Red Sox pitcher Wes Ferrell won games with his bat as well as his arm. Ferrell slugged walkoff home runs in consecutive days against the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Browns.
A right-hander, Ferrell holds the record for regular-season career home runs hit by a pitcher. According to baseball-reference.com, the top six are Ferrell (38), Bob Lemon (37), Warren Spahn (35), Red Ruffing (34), Earl Wilson (33) and Don Drysdale (29). Bob Gibson (24) is the leader among Cardinals pitchers.
(Note: Through 2023, Shohei Ohtani hit 166 home runs as a designated hitter, three as a pitcher and two as a pinch-hitter. According to retrosheet.org, Babe Ruth hit 692 homers as an outfielder, 14 as a pitcher, seven as a first baseman and one as a pinch-hitter.)
In 15 seasons in the majors, Ferrell was a 20-game winner six times and posted a career mark of 193-128. He batted .280 overall and established a single-season record for pitchers with nine home runs in 1931.
His most dramatic were those consecutive game-winning shots in 1935.
Please come to Boston
Wes Ferrell was the younger brother of catcher Rick Ferrell, who debuted in the majors with the Browns and was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
With the start Wes Ferrell had in the big leagues, it seemed he might be headed to Cooperstown, too. He was a 20-game winner in each of his first four full seasons (1929-32) with the Cleveland Indians. When he stumbled (11-12) in 1933, the Indians wanted to cut his salary. Ferrell wouldn’t sign, prompting a trade in May 1934 to the Red Sox, whose catcher was his brother.
Ferrell (25-12) and Lefty Grove (20-12) were Red Sox aces in 1935, but they ran into trouble with the Tigers, who were on their way to becoming World Series champions that year.
In the July 18 opener of a four-game series at Boston’s Fenway Park, Ferrell started against the Tigers’ Schoolboy Rowe and was defeated, 8-0. Boxscore
Detroit won the second game, too. Then, in Game 3 on July 20, Ferrell entered as a pinch-hitter in the seventh, stayed in to pitch and gave up the winning run, losing for the second time in three days. Boxscore
Storybook drama
For the July 21 series finale, the Red Sox started Lefty Grove, hoping to avoid a sweep. In the top of the ninth, Grove gave up three runs with two outs, enabling Detroit to turn a 4-3 deficit into a 6-4 lead. As the Boston Globe noted, the Tigers “seemed to have snatched victory from Grove’s grasp.”
When the Tigers got done in the ninth, Grove “stormed into the dugout, stopping to kick the bat rack on his way,” the Globe reported. “He picked up a bat, which proved to be (player-manager) Joe Cronin’s favorite, and broke it in two on the steps. Then he kicked over the water bucket, sending several mates scurrying.”
Grove disappeared into the locker room, where he was left to stew while the Red Sox went to bat in the bottom of the ninth against Tigers starter Tommy Bridges.
The first two batters, Cronin and Billy Werber, each singled. Babe Dahlgren’s sacrifice bunt moved Cronin to third and Werber to second. Then Cronin called on Wes Ferrell to bat for Grove.
Tigers player-manager Mickey Cochrane, the catcher, went to the mound to confer with Bridges. Ferrell had three career home runs versus Bridges _ he’d end up hitting five against him _ but Cochrane decided against issuing an intentional walk with first base open and leadoff batter Oscar Melillo on deck.
“The crowd (of 24,000) gave Wes a great ovation as he strode to the plate in his cocky manner,” Gerry Moore of the Globe observed.
Ferrell launched a Bridges fastball deep to left. “There was little doubt about the ball’s destination almost from the instant it left the bat,” the Globe reported, “even though there was unfavorable wind blowing against.”
Left fielder Goose Goslin “took one look at the ball as it passed over his head and then started on the run for the clubhouse,” the Globe noted.
Ferrell’s three-run home run lifted the Red Sox to a 7-6 triumph.
“The scene the instant the ball disappeared behind the barrier will not be forgotten for some time,” the Globe reported. “Most of the spectators stood in their seats and shrieked and pounded each other. They weren’t ordinary cheers.
“Ferrell trotted around the bases with his head down until he rounded third. Then his face broke into a wide grin as coach Al Schacht started to race him home. A bunch of eager youngsters broke through the police cordon and ran along with Wes and Schacht, but they weren’t able to get close to Wes when he crossed the plate. His teammates were the kids then, pounding, hugging, mauling Wes.”
According to the Boston newspaper, when the ball left the park, the Tigers’ Mickey Cochrane “kicked his mask almost into the Red Sox dugout. Then he turned and heaved his catcher’s mitt in the other direction, almost into the Detroit dugout.”
The home run ball “was caught on the fly by a little Negro boy who was playing catch on the far side of Lansdowne Street,” the Globe reported.
Gratitude from Grove
While the Red Sox were rallying, Grove sat alone, sulking in the locker room.
In the book “Baseball: When the Grass Was Real,” Ferrell told author Donald Honig, “So we all rush into the clubhouse, laughing and hollering, the way you do after a game like that, and here’s Lefty, still thinking he’s lost his game. When he saw all the carrying on, I tell you, the smoke started coming out of his ears.”
Grove said, “I don’t see what’s so funny. A man loses a ballgame and you’re all carrying on.”
Somebody replied, “Hell, Lefty, we won it. Wes hit a home run for you.”
Ferrell told Honig: “Well, I was sitting across the clubhouse from him, pulling my uniform off, and I notice he’s staring at me, with just a trace of smile at the corners of his mouth. Just staring at me. He doesn’t say anything. I give him a big grin and pull my sweatshirt up over my head.
“Then I hear him say, ‘Hey, Wes.’ I look over and he’s rolling a bottle of wine across to me _ he’d keep a bottle of one thing or another stashed up in his locker. So here it comes, rolling and bumping along the clubhouse floor. I picked it up and thanked him and put it in my locker. At the end of the season, I brought it back to North Carolina with me and let it sit up on the mantel. It sat up there for years and years. Every time I looked at it, I thought of old Left.” Boxscore
Encore performance
When Melville E. Webb Jr. of the Boston Globe jokingly suggested to Grove that the win should be credited to Ferrell, Grove said, “You can bet your life that’s all right with me, old boy.”
The next day, July 22, 1935, Ferrell started against the Browns at Fenway Park. He and the Browns’ Dick Coffman were both sharp that Monday afternoon.
The score was tied at 1-1 and the bases were empty when Ferrell batted in the bottom of the ninth. Coffman threw a letter-high curve and Ferrell hit it over the wall in left, giving Boston a 2-1 victory.
According to the Globe, “The hit was a twin brother of the one of the day before except that the ball may have reached a higher altitude.”
Just as the Tigers’ Goose Goslin did, Browns left fielder Moose Solters “immediately began making tracks toward the dressing room” when he saw where the ball was headed, the Globe observed. “A small crowd was present _ 1,600 was the count _ but these made as much noise as 16,000, it seemed.” Boxscore
Ferrell hit .347 in 1935. His on-base percentage was .427 and he had more walks (21) than strikeouts (16).
Ferrell had one other walkoff homer in the big leagues. On Aug. 22, 1934, his second home run of the game against Les Tietje of the White Sox broke a 2-2 tie in the bottom of the 10th and gave Ferrell a 12-2 record for the season. Boxscore