1917 World Series

The Giants finally returned to the Fall Classic after a four year hiatus ready to make amends for the three consecutive championship losses that they had suffered earlier in the decade. It would be their fifth appearance and the second of their rivals, Chicago's South Side White Sox. 1917 had been a year of many firsts including the first back-to-back no-hitters ever thrown in the American League. On May 5th, Ernie Koob tossed a shutout for St. Louis against Chicago and the very next day his teammate, Bob Groom did the same. Apparently, the second game had been determined by the umpires who changed a scored "hit" in the first inning to an error. An outraged Writers Association quickly passed a resolution disallowing such actions for all future games. Some league Umpires were beginning to become unpopular with the players and the no-hitter controversy didn't help their situation. The following month, Babe Ruth started his June 23rd outing with four called balls. The Boston lefty was upset with each call and visited umpire Brick Owens at the plate each time. After the official issued a base on balls to Eddie Foster, Ruth charged the plate and punched him in the face, resulting in an ejection.

The Giants were probably upset too as they found themselves in familiar territory midway through the Series. After five relatively uneventful outings, New York was down three games to two. Their starter, Rube Benton and Chicago's (Game 2 and 5 winner) Red Farber were locked in a 0-0 struggle going into the fourth inning when it all came crashing down. The White Sox's Eddie Collins hit a routine grounder to Heinie Zimmerman who overthrew the base. Next, teammate Dave Robertson made another crucial error on a dropped fly-ball from Joe Jackson. In two at bats, Chicago had put runners on first and third due entirely to poor fielding. The Giants weren't done yet and made another costly misplay on the very next at bat. Happy Felsch stepped up with runners in prime scoring position and grounded back to the mound. Benton saw Collins break from third and threw to Zimmerman in an attempt to get Collins hung up. The third baseman ran Collins toward home, but the White Sox star somehow evaded catcher Bill Rariden to make it a Zimmerman-Collins race to the plate. Collins won the dash with the other two runners advancing to second and third. Fundamental baseball had killed the Giants as Rariden, Benton and first baseman Walter Holke, had all left the plate unattended. New York cut the lead to one in the fifth, but it wasn't enough as the White Sox walked away with a 4-2 victory and their second World Series Championship.

While Faber's Series winning performance grabbed most of the headlines, the Giants' Robertson was another standout. Despite his costly error in Game 6, he had salvaged some respect with his eleven-for-twenty-two performance at the plate. Collins was praised, too, as evidenced by his .409 average for the White Sox. One other notable event took place during the 1917 Series as Olympic athlete and football star Jim Thorpe made the only postseason "appearance" of his Major League career in Game 5. Unfortunately, he never made it onto the field. Listed as the Giants' #6 man in the line-up, the right-handed Thorpe was strategically removed for the left-handed pinch-hitter, Robertson after Chicago lifted lefty Reb Russell in favor of righty Eddie Cicotte. Still the biggest story of the 1917 Fall Classic was the New York Giants and their everlasting potential for postseason disasters.