Stan Musial: Stan The Sailor Man

He was the hottest young player on the Cardinals when duty called. Playing ball in the Navy taught Stan a few new skills that would elevate his game to the Hall of Fame level...

HE WAS THE budding superstar of the early 1940’s. On a St. Louis Cardinals team that was loaded with talent, young Stan Musial stood out. Unlike his tough and rough teammates like Whitey Kurowski or Enos Slaughter, Musial was a quiet, friendly fella. When radio announcers pronounced his Polish last name wrong, Stan was too nice of a guy to bring it to their attention. Thus, Musial (pronounced “Mu-show”) became Musial (pronounced “Mew-see-al”).

He seemed to have come out of nowhere – a converted pitcher from the sticks of Pennsylvania who hit .315 and quietly took his place in the starting lineup of the best team in the National League. It was while he was still relatively unknown that Stan got his famous nickname. The Brooklyn fans in the Ebbets Field stands didn’t know who this new Cardinal player was, but it seemed that every time “that man” came to the plate, he tore Dodger pitching apart. Eventually, as more and more singles, doubles and homers flew off the end of his bat, “that man” evolved into a more reverent “The Man” – the name Stan Musial was forever known by.

That 1942 rookie season was just a teaser – in ‘43 he led the league in hits, doubles, triples, batting average, slugging percentage – being named the National League MVP was just a formality. 1944 was pretty much a repeat of the previous year, and for the third year in a row the Cardinals went to the World Series. But there was that thing called World War II going on, and it was inevitable that The Man would have to take part. Brooklyn’s Pete Reiser pushed hard to get Stan to join the Army and play on his Fort Riley ball club, but Musial went Navy instead.

SEAMAN STAN MUSIAL was posted to Bainbridge Naval Training Center in Maryland. During the war, all military bases had football, basketball and baseball teams to keep the servicemen occupied and out of trouble. Team sports helped build an esprit de corps among the recruits, and many of the larger bases fielded teams loaded with former big leaguers. Teams like the Bainbridge Commodores, which Musial played for, would play exhibition games against major league teams and local semi-pro outfits for the benefit of the boys. Free admission to see Bainbridge face the Philadelphia Athletics or Brooklyn Dodgers kept many a sailor out of trouble for the afternoon and helped take his mind off of what was to come when he inevitably shipped overseas.

The Bainbridge team was coached by the base’s athletic officer, Lieutenant Jerry O’Brien, and boasted some first-rate talent. Besides Musial, the Commodores had big leaguers Lum Harris (A’s), Dick Wakefield (Tigers), Thurman Tucker (White Sox), Stan Spence (Senators) and Dick Sisler (Cardinals). Wearing the Navy-issued number 44 on his back instead of his familiar 6 and swinging a GI model Hanna Batrite in place of his Louisville Slugger, Musial and the Commodores opened their 1945 season with a game against the New York Giants. The pros were winning going into the 9th when The Man tied it up, where it remained when the game was called after nine innings. Next, Musial and the Navy boys whipped the Phillies and then took a pair from the Senators, Stan’s bat coming through in the clutch time after time.

Stan also had to get used to the Navy’s strict rank system in which subordinates were expected to follow a superior’s orders unquestioningly. While this made perfect sense on a battlefield, it was sometimes a little hard for an experienced pro like Musial to blindly follow Lt. O’Brien’s instructions on the diamond. For instance, although the Cardinal Stan Musial was exclusively an outfielder in the majors, Lt. O’Brien decided that Seaman Musial would be more valuable to the Navy as a first baseman. As would be expected, Musial was not very good at the unfamiliar position, with Lt. O’Brien assessing his abilities as “terrible.” Musial responded by working overtime and quickly mastered the new position. Years later, Stan’s ability to easily switch between outfield and first base would double his value to the Cardinals.

When not undergoing recruit training or playing ball, Stan spent his time talking baseball and autographing his fellow sailor’s white hats. Though Musial was no doubt the star attraction of the Bainbridge team, Stan was astute enough to see that while the sailors appreciated the doubles and triples that sprung off the end of his bat, the swabbies REALLY loved the booming homers that his teammate Dick Sisler pounded out.

EVER THE NICE GUY, The Man decided that he would give the Navy boys what they wanted: home runs. The Man began tinkering with his swing and changing his grip on the bat. By the time he shipped out to the Pacific in June, The Man had begun evolving from a great hitter into a power hitter.

