Eddie Stanky and Alvin Dark complemented one another in the field, just as well they did at bat and on the bases. In 1950, with Stanky at second and Dark at shortstop, the Giants executed 181 double plays in 154 games, close to the-then National League record. That was one more every two games than in 1949 when Buddy Kerr, Bill Rigney and Hank Thompson were playing short and second. Double plays crush rallies and demoralize the team at bat. Stanky was as adept at demoralizing the team at bat when in the field, as at demoralizing the team in the field when at bat.
It wasn’t only the number of double plays, but Stanky’s methods. The most common double play starts with a ground ball to the shortstop, who flips it to the second baseman, who pivots and throws to first. In Stanky Ball a ground ball would be hit to Dark with men at first and second. Dark would flip to Stanky, but instead of throwing to first, Stanky would watch the runner who’d been on second. If he took a turn at third, Stanky would snap a throw there, catch him off third and complete the double play that way. Instead of a man on third with two out, the team at bat would have a man on first with two out. If the next batter got a hit, or the Giants made an error, the run didn’t score. The man caught off third and the third base-coach felt embarrassed and their manager was angry. A few infielders still pull that play today, Omar Vizquel, for example. But Stanky was particularly adept at making the opposing team feel stupid and slow and the Giants feel fast and smart.
Another Stanky Ball double play was letting an infield pop fly drop and hit the ground with a man on first and none or one out. Stanky would watch to see whether the batter who’d popped up was walking to the dugout in disgust or loafing his way to first base. If so, Stanky would let the ball drop, scoop it up as it hit the ground, and throw to first, where Whitey Lockman would tag the baserunner and step on first for yet another demoralizing Stanky Ball double play.
Opposing teams objected when Stanky started doing that and another Stanky-caused special addendum had to be written into the rulebook saying, that if the infielder touched the ball before it hit the ground the batter was out, but if the ball hit the ground before the fielder touched it, the practice was permitted. Stanky did a variant of that practice on soft line drives. He’d make a “best efforts” attempt to catch it, but only succeed in knocking it down. Then he’d snatch it up, flip it to Dark who’d relay it to first for still one more unorthodox double play. Or if there were a fast man on first and a slow runner at bat, Stanky would do it again, knock it down, flip to Dark, who was always there waiting, get the fast runner off the bases and decrease the opposing team’s chances of scoring. Classic Stanky Ball--get on base and score a run any way you could; prevent the other team from getting on base and scoring runs any way you could.
In addition to all their double plays, on September 1st 1951, Stanky and Dark combined on a triple play on a fifth inning line drive hit by Pee Wee Reese, the Dodger’s Hall of Fame shortstop. That was the year the Giants had been thirteen and a half games behind the Dodgers on August 11th and were gaining on them day by day. The Giant win that day cut the dwindling Dodger lead to six games and the two teams finished the year tied for first place.
To decide the National League championship the Giants and Dodgers played a three game series. They split the first two games and in the third game at the Polo Grounds, the Dodgers scored three runs in the eighth inning and were ahead 4-1. Then, in the last half of the ninth, Dark scored on Lockman’s double, Bobby Thomson hit his home run with two men on base and the Giants won the game, the playoffs and the National League pennant.
Thomson was the biggest hero of that most memorable of all baseball pennant races. Monte Irvin was close behind, as were pitchers Larry Jansen, Sal Maglie and Jim Hearn. But faithful old Giant fans, whose team had not won a championship since 1937, will always remember that on August 12th, Eddie Stanky returned to the Giant lineup after an injury that had kept him off second base for a week. In the doubleheader the Giants played and won that day, Stanky walked five times and helped start his team on a Stanky-Ball streak in which they won their next fourteen, thirty-seven of their next forty-four and finished the regular season tied with the Dodgers for first place.
Herb L
oldtimewriter.com
