John Henry Kramer, nicknamed Jack, was born January 5, 1918 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Kramer likely did not make the most of his considerable ability but he certainly left lasting impressions in Red Sox and Browns baseball history. When he was on, he was a very good pitcher and often delivered clutch wins for his ballclubs
Welcome to Baseball History Podcast, featuring baseball biographies. I’m your announcer Bob Wright.
This is game 48 of the 2010 baseball season.
In the first inning let’s take a look at This Week in Baseball History for the 2 week of February.
November 18
1947 The Browns trade All-Star shortstop Vern Stephens and pitcher Jack Kramer to the Red Sox for six players and $310,000. The dealing will continue tomorrow as Ellis Kinder and Billy Hitchcock also go to Boston in exchange for three more St. Louis players and $65,000 making the total number of players traded 13 (4 Browns, 9 Red Sox) with $375,000 going to the cash deprived Browns.
John Henry Kramer, nicknamed Jack, was born January 5, 1918 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Kramer likely did not make the most of his considerable ability but he certainly left lasting impressions in Red Sox and Browns baseball history. When he was on, he was a very good pitcher and often delivered clutch wins for his ballclubs
Flunking in four shots with the Browns due to poor control, Kramer got a fifth chance, thanks to the WWII player shortage. He went 17-13 with a 2.49 earned run average for the 1944 pennant winners. From 1945 to 1947, he averaged 11 wins per season and topped his career with 18 wins in 1948.
Pitching in the Texas League in 1938 Kramer, at the age of 20, won 20 games while losing only 11. In 242 innings he allowed only 201 hits and put together a sparkling 2.42 earned run average. His great performance that year earned him a promotion to the woeful St. Louis Browns for the 1939 season.
The 1939 Browns could win only 43 games while losing 111 and finished deep in the American League cellar, a whopping 64 1/2 games out of first place. Kramer’s nine wins tied for the club lead. He suffered 16 defeats and his earned run average was an unsightly 5.83. His strikeout to walk ratio was a backwards 1-to-2, with only 68 strikeouts and 127 walks. He still showed promise, throwing two shutouts and pitching 10 complete games.
Kramer struggled even more in 1940, going 3-7 with a 6.26 Earned Run Average before the Browns shipped him to Toledo of the American Association. He wasn’t any better with the Mud Hens, finishing with a 1-6 won-loss record and an unhealthy 6.86 Earned Run Average.
The pitching deprived Browns gave him another shot in 1941 and he compiled a 4-3 record in 29 games, all but three in relief. Still plagued by wildness, Jack walked 40 and struck out only 20 in 59 1/3 innings while his Earned Run Average remained above five.
With World War II on in full force, Kramer spent 1942 working as a ship fitter at the Delta Shipyard in New Orleans where he was able to pitch an occasional Sunday semipro game.
He enlisted in the Navy in January 1943 and volunteered for the rigorous Seabee training at Camp Peary near Williamsburg, Virginia. His sinuses, which had first been a problem in Toledo in 1940, kicked up with all the plunging in and out of water in Virginia’s marshlands that was required of him, landing him in the post hospital. After a month’s stay there the Navy gave him an honorable discharge on May 14 and he headed home to New Orleans to further recuperate.
Kramer rejoined the Browns on June 22, 1943 and appeared in three games as he worked his way back into pitching shape. The Browns played an exhibition game on August 5 with Toledo, still their top minor league affiliate, and left Kramer with the Mud Hens. It was a wise decision, for there, in his second stint in Toledo, Jack turned his career around and never looked back.
After losing his first start to the Kansas City Blues 3-1, he reeled off eight straight wins, including two-hit and three-hit shutouts. He even topped those performances on September 11 when he threw a no-hitter against the Louisville Colonels. He finished the year with the Mud Hens with an 8-2 record and an impressive 2.46 earned run average. Improved control helped immeasurably, he struck out 59 and walked 26 in 84 innings of work.
With the war at its peak, the Browns’ roster was favored with a number of front-line players who were medically ineligible for the military. In addition, they had key players, like Kramer, who had been discharged from the service.
The Browns entered the season with uncertain pitching to say the least.
Kramer was selected to pitch the opener against the Tigers in Detroit even though his lifetime record was 16-26 and his earned run average was close to six. But Jack was superb, beating them 2-1. That win was the first of nine straight Brown’s victories to start the season, blowing by the Yankees’ record of seven straight wins to open a season, set in 1933.
The Browns were in and out of the lead and embroiled in a tight pennant race with up to four teams. Kramer won five in a row to start the season before slumping. At the All-Star break the Browns were 45 and 34 and in first place by 2 1/2 games. They won 10 in a row in early August to open a 6 1/2 game lead over the Yankees but by Labor Day had surrendered the lead to those same New Yorkers. Although the Browns briefly slipped to third place in early September, they refused to wilt and showed the resiliency necessary to hang in there.
