Rogers Hornsby, Rajah of Swat. (original) (raw)

In 1950, I was a bit beyond "Knot Hole Gang" days, but still a close observer of my hometown Beaumont Exporters, a baseball team in the old Texas League. Knot Holers were kids who received reduced admission costs to Stuart Stadium so they could sit in a section of the left field bleaches and root for the Exporters.

By then, aged 15, I had moved to a right sideline seat beside my father, near the Exporter's dugout, and a good view of their manager for the year, Rogers Hornsby. Hornsby was quite a baseball celebrity then, for though he had played in the "big leagues" twenty-five years earlier, he still had the best batting average of any right-handed batter. Since I sat near enough to hear the "Rajah" speak, I can also report that he was the most profane man I had ever (then) heard. So he had a fault. Hornsby could hit.

Hornsby was born in 1896 on his family's ranch near Winters, Texas, and played minor league ball in Hugo, Oklahoma, and Dennison, Texas, before joining the St. Louis Cardinals in 1915. Hornsby weighed only 130 pounds then, but added another thirty pounds over the winter and hit for a remarkable average of .313 during his first full season. From 1921 to 1925 Hornsby averaged .397, .401, .384, .424, and .403. No other hitter, either right or left handed, has equaled that record. Hornsby's lifetime batting average of .358 is second only to Ty Cobb's .367.

During his playing days, Hornsby refused to attend motion pictures or read to avoid straining the remarkable eyesight that enabled him to meet the ball with a solid bat. He also refused to use alcohol or tobacco because he believed they would reduce his physical strength and interfere with his success in batting.

Hornsby managed five major league teams after his career as a player ended, and he also managed the Fort Worth Cats in the Texas league, in addition to the Beaumont Exporters in 1950. That was a remarkable team. Second baseman Gil McDougall later played second base for the New York Yankees, and its catcher, Clint Courtney, warmed a bench for the Yankees behind Yogi Berra and Ralph Houk (another former player-manager for the Exporters), then played for other major league teams.

Beaumonters of that period remember this team over all others. It was the only edition of the Exporters that ever won the straight-way pennant of the Texas league, although it lost in a weird competition to the fourth-place San Antonio Missions to represent the league in the Shaunassey Series. I�ll bet Hornsby had gained another 100 pounds by then. The Rajah died in 1963.