Posted on 04/24/2019 1:52:16 PM PDT by fugazi
Thousands of Major League Baseball players have answered the nation's call, serving in two world wars, Korea, Vietnam, and peacetime. The following is a brief list of players who served in the United States Armed Forces, and will be added to frequently...
[Slideshow with images]
Hall of Fame Yankee shortstop Phil Rizzuto led a 20mm gun crew in the Pacific during World War II and played baseball for the Navy while he recovered from contracting malaria in New Guinea...
On the day that Rizzuto's number was retired, Chicago White Sox hurler Tom Seaver stole (his future broadcast partner) Rizzuto's thunder by beating the Yankees for his 300th career win. After graduating high school, Seaver enlisted in the Marine Corps and was serving a six-year commitment in the Reserves while he earned National League Rookie of the Year in 1967 and netted three Cy Young Awards over his 20-year career...
After the 1963 season, a young private named Pete Rose (front row, second from left) was mopping the mess hall at Fort Knox when he got the call that he had earned the National League Rookie of the Year. "Charlie Hustle" served his six-year Reserve commitment at Fort Thomas, Ky,, which meant he could be a soldier during the day and still make the Reds game during summer drills...
Several Cincinnati Reds served in the 478th Engineer Battalion, including fellow Hall of Fame player/soldier Johnny Bench (front row, third from left), whom many consider to be the best catcher of all time...
(Excerpt) Read more at victoryinstitute.net ...
The guys who lost the most baseball while serving leave us guessing “what if”. Based on season averages, Bob Feller would have wound around 360 games. Ted Williams woukd have accumulated more than 3,600 hits and 720 homeruns. The greatest hitter indeed!
Ted Williams, who many (including me) think was the best hitter of all time lost three years of baseball, when he was in his prime, to serve in the military. He probably would not have beaten Babe’s Ruth record (at the time) of 714 career home runs, but he almost certainly would have hit comfortably more than 600.
For a power hitter, Williams did not strike out much. It may have been around his time when baseball first started the now common practice of shifting three infielders to the first base side of second base. At the time, they called it the Boudreau shift. Williams refused (or couldn’t) hit the ball to left because he was so determined to beat the shift.
Here’s a good summary of Williams’ service as a fighter pilot in the Marines:
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/news/tributes/mlb_obit_ted_williams.jsp?content=military
Ty Cobb served in WWI.
And he also missed most of 51 and 52 in the Korean War.
I guess they can’t include everybody, but I always especially admired Warren Spahn’s service. From his Wiki entry:
“Along with many other major leaguers, Spahn chose to enlist in the United States Army, after finishing the 1942 season in the minors. He served with distinction, and was awarded a Purple Heart. He saw action in the Battle of the Bulge and at the Ludendorff Bridge as a combat engineer, and was awarded a battlefield commission.
“Spahn returned to the major leagues in 1946 at the age of 25, having missed three full seasons. Had he played, it is possible that Spahn would have finished his career behind only Walter Johnson and Cy Young in all-time wins. Spahn was unsure of the war’s impact on his career:
” ‘People say that my absence from the big leagues may have cost me a chance to win 400 games. But I don’t know about that. I matured a lot in three years, and I think I was better equipped to handle major league hitters at 25 than I was at 22. Also, I pitched until I was 44. Maybe I wouldn’t have been able to do that otherwise.’ “
not quite military but I think I would include Moe Berg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_Was_a_Spy_(film)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moe_Berg
Al was on one World Series winner with Baltimore, not 2.
Yes. Bumbry PLAYED in 2 World Series with the Orioles 1979 (lost to Pittsburgh 4 games to 3) and in 1983 which Baltimore won over the Phillies.
Yep, and the ‘2 WS winners goof’ was easy to spot for any older MLB trivia nut.
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