James Patrick Seerey, nicknamed “Pat”, was born March 17, 1923 in Wilburton, Oklahoma.
Seerey hit the ball a long way, but he also led American League batters in strikeouts in all four of his seasons as a regular. He became the fifth Major League player to hit four home runs in a game.
Welcome to Baseball History Podcast, featuring baseball biographies. I’m your announcer Bob Wright.
This is game 28 of the 2011 baseball season.
In the first inning let’s take a look at This Week in Baseball History for the 3 week of July.
July 18
1948 In an eleven inning 12-11 victory over the A’s, White Sox outfielder Pat Seerey hits 4 HRs in one game. His last homer comes in the final inning of the game.
James Patrick Seerey, nicknamed “Pat”, was born March 17, 1923 in Wilburton, Oklahoma.
Seerey hit the ball a long way, but he also led American League batters in strikeouts in all four of his seasons as a regular. He became the fifth Major League player to hit four home runs in a game.
Only an average major league player, he had two of the greatest slugging games in baseball history. At Yankee Stadium on July 13, 1945, Seerey hit three home runs and a triple in a 16-4 win over the New Yorkers. Pat was only in the lineup because the regular player had injured his back the day before. After tripling in the first inning, the rotund batter hit a solo home run in the third. In the fourth inning, a grand slam home run featured a seven-run Cleveland inning. In the seventh inning, Seerey’s third home run went into the left field stands.
After being traded to Chicago in 1948, on June 18 Seerey pounded out four home runs in an 11- inning game at Philadelphia’s Shibe Park. For his fete, he received a $500 bonus from a Philadelphia scorecard advertiser who had offered $300 for any player who hit three home runs in one game. The advertiser called the ballpark and promised Seerey $500 if he hit his fourth. Pat did it and collected his prize. At that time, he was the fifth player in history to hit four home runs in a game. The powerful Seerey and Willie Mays were rare players who totaled 31 bases in two games.
Seerey signed with Cleveland out of high school in 1941. He hit 31 home runs that season and 33 the next before making his debut with the Indians in 1943.
On June 8, 1943 Seerey was called to the major league when the Indians Hank Edwards broke his collarbone. Lou Boudreau, the young player-manager, had a veteran outfield and had no intention of playing Seerey. The rookie was to be used in case of emergency, play a game or two if a tough lefthander was pitching, or if a pinch hitter was needed. He played in five games, including three pinch-hit appearances, and hit a home run in the first month and a half he was with the Indians.
Seerey was a rare player who became well known at the major league level before he did anything important on the field. Bob Yonkers, baseball writer of the Press, was the first to call Seerey “The People’s Choice.” After making two spectacular catches at League Park on June 14, Yonkers concluded “Pat was the people’s choice after those two catches.” On June 24, 1943, Press cartoonist Jim Herron drew a lively cartoon labeled “The People’s Choice.”
Why was Seerey so popular with the fans? It’s speculated that at 5’9″ and 220-plus pounds, he resembled many of them. “The People’s Choice” looked like a beer-drinking weekend softball bopper. In the world of baseball fantasy, the fans could visualize themselves playing major league baseball and hitting tape measure home runs. Whitey Lewis wrote a story about one of his blasts: “The afternoon in Philadelphia when Seerey stepped into a pitch by Bill Dietrich and hit it over the double-decked pavilion in deep left center, the ball was rising all the time and finally skipped off the top of the pavilion and startled some good neighbors a few blocks down the street.”
Bob Feller related to Plain Dealer writer Bob Dolgan in 1986: “Seerey never choked up or cut down his swing with two strikes on him. He had a blind spot high and inside, but he was a dead lowball hitter.” Dolgan wrote that Seerey had a picture-perfect swing but lacked the hand-eye coordination to make contact regularly.
There was a pattern to the five complete seasons, 1944 to 1948, that Seerey spent in the major leagues with Cleveland and Chicago. Slimming down as best he could, the young player would be a spring training sensation. Harry Jones of the Plain Dealer, writing from Topeka, Kansas April 14, 1948: “Pat Seerey hit a home run today that sailed high over the left field fence, cleared a fair sized elm tree, bounced on top of a garage and landed in a parking lot half a block from the ball park.”