On September 16, Kramer threw a one-hitter at the White Sox to propel the Browns back into the lead. It was short-lived, however, as the next day the Tigers won a doubleheader over New York to regain the lead and virtually eliminate the Yankees from contention.
Heading into the final weekend of the season, the Browns found themselves one game behind the Tigers, with four games against the tough Yankees while Detroit hosted the cellar-dwelling Senators.
Kramer pitched the crucial first game of the Friday doubleheader and prevailed 4-1, contributing a key double to the Browns’ offense. The Browns went on the sweep the Yankees while the Tigers could only split their four games with Washington. The Browns’ performance vaulted them by a single game to the first and only pennant in franchise history.
Waiting for the Browns in the World Series were the powerful, by wartime standards at least, Cardinals, who had won 105 games and swept to the National League pennant by 14 1/2 games. Unhappily for the Browns, the Cardinals won the Series four games to two.
Kramer held out until late March the following spring, looking for a $5,000 raise. He got something less than a $3,000 increase but still started the season strong, winning his seventh game in mid-June. Thereafter a groin injury hampered him but he tried to pitch through it. He finished 10-15 for the season, but with a solid 3.36 Earned Run Average.
The drop-off in his performance, however, certainly had an impact on the Browns, who finished in third place with a solid 81-70 record, six games behind the Tigers. It may also have had something to do with the fact that he was tipping his pitches and at least the rival Tigers picked it up. Supposedly Kramer turned his glove one way when throwing his fastball and another when throwing his curve, making it easy for the batter to know what pitch was coming. As a result, Kramer rarely got past the fifth inning against Detroit, and since the Tigers won the pennant by only a game and a half over Washington, may have been a significant, if unwitting, contributor to their pennant run.
The spring of 1946 the Browns attempted to cut Kramer’s salary by $2,000, evoking an angry reaction from Jack who indicated that the club was fully aware of his injury the previous year. He ended his holdout in February and joined the club for spring training.
The Browns struggled from the start and won only 66 games, finishing in seventh place, 38 games out of first. Kramer was one of the few bright spots, leading the team with 13 wins against 11 losses with three shutouts and a 3.19 Earned Run Average. He was selected to the American League All-Star team for the first and only time of his career.
Kramer had Hollywood good looks and by now had an earned reputation as a clothes horse. It was said that he couldn’t pass a mirror without stopping to admire himself. One afternoon the Indians, led by one of their coaches Del Baker, were quickly on his case, giving him a considerable going over from their dugout. In the second inning, Kramer plunked player-manager Lou Boudreau in the ribs with a fastball. As Boudreau trotted to first, Jack strolled over toward the first base line and said, “If you don’t keep those guys on the bench quiet, I’ll stick one in your ear the next time you come to bat. You’re the boss so let’s see you shut them up.”7
Kramer was well known for his competitive drive and generally did not like to be removed from games he started. Once when the Browns manager took him out of a game against the Red Sox in Fenway Park, Kramer became so angry that he fired the ball far up into the stands. One reporter remarked that it was his best throw of the day.
The 1947 Browns continued the team’s slide, this time falling all the way to the American League basement. The club could win only 59 games. They were led by Kramer’s 11 victories, the only Browns’ hurler with double digit wins. But Jack lost 16 times and his earned run average was an unsightly 4.97. For the first time since 1941 he walked more men than he struck out and gave up more hits than innings pitched.
After winning the American League pennant by 12 games in 1946, the Boston Red Sox had slipped to third in 1947, finishing 14 games behind the champion New York Yankees and two games back of the second place Detroit Tigers. In an attempt to improve their hitting and pitching the Red Sox pulled the trigger on a block bluster trade with the St. Louis Browns in November 1947, acquiring the 30-year-old Kramer and slugging shortstop Vern Stephens in exchange for seven players and a reported $310,000 cash.
Both Kramer and Stephens would respond with terrific years and would be key ingredients to the Red Sox chase for the pennant in 1948, which they lost in a one game playoff to the Cleveland Indians.
Kramer would become the team’s leading winner, compiling a record of 18 wins against only five losses, including a clutch 5-1 victory over the powerful Yankees on the last weekend of the season. It would be Kramer’s career year and last real hurrah. Plagued by a sore arm, Kramer could win only six games while losing eight in 1949 when the Red Sox would again fall just short of the pennant.
Kramer parlayed his memorable 1948 season into a $30,000 contract for 1949, one of the top salaries on the team.
