Baseball Memorabilia

1919 World Series Press Pass<br /><br />The 1919 World Series matched the Chicago White Sox against the Cincinnati Reds. The 1919 World Series was a best-of-nine to increase popularity of the sport and generate more revenue.<br /><br />The series is associated with the Black Sox Scandal, when several members of the White Sox conspired with gamblers to throw World Series games. The 1919 World Series was the last World Series to take place without a Commissioner of Baseball in place. In 1920, the various owners installed Kenesaw Mountain Landis as the first Commissioner.<br /><br />The Chicago White Sox of 1919 were one of baseball's glamour teams. “Shoeless” Joe Jackson was the unchallenged star of the team, but other players including second baseman Eddie Collins and right fielder Nemo Leibold were outstanding as well. Tensions between the players and penny-pinching Sox owner Charles Comiskey. The “fix” was the brainchild of White Sox first baseman Arnold "Chick" Gandil and Joseph "Sport" Sullivan, a professional gambler. Gandil enlisted seven of his teammates, motivated by a mixture of greed and a dislike club owner Comiskey. Sullivan and two associates arranged for the money for the players, who were promised a total of $100,000. <br /><br />All involved were banned from baseball by Commissioner Landis. Starting pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Claude "Lefty" Williams, outfielders "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and Oscar "Happy" Felsch, and infielder Charles "Swede" Risberg were all involved. Buck Weaver was asked to participate, but refused. He was later banned for knowing of the fix but not reporting it. Utility infielder Fred McMullin was not initially approached but got word of the fix and threatened to report the others unless he was in on the payoff.<br /><br />The “Black Sox Scandal” is considered one of the worst chapters in the history of baseball.
1932 Autographed Baseball<br /><br />This baseball was signed by the entire team of the ’32 New York Yankees. A record nine future Hall of Famers played on the team (Earle Combs, Bill Dickey, Lou Gehrig, Lefty Gomez, Tony Lazzeri, Herb Pennock, Red Ruffing, Babe Ruth, Joe Sewell).<br /><br />This was the season of Babe Ruth’s “called shot”, during Game 3 of the 1932 World Series. Coming up to bat, Ruth made a pointing gesture, which existing film confirms, to the center field bleachers. On the next pitch, Ruth hit a home run to center field. The Yankees went on to sweep the Chicago Cubs for the World Series.
Yankee Checklist<br /><br />Though this 1984 “Yankees Checklist” was signed by Billy Martin, and he is listed as Manager, the Yankee skipper for that year was Yogi Berra. <br /><br />The volatile Martin managed the Yankees on numerous occasions including 1983 and 1985, but never in 1984.<br /><br />The New York Yankees' 1984 season was the 82nd season for the Yankees. The team finished in third place in the American League Eastern Division with a record of 87-75, finishing 17 games behind the Detroit Tigers.
Harry Caray was a broadcaster on radio and television. He covered four Major League Baseball teams, beginning with a long tenure calling the games of the St. Louis Cardinals, then the Oakland Athletics (for one year) and the Chicago White Sox (for eleven years), before ending his career as the announcer for the Chicago Cubs.<br /><br />His famous seventh-inning stretch singing of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" began during his tenure with the White Sox. Habitually singing the song in the broadcast booth Caray was doing it one afternoon when radio producer/broadcaster Jay Scott decided to open the booth mikes on him without his realizing it. For the rest of his career, Caray enthusiastically led the song's singing during the seventh-inning stretch, using a hand-held microphone and holding it out outside the booth window.For the lyrics "One, Two, Three, strikes you're out...." Harry would usually hold the microphone out to the crowd to punctuate the climactic end of the song. <br /><br />After Harry’s death, the Cubs began a practice of inviting guest celebrities to lead the singing Caray-style. The use of "guest conductors" continues to this day.
Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who served as a federal judge, became the first commissioner of organized baseball in November of 1920. His appointment by the owners was an attempt to restore public confidence in the sport following the 1919 Black Sox Scandal. <br /><br />Landis said that he would accept only an appointment as sole commissioner. He demanded unlimited authority to act in the "best interests of baseball"--in essence, his decisions could not be appealed. The owners, trying to overcome the public perception that the sport was crooked, readily agreed.<br /><br />Landis' first act was to deal with the Black Sox scandal. He banned for life eight players suspected of involvement in the fix, including superstar Shoeless Joe Jackson.Over the years, he dealt harshly with others proven to have thrown individual games, consorted with gamblers or engaged in actions that he felt tarnished the image of the game. Landis ruled baseball with an iron hand for the next 25 years. Though considered “the baseball tyrant” by many, baseball historians regard Landis as the right man at the right time.<br /><br />Landis perpetuated the color line and prolonged the segregation of organized baseball. His successor, Happy Chandler, said, "For twenty-four years Judge Landis wouldn't let a black man play. I had his records, and I read them, and for twenty-four years Landis consistently blocked any attempts to put blacks and whites together on a big league field." The signing of the first black ballplayer in the modern era, Jackie Robinson, came less than a year after Landis's death on Chandler's watch.<br /><br />Landis was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1944, in a special election held one month after his death, and the Most Valuable Player Award in each league is officially known as the Kenesaw Mountain Landis Award in his honor
1919 World Series Press Pass

The 1919 World Series matched the Chicago White Sox against the Cincinnati Reds. The 1919 World Series was a best-of-nine to increase popularity of the sport and generate more revenue.

The series is associated with the Black Sox Scandal, when several members of the White Sox conspired with gamblers to throw World Series games. The 1919 World Series was the last World Series to take place without a Commissioner of Baseball in place. In 1920, the various owners installed Kenesaw Mountain Landis as the first Commissioner.

The Chicago White Sox of 1919 were one of baseball's glamour teams. “Shoeless” Joe Jackson was the unchallenged star of the team, but other players including second baseman Eddie Collins and right fielder Nemo Leibold were outstanding as well. Tensions between the players and penny-pinching Sox owner Charles Comiskey. The “fix” was the brainchild of White Sox first baseman Arnold "Chick" Gandil and Joseph "Sport" Sullivan, a professional gambler. Gandil enlisted seven of his teammates, motivated by a mixture of greed and a dislike club owner Comiskey. Sullivan and two associates arranged for the money for the players, who were promised a total of $100,000.

All involved were banned from baseball by Commissioner Landis. Starting pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Claude "Lefty" Williams, outfielders "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and Oscar "Happy" Felsch, and infielder Charles "Swede" Risberg were all involved. Buck Weaver was asked to participate, but refused. He was later banned for knowing of the fix but not reporting it. Utility infielder Fred McMullin was not initially approached but got word of the fix and threatened to report the others unless he was in on the payoff.

The “Black Sox Scandal” is considered one of the worst chapters in the history of baseball.