Inserted into the lineup on opening day, Seerey would often hit tape measure home runs. Bob Feller remembered Seerey and a 1947 game Feller pitched against Detroit ace Hal Newhouser: “See that exit from the end of the stands up there?” Feller said, squinting into the Stadium’s upper deck in left field, a distance of perhaps 475 feet. “I saw Seerey hit one right through there off Newhouser for a three run homer.”
Soon, though, he would fail to hit, striking out on a regular basis, and the fans would boo him. Four times he led the league in strikeouts. He averaged one strikeout for every four times at bat. Seerey never had more than 414 plate appearances in a season.
Boudreau’s impatience would send him to the bench for a time. It didn’t help, either, that Boudreau most often played Seerey in left field where he frequently had problems, even though he had come up to the majors as a center fielder. Mel Harder, Cleveland coach, considered him a better than average fielder. All these factors, his weight, his lack of discipline and his playing out of position combined to keep Seerey from stardom.
Not all American League managers had a poor opinion of Seerey’s playing abilities. I n 1944 Steve O’Neill, manager of the Tigers, wanted Pat in Detroit: “Let him strike out. All free swingers strike out, but he’ll hit plenty of home runs for you. I’d take him in a minute if Cleveland would deal him.” Whitey Lewis of the Press concluded: “Seerey required special handling. He never got it from Lou Boudreau whose University of Illinois theories were nothing more than positive confusion to Pat.”
Seerey’s best year with Cleveland was 1946 when in 117 games and 404 at bats, he hit 26 home runs and drove in 62 runs.
Boudreau would have sent Seerey to the minors by the middle of 1946 but Bill Veeck had purchased the club, looked at Seerey, and thought he had another Hack Wilson. In the fall of 1947 Veeck said, “This fellow has so much potential ability that I hate to quit. I have known only about five ball players who had Seerey’s ‘color’ and possibilities.”
In addition to hiring Hall of Famers Rogers Hornsby, Tris Speaker and Hank Greenberg as Pat’s batting coaches, Veeck had Seerey and catcher Jim Hegan at his Arizona ranch in the winter of 1947-48 for a program of conditioning and batting drills with Greenberg. Pat admitted being difficult to coach: “I’m sort of a rockhead. When somebody tells me something and I’m not sure it’s right, I get stubborn and won’t do it.”
Boudreau thought of playing the slugger at catcher, where he could have held his weight down at a more demanding position. Even though Seerey arrived at spring training in 1948 at 195 pounds and hit well enough for Boudreau to promise writers that Seerey would start, taking called third strikes against the Giants relegated Pat to the bench. Veeck tried to send Seerey to the minors, but four American League clubs claimed him, so on June 2, 1948, Cleveland traded Seerey to the last place White Sox.
Seerey never made more than $12,000 in one season, but people in other American League cities also recognized something special in the stout player. Gordon Cobbledick, sports editor of the Plain Dealer, recalled: “In Philadelphia the fans in the double decked left field pavilion adopted a ritual years ago by way of indicating their opinion that Pat was no ordinary ball player. When he stooped to pick up his glove as he took his position in left field, the fans would rise as one man, extend their arms above their heads and bow in a sweeping salaam. You had to see it to appreciate the impressive nature of the rite when performed by several thousand persons.”
After the White Sox sent him to the minors in 1949, the 26-year-old slugger spent time that season in Los Angeles, Kansas City, Newark, and San Antonio. After playing 14 games at Memphis in 1950, Seerey was sent to a lower league team at Colorado Springs of the Western Association, where he had a monster year. Fans lined up to get in the park in hopes of seeing Seerey hit a drive over the centerfield fence. With 44 homers and 117 Runs Batted In, the odds would have been good. On just 112 hits, he scored 113 runs and was walked an amazing 135 times. Seerey’s last full season in professional baseball came in 1951. With a growing family in St. Louis and little chance of returning to the major leagues, he left professional baseball after a tryout in 1952.
Ted Williams selected Pat Seerey to be included in his 1994 card company’s “Swingin’ for the Fences” set. Questioned by several people why he chose Seerey for inclusion, Williams replied “Seerey did something that I never did. He hit four home runs in one game.”
Pat Seerey died on April 28, 1986 in Jennings, Missouri at the age of 63.
A large part of this biography comes from the SABR Baseball Biography Project written by Fred Schuld. 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.
