| Ross Youngs | |
|---|---|
 Youngs with the Giants in 1920 | |
| Right fielder | |
| Born:(1897-04-10)April 10, 1897 Shiner, Texas, U.S. | |
| Died: October 22, 1927(1927-10-22) (aged 30) San Antonio, Texas, U.S. | |
Batted: Left Threw: Right | |
| MLB debut | |
| September 25, 1917, for the New York Giants | |
| Last MLB appearance | |
| August 10, 1926, for the New York Giants | |
| MLB statistics | |
| Batting average | .322 |
| Home runs | 42 |
| Runs batted in | 592 |
Stats atBaseball Reference  | |
| Teams | |
| Career highlights and awards | |
| Member of the National | |
 Baseball Hall of Fame | |
| Induction | 1972 |
| Election method | Veterans Committee |
Ross Middlebrook "Pep"Youngs (April 10, 1897 – October 22, 1927) was an American professionalbaseball player. Nicknamed "Pep", he played ten seasons inMajor League Baseball for theNew York Giants from 1917 through 1926, playingright field almost exclusively. Youngs was a part of the Giants teams that won four consecutiveNational League pennants and the1921 and1922 World Series.
FromShiner, Texas, Youngs excelled at baseball andAmerican football at theWest Texas Military Institute. After beginning his professional career inminor league baseball, Youngs was signed by the Giants in 1916. Youngs had a lifetime .322batting average with the Giants and batted over .300 nine times in his career, including eight consecutive seasons. His career was cut short by illness, however, as he died at the age of 30 ofBright's disease.
Youngs was elected to theBaseball Hall of Fame in 1972 by theVeterans Committee. His election was not without controversy,[1] however, as the Veterans Committee consisted of his former teammates, and charges of cronyism were leveled against the committee.[2][3]
Youngs was born inShiner, Texas, the second of three children, all sons.[4] His father was a railroad worker,[5] but suffered disability and moved his family toSan Antonio where he worked as a rancher. Youngs' mother ran a small hotel in San Antonio and Youngs had a paper route.[4]
Youngs was educated atWest Texas Military Institute.[4] He received offers for scholarships to playcollege football but passed on these, as he preferred baseball.[4] He made his professional baseball debut for theAustin Senators of theTexas League in 1914. Appearing in 17 games, he hit just .145 for the class-B Senators and, in 1915, found himself down in the Class-D leagues, playing for Brenham of theMiddle Texas League and theWaxahachie Athletics of theCentral Texas League; both leagues disbanded during the season.[4] In 1916, playing in theinfield for theSherman Lions of the Class-DWestern Association, he hit .362 as aswitch-hitter, drawing the attention of theNew York Giants, who purchased his contract in August for $2,000 ($57,792 in current dollar terms).[4]
Youngs reported tospring training inMarlin, Texas with the Giants in 1917. They initially assigned him to theRochester Hustlers, a team in theInternational League with which the Giants had a working relationship. Giants managerJohn McGraw toldMickey Doolan, the manager of the Hustlers, "I'm giving you one of the greatest players I've ever seen. Play him in the outfield. If anything happens to him, I'm holding you responsible."[4] In 140 games with Rochester, Youngs hit .356, earning himself a late-season promotion to the big league club.[4] McGraw gave Youngs the nickname "Pep" due to his hustle[6] and soon began to groom Youngs to become his successor as Giants' manager.[4]
Youngs made his major league debut on September 25 and played in seven of the last nine games of the season for the eventualNational League (NL)pennant-winners: six incenter field and one in right. In those seven games he went 9-for-26 (.346) with two doubles and three triples.[4] In 1918, regular Giants right fielderDave Robertson left the team to manage a local military ballclub,[7] and Youngs was given the full-time job out of spring training. Batting exclusively left-handed, Youngs responded by batting .302 in 121 games, finishing sixth in the league.[4][8] It would be the first of seven straight seasons in which he hit .300 as a regular, and the second of eight overall counting his brief stint in 1917. He also finished sixth in the NL with a .368on-base percentage (OBP).[8] The next season Robertson was traded to theChicago Cubs forpitcherPhil Douglas, leaving Youngs to become a fixture in right field for the Giants.[9] Youngs finished third in the NL in 1919 with a .311 batting average.[10] His .351 batting average in 1920 was second in the NL toRogers Hornsby.[11]
Youngs batted .327 in 1921, good for ninth in the NL.[12] In Game 3 of the1921 World Series Youngs became the first player to record twohits in the sameinning of a World Series game. The Giants defeated theNew York Yankees[4] as Youngs batted .280 in the series.[13] Youngshit for the cycle on April 29, 1922.[14] He finished the regular season ninth in the NL in OBP (.398) and tied for ninth instolen bases (17),[15] proceeding to hit .375 in the1922 World Series as the Giants again defeated the Yankees.[4] Youngs led the NL inruns scored in 1923, with 121, and his .348 batting average was the eighth best in the league.[16] Youngs batted .356 in the1923 World Series, which the Giants lost to the Yankees.[13]
