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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about baseball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the baseball urban legends featured so far.

BASEBALL URBAN LEGEND: Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees to (among other things) finance a musical called No No, Nanette that proceeded to flop!

As noted in this earlier Baseball Urban Legends Revealed, Red Sox owner Harry Frazee decided to trade his star player, Babe Ruth, after the 1919 season (a season where the Red Sox finished sixth out of eight teams), when Ruth demanded that his salary be doubled to $20,000.

Ultimately, Frazee accepted an offer from the New York Yankees for over $100,000 in cash, plus three $25,000 notes that would be paid out over the next six years PLUS a $300,000 mortgage on Fenway Park (Frazee had just purchased the park to protect him from being forced out as owner of the Red Sox if the other owners turned on him, as he would own the park where the Red Sox played).

At the time, Frazee actually made a strong argument as to why he made the deal…

I should have preferred to take players in exchange for Ruth, but no club could have given me the equivalent in men without wrecking itself, and so the deal had to be made on a cash basis. No other club could afford to give me the amount the Yankees have paid for him, and I don’t mind saying I think they are taking a gamble. With this money the Boston club can now go into the market and buy other players and have a stronger and better team in all respects than we would have had if Ruth had remained with us.

You have to admit, that’s a pretty strong argument.

Of course, Frazee did NOT spend the money on his club, at least not to the extent that he said he would, and the Red Sox became worse and worse over the next few years.

Frazee also happened to be a major investor in the world of the theater.

Perhaps his most famous production was the musical, No, No, Nanette, a 1925 hit (that has been revived and turned into films more than a few times) that featured the song “Tea for Two,” which is STILL famous today…

There are lots of rumors and half truths when it comes to Frazee’s involvement in the theater and its relationship with the Babe Ruth deal, most prominently that Frazee sold off Ruth to pay for the musical No, No Nanette and then saw the musical flop.

Are those rumors true?
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about baseball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the baseball urban legends featured so far.

BASEBALL URBAN LEGEND: The White Sox offered Joe Jackson and $60,000 for Babe Ruth before the Red Sox sold him to the Yankees.

The main thing that you need to take out of the landscape of the world of American League baseball in 1919 is the following – there was a serious rift between the teams in the American League.

Ban Johnson was the President of the American League and he had a lot to do with making the American League comparable to the National League, the “Senior Circuit,” including the raiding of the National League turn of the century when the National League had decided to put caps on the salaries of their players.

The eight teams in the American League in 1919 were the New York Yankees, the Boston Red Sox, the Chicago White Sox, the Washington Senators, the Detroit Tigers, the Cleveland Indians, the St. Louis Browns and the Philadelphia Athletics.

Ban Johnson ruled the league with an iron fist, and he made it very difficult for people to buy a team if he did not approve of them. Hell, he actually owned a piece of the Indians!!

This control loosened a bit in 1917 when Harry Frazee purchased the Boston Red Sox. Johnson was not a fan of Frazee, and almost from the start seemed to want to drive Frazee off.

Meanwhile, the owners of the New York Yankees, Jacob Ruppert and Tillinghast Huston, were not exactly fans of Johnson. When they purchased the Yankees in 1915, Johnson promised them that he would help them purchase good players, but in fact he actually specifically BLOCKED them from acquiring players, including the great Tris Speaker, who Johnson funneled from Boston to Cleveland, a team that Johnson owned an interest in (the Yankee owners did not know this at the time).

In addition, Charles Comiskey, famed owner of the White Sox, who was once such great friends with Johnson that he helped ESTABLISH Johnson’s position, had soured on Johnson and the two were no longer friends.

So those three teams were on the outs, with the other five teams (known as “The Loyal Five” at the time) also set against the three “Insurrectos.”

Things escalated in 1919 when Boston pitcher Carl Mays, angry with the Red Sox over contract negotiations and the fact that the Sox (1918 World Champions) seemed likely to miss the playoffs (and therefore Mays would have little chance of getting a World Series bonus), left the team. The rumors were that Mays was hoping to “force” the Red Sox into trading him to a contender. Frazee was somewhat surprised that other contending teams WERE offering him good money for his malcontent.

Frazee then traded Mays to the Yankees in the Summer of 1919.

Johnson, however, did not want to see future players using such a strategy to force trades, so he suspended Mays and refused to allow him to play for any other team while suspended.

They went to court over the suspension, and ultimately Johnson lost and Mays was allowed to pitch for the Yankees. That was the first major “loss” for Johnson as President.

However, this “victory” also further solidified the tension between Frazee and “The Loyal Five.”

So when, at the end of the 1919 season (a season where the Red Sox finished sixth out of eight teams), when his star player, Babe Ruth, demanded that his salary be doubled to $20,000, well, Frazee decided to get rid of Ruth, but as you could see, the teams he could deal with were limited.

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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about basketball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the basketball urban legends featured so far.

BASKETBALL URBAN LEGEND: NBA guard Eric Gordon played Michael Jordan’s son in the film Space Jam.

Michael Jordan’s youngest son, Marcus, played college basketball for the University of Central Florida. Before Florida, Jordan graduated from Whitney Young, a prestigious public school in Chicago. Jordan only attended Whitney Young his last two years of high school. His first two years he spent attending the private school, Loyola Academy, along with his older brother, Jeffrey. The two played together during the 2005-06 and 2006-07 seasons and led Loyola to a pair of conference championships. In February of 2007, the Jordan brothers faced off against North Central High School (from Indianapolis, Indiana). North Central’s star player, guard Eric Gordon, exploded for 43 points, 5 rebounds, 4 steals and 3 assists. This is noteworthy because an Eric Gordon PORTRAYED Marcus Jordan in Michael Jordan’s hit 1996 film, Space Jam!

