#14: MR. CUB
| ALL-TIME #14 ROSTER | |
| Player | Years |
| Guy Bush | 1932 |
| Zack Taylor | 1933 |
| Charlie Root | 1934 |
| Larry French | 1935–41 |
| Ken Raffensberger | 1941 |
| Lou Novikoff | 1942 |
| Vallie Eaves | 1942 |
| Paul Schramka | 1953 |
| Ernie Banks (player and coach) | 1953–73 |
Paul Schramka is the answer to one of the all-time Cub trivia questions: Who was the last player to wear #14 before Ernie Banks? Originally signed by the Cubs in 1949 out of the University of San Francisco, Schramka, an outfielder, spent the next three-plus years playing in the Cubs minor league system and in military service. But he impressed manager Phil Cavarretta enough during spring training in 1953 to make the Opening Day roster, and in fact, Cavarretta had told reporters that Schramka would be his Opening Day left fielder, becoming the first player to wear #14 in eleven years. When that day, April 14, came, Gene Hermanski was in left field and Schramka was on the bench. He did get into the game as a pinch-runner, and two days later he replaced Hermanski in left field in the eighth inning. But that was the sum total of his major league career. He never again appeared in a game for the Cubs, and nine days after that, Schramka was sent to the minor league affiliate in Springfield, Massachusetts, and #14 was put away in storage. Up to that time it had been worn by seven other players, some well-known (Charlie Root) and others not (Zach Taylor), some colorful (Lou “The Mad Russian” Novikoff), and some workmanlike (Larry French, winner of 17 games with the ’35 pennant winners and loser of 19 when the Cubs won again in ’38). Just short of five months after Schramka had his uniform taken back, a skinny shortstop was recalled by the Cubs and issued #14 on September 17, 1953.
Twenty-nine years later, Paul Schramka’s uniform number was retired by the Cubs, having been worn with great distinction by Ernie Banks (1953–71, plus two more years as a coach). Schramka, who still lives in his hometown of Milwaukee, sent Banks a telegram after his number was retired on August 22, 1982, reading: “I left all the base hits in the jersey for you.”
Ernie Banks will forever be remembered for the grin on his face and the grin he put on the face of so many others.
Ernie Banks’s standing as the greatest Cub has been apparent for so long, even evident during his days as an active player, that it has become a cliché, obscuring his true magnitude. He is not a first tier Hall of Famer (e.g. Henry Aaron, Willie Mays, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb), but Banks is at the top of what may be called the “second class,” and that’s not intended as a slight. There is no question he was definitely headed for that first tier in the early years of his career, only to be derailed by serious injury. Indeed, a large part of Ernie’s greatness is that he overcame that obstacle to achieve as much as he did.
From 1955 through 1960, he hit 40 or more home runs five times in six seasons. In more than half a century since then, only Sammy Sosa, Ken Griffey Jr., Harmon Killebrew, and Alex Rodriguez have accomplished that feat; Hall of Famers Mays and Aaron, Banks’s contemporaries, never did. In 1955, he hit five grand slams, a feat that is still the NL record. The climax to all this production was the back-to-back MVP awards he won in 1958 and 1959, the first time a National Leaguer had won two in a row.
Looking back on those awards from today’s perspective, they are even more impressive than they must have seemed at the time. The Cubs finished sixth in both those of seasons–losing 82 games and finishing twenty games out of first place in ’58, losing 80 and winding up a closer, but still poor, thirteen games behind in ’59. But Ernie dominated the league. In 1958, he led the National League in games, at-bats, slugging, total bases, homers, RBI, and extra-base hits, finished second in OPS, and for good measure, second in triples with 11, though he was never much known for having much baserunning speed. He got sixteen of the possible twenty-four first-place MVP votes. He became only the third Cub to hit 40 homers in a season, after Hack Wilson and Hank Sauer, and it would take another dozen years (until Billy Williams hit 42 in 1970) for anyone else to join that exclusive club (since joined by Dave Kingman, Andre Dawson, Ryne Sandberg, Sosa, and Derrek Lee).