Youngs batted .356 during the 1924 season, finishing third in the NL.[17] In the final series of this season, the Giants were playing thePhiladelphia Phillies at thePolo Grounds and battling for the pennant with theBrooklyn Dodgers.Jimmy O'Connell, anoutfielder for the Giants, offered Phillies shortstopHeinie Sand $500 tointentionally lose the games ($9,174 in current dollar terms). Sand rejected the bribe and reported it to Phillies managerArt Fletcher. It eventually led to the lifetime suspension of O'Connell and GiantscoachCrazy Dolan by CommissionerKenesaw Mountain Landis. O'Connell implicated teammates Youngs,George Kelly, andFrankie Frisch as co-conspirators;[18] Landis, however, cleared the trio of any wrongdoing.[19]
Youngs slumped to a .185 batting average during the1924 World Series, which the Giants lost to theWashington Senators.[20] Continuing to struggle in 1925, Youngs batted .264, his only season with a batting average below .300,[4] but improved to .306 in 95 games during the 1926 season.[4] Toward the end of his career, Youngs taughtMel Ott, his eventual successor, how to play right field in thePolo Grounds.[4]
Youngs's career was abruptly cut short in 1926, when he was diagnosed with thekidney disorder that, at the time, was calledBright's disease. He had been exposed tostreptococcal infection in 1924.[21] Too ill to play after August 10, 1926, Youngs returned home on McGraw's insistence[4][6] and received ablood transfusion in March 1927.[22]
Youngs died of Bright's disease on October 22, 1927, at the age of 30. He went from weighing 170 pounds (77 kg) during his playing career to 100 pounds (45 kg) by the time of his death.[4] In Youngs' obituary inThe New York Times, Giants managerJohn McGraw called Youngs "the greatest outfielder I ever saw on a ball field."[6] The Giants honored Youngs with a bronze plaque on the right field wall of the Polo Grounds;[23] although the Giants intended to pay for it, fans expressed their desire to contribute and, even though contributions were limited to $1 per person, donations paid for the plaque entirely.[4]
Over his ten-year career, Youngs posted 812 runs, 42 home runs, 592runs batted in (RBI), 153stolen bases, .322 career batting average, .399on-base percentage and .441slugging percentage. He batted .300 or higher in every season until 1925, and higher than .350 twice. Youngs scored 100 or moreruns three times and posted a career-high 102 RBI in 1921 and 10home runs in 1924. During his tenure with the team, the Giants went to theWorld Series four consecutive years (1921–1924) and won twice (1921, 1922).[24] Youngs was a favorite of McGraw, who kept only two pictures in his office: one ofChristy Mathewson and one of Youngs.[4]Rosy Ryan, a teammate with the Giants, andBurleigh Grimes, who played against Youngs as a member of theBrooklyn Dodgers, considered Youngs the best player they ever saw.[25]
Youngs was included in the inaugural balloting for theNational Baseball Hall of Fame in1936, but received less than 5% of the vote from theBaseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA). Youngs remained on the ballot every year through 1956, receiving his highest vote total in 1947 with 22%.[26]Ford C. Frick,Commissioner of Baseball, and former teammateBill Terry both championed Youngs' candidacy.[4]
Former Giants teammates Terry andFrankie Frisch joined theVeterans Committee in 1967 and aided the elections of several of their former teammates, including Youngs in 1972.[27] In addition to Youngs, Terry and Frisch shepherded the selections of Giants teammatesJesse Haines in1970,Dave Bancroft andChick Hafey in1971,George Kelly in1973,Jim Bottomley in1974, andFreddie Lindstrom in1976.[26][2] Youngs died at the earliest age of any current Hall of Famer.[28] Youngs is the only member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame from San Antonio and was inducted into the San Antonio Sports Hall of Fame in 1998.[29] Shiner, the town in which Youngs was born, hosted a baseball tournament in his honor at Clipper Field from 2001 through 2003.[5][30]
Youngs' selection, along with some of the other selections made by Terry and Frisch, has been considered one of the weakest in some circles.[2] According to the BBWAA, the Veterans Committee was not selective enough in choosing members,[31] and charges of cronyism were later leveled against the committee.[2][3] This led to the Veterans Committee having its powers reduced in subsequent years.[32] Baseball statisticianBill James recognized this and wrote that Youngs does not belong in the Hall of Fame.[33] In 1981, however,Lawrence Ritter andDonald Honig included Youngs in their bookThe 100 Greatest Baseball Players of All Time. They explained what they called "theSmoky Joe Wood Syndrome", where a player of truly exceptional talent but a career curtailed by injury or illness should still – in spite of not owning career statistics that would quantitatively rank him with the all-time greats – be included on their list of the 100 greatest players.[34]
Youngs married Dorothy Pienecke, a woman fromBrooklyn who he met while vacationing in theBerkshires, in October 1924. Their daughter Caroline was born in December 1925.[4] Dorothy feuded with Youngs' mother, however, and the couple separated before the birth of Caroline, whom he never met.[4] Youngs was considered friendly and generous, loaned money constantly, and was reportedly owed $16,000 at the time of his death ($289,625 in current dollar terms).[4] Youngs enjoyed playinggolf and was considered the best golfer in the major leagues.[4]
· Baseball Almanac, orRetrosheet| Preceded by | Hitting for the cycle April 29, 1922 | Succeeded by |
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