In Hawaii, Stan was assigned to the Ship Repair Unit in Pearl Harbor, where he spent mornings sailing a motor launch between the docks and the warships being repaired in the harbor. In the afternoon he played baseball. In the spring of 1945 the islands were an arsenal of talent, and it can be argued that the level of ball being played on any given weekend in Hawaii was better than what was being offered by the Major Leagues back in the States.

With so many ex-big leaguers in their ranks, the Navy formed the Fourteenth Naval District League that consisted of ten teams playing a 54 game schedule. Teams regularly played before crowds of 10,000 or more sailors and marines. Musial joined his old Bainbridge teammate Lum Harris on the Ship Repair Unit club which was managed by former Dodger Cookie Lavagetto and included Ray Lamanno and Wes Livengood of the Cincinnati Reds. Though the Ship Repair team failed to make the playoffs, Musial’s .380 batting average was third best in the league and was named to the all-star team.

During his time in Hawaii, The Man also got a chance to relive his former glory days as a pitcher; his 4-hit shutout of an army all-star team showed he still had something on the ball.

At the conclusion of the season, the Navy floated the idea of an Army-Navy World Series, but the doughboys demurred as they did not have anywhere near the diamond star power in the islands as the bluejackets. With the prospect of an inter-service series slashed, the Navy decided to split their big league talent into two teams representing the American and National Leagues for a Navy World Series.

The talent present on each of the teams was staggering, with Ted Williams, Johnny Pesky, Schoolboy Rowe, Bob Lemon and Dick Wakefield for the AL and Musial, Billy Herman, Hugh Casey, Herman Franks and Cookie Lavagetto representing the NL. Held from September 26 to October 6, 1945, each game pulled crowds of around 28,000. The National League prevailed 4 games to 2, with Musial demonstrating his slugging prowess by hitting a home run in Game 1.

With the war over, Stan was shipped to the Philadelphia Navy Yard. His lack of any training whatsoever notwithstanding, the brass expected Seaman Musial to take part in the dismantling of a destroyer. Fortunately, someone up the ladder came to their senses, and Stan was discharged just in time to join the Cardinals in spring training.

WHILE OTHER players’ careers had suffered after several years away, playing Navy ball for 18 months made The Man even more dangerous than before. He led the National League in all the same offensive categories that he did in 1943, his new-found power winning him his second NL MVP Award and helping the Cards win the 1946 World Championship. Two years later he came one home run-shy of winning the Triple Crown, but settled for his third NL MVP Award – the first player in his league to do so.

Besides being arguably the best hitter of all-time, Stan‘s sense of sportsmanship earned him the respect of millions of fans. When the game was integrated in 1947, Stan showed support in his typically quiet way that spoke volumes. In a 1947 Dodgers-Cards game, Stan’s teammate Enos Slaughter deliberately spiked Jackie Robinson in a dirty play at first. The next inning when Robinson reached first base, he was seething mad and told Musial he wanted to tear his Cardinals teammates apart. Stan’s reply of “I don’t blame you” diffused the situation, making Robinson realize that he was not fighting the entire world, just a few ignorant bigots.

Willie Mays remembered The Man joining in a card game with Black players during a plane flight heading to an All-Star Game. “That told me how classy he was, and I never forgot that,” Mays later recalled.

After he retired in ’63, The Man held various front office jobs with the Cards including General Manager of the team when they won the World Series in 1967. He headed up Lyndon Johnson’s physical education taskforce in the late sixties and led by example when he became one of the first athletes to turn down lucrative tobacco ad endorsements.

Stan was the ultimate family man, and to help other players achieve what he held so dear, had the Cards organize a babysitting service so wives could attend their husband’s games. An accomplished harmonica player, Musial’s rendition of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” was a fixture at old-timers events and he even published a book about mastering the mouth organ. If one was to venture to the city of Kutno in the dead-center of Poland, you’ll find Stan Musial Field, part of a sprawling baseball complex that serves as HQ to European youth baseball.

BOB COSTAS has always possessed the talent of crafting the perfect one-paragraph synopsis that rides that fine line between sentimentality and true fact, and his summation of The Man is the perfect example with which to close this story:

He didn’t hit a homer in his last at-bat; he hit a single. He didn’t hit in 56 straight games. He married his high school sweetheart and stayed married to her. … All Musial represents is more than two decades of sustained excellence and complete decency as a human being.

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This week’s story is Number 1 in a series of collectible booklets.

Each of the hand-numbered and signed 4 ¼” x 5 1/2″ booklets feature an 8 to 24 page story along with a colored art card attached to the inside back cover. These mini-books can be bought individually, thematically or collected as a