Tony Cuccinello: What the Big Leagues Were Like in the 1930s

Tony Cuccinello was a baseball lifer: 44 years (1926-1969) as an infielder with four NL clubs and the Chicago White Sox (1930-1945), and a coach with the Reds, Indians, White Sox and Tigers – 16 of them for Al Lopez at Cleveland and Chicago.

We met in the clubhouse at the Tampa golf course where he played 18 holes almost every day with Lopez, his friend of more than 50 years, on July 20, 1985.  - Norman L. Macht

I originally was signed by the Cardinals for Syracuse in 1926. They wanted to send me to Topeka, Kansas. I came from Long Island City, just outside New York.

I said, “Where the hell is Topeka, Kansas?”

At Syracuse I got into a couple games. Burt Shotton was the manager.  Pepper Martin was playing there.

He said to me, “”Do you want to get into a game?” I said, “Sure.” So he’d say to Shotton, “I feel a little tired,” and Shotton would tell me to get a glove and go in.

I’d get a base hit, and then a few weeks later, I would get in again and get a hit. I hit .750 that season, got three hits in four times up. Then they farmed me to Lawrence, Massachusetts, in the New England League.

In 1927 I asked them to send me back up there. It was twilight ball, wool mills all over the place. We’d play about four o’clock, when the millworkers got off. 

First Spring Training

My first big league spring training was in Tampa in 1930 with the Reds.

They had all these old-timers. I’m only about 22 and these guys are 35 -- 40 years old, probably playing before I was born.

It was kinda tough, being a young fellow going up to the batting cage, with all those old timers jumping in there. I was scared to get in there.

Finally, one of them pushed me in and said, “Come on, take a couple swings.” I finally got into the lineup, usually at second or third.

We set a double play record. [Teams with Cuccinello at second base led the NL in double plays five times during the 1930s.] Course on a bad ball club you had more chances to make double plays.

Every time you look around there’s one, two or three men on base. We finished seventh or last two years in a row. 

Playing for Losing Teams

I played for a lot of second division teams. Sometimes we had pretty good hitting but no pitching. We’d get six or seven runs, but the other club would get eight or nine.

Then when we did have the pitching, we didn’t have the hitting. You worried more about what you did this year because that’s how you got paid next year.

If you had a good year, maybe you’d get a thousand or two raise. A $20,000 man in the early ‘30s was pretty good.

When I was with Brooklyn in 1932 we had pretty good hitting and pitching. Mostly older players on their way out. That’s where I met Al Lopez. He and I and pitcher Van Mungo were the babies of the club.

We were leading the league until the last few weeks of the season, then finished third back of the Cubs and Pirates and got a rare share of the World Series pot.  

The First All-Star Game

I was the last batter in the first All-Star Game in 1933. John McGraw was the manager. We were two runs behind in the top of the ninth with two outs. McGraw called me over. He said, “Young man, take a strike.” That’s all he said.

I thought to myself, “Geez, with Mose Grove pitching, they ought to give me a strike.”

Anyhow, I took the first pitch for a strike. Then he came inside. The next pitch, I got around real good and pulled it into the left field stands, just foul. I fouled off a few more, then worked him to a 3-2 count.

The next pitch was right down the middle. I swung right through it and missed it.

Lopez and I were traded to the Boston Bees in 1936. Bill McKechnie was the manager. McKechnie was like a preacher, but he knew baseball.

Baseball player Tony Cuccinello

He played for one run all the time; if we got one run, they’d have to get two to beat us. That ball park in Boston on the Charles River, the wind used to blow in. You could hit drives out there and they’d come blowing back in at you. 

Opening day was Patriots’ Day. We’d play in the morning, then they had this marathon race, then we’d play again in the afternoon.

We played the Phillies and they beat us, 1 to 0 and 2 to 1, and they were the tail-end team in the league. But they had a good hitting team -- in Baker Bowl. I got six for six there one day.

They had a tin fence out in right field. Broad Street was right behind it.  The balls would hit those cars driving by. They had a big Lifebuoy sign there.

I used to hit it all the time and you had to run like hell to get a double because the right fielder could throw you out. Then Casey Stengel became the manager. He was always for the younger players. He’d rather play them than the older ones.

Throwing at Hitters

I played with and against catcher Ernie Lombardi in Boston. For a guy who couldn’t run he sure could hit. I used to play 30 feet back on the grass when he batted.

