Walter Henry Schang (August 22, 1889 – March 6, 1965) was an American professional baseball player and manager. He played in Major League Baseball as a catcher from to for the Philadelphia Athletics, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, St. Louis Browns and the Detroit Tigers.
Schang was the starting catcher for six American League pennant winning teams (Philadelphia Athletics (–), Boston Red Sox (), New York Yankees (–), and was considered one of the best major league catchers of his era, performing well both offensively and defensively. He was a switch-hitter who batted above .300 six times during his playing career and posted a career .393 on-base percentage, second only to Mickey Cochrane among major league catchers. In he became the first Major League Baseball player to hit a home run from both sides of the plate in the same game.
Standing 5-foot-10 inches tall and weighing 180 pounds, Schang was one of the new breed of catchers that emerged from the Deadball Era who used speed and agility to field their position. His reputation as a defensive stand out is enhanced because of the era in which he played. In the Deadball Era, catchers played a huge defensive role, given the large number of bunts and stolen base attempts, as well as the difficulty of handling every type of pitch imaginable, such as shine balls, spitballs, knuckleballs, and emery balls.
Career
Schang was born on August 22, 1889, in South Wales, New York, a small town approximately 25 miles southeast of Buffalo where, his parents worked as farmers. In 1912, while he was playing in the sandlots of upstate New York for the Buffalo Pullmans, he was discovered by George Stallings, who went on to manage the 1914 Miracle Braves. Schang began his major league career with the Philadelphia Athletics on May 9, 1913 at the age of 23. He played in 79 games and had a slashline of .266/.392/.415 (batting average/on-base percentage/slugging percentage) while walking 34 times to 44 strikeouts. He also finished eighth in the MVP voting. That year, the Athletics won the American League pennant and played in the 1913 World Series (the first of six appearances for Schang). In the five game defeat of the New York Giants, he hit .357 with five hits and seven RBIs in four games played, which included a home run in Game 3 (as it would turn out, this was the only postseason home run he ever hit). He played 107 games the following year and batted .287/.371/.404 with 45 RBIs while reducing his strikeouts to 33 (which nearly matched his walks of 32). For the fourth time in five seasons, the Athletics won the league pennant. They faced the Boston Braves, who were managed by Schang's mentor, George Stallings. The Braves would later be known as the "Miracle Braves" as they conducted a shocking sweep of Philadelphia. In the four-game sweep, he hit .167 with two hits.
The next three years for the Athletics and Schang were miserable, since manager/owner Connie Mack sold numerous pieces of his title teams to stay afloat (with the exception of players like Schang). He batted a combined .266/.369/.391 in those seasons with 118 RBIs while receiving more walks (133) than strikeouts (115). He was sold to the Boston Red Sox before the 1918 season. He played in 88 games (of a season shortened to send in September due to World War I) that year. While he batted .244, he maintained a consistent walk rate with 46 to 35 strikeouts while the Red Sox made the 1918 World Series. He played in five of the six games and batted .444 with four hits and an RBI. Schang was the regular catcher for that club, the last Red Sox team to win the title 2004. Soon afterwards, Boston owner Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees. He played 113 games in 1919 and batted .306 while reaching base at a .436 clip with 71 walks to 42 strikeouts with 101 hits (the first time he cracked the century mark in that category). In 1920, he hit .305/.413 with 64 walks to 37 strikeouts with another 50 RBI season (51) and 100-hit season (118). Schang followed Ruth in 1921 to the Yankees, becoming the first in the great string of Yankee catchers, including Bill Dickey, Yogi Berra, Elston Howard and Thurman Munson.