Ray Chapman is a unique player in baseball history. Some players are unique because of the records they hold. In the case of Ray Chapman, he is unique because he is the only baseball player in the history of baseball to die directly due to events that took place in a major league game. This tragic end to Chapman’s career and life took place just over 100 years ago.
What makes the Ray Chapman story even more interesting is that some fans believe he could have eventually made into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Chapman was a solid player. Was he good enough to have a plaque in Cooperstown at the Baseball Hall of Fame?
Collectors Dashboard does not have Ray Chapman as a player that was destined for Cooperstown. At least not entirely. His stats are not unimpressive, but they just lack enough years to know if he would have developed into an even better player. Chapman’s baseball career had injuries and interruptions. Even the next two (or few) years of “what could have been” had he not been injured and died it is more possible that Ray Chapman would have at least been considered closer to being a Hall of Fame candidate.
Collectors Dashboard has reviewed several sources for information on Ray Chapman’s career and on the incident that brought his tragic end. The New York Times covered the instance of his death and the aftermath. We used Baseball Reference for his statistics, Baseball Almanac for additional data, reviewed a posthumous Baseball Magazine account, and looked at the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) for additional details. The Baseball Hall of Fame was also referenced.
Chapman was a one-team career player in Cleveland. He started out with the Cleveland Naps in 1912 at age 21, before they became the Indians and before the team changed names after Nap Lajoie’s departure from the team. Chapman’s career came to a sudden and tragic end on August 16, 1920 in a game against the New York Yankees.
THE FATEFUL GAME
With the Indians up 3-0 in the top of the fifth inning, Yankee pitcher Carl Mays threw a pitch that was high and inside at the time that Chapman was crouched over the plate with dark skies above. Mays was known for a sidewinder “submarine” throwing, which is clearly featured in his 1922 American Carmel card and in his 1927 York Caramel card.
The pitch thrown was a dirtied ball and it struck Chapman in the head and Mays thought it had the bat because he fielded the ball and threw it to first base. Chapman had collapsed and was walked off the field with the assistance of teammates. The Hall of Fame article about a Babe Ruth and Carl Mays signed ball also noted that Babe Ruth heard the sound of Chapman being hit from 250 feet away.
According to a New York Times article, written on August 17, 1920, Chapman died about 12 hours later at St. Lawrence Hospital. The New York Times reported that Chapman had a depressed skull fracture, and after a surgery to remove a piece of his skull the brain in that area had been so severely jarred that blood clots had formed. The doctors even noted that the brain was damaged on the other side of his skull.
The Times report referred to pitcher Carl Mays as a “known headhunter.” The report also suggested that Chapman’s spikes may have caught in the dirt and prevented him from dodging that pitch.
FOR & AGAINST… HIS NUMBERS
Chapman was described as “a true sportsman, a skillful player, and one of the most popular men in the major leagues.” Is that enough to make Ray Chapman as a player who was bound for the Hall of Fame?
As far as Chapman’s playing, he was described as an excellent shortstop who led the league in assists one season. With the bat he hit the .300 mark in 3 seasons (4 seasons if you count his .312 in 31 games in 1912) and he led team in stolen bases four times. Chapman’s team record of 52 stolen bases in 1917 stood until 1980. Chapman also led the league in sacrifice hits in three seasons.
With 3,785 career at-bats, Chapman had 1,053 hits, had 671 runs and was credited with 364 RBI. Chapman’s career batting average of .278 was held down by lower averages in 2013 to 2016, but Chapman batted .300 or better in three of his last four seasons if you count his 111 games in the final 1920 season. One issue which may have been to blame for weaker stats was that Chapman played a shortened season in 1914 after a leg-break in the spring and that he again had leg ailments again in 1916.
OUTSIDE OF THE NUMBERS
The SABR website is full of praise for Ray Chapman. SABR’s Don Jensen said that Chapman was even more beloved off-the field because of “infectious cheerfulness and enthusiasm.” Chapman also spent a brief time in the Naval Auxiliary Reserve after the 1918 season after the War Department’s work-or-fight order, but that ended with the armistice in November 1918. Here was the praise written:
Put it all together, and Chapman was, in the view of the Cleveland News, the “greatest shortstop, that is, considering all-around ability, batting, throwing, base-running, bunting, fielding and ground covering ability, to mention nothing of his fight, spirit and conscientiousness, ever to wear a Cleveland uniform.”
SABR did have one more round of praise for Ray Chapman — In 1915 the Chicago White Sox tried to obtain him from Cleveland, but, after being rebuffed, had to settle for acquiring outfielder Shoeless Joe Jackson instead.
WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN…
Ray Chapman was 29 years old in his final season. His average in the final 1920 season was .303 and his slugging percentage was his career high at .423 with a second best career high .380 on-base percentage. Chapman played during the Dead Ball Era so his career 17 home runs sound very unimpressive by modern standards.
Had Chapman continued to play strong and without injury this verdict about having a plaque in the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown might be a very different story. Injuries from the early 1900s kept many great players from being able to achieve the greatness they could have reached. There was no Tommy John surgery. Muscle tears and leg breaks were often not given the attention that was needed compared to modern times.
Ball players were not known for lengthy careers in the 1910s and 1920s. Teams would wheel and deal players by selling their contracts once they felt they had a younger replacement from the minors or a better player from another team. Still, the great Tris Speaker was a player-manager in 1920, and was considered to be a dear friend of Ray Chapman.
Chapman had been asked about retirement before the 2020 season, but his response was that he wanted to help Tris Speaker win Cleveland’s first World Series before considering retirement. Guess which team won the World Series in 1920 — Cleveland. Imagine if Chapman would have gone on to have a great World Series showing what it would have done for his already popular reputation. Would he have put off retirement and helped the Indians win another World Series?
“Chappie” was not just popular as a player. He was an entertainer of sorts and was friends with entertainers like Al Jolson and Will Rogers. Chapman had also married a woman named Kathleen Daly, who was daughter to the millionaire president of the East Ohio Gas Company which supplied natural gas to the area. Her father was reported to have gotten Chapman hired on as secretary-treasurer for a local company Pioneer Alloys.
WHAT ABOUT CARL MAYS?
Carl Mays voluntarily went before an Assistant District Attorney and was exonerated of all blame. A reprinting of the November 1920 issue of Baseball Magazine has an account by Carl Mays to share his side of the story. Some players had called for Mays to be banned from baseball. That did not happen.
Mays was a strong pitcher, winning 26 games in 2020 and 27 games in 2021. After heading to Cincinnati after 1923, Mays won 20 games for them in 1924 and won 19 games in 1926 before his career numbers really started to taper off.
Mays continued to pitch and ended with 207 career major league victories and a 2.92 ERA. He also won an additional 75 games in the minor leagues. He did receive votes in the 1958 Hall of Fame ballot, but not enough to be inducted. The pitching incident was after Mays was already not a popular player and his reputation was dogged for years after Chapman’s death.
