago White Sox , the Cleveland Indians and the Philadelphia Athletics . The White Sox and the Indians lost the connection towards the end of the season, so the decision for the title fell between the Tigers and the A's. Both teams faced each other in the last series of the season. A double header in Philadelphia was planned for September 30th. In the first game, Philadelphia, directed by Connie Mack, was already 7-1 ahead. Ty Cobb was able to equalize the game in the 8th inning to 8: 8 with a 2-run home run . In the 11th inning Cobb was able to put his team in the lead with a double, which Philadelphia was able to equalize. In the 17th inning the game was abandoned due to darkness and the result was a tie, the second planned encounter was never played. Because of this tie, the Tigers secured victory in the American League and moved into the 1907 World Series against the Chicago Cubs . Cobb came in the World Series, however, only to a batting average of 20%, the Tigers clearly defeated with four defeats and one draw.

With a batting average of 35%, 212 hits, 116 RBI and 49 stolen bases, he led the American League in four categories. In terms of batting average, Cobb was always the best in its league for the next 8 years, a record that still exists today. In September 1907, Cobb had also started a collaboration with Coca-Cola that would make him a wealthy man for the rest of his life.

In 1908 and 1909 the Tigers also reached the World Series, but were again subject to the Cubs in 1908. Cobb increased his performance and batting average in the finals to 35%. In 1909 Cobb had won the Triple Crown , i. that is, he was best in the batting average, RBI and home runs categories . In the World Series, Cobb, the outstanding player of the American League, and Honus Wagner of the Pittsburgh Pirates , the superstar of the National League, met each other. The Pirates had the upper hand in seven games. In August there was an incident between Cobb, feared by his aggressive style of play and heated temperament, and Frank Baker . Cobb had slipped to 3rd base with his sharpened spikes and slashed Baker on the upper arm. Baker continued to play, but Connie Mack called Cobb "the dirtiest baseball player he has ever seen." Before the return matches in Philadelphia, there were death threats against Cobb, which resulted in police protection for him on the way to and from the stadium and during the game.

In 1910, the car company Chalmers Automobile offered a car as a prize for the player with the best batting average. Cobb led just ahead of Cleveland's Nap Lajoie on the final day of the season . Ty Cobb skipped the last game so as not to lower his average. Lajoie, on the other hand, scored seven hits in a double header against the St. Louis Browns . Six of these hits were colorful singles, which the 3rd baseman of the Browns could not achieve due to his position far from the base. American League President Ban Johnson then declared Cobb the controversial winner in this category. The car company solved this problem in a more Solomonic way and gave everyone a car. After this season, they made their automobile award available to the most valuable player in the league, and the MVP Award was born.

In 1911, Cobb set a new record in the American League with hits in 41 consecutive games. In the battle for the title of best batsman, Cobb fought a tough battle with Shoeless Joe Jackson . Towards the end of the season, the Tigers met Cleveland. In these six games Jackson tried to be friendly to Cobb, who ignored all attempts of his opponent. In the end, Cobb was the winner with 42% against Jackson, who also had a great batting average with 40.8%.

During this season, Cobb provided plenty of material for discussion. In a game against the Yankees, there was controversy with the referee on the part of the Yankees. Since all the Yankees field players had gathered around the catcher and the referee, but no one had asked for a time-out, Cobb walked to 3rd base and then to the home plate and scored the winning run. In a series against players from the Negro Leagues in Cuba, Cobb stated that he would never again play a team of colored players. On May 15, 1912, a spectator in New York Cobb excited so much that he jumped from the bench to the audience and beat the spectator. Cobb was then suspended, but his teammates declared their solidarity with him and refused to play at the next game in Philadelphia. Since the league threatened with a fine of $ 5,000, Frank Navin , the manager of the Tigers, put on a team of amateur and college players who lost 2:24. Some of baseball's negative records came from this game. u. a. the 24 runs that the unfortunate pitcher Allan Travers got against him. That first baseball strike then ended when Cobb asked his colleagues to return to the field.

Cobb was also the first professional athlete to star in a movie. In Somewhere in Georgia he practically played himself, the story of a bank clerk who discovered his talent for baseball.

In 1916 Cobb lost for the first time in the race for the best batting average since 1907. Tris Speaker of the Cleveland Indians achieved 38.7%, while Cobb only got 37%.

Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb 1920

With Babe Ruth a new opponent arose for Cobb, who also stood for a different kind of baseball game. While Cobb worked with bunts, stolen bases and targeted singles, Ruth belonged to a new generation who could beat the balls out of the stadiums with a lot of force and let the number of home runs increase. The audience was also fascinated by this new variety. But even people like the manager of the Yankees, Miller Huggins or Tris Speaker continued to favor the way Cobb played. As Speaker said, “Babe was a great baseball player, but Ty was a great one. Ruth could knock your brain out, but Cobb drove you completely crazy. ”However, Cobb became more and more hostile to Ruth, the more his popularity grew. On May 5, 1925, Cobb, who had also been a manager at the Tigers since 1921, decided to prove that anyone who wants can hit home runs. He told a reporter that it was the first time that he would hit the ball over the fences. In this game, he actually got six hits in six chances to hit: two singles, one double and three home runs. The next day he got three hits, two of which were home runs. After this series he returned to his usual game.

Cobb in Philadelphia

After 22 years, Ty Cobb announced his resignation in November 1926. He returned to Augusta. Shortly afterwards, Tris Speaker, who had also acted as manager and player in Cleveland, resigned. The resignation had been launched by Ban Johnson as they were both suspected of rigging a game in September 1919 to secure third place for the Tigers. Dutch Leonard , a player who had both been fired, had brought these allegations to the public. However, neither Kenesaw Mountain Landis as commissioner nor the public agreed to these resignations, allowing both of them to return to baseball. Their respective teams declared them free agents , which meant that the changes were free to them. Cobb moved to the Philadelphia Athletics, which were still under the direction of Connie Mack. Speaker played for the Washington Senators in 1927 before playing with Cobb in Philadelphia in 1928. On July 18, 1927, Cobb scored his 4,000th hit as a baseball player in the Major Leagues at Navin Field in Detroit. After the 1928 season, Cobb finally announced his resignation. Notable in his final season was another game against the Yankees, in which thirteen eventual members of the Baseball Hall of Fame were on the field. Besides Cobb, Speaker and Ruth, Jimmie Foxx , Lefty Grove , Mickey Cochrane , Eddie Collins , Bill Dickey , Lou Gehrig , Waite Hoyt , Earle Combs , Herb Pennock and Tony Lazzeri also played .

After baseball

Cobb resigned from baseball as a wealthy but very lonely man. He dedicated himself to hunting, fishing and playing golf, and traveled extensively. He increased his wealth by speculating on stocks. In 1931, he bought a ranch in a millionaire's neighborhood near San Francisco . He wasn’t on the best of terms with his wife or children. Most of all, he was disappointed that his sons didn't become baseball players. In 1947, his wife divorced him after 39 years of marriage.

The Baseball Hall of Fame was introduced in 1936 . With 98.2% of the vote, Cobb left Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson behind, all of whom had also received the required 75% of the vote in the first year. Only Tom Seaver 1992 and Nolan Ryan 1999 received a larger number of votes.

Cobb then helped young players such as Joe DiMaggio, among others . He also became friends with Ted Williams , which Cobb ended when he claimed that Rogers Hornsby was a bigger batsman than him. A second marriage that Cobb entered failed as well. He donated a hospital called the Cobb Memorial Hospital to the town of Royston, where he grew up . With John McCallum he wrote a biography that appeared in 1956 and contained many half-truths and falsehoods that McCallum had never checked. Upon returning to Georgia, Cobb was diagnosed with prostate cancer, diabetes, and high blood pressure. He died on July 17, 1961 in the Atlanta hospital. Only three of his old teammates ( Ray Schalk , Mickey Cochrane and Nap Rucker ), Sid Keener of the Baseball Hall of Fame, and his first wife and surviving children and children-in-law attended his funeral . Cobb had made many enemies in his lifetime.

The Detroit Tigers have immortalized his name on the wall of Comerica Fields , as no shirt numbers were common when Cobb was playing.

Cobb's sporting fame is overshadowed by the fact that he was accused of racism and violent attacks on black people. Upon closer research, all of these rumors can be traced back to the journalist Al Stump, who circulated all these allegations after Cobb's death and was successfully sued several times for these defamations.

His stations as a player

• 1905-1926 Detroit Tigers
• 1927-1928 Philadelphia Athletics

His stations as a manager

• 1921-1926 Detroit Tigers

Web links

Commons : Ty Cobb  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Player information and statistics from Baseball Reference  or  Fangraphs  or  The Baseball Cube  or  Baseball Reference (Minor League) (English)
• Data as a manager (English)
• Biography of Ty Cobb (English)
• Ty Cobb in the Hall of Fame (English)
• Author says Cobb's reputation built on tales (May 17, 2016)
• Interview with Ty Cobb in the 1930s (English)