Unfortunately Jack struggled mightily in 1949 with a sore arm and at the All-Star break had only one victory against four defeats.
The Red Sox again lost a taut pennant race, this time on the last day of the season, 5-3 to the Yankees. Kramer struggled to a 6-8 record and a dismal 5.16 earned run average. He was able to start only 18 games.
Joe McCarthy was clearly tired of Kramer’s act and in February 1950 the Red Sox sold Jack outright to the New York Giants for a reported $25,000. Under the rules then in place, all the American League clubs would have had to pass on Kramer for him to be sold to the National League. Kramer had his feelings hurt by being dumped by the Red Sox and lashed out at Joe McCarthy, calling him “the most ornery man I know” and accusing him of “railroading him out of the league only because he had a personal grudge” against him. He promised that he would make McCarthy regret the sale.
By most accounts, his Boston teammates were glad to see Kramer go. Birdie Tebbetts, the Red Sox regular catcher, was particularly harsh, alleging that Kramer “never delivered when we needed him. His attitude was all wrong from the time he first joined up. A ll he cared about the game of baseball was the money he could get out of it to buy fancy clothes and cars and strut as Handsome Jack. He didn’t really care for the game and he certainly didn’t care for anybody on this squad.”
When Kramer learned of the quotes attributed to Tebbetts, he found it hard to believe that Birdie had said those things about him. He said, “If Tebbetts had said those things, they were lies. I gave my best for Boston. I always have and always will. Man, I couldn’t sleep nights if I didn’t and I can always sleep nights.”
On the other side of the deal, Giants’ manager Leo Durocher was sold on Kramer’s reputation as a good competitor. However, Kramer went 3-6 for the Giants in 1950 in 35 games and only 86 2/3 innings. His Earned Run Average was a respectable 3.53 but he walked more than he struck out and gave up more than a hit an inning. He was used mostly in relief and as a spot starter, with nine starts and one complete game.
Kramer held out in the spring of 1951 balking at a proposed pay cut. The Giants and Manager Leo Durocher found it amusing that someone who had won three games was holding out and made it clear that they really didn’t care much if he signed or not. Kramer did sign on March 7, accepting a $15,000 salary, a reduction of $3,000 from the previous year.
He reported to spring training but it was not long before he got himself into the doghouse. First, Durocher ignored him for a week or so after he announced that he was ready to pitch. After finally pitching two innings against the Cardinals, he reported sick for another exhibition game, claiming stomach problems.
The following day, on the train to Mobile, Alabama, Durocher talked with Kramer, telling him to stop acting like a prima-donna and to get ready to contribute to the team. Durocher told the press that Kramer’s problems were all in his mental approach to the game. He referred to a great batting practice Kramer had recently thrown and said, “The guy can pitch if he wants to pitch. Larry [Jansen] and I thought it was one of the greatest pitching shows we’ve ever seen.”21
Durocher must have struck a chord with Kramer. On April 3, the day after his heart-to-heart talk with Durocher, Kramer threw five scoreless innings in an exhibition game against the Boston Braves, allowing only one hit. Then a few days later Kramer threw a complete game against the Cleveland Indians, winning 10-3. He shut the Tribe out for six innings, running his spring training stretch of scoreless innings to 13.
Once the season began, however, Kramer was ineffective. In four appearances, including one start, he pitched 4 2/3 innings, giving up 11 hits and eight earned runs. On May 17, the Giants gave the 33-year-old his unconditional release.
On May 28 the Yankees signed Kramer. Unhappily, he could not regain his mound form. He appeared in 19 games for the Yankees, starting three, while compiling a 1-3 won-loss record and a 4.65 earned run average. The Yankees, headed for their third straight American League pennant, ultimately decided that Jack wasn’t going to help them. They released him on August 30, ending Kramer’s big league career.
Probably the best dresser in the game, Jack Kramer could be a persnickety and difficult teammate. He seemed to wear out his welcome, particularly when he was not pitching well. He struggled with arm trouble for much of the end of his career and his attitude was often suspect.
In 12 big league seasons, Kramer won 95 games and lost 103 and thus ended up a sub-.500 pitcher. His career earned run average was an unimpressive 4.24, he walked more men than he struck out, and gave up more than a hit an inning.
But he helped the St. Louis Browns to their only American League pennant and was a driving force in the Red Sox near run to the 1948 pennant.
Jack Kramer died on May 18, 1995 in New Orleans, LA at the age of 77.
A large part of this biography comes from the SABR Baseball Biography Project written by C. Paul Rogers III. It can be found online at http://bioproj.sabr.org
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Well, that’s it for today’s Baseball History Podcast. I’ll see you later at the ballpark.