Injuries forced Banks to move from his original position, shortstop, where he played with grace and style and in many ways was the prototype for the power-hitting shortstops of today, to first base. As his knees got worse his mobility declined to the point where Leo Durocher openly campaigned to management to trade for a replacement. Perhaps as a reaction, Banks hit only 15 homers in 1966, the first year Durocher managed the club, but his power numbers came back in subsequent seasons. In 1969, Ernie drove in 106 runs at age thirty-eight. While that may not seem that “old” to us today, consider again the perspective of time–Ernie was the oldest position player in the major leagues that year.
As he approached retirement, Ernie became a player-coach. He continued those coaching duties for two years after his retirement as a player in 1971. Though his duties were somewhat undefined, he primarily coached first base–and Banks remained on the staff after Durocher was fired midway through ’72. On May 8, 1973, manager Whitey Lockman was ejected in the third inning and Ernie took over for the rest of the game, technically becoming the first black manager in baseball history. In 1977, Ernie was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, named on 83.8 percent of the ballots.
Banks, whose love for the Cubs was so great that he was bestowed the moniker “Mr. Cub,” received his nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, November 20, 2013 at the White House.
But he never did get to see his team win a World Series. He passed away in Chicago January 23, 2015, producing an outpouring of love both in Chicago and nationwide. The Cubs celebrated Ernie’s memory by placing his #14 on the field at Wrigley (behind the plate) and as a patch on the uniform sleeve all season long, and one of the very first things played on the new Wrigley Field video boards on Opening Night was a tribute to his career and life. On July 12, in a game against the White Sox, the entire Cubs team wore 1959 throwback uniforms bearing Ernie’s #14.
Even if the doubleheader is long out of fashion, his mantra endures: “Let’s play two.” They don’t make two like Ernie.
MOST OBSCURE CUB TO WEAR #14: Vallie Eaves (1941–42). One might call this “most obscure name to wear #14,” or any other number, for that matter; Eaves is the only “Vallie” in major league history, and that is, in fact, his true given first name (Vallie Ennis Eaves is his full name). Eaves appeared in 12 games for the 1941 Cubs and two more in 1942.
GUY YOU NEVER THOUGHT OF AS A CUB WHO WORE #14: Ken Raffensberger (1940–41) won 119 games (and lost 154!) over a fifteen-year major league career, primarily with the Reds; he also played for the Cardinals and Phillies. Seven of those wins came in 1940 as a part-time starter for the 75–79, fifth-place Cubs; after 10 mediocre appearances in 1941, he was sent to the minors and eventually traded to the Phillies two years later.
The Number No One Knows About: Rose Breaks Cobb’s Record at Wrigley
Pete Rose, just as Ernie Banks did for the Cubs, set many records wearing #14 for the Cincinnati Reds. On September 11, 1985, Rose got his 4,192nd career hit against the San Diego Padres before a sellout crowd in Cincinnati and in doing so, broke Ty Cobb’s all-time career hits record.
Or did he? Later research corrected Cobb’s hit total to be 4,189 instead of 4,191, the number it had been thought to be for decades. So to be historically correct, Rose’s 4,190th hit should be the one denoted as the record-breaker.
Three days before the “official” record-breaking hit, Rose’s Reds were in Chicago to play the Cubs. Rose, 44 years old and a player-manager, no longer played against lefthanders, and was going to sit against the Cubs’ scheduled starter, lefty Steve Trout. But it was reported that Trout “fell off a bicycle” that morning and right-hander Reggie Patterson replaced him. Rose put himself in the lineup and singled in the first inning, his 4,190th career hit. He singled again in the fifth for #4,191.
So, the 28,269 on hand at Wrigley on Sunday, September 8, 1985 were the ones who really saw Pete Rose break Ty Cobb’s record. Incidentally, that day started hot and humid and 88 degrees; midway through the game, a blinding thunderstorm blew through, delayed the game two hours, dropped the temperature to 58 and forced it to be called a tie when it got too dark to play. Perhaps forces other than Rose’s bat were at work that afternoon.