Cobb & Redding, 1916

I’ve been asked recently (see this comment) whether Ty Cobb ever faced Cannonball Dick Redding. In a 1932 interview with the Chicago Defender (posted here by Ryan Whirty) Redding himself said (or at least implied) that he had played against Cobb in Cuba. Many of the claims in that article are maybe a bit exaggerated, and some are simply false—this one is in the latter category. Ty Cobb only played baseball in Cuba once, in 1910. Redding came to Cuba several times, beginning in the 1911/12 winter season, and he never faced the Detroit Tigers or Cobb there.

In fact, according to many sources, after the 1910 series in Havana, Cobb vowed never to play against black players again. I’ve so far been unable to figure out where this story originated. In any case Charles Alexander affirms that Cobb never did face black players again in his career, and I’ve never seen anyone suggest otherwise.

So no, there’s no known instance of Cobb facing off against Redding in a game. However—John Holway wrote that Cobb once “refused to hit against [Redding] in batting practice,” but gave no specifics. I have found just such an incident, though not in batting practice.

In the 1910s George Weiss, future Yankees (and much later, Mets) president and Hall of Famer, ran the New Haven Colonials, an independent team that often outdrew the city’s minor league club. In 1916 he hired Ty Cobb to play in five games (as a first baseman) after the regular season was over. As it happened, the town team in Putnam, Connecticut, brought in Dick Redding to pitch during the October barnstorming season in both 1915 and 1916. On Sunday, October 8, 1916, the Putnams played host to the Colonials. Cobb was the headliner obviously, but both Redding and Jimmy Clinton, a white semipro star (there’s a chapter on him in Scott Simkus’s wonderful book Outsider Baseball), were given secondary billing as Putnam’s answers to Cobb.

(Hartford Courant, October 7, 1916, p. 19)

 

(Norwich Bulletin, October 6, 1916, p. 9)

Putnam won the game 1-0, as Redding threw four innings in relief and doubled to help score the game’s only run. He struck out the first seven batters he faced—but Cobb had already left the game. After delaying the contest for an hour while negotiating his fee, Cobb “by previous agreement stopped playing when it was half over when Cannonball Redding the great colored pitcher went in to work for Putnam.” Cobb didn’t play especially well, and the Norwich Bulletin reported that Redding “was given a great ovation by the crowd to whom he proved much more of an attraction than the high salaried Cobb.”

(Norwich Bulletin, October 9, 1916, p. 3)

This was pretty unusual. In fact, I can’t think of another instance of a predetermined agreement for a player to leave a game due to the entrance of another player.

A couple of years later the Bulletin printed an anecdote about Pat Cawley, the Colonials’ manager, who had to put himself in to hit for Cobb against Redding. The article attributes the arrangement for Cobb to exit the game directly to Cobb’s “southern prejudices”:

(Norwich Bulletin, October 22, 1918, p. 3)

(I’m not the first person to notice this incident: Howard W. Rosenberg wrote about it in Ty Cobb Unleashed, though I haven’t read the book.)

Comments

[Bob Poet]

Many thanks! Looking for ANY time after 1910 that Cobb played with or against a black player..... The New Haven-Putnam game w/ Redding is the closest I've seen -- thanks to you!

[Gary Ashwill]

I don't have a box score for the Putnam/Colonials game, so can't say. FWIW other Colonials box scores don't have any names in them I recognize as black players. Incidentally on October 15, 1916, the Colonials, with Cobb at first, played the Boston Red Sox, fresh off winning the World Series. Ruth pitched for Boston. Cobb hit 2 for 4 with a double, and the two teams tied 3 to 3.

[Bob Poet]

Say Gary -- a spirited discussion going on re: this game at Ty Cobb's facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/groups/1382597308682072/permalink/2163573567251105/
Besides Redding, were there any other black players on either the New Haven or Putnam teams?

[Bob Poet]

Wow, Gary -- thanks so much for this!
And so quick -- Didn't notice 'til Sunday.
Kudos!