Here lies Ossie Bluege, a lifer for the Washington Senators. Not only was he an All-Star third baseman for the team from 1922-39, but he also served as a coach, a manager & a front-office executive.
Oswald Louis Bluege was born on October 24, 1900 in Chicago. Bluege started his pro baseball career not too far away from home, in Peoria with the Tractors of the Three-I League. It wasn’t long before he started attracting scouts, and the Senators signed Bluege in 1921.
Starting in 1923, Bluege locked down the role of the starting third baseman for the better part of the next two decades. In that entire stretch, he had an OPS+ above 100 just once, meaning that he was largely a below average hitter for his career. Part of that may have been that he never did develop a power stroke. He never reached double digits in home runs, and he only led the AL in an offensive category once in his career – he was hit by 8 pitches in 1928. While he wasn’t a major offensive weapon, he was still a good hitter. Most importantly, he had no peers when it came to playing third base. He’s been compared favorably to HOFer Brooks Robinson when it comes to fielding.
Bluege was one of a handful of players to play in all 3 World Series that the Senators had in their history. The Senators were World Champs in 1924, when Bluege slashed .281/.358/.353 in 117 games, with 113 hits and 49 RBIs.
In his 18 years with the Senators, Bluege had a slash line of .272/.352/.356, with 1,741 hits and 848 RBIs. He hit 276 doubles, 67 triples and 43 home runs.
Bluege was offered a lifetime job with the Senators, and he took advantage of it. He served as a coach, he managed the team for 5 seasons and then took over the Senators’ farm system. Bluege added more teams to the system and signed a young slugger named Harmon Killebrew. Bluege, an accountant by trade, finished his tenure as the Twins controller, as the team moved to Minnesota. When he retired in 1971, he had been with the team for 50 years.
Ossie Bluege died in his sleep on October 14, 1985, at the age of 84.
Here lies Howard Fox, who spent nearly 60 years with the Minnesota Twins in a management capacity. Starting as a minor-league general manager, he rose through the ranks and helped to build the Twins into a World Series Champion team.
Howard Fox was born in Emporia, Va., on September 4, 1920. His baseball career started back in his hometown after his discharge from the Army, as he helped to launch a semi-pro league while helping at his father’s peanut business in the offseason.
He was named general manager of the Emporia ball club when it became a farm team of the Washington Senators. Fox was a GM for several other minor-league teams before moving up to the parent club, first in public relations and then as the Senators traveling secretary. He, along with the rest of the team, moved to Minnesota as the Twins in 1961.
The traveling secretary of a ball club handles all flights and hotel stays. Fox handed out meal money, assigned roommates and took care of any emergency situations. Basically, he was den mother to 24 ballplayers. He once got in a fist fight with Twins coach Billy Martin, too — check the blog for that story.
As time wore on, Fox became a vice president and confidante of Twins owner Calvin Griffith, and he handled much of the baseball operations as well. He was sometimes thought of as Griffith’s errand boy or his hatchet man, but he was the most powerful non-family member on a team that was operated by the whole Griffith clan.
Fox negotiated the sale of the Twins to Carl Pohlad in 1984, when Griffith retired. Fox was named CEO, fired the remaining members of the Griffith family who still worked for the team and, freed of Griffith’s miserly habits, built a contender. Not every move panned out, and he had stepped away from day-to-day operations by the time the Twins won the World Series in 1987. But much of that team’s success was the result of Fox’s handiwork. One of his last moves was to hire Tom Kelly as Twins manager.
Fox retired to Orlando but remained on the team’s executive committee until his death. Howard Fox died on June 28, 2011, in hospice care near his home in Orlando, Fla. He was 90 years old.
Here lies Spencer Harris, who had a brief, 4-year career in the majors. That short description doesn’t even begin to do justice to his professional career, as Harris played in professional baseball for almost 30 years and retired as one of the greatest hitters in the history of the minor leagues. Harris was an outfielder for the Chicago White Sox (1925-26), Washington Senators (1929) and Philadelphia Athletics (1930).
Anthony Spencer Harris was born in Duluth, Minn., on August 12, 1900. According to his obituary, his family income came from the railroad, so they moved around quite a bit. Harris grew up in Minnesota and attended grade school in Milwaukee before moving to the West Coast. He finished grammar school and high school in Seattle and signed his first pro contract days after graduating.
After a couple years in the minors, Harris was acquired by the White Sox and spent 1925 & 1926 as a pinch hitter and backup outfielder. He didn’t get many chances to play, but he had some key hits. In one game, he had a pinch-RBI single off of Walter Johnson and hit an inside-the-park grand slam for his first MLB homer.
