The fortunes of one of these teams would change in 1935, a year in which the fall classic matched Charley Grimm’s Cubs — winners of 21 consecutive games in September — against a Detroit team that had won the American League pennant for the second straight year.
By the time the late stages of Game 6 of the 1935 World Series rolled around, there was little clue as to which club would shake off its postseason funk and which would endure more agony. The Cubs were trailing in the Series, three games to two, but this contest was knotted at 3-3 in the top of the ninth and Chicago’s Stan Hack was perched on third base with no one out. Hack had just tripled off Detroit curveballer Tommy Bridges, driving the ball over the head of center fielder Gee Walker.
Bridges, whose 21 victories paced the Detroit pitching staff ’35, was in an unenviable — but not hopeless — situation. While the potential Series-tying run was 90 feet down the third-base line, Bridges wasn’t going against the heart of the Cubs’ order. Instead, eighth-place hitter Billy Jurges, pitcher Larry French and leadoff man Augie Galan were due up.
Bridges was up to the challenge. First, he struck out Jurges. Then, he induced French to ground back to the mound, with Hack holding third. And finally he got Galan to fly out. Whatever the threesome the Cubs had sent to the plate, it was a textbook piece of clutch pitching.
Now the Tigers could win it — not only the game, but their first World Series — with a run in the last of the ninth. After French struck out Flea Clifton, Mickey Cochrane slapped a single off second baseman Billy Herman’s glove and the Tigers’ manager/catcher advanced to second on Gehringer’s groundout. Goose Goslin, who had performed so admirably for the Washington Senators in World Series competition, who had delivered the 12th-inning hit that won Game 2 of the ’34 Series for Detroit, was up next. Goslin, in what would be his 129th and last at-bat in World Series play, banged a single to right field and Cochrane scored from second with the decisive run.
Detroit — the team and the city — went bonkers.
The Tigers had won the hard way — without slugging first baseman Hank Greenberg, who missed the last four games of the Series after breaking his wrist in Game 2. Greenberg was coming off a remarkable season, one in which he slammed 36 home runs, drove in 170 runs (100 by the All-Star break) and batted .328. With Greenberg on the sideline, Detroit switched third baseman Marv Owen to first and inserted Clifton at Owen’s usual position. Owen and Clifton went 1-for-36 in the Series.
Greenberg had helped Detroit even the Series at a game apiece, capping a four-run Tigers first inning in Game 2 with a two-run home run off Charlie Root (who, in his first Series appearance since being victimized by Babe Ruth’s “called shot” homer in 1932, failed to retire a batter as the Cubs’ starter). Detroit went on to win, 8-3, on Bridges’ six-hitter. Chicago’s Lon Warneke had won the Series opener, 3-0, giving up only four hits.
Jo Jo White’s run-scoring single in the 11th inning of Game 3 lifted Detroit to a 6-5 triumph after Schoolboy Rowe, working in relief, had blown a 5-3 lead in the ninth. The Tigers made it three straight victories the next day when Alvin Crowder outdueled Tex Carleton, 2-1.
The Cubs rebounded in Game 5 as Chuck Klein hammered a two-run homer and Warneke pitched six shutout innings before leaving because of a sore shoulder. Bill Lee finished up for Warneke as the Cubs posted a 3-1 triumph, setting the stage for the sixth-game dramatics.
Right fielder Pete Fox, who doubled home Detroit’s first run in the finale, was the leading hitter in the Series with a .385 average. Gehringer batted .375 for the Tigers after hitting .379 in the previous year’s fall classic. Herman, who drove in all three of the Cubs’ runs in Game 6, had a Series-high six RBIs and tied Klein for Chicago’s batting lead with a .333 mark. The Tigers’ Bridges and the Cubs’ Warneke each were 2-0.
While neither team excelled overall, the conquerors at least (and at last) won their first World Series. The conquered are still looking for their first fall-classic title since 1908.
