Cal alum helped Cubs win in early World Series runs
Behold the cover of The Chronicle sports page, Oct. 15, 1908:
The headline reads, “CHICAGO DOWNS DETROIT 2 TO 0 AND RETAINS ITS TITLE AS THE CHAMPION.”
The accompanying illustration depicts a big, fat bear, relaxing after “another full meal for the Cubs.”
“Well, that will hold me for awhile,” his thought bubble reads, blissfully unaware of the oncoming irony.
Little did he know, but that chubby cubby just enjoyed his last supper. After winning back-to-back titles in 1907 and ’08, the Chicago Nationals haven’t eaten since.
We’ll see whether these latter-day Cubs can join their ancestors at the table, finishing off the Indians and a billy goat and a curse in the process. But while that plays out in the present day, let’s take a trip back to those heady days for the juggernaut Cubs.
It was Tinker to Evers to Chance in the field, leading Chicago to four World Series appearances in five years. They
won two titles during that run, and their infield trio was immortalized by a New York sports columnist named Franklin Pierce Adams.
He penned “Baseball’s Sad Lexicon” as a rueful tribute to the slick-fielding double-play combination. And it was written from the perspective of a Giants fan, bemoaning yet another twinkilling. (These are the saddest of possible words/ “Tinker to Evers to Chance.”)
It’s a beautifully hokey piece of writing, ingraining shortstop Joe Tinker, second baseman Johnny Evers and first baseman Frank Chance in baseball history. Some say it was responsible for all three being inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1946. Others simply like the cadence of their names.
But the true poetry of those 1908 Cubs cannot be expressed without one of the great athletes in Bay Area history.
Orval “Orvie” Overall possessed one of the great names in baseball history. He also had a pretty live arm.
Overall was born near Visalia in 1881, “son of a former hotel man and one-time sheriff of Tulare County,” his Chronicle obituary read 66 years later. He learned to play baseball on the sandlots of the Central Valley, eventually heading West to play at Cal. At Berkeley, he became a legend, playing both baseball and football and giving the fellas from Palo Alto fits. The headline on the aforementioned obituary put it simply: “He was the dread of Stanford.”
Overall captained the football team, was named class president, joined Sigma Nu and baffled batters with his curveball.
After graduation, he tried his hand at pro baseball, catching on with the Cincinnati Reds. He didn’t stick, but it was there that Chicago’s player-manager, a fellow Californian named Chance, got a good look at him and decided to give “Orvie” a shot.
Overall thrived with the Cubs, joining a famed rotation that included Mordecai “Three-Finger” Brown, among others with less extraordinary nicknames. In 1907, the kid from Cal went 23-7 with a 1.68 ERA. He pitched 26 complete games and led the league with eight shutouts. He won a World Series game en route to the Cubs’ first title that fall.
In 1908, he had another solid regular season, then dominated the Fall Classic. Overall pitched the deciding game of that Series. And you guessed it — it was a shutout. In fact, it was his second complete game of the Series, earning him two of the four wins and a hallowed place in Cubs history.
“Overall, for the second time, pitched a masterly game,” The Chronicle’s story read. “Only three hits were made off him and one of those would have been an easy out had the ball not taken an erratic bound as it approached Steinfeldt. He was wild at times, giving four bases on balls, but, on the other hand, his strikeouts numbered 10.”
There you have it. Overall was overwhelming.
Chicago hasn’t tasted the Champagne since.
Overall’s arm went dead in 1910, and that was basically it. He tried a few comebacks before returning to California, where he played a little ball with the San Francisco Seals. He tried his hand at mining and citrus farming, eventually landing as a banker in Fresno, where he finished his days. He succumbed to a heart attack there in 1947.
So, as you watch these Cubs today, trying to break their curse.
Remember back to yesteryear, when Orval threw his deuce.
Remember Tinker, Evers and Chance. And, surely, they were great.
But good ol’ Orvie Overall? He was just the best.