johnny Dickshot
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Johnny Dickshot Stats & Facts

Johnny Dickshot Essentials

Position: Leftfielder
Bats: Right  •  Throws: Right
6-0, 195lb (183cm, 88kg)
Born: Monday, January 24, 1910 in Waukegan, IL USA
Died: November 4, 1997  in Waukegan, IL
Buried: Ascension Cemetery, Libertyville, IL
High School: Waukegan HS (Waukegan, IL)
Debut: April 16, 1936 (6,638th in MLB history)
vs. CIN 1 AB, 0 H, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 0 SB
Last Game: September 25, 1945 
vs. SLB 4 AB, 2 H, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 0 SB
Full Name: John Oscar Dickshot
Nicknames: Ugly
Johnny Dickshot Baseball Reference Page 

 

 

Nine Players Who Debuted in 1936

Johnny Mize
Joe DiMaggio
Bill Nicholson
Eddie Joost
George McQuinn
Jeff Heath
Bob Feller
Nels Potter
Birdie Tebbetts

 

 

 

Notable Events and Chronology for Johnny Dickshot Career

Johnny Dickshot was born on January 24, 1910, was born and raised in Waukegan, Illinois, Dickshot began his professional career in the early 1930s playing for the Milwaukee Brewers, which was then a minor league team. He entered the majors with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1935. In a time before baseball salaries took off, Dickshot worked at a North Chicago steel mill in the off-season.

He won the nickname “Ugly” because of his self-proclaimed status as the “ugliest man in baseball”.

He appeared in 9 games with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1936 hitting .222. Most of the season, he was with the Buffalo Bisons of the International League, hitting .359 with 33 steals to lead the league in stolen bases. The Pirates of the time had an outfield that consisted of future hall of Famers – Paul Waner & Lloyd Waner, and Woody Jensen. In 1937, Dickshot became the fourth outfielder. In 1938, he appeared in only 29 games as another Johnny, Johnny Rizzo, became the third outfielder when Jensen slumped to .200. Dickshot hit only .229 but had a .372 on-base percentage.

He was sold to the Boston Bees in the off-season after 1938, but before he could appear in a game with them, he was traded to the New York Giants. He was up for just 10 games with the Giants, hitting .235 but with a .333 on-base percentage. He was outstanding in the International League with the Jersery City Skeeters leading the league in hitting with a .355 average.

He moved to the Hollywood Stars in 1941. In 1943, he hit .352 and had a 33-game hitting streak.

After 5 years in the minors, he joined the White Sox in 1944 and had his best major league season in 1945, his last year in the majors, when he had a .302 batting average (third-best in the American League) with 58 RBIs, 10 triples and 18 stolen bases in 486 at-bats.

The three White Sox outfielders in 1945 were Dickshot, Wally Moses and Oris Hockett. They all hit at least .290, with Dickshot having the highest average in a league that hit .255. The next year, 1946 with the war over, the White Sox had three entirely new outfielders. None of them hit as high as .290. Neither Dickshot nor Hockett, who was also 35 in 1945, ever play again in the majors. Moses, one year younger and the only one in the 1945 outfield who had been a regular prior to the war, was sold by the White Sox in July 1946 to the Boston Red Sox and played through 1951.

Soon after his retirement, Dickshot opened a tavern called the Dugout in Waukegan. In his obituary, his granddaughter said he would often call his wife at home from the bar demanding that she look in his encyclopedia to settle a dispute over baseball trivia. He threw out a first pitch in the new Comiskey Park in June 1994.

He died Nov. 4 in Waukegan, Ill. He was 87.

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