I would let him bunt; the pitcher could throw him out. But he hit shots. We got into fights with the Cubs.

They were known for throwing at batters. Lon Warneke and Pat Malone and Tex Carleton  -- those guys could throw like hell, and especially at Wrigley Field with those white shirts out in the stands, it was tough to pick up the ball.

I remember Stengel saying, “Who do I have here who can go out there and knock somebody on his fanny?” And Mungo was the one.

The only guy I didn’t want to see get hit – he was a really good guy, never caused any trouble – was Gabby Hartnett. Mungo hit Hartnett right on the elbow, put him out for a week or two.

We had an infielder named Mickey Finn. An inning or two later he slid into second base and he and Billy Jurges came up swinging and started a real free for all.

Then I think it happened again in Chicago. It finally got settled, because it got to where somebody was going to get hurt. 

One day Dizzy Dean threw one right at my face. I stuck my hand up and it hit off my hand and got me in the face.  At Cincinnati we had a catcher, Clyde Sukeforth.

He had been in a shooting accident while hunting the year before. Got bird shot in his eye. I think he still had a pellet way in the back of his eye.

In the spring one day, Dean took the button right off his cap. You could see he was stunned.

He went out to the mound and took the bat and said to Dean, “If you ever do that again, I’m going to hit you right over the head with this bat.” Dean never threw at him again. But that’s the way things were. You’d hear pitchers say, “When he comes up to bat again, I’ll get him.”

That’s why I’m still having trouble with my knee today. It happened in 1939. I was with the Braves. Dick Bartell was with the Cubs.

What happened was one of our guys threw at his head, and he got mad and said, “I’m going to get the first guy in my path.”

I was the first guy in his path. I didn’t know it until they told me later. If I had known it then, I could have protected myself. So he came into second base on a force out. We’d go into each other to break up a double play, not to hurt one another.

There was no chance for a double play this time, and when I reached out to get the ball he gave me a football block across the knees.

I was in the hospital for a week and came back on crutches and was out for two months. That’s when they told me what he had said. I never played in over 100 games any year after that until 1945. That was during the war and everybody was away.

I was 38, and signed with the White Sox on a month-to-month basis, for $1,000 a month. 

The Hidden Ball Trick

On opening day in Cleveland I pulled the hidden ball trick on Indians’ manager Lou Boudreau. Was he ever embarrassed. 

The night before they’d had a big father and son dinner and Lou was the speaker. Somebody asked him about the hidden ball trick. He said, “Oh, they don’t use that any more. That’s obsolete.”

So I’m playing third and we’ve got a three-run lead. The Indians get a few men on, then Boudreau gets a hit, and the next guy up gets another hit, and Boudreau comes around and slides into third. And I tag him.

The umpire calls him safe. I argue a little bit, and the pitcher comes over. I tell him, “Stay off the rubber,” and I keep the ball.

So he goes near the mound while I’m pounding my fist into my glove like it’s empty and sure enough Lou takes a few steps off the bag.  I dive for him as he dives for the bag.

The umpire yells, “He’s out, if you got the ball.” I had the ball, alright. Jimmy Dykes was a conservative manager, but he’d gamble with you.

In Detroit one day we got a few men on base, a run behind in the seventh inning. I get a 3-0 count. I look around and he’s got me hitting. I didn’t believe it.

I look again and by God he’s got me hitting. I hit one in the seats. He’d gamble sometimes like that, then he’d sacrifice for a run.

Almost a Batting Champ

 In 1945 – my last season -- I had a chance to lead the league in batting, and you had to have over 400 at bats to qualify.

I had a two-point lead over George Stirnweiss [of the Yankees] going into the last day of the season.  We were scheduled to play a doubleheader and got rained out.

I had 402 at bats. The Red Sox were playing in New York. First time up Stirnweiss hit the ball to the third baseman, who booted it, then threw it away.

The writer for the Bronx Home News was the official scorer. He called it an error. A few plays later, it came over the ticker that our games were rained out. The writer thought, “Now Stirnweiss has a chance to lead the league.”

He changed the error to a hit. I know that’s how it happened because I’d played at Boston and knew all those writers and they were fighting with him over changing the scoring.

Stirnweiss wound up with .30856 and I was .30845. So the records show him with .309 and me at .308.

In those days the league gave you a plaque and you got a $500 bonus. Today that’s tip money, but in those days it meant something.

Plus getting your name in the record books. But number two is not in the record books.