But is it the SAME Eric Gordon who now plays for the New Orleans Pelicans?

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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about hockey and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the hockey urban legends featured so far.

HOCKEY URBAN LEGEND: A professional wrestling promoter ended up securing the Montreal Canadiens’ place in professional hockey history.

Les Canadiens de Montréal (otherwise known as the Montreal Canadiens) are the most successful team in the history of professional hockey. They have won the Stanley Cup a record twenty-four times (twenty-two since the Cup has been awarded to just the winner of the playoffs of the National Hockey League, before that, multiple leagues would compete for the trophy). They are the only original member of the National Hockey League (NHL) that is still playing today and are also the only team that pre-dated the founding of the NHL.

And yet, if it were not for a professional wrestling promoter, they likely never would have lasted five seasons, and we might never have had an NHL!
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about baseball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the baseball urban legends featured so far.

BASEBALL URBAN LEGEND: A Twins pitcher was once knocked out during a bar brawl…by his own manager!!

Dave Boswell was a strong, young pitcher coming into the 1969 season (Boswell’s Age 24 season). The big, brawny pitcher had already been to the playoffs in his second year with the Twins in 1965, and he seemed poised for big things in 1969.

His new manager for the 1969 was the fiery Billy Martin, who had actually technically been teammates with Boswell in 1965 (Martin’s last year in the big leagues).

Both Boswell and Martin were known to enjoy the night life, and it was one specific night, August 6th of 1969, that would forever link the two men together.
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about football and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the football urban legends featured so far.

FOOTBALL URBAN LEGEND: A player suffered a career ending injury walking back from a coin toss.

Albert “Turk” Edwards was a high profile offensive tackle coming out of college in 1932. An All-American for Washington State, Edwards had teams climbing over themselves to sign him. He ultimately signed with the Boston Braves, who changed their name in 1933 to the Boston Redskins and then moved to Washington in 1937.

Edwards spent his entire career playing for the Redskins, and upon his retirement in 1940, he became an assistant coach before finally becoming Head Coach in 1946. He retired in 1948, having spent all of his seventeen years in the NFL as a member of the Redskins organization.

He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1969.

Edwards was a massive guy – Life Magazine even did a spread on him in 1938, spotlighting his size…

However, as you might imagine, size can have a major downside, and in Edwards’ case, it led to a bizarre career-ending injury.
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about basketball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the basketball urban legends featured so far.

BASKETBALL URBAN LEGEND: While in the NBA, Dave Bing went to work for the same bank that denied him a mortgage for a house.

The NBA in the 1960s was a lot different than it is today, with one of the most important differences coming in the salary department. Players did not make nearly as much money then as they do now (even in context and with inflation taken into account).

However, even for the NBA of the 1960s, Dave Bing had a unique work ethic.

A star guard for the Detroit Pistons (he won the NBA Rookie of the Year in 1967), the future Basketball Hall of Famer attempted to get a mortgage for a home in 1968.

They turned him down, primarily because he had no credit history. What happened next was quite surprising…
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about hockey and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the hockey urban legends featured so far.

HOCKEY URBAN LEGEND: Six weeks after having Last Rites performed for him, a hockey player was playing in the Stanley Cup Finals!

Born in Montreal in 1931, Bernie “Boom Boom” Geoffrion was able to live his dream and not only play for the Montreal Canadiens, but play with them on SIX Stanley Cup winning teams, including a remarkable five in a row from 1956-1960, the only NHL team to ever achieve such a feat!

If there was any sadness in Geoffrion’s playing career it was that he was often overshadowed by his famous teammates, especially fellow scorer Maurice “Rocket” Richard. Geoffrion was the second NHL player ever to score 50 goals! Richard, though, was the first. Geoffrion was actually BOOED by Canadien fans a year that Geoffrion passed Richard for the scoring lead late in the season (while Richard was serving a one-game suspension)! Ultimately, Geoffrion actually retired from the Canadiens while still in playing condition. He never admitted as much, but it most likely had to be the fact that the Captainship upon Richard’s retirement and Doug Harvey being traded went not to Geoffrion, but fellow star Jean Béliveau, who was not even an Alternate Captain at the time (these guys, of course, are all amazing players – Richard, Harvey, Béliveau and Geoffrion are ALL Hall of Famers). Geoffrion returned to the NHL a couple of years later and played two years for the New York Rangers.

In any event, while his teammates might have taken the spotlight from him at times, there were times that Geoffrion couldn’t help but stand out.
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about football and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the football urban legends featured so far.

FOOTBALL URBAN LEGEND: A lawsuit by an injured rookie very nearly eliminated the NFL draft!

James McCoy Smith (born in Yazoo City, Mississippi, which led to him getting the nickname “Yazoo”) was drafted in the first round by the Washington Redskins as the twelfth overall pick.

The defensive back signed for $50,000 and proceeded to suffer a neck injury in his first season in the NFL, ending his career as soon as it began.

Sounds familiar enough – plenty of sad stories like that in the NFL.

However, Smith decided to DO something about it.
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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about football and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the football urban legends featured so far.

FOOTBALL URBAN LEGEND: The Pittsburgh Steelers chose Mike Tomlin for their head coaching job over Ken Whisenhunt.

This story really got a lot of play during the 2009 Super Bowl, as the Arizona Cardinals were pitted against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Whisenhunt had been a longtime assistant under legendary Steeler coach Bill Cowher, so when Mike Tomlin had gotten the job replacing Cowher, it was seen as though Tomlin was chosen for the position over Whisenhunt.

However, that’s not how the situation really unfolded.
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