The 1928 New York Yankees: The Return of Murderers’ Row by Charlie Gentile (review)

“My kid brother—why, my aunt for that matter—could have managed the Yankees of 1927. . . . Take the Yankees in 1928, when they were shot through with injuries and handicapped by poor pitching and overconfidence. That’s when Miller Huggins proved to me that he was a great manager.”¹ So said major leaguer Al Schacht (who played with the team from 1919 to 1921) in 1932. The 1927 Yankees are considered one of the greatest teams ever and have been the subject of many books. The 1928 Yankees—in many ways a more compelling story—have remained relatively unknown. Charlie Gentile has now corrected that oversight, and admirably so, with this well-researched and entertaining book.

Gentile draws on a vast array of newspapers from the 1920s, including a number of New York and Philadelphia dailies, many available only on microfilm. He has almost fifty pages of endnotes with more than nine hundred citations, a treasure trove for researchers. Extensive use of quotes by sportswriters and ballplayers (or their “ghosts”) enlivens the narrative. Gentile also gives more coverage to games he considers more important. Both approaches help the pace of the story, which avoids what might otherwise have been the monotony of daily diary entries. This book has a lot of details, but Gentile manages to keep his eye on the forest as well as the trees, explaining the significance of key events and providing context for them.

The Yankees’ mediocre spring-training record was overanalyzed by reporters, but Huggins dismissed any concern. “These games in Florida don’t mean a thing,” he said (54). At the season’s start, the Yankees’ business manager, Ed Barrow, said, “The only time I ever worry is when it rains” (61). He worried a lot in 1928: the Yankees had 11 games rained out in April and May. This put an added burden on his already-depleted pitching staff. Aging and ailing pitchers Urban Shocker, Bob Shawkey, and Dutch Ruether, who won a combined 33 games in 1927, had all been released. And 19-game winner Wilcy Moore had arm trouble and would win only four games in 1928.

Yet the Yankees started quickly and made a mockery of the pennant race. On July 1, New York’s record stood at 52-16, good for a 13.5-game lead over the second-place Philadelphia Athletics. Babe Ruth was ahead of his 60–home run pace most of the season.

Gentile presents different perspectives of the Yankees’ season. When their owner Jacob Ruppert was asked about the pennant race on July 1, he replied, “It’s great, as thrilling as I ever want to see” (138). Outside the city, however, the sentiment was distinctly anti–New York. “The Yankees have been in the saddle too long for the good of the league. No city can compete with the Yankees in finance and so none can compete with them in spending money for talent,” wrote John Wray of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (118).

A Washington Post reporter sarcastically described the pennant race, also on July 1. “The Mackmen (A’s) have an excellent chance to win. If Ruth contracts yellow fever, Lazzeri breaks his leg, Gehrig comes down with sleeping sickness, and George Pipgras suffers a complete paralysis of the right arm, the Mackmen will have a fine chance to gallop through” (141).

Yet in a stunning turn of events, a real pennant race was about to develop. The Yankees—hit by injuries to pitchers Moore and Herb Pennock and regulars Lazzeri and Earle Combs, among others—played just over .500 ball the next two months. The A’s, meanwhile, caught fire and won at a .750 clip. On September 8, they took over first place, by one-half game. One league owner commented on the revived and dramatic race: “The Yankees’ slump was worth at least a half million dollars to the American League” (176).

The next day, before...