Harris returned to the minors and joined the Minneapolis Millers, where he played for the next decade. Harris never hit under .300 with the Millers and topped 200 hits four times. While not a slugger, he hit 20+ homers twice, with a high of 32 in 1928. He was acquired by major-league teams a couple of times, but never for very long. It was thought that he was just happier in the minor leagues and performed better there.
Harris was traded from the Millers to San Diego, then a minor-league team, after 1937 — for a kid named Ted Williams. Though Harris was 38, he would play for another decade and still hit over .320 a couple times. He finally hung up his spikes after 1948.
In his 4 MLB seasons, he had a slash line of .249/.323/.329, with 94 hits that included 15 doubles, 3 triples & 3 homers.
In 26 minor-league seasons, Harris had a lifetime .320 batting average. He’s the all-time MiLB leader in hits (3,538), doubles (726) and runs scored (2,287).
Harris became a suit salesman in Minneapolis until retiring. He died on July 3, 1982 at the age of 81.
Here lies Ed Springer, who pitched one game in the major leagues for the Louisville Colonels of the American Association in 1889. The rest of his short life is largely a mystery.
Ed Springer was born in 1867 – the exact day isn’t known. For the longest time, it was thought that he was born in California. SABR researcher extraordinaire Peter Morris dug into Springer’s life and determined that he was actually born in Detroit. Still, Baseball Reference has his birthplace in Oil City, Ontario. The family was living in Canada as of 1871, where his father was working as an oil well driller.
Springer is supposed to have played for a team called the Dallas Hams in 1888, but I can’t find evidence that he did. Come 1889, he came to the attention to the Louisville Colonels, who were en route to a 27-111 record. Things got so bad that they signed the relatively inexperienced Springer to pitch. It didn’t go well. He was shelled by the 1st place Brooklyn Bridegrooms in an 8-1 loss that mercifully ended after 5 innings due to darkness.
Springer’s one game in the majors resulted in an 0-1 record, 9.00 ERA, 8 hits and 8 runs (5 earned) in 5 innings pitched, with 2 walks, 1 strikeout and 2 hit batters. He went 0-for-2 with a strikeout at the plate and made 2 errors in 3 chances for a .333 fielding percentage.
Springer played in 1890 for teams in Michigan and Indiana, though he may not have been pitching. One box score shows him playing third base.
Ed Springer died on December 17, 1891, in Minneapolis. He was 22 years old, and I cannot find a cause of death. He was buried the following spring in Lakewood Cemetery in Minneapolis – with the wrong birth year on his headstone. There are three other people buried in the same plot: his mother, Nancy, who died on November 24, 1916; Blanche Springer, who I believe is his niece, who died on August 26, 1924, and Emma May Kaumeyer, who died on June 24, 1930.
Here lies Dick Siebert, an All-Star first baseman. He later became one of the winningest coaches in NCAA baseball history. He played for the Brooklyn Dodgers (1932, 1936), St. Louis Cardinals (1937-38) & Philadelphia Athletics (1939-45).
Dick Siebert was born in Fall River, Mass., on February 19, 1912. His family moved to St. Paul, and he played baseball at Concordia College. He originally signed with the Cardinals as a pitcher, but a sore arm led to his release. He then attended Concordia Seminary in St. Louis with the intent of entering the ministry. Before that happened, a higher power — the Yankees — signed him as a first baseman.
Siebert’s early career was turbulent. The Yankees sold him to Brooklyn, but the Dodgers hardly used him in the majors over the four years he was in their system. He was claimed by the Cubs, who sold him to the Cardinals, who got him in case young star Johnny Mize held out for more money. Siebert was kept in the minors until he complained to the MLB Commissioner. Kenesaw Landis didn’t intervene, but St. Louis traded him to the A’s. Only then did he get the chance to play regularly.
From 1939 through 1945, Siebert played in an average of 137 games and had a slash line of .283/.332/.382. He also broke up two Bob Feller no-hitters. He wasn’t a power hitter, but he was a good contact hitter who rarely struck out and was a great defensive first baseman.
Siebert’s best season came in 1941, when he hit .334, good for 5th in the AL. He knocked in a career high 79 runs and hit 5 home runs. He made the All-Star team in 1943, even though it was a down year for him.
Siebert was traded to the St. Louis Browns for the 1946 season. The Browns offered him $2,000 less than he made in 1945, so he up and quit the game.
In 1947, Siebert was hired as the head coach of the University of Minnesota baseball team, a job he held for 31 years. He won 3 College World Series and more than 700 games.
On November 9, 1978, Siebert was admitted to a hospital for ulcers and had surgery to remove his spleen 3 days after that. He then suffered from complications and pneumonia and died on December 9 at the age of 66.
