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Thursday January 02, 2025

Mudcat

An unexpected surprise reading Terry Pluto's “The Curse of Rocky Colavito: A Loving Look at a Thirty-Year Slump” was getting the backstory of one-time Twins pitcher Jim “Mudcat” Grant, whose story reads like a compendium of baseball history. He was scouted for the Cleveland Indians by Fred Merkle of the infamous 1908 “boner” play, and during spring training the coaches were about to send him away but Hank Greenberg, the great Detroit Tigers slugger and current Cleveland GM, asked if he had anywhere else to go. When Grant said no,  Greenberg made sure he got to stay. Grant was then assigned to the minors by Yankees pitching great Red Ruffing, given a pair of spikes by Sam Mele and taken under the wing of Hall of Famer Larry Doby.

That's a lot of baseball history right there.

He sounds like a lovely person, too. Pluto begins the section with a personal childhood anecdote:

My father and I were walking out of the Stadium, and Mudcat was coming right toward us. He was wearing a nice dark suit. He carried a suitcase in one hand, a garment bag in the other, and had a third bag hanging from his shoulder. “That's Mudcat Grant,” my dad said. “Go ask him for an autograph.” I hesitated for a moment. I didn't know how to ask for an autograph. My father handed me the Indians scorecard—they were ten-cent scorecards back then, no five-dollar glossy programs. Then he gave me a pen. “Go ahead,” he said. “Go ask Mudcat to sign.” I was eight years old. As I took a couple of steps in his direction, Mudcat stopped, put down all of his bags, and said, “How you doing, little man?” I knew who Mudcat was, and I knew he was a good pitcher. I also was too scared to say a word. “Want me to sign that for you?” he asked, taking the scorecard out of my hand. “What's your name?” he asked. I told him, in a whisper. He signed the program “To Terry, best wishes, Mudcat Grant.” I whispered a thank you.

How wonderful is that? 

At the trade deadline in 1964, the Indians traded him to the Twins for George Banks and Lee Stange. “A year later he was 21-7,” Pluto writes, “and he was a World Series hero, winning two games and hitting a three-run homer.”

Posted at 08:05 PM on Thursday January 02, 2025 in category Baseball