After going at each other viciously for two years, the established National League and fledgling American League buried the hatchet, at least temporarily, in 1903 — thanks in large part to the owners of the NL’s Pittsburgh club and the AL’s Boston team.
With their clubs apparently headed toward pennants, Pittsburgh’s Barney Dreyfuss and Boston’s Henry Killilea agreed during the 1903 season to stage a best-of-nine postseason playoff for the “world championship.” The accommodation came in the wake of open hostilities — punctuated player raids — that had existed between the National League and American League since the junior’s entry on the major-league scene in 1901.
Dreyfuss’ Pirates appeared to be stellar representatives for the league, whose history dated to 1876. Pittsburgh had third consecutive pennant in ’03. Boston also seemed a worthy competitor in this first modern World Series, having won the AL flag by 14 1/2 games.
In Game 1, Pirates workhorse Deacon Phillippe pitched a six-hitter and right fielder Jimmy Sebring hit the first home run in Series history and drove in four runs as Pittsburgh scored a 7-3 victory. Third baseman Tommy Leach rapped two singles and two triples for the Pirates. Boston evened the Series, though, when Bill Dinneen threw a three-hitter and Patsy Dougherty walloped two homers in a 3-0 triumph.
Phillippe, pressed into heavy duty because of illness and injury to the Pittsburgh pitching staff, came back on just one day of rest to start Game 3. A 25-game winner during the season, Phillippe continued to excel. He allowed only four hits, won 4-2 and, as it turned out, was just getting warmed up. When a travel day and rainout ensued, the Pirates turned to the good Deacon for Game 4 as well. Phillippe met the challenge with a complete-game 54 triumph — Leach knocked in three of the Pirates’ runs, while Honus Wagner and Ginger Beaumont each collected three hits — and Pittsburgh led Boston, three games to one.
Cy Young, 36 years old but a 28-game winner for the 1903 Red Sox (also known as the Pilgrims, Puritans and Americans), was called upon to cool off the Pirates in Game 5 — and did just that. Young yielded only six hits and drove in three runs in an 11-2 runaway. The next day, Dinneen was a 6-3 victor in a game that featured four hits, two RBIs and two stolen bases by the losers’ Beaumont. After six games, it was the Red Sox 3, Phillippe 3.
Having won each time Phillippe had trudged to the mound, Pittsburgh sent the strong-armed righthander against Boston in Game 7. But this wasn’t to be Phillippe’s day. Jimmy Collins, the Red Sox’s playing manager, and Chick Stahl touched him for first-inning triples and Boston bolted to a 2-0 lead en route to a 7-3 triumph. For the first time, the Red Sox had seized the Series lead. Ahead four games to three, Boston would attempt to nail down the championship on its Huntington Avenue Grounds.
The pitching matchup for Game 8 was a beauty — Dinneen against, yes, Deacon Phillippe. Working on two days of rest this time, Phillippe battled Dinneen to a scoreless tie through three innings. After Dinneen blanked Pittsburgh again in the fourth, the Red Sox broke through against the Deacon in their half of the inning. Buck Freeman led off with a triple and Freddy Parent reached base on an error (with Freeman holding third). Candy LaChance then sacrificed Parent to second. Hobe Ferris followed with a single, putting Phillippe and the Pirates in a 2-0 hole.
The hole grew deeper two innings later when LaChance stroked a two-out triple and scored on Ferris’ single.
Phillippe battled on and would up pitching his fifth complete in the Series, which lasted 13 days. But Dinneen bested him in the climactic Game 8, tossing his second shutout of the Series and notching his third victory. The 3-0 decision was the Red Sox’s fourth straight triumph and made the upstart Boston team champion of the First American league-vs. National League World Series.
Dinneen and Young were bellwethers for Boston. Together, they pitched 69 of the 71 innings that Red Sox hurlers totaled in the fall classic. (Tom Hughes lasted two-plus innings as Boston’s third-game starter.) Young, appearing in what would prove his only Series, won two of three decisions for Boston and recorded a 1.59 earned-run average.
With Phillippe, Dinneen and Young dominating play, hitters obviously had a tough time. The Red Sox batted .252 while Pittsburgh, despite the presence of NL batting champion Wagner, hit .237. Wagner hit .222 in the Series, managing only one hit in the final four games. And the rival playing managers, third baseman Collins of Boston and left fielder Fred Clarke of Pittsburgh, drove in one run in a combined 70 at-bats.
Pittsburgh’s Sebring, besides accounting for the first homer in Series history, also led all regulars with a .367 average.
Perhaps the main thing about the 1903 Series, though, was that it at least cooled tempers between baseball’s warring factions. That the upstart American League buried the hatchet squarely in the back of the haughty National League — and did so with fiendish delight — was merely a sidelight.
This article was originally published on TSN
Game Recaps from Retrosheet
1903 World Series Stories
The 1903 Post-Season Games
World Series: Boston Americans (5) defeated Pittsburgh Pirates (3)
World Series Game 1 Played on Thursday, October 1, 1903 (D) at Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
PIT N 4 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 - 7 12 2 BOS A 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 1 - 3 6 4
BOX+PBP WP: Phillippe (1-0) LP: Young (0-1) HR: Sebring (1)
World Series Game 2 Played on Friday, October 2, 1903 (D) at Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
PIT N 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 3 3 BOS A 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 x - 3 8 0
BOX+PBP WP: Dinneen (1-0) LP: Leever (0-1) HR: Dougherty 2 (2)
World Series Game 3 Played on Saturday, October 3, 1903 (D) at Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
PIT N 0 1 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 - 4 7 1 BOS A 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 - 2 4 2
BOX+PBP WP: Phillippe (2-0) LP: Hughes (0-1)
World Series Game 4 Played on Tuesday, October 6, 1903 (D) at Exposition Park III
BOS A 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 - 4 9 1 PIT N 1 0 0 0 1 0 3 0 x - 5 12 1
BOX+PBP WP: Phillippe (3-0) LP: Dinneen (1-1)
World Series Game 5 Played on Wednesday, October 7, 1903 (D) at Exposition Park III
BOS A 0 0 0 0 0 6 4 1 0 - 11 13 2 PIT N 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 - 2 6 4
BOX+PBP WP: Young (1-1) LP: Kennedy (0-1)
World Series Game 6 Played on Thursday, October 8, 1903 (D) at Exposition Park III
BOS A 0 0 3 0 2 0 1 0 0 - 6 10 1 PIT N 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 - 3 10 3
BOX+PBP WP: Dinneen (2-1) LP: Leever (0-2)
World Series Game 7 Played on Saturday, October 10, 1903 (D) at Exposition Park III
BOS A 2 0 0 2 0 2 0 1 0 - 7 11 4 PIT N 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 - 3 10 3
BOX+PBP WP: Young (2-1) LP: Phillippe (3-1)
World Series Game 8 Played on Tuesday, October 13, 1903 (D) at Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
PIT N 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 4 3 BOS A 0 0 0 2 0 1 0 0 x - 3 8 0
BOX+PBP WP: Dinneen (3-1) LP: Phillippe (3-2)
