1920 New York Yankees season

Season for the Major League Baseball team the New York Yankees March 2026 November 2013 New York Yankees 1920 American League Polo Grounds New York City, New York 95 59 y 3rd Jacob Ruppert and Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston Miller Huggins The 1920 New York Yankees season was the 18th season for the Yankees. The team finished with a record of 95–59, just 3 games behind the American League champion Cleveland Indians. New York was managed by Miller Huggins. Home games were played at the Polo Grounds. The Yankees of 1920 were the first team in the history of Major League Baseball to have an attendance of more than one million fans.Baseball's Top 100: The Game's Greatest Records, p.22, Kerry Banks, 2010, Greystone Books, Vancouver, BC, 978-1-55365-507-7 Offseason The year started with a bang on January 5, when the Boston Red Sox sold their star pitcher-turned-outfielder Babe Ruth to the Yankees for $125,000 (US 125000 1919 eq -5). The sub-headline in The New York Times the next day read, "Highest Purchase Price in Baseball History Paid for Game's Greatest Slugger."Ruth Bought By New York Americans For $125,000, Highest Price in Baseball Annals New York Times January 6, 1920 https://www.nytimes.com/1920/01/06/archives/ruth-bought-by-new-york-americans-for-125000-highest-price-in.html This deal would live in infamy for generations of Boston fans, and would vault the Yankees from respectability (80 wins in 1919) to pennant contention. Regular season Babe Ruth, his wife, and three teammates were in a car accident on July 7, 1920, from which they were lucky to walk away. Ruth was driving the group back to New York from Washington where the Yankees had beaten the Senators the previous day. Nearing Wawa, Pennsylvania at 2:00 AM, Ruth missed a sharp curve, drove into a ditch, and totaled the car where it flipped on top of them. Ruth was able to move the vehicle, and all five made it to a local farmhouse where they were attended to. They were driven that same day to Philadelphia where they boarded a train for New York.https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SU19200708.2.126&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1 Babe Ruth Injured In Auto Accident July 8, 1920 Sacramento Union 8 April 15, 2019 Ruth was in the lineup for the next game on July 8, 1920, where he went one for four with a triple against the Detroit Tigers. https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA192007080.shtml Detroit Tigers at New York Yankees Box Score, July 8, 1920 baseball-reference.com Sports Reference LLC April 15, 2019 The Indians won the pennant despite a horrific incident at the Polo Grounds on August 16. Yankees pitcher Carl Mays, another of several ex-Red Sox players who had come the Yankees' way, used a "submarine" (underhand) pitching style. He threw one up and in on Cleveland shortstop Ray Chapman, who tended to crowd the plate and apparently never saw the ball coming. Chapman suffered a severe skull fracture, and died the following morning.My Pitch That Killed Chapman Was A Strike! by Phyllis Propert, Baseball Digest, July 1957, Vol. 16, No. 6, 0005-609X Mays was absolved of any wrongdoing, but the incident would haunt him for the rest of his life. Meanwhile, the Indians rallied around the memory of their shortstop, and won the season. However, with Ruth leading the Yankees, and with his stunning total of 54 home runs (George Sisler the second place homerun holder that year, only hit 19) nearly doubling his own major league record from just the previous year, New York finished just a game behind the second-place Chicago White Sox and three behind the Indians. Ruth's 54 home runs marked an end to the dead-ball era, and ushered in a new style of play with an emphasis on power hitting. The Yankees had once been the "poor relations of the Polo Grounds", as Lamont Buchanan characterized them in The World Series and Highlights of Baseball. But the Giants had faded a bit in the late 1910s while the Yankees had grown stronger. The Yankees were now poised to take the next step to beginning the greatest dynasty in professional sports. Season standings New York Yankees Record vs. opponents NYY Roster 1920 New York Yankees Roster Pitchers Rip Collins Carl Mays Bob McGraw George Mogridge Lefty O'Doul Jack Quinn Bob Shawkey Ernie Shore Hank Thormahlen Catchers Truck Hannah Fred Hofmann Muddy Ruel Infielders Chick Fewster Ray French Joe Lucey Roger Peckinpaugh Wally Pipp Del Pratt Aaron Ward Outfielders Ping Bodie Frank Gleich Duffy Lewis Bob Meusel Babe Ruth Sammy Vick Other batters Tom Connelly Manager Miller Huggins Player stats = Indicates team leader = Indicates league leader Batting Starters by position Note: Pos = Position; G = Games played; AB = At bats; H = Hits; Avg. = Batting average; HR = Home runs; RBI = Runs batted in Pos Player G AB H Avg. HR RBI C Truck Hannah 79 259 64 .247 2 25 1B Wally Pipp 153 610 171 .280 11 76 2B Del Pratt 154 574 180 .314 4 108 SS Roger Peckinpaugh 139 534 144 .270 8 54 3B Aaron Ward Aaron Ward (baseball) 127 496 127 .256 11 56 OF Ping Bodie 129 471 139 .295 7 77 OF Duffy Lewis 107 365 99 .271 4 59 OF Babe Ruth 142 457 172 .376 54 137 Other batters Note: G = Games played; AB = At bats; H = Hits; Avg. = Batting average; HR = Home runs; RBI = Runs batted in Player G AB H Avg. HR RBI Bob Meusel 119 460 151 .328 11 83 Muddy Ruel 82 261 70 .268 1 14 Sammy Vick 51 118 26 .220 0 11 Frank Gleich 24 41 5 .122 0 4 Fred Hofmann 15 24 7 .292 0 1 Chick Fewster 21 21 6 .286 0 1 Joe Lucey 3 3 0 .000 0 0 Ray French Ray French (baseball) 2 2 0 .000 0 1 Tom Connelly 1 1 0 .000 0 0 Pitching Starting pitchers Note: G = Games pitched; IP = Innings pitched; W = Wins; L = Losses; ERA = Earned run average; SO = Strikeouts Player G IP W L ERA SO Carl Mays 45 312.0 26 11 3.06 92 Bob Shawkey 38 267.2 20 13 2.45 126 Jack Quinn Jack Quinn (baseball) 41 253.1 18 10 3.20 101 Hank Thormahlen 29 143.1 9 6 4.14 35 George Mogridge 26 125.1 5 9 4.31 35 Babe Ruth 1 4.0 1 0 4.50 0 Other pitchers Note: G = Games pitched; IP = Innings pitched; W = Wins; L = Losses; ERA = Earned run average; SO = Strikeouts Player G IP W L ERA SO Rip Collins Rip Collins (pitcher) 36 187.1 14 8 3.22 66 Relief pitchers Note: G = Games pitched; W = Wins; L = Losses; SV = Saves; ERA = Earned run average; SO = Strikeouts Player G W L SV ERA SO Ernie Shore 14 2 2 1 4.87 12 Bob McGraw 15 0 0 0 4.67 11 Lefty O'Doul 2 0 0 0 4.91 2 Awards Records Babe Ruth, 20th century record, Highest slugging average in one season (.847) Notes References 1920 New York Yankees team page at www.baseball-almanac.com 1920 New York Yankees at Baseball Reference Category:New York Yankees seasons New York Yankees New York Yankees Category:1920s in Washington Heights, Manhattan