Gloria Cordes Elliott (September 21, 1931 – March 13, 2018) was a starting pitcher who played from through in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Listed at 5' 8", 138 lb., she batted and threw right-handed.
Overview profile
Gloria Cordes was one of 25 players who made the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League clubs hailed from New York City and State, including Muriel Bevis, Mildred Deegan, Nancy Mudge, Betty Trezza and Margaret Wigiser. Cordes pitched in the last five seasons of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, primarily with the Kalamazoo Lassies. A hard-thrower and extremely competitive, she overcame control problems early in her career to become one of the most consistent overhand pitchers of the league. She was adversely affected by frequently moving from one city to another, totaling five moves in her first two seasons before settling in Kalamazoo for the rest of her career.
Early life
A native of Staten Island, New York, Cordes was one of eleven children, having five sisters and five brothers. At the age of eleven she began playing baseball with her brothers, learning the basics of the game, but intermittently, because there were no teams for girls. Nevertheless, she was determined to play well and continued to practice whenever she could.
In 1948, the Springfield Sallies and Chicago Colleens were added to the roster of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). Both teams had a lousy year and lost their franchises by the end of the season. For the next two years, the Colleens and Sallies became rookie training teams that played exhibition games and recruited new talent as they toured through the South and East. When the teams stopped for an exhibition game at Yankee Stadium in 1949, Cordes tried out for the league and was invited to another tryout in South Bend, Indiana, the following year. She attended the invitation and was assigned to the Muskegon Lassies.
AAGPBL career
At 19 age, Cordes entered the league in 1950 with the Lassies, based in Muskegon, Michigan. She pitched in nine games and was 0–5 on a team made up mainly of rookies from the traveling teams. It was a very bad season for the Lassies, who relocated to Kalamazoo, Michigan, in the middle of the year, and posted the worst record of the league with 36 wins, 73 losses and two ties. Although never credited with a no-hitter in the midseason because the contest ended in a 0–0 tie, she later defeated the South Bend Blue Sox, 1–0, behind a two-hit shutout. After pitching in the two cities, she joined the Racine Belles late in the season. She combined for a 5–10 record with a 3.63 earned run average, giving up 76 walks while striking out just 23 in 119 innings of work. Cordes stayed with the Belles when the team moved from Racine, Wisconsin, to Battle Creek, Michigan, for the 1951 season, but was sent back to the Lassies during the midseason. She finished 1951 with a solid 3.63 ERA, despite her 3–15 record for two helpless teams.
Cordes enjoyed a career year in 1952, pitching 34 consecutive scoreless innings and going the whole season without ever being relieved in her 24 starts. She finished with a 16–8 record and a 1.44 ERA and lowered drastically her numbers of the previous season, cutting her walks from 96 to 52, by increasing her strikeouts from 70 to 84, and allowing 12 fewer hits (168 to 156) in 34 more innings (179 to 213). Besides this, she finished fifth in the league in innings, third in strikeouts, sixth in wins and second in ERA to Jean Faut, who set an all-time, single-season record of 0.93 (.51 ahead of Cordes).
Cordes also appeared in the 1952 midseason All-Star Game as a member of the All-Star Team, which faced the South Bend Blue Sox, the league's 1951 playoff champions. The All-Stars prevailed, 7–6, when Betty Foss scored the eventual winning run on an RBI-single by Doris Sams in the top of the 9th inning. Then Cordes retired South Bend in the bottom of the ninth to earn the save. Kalamazoo improved to a 49–61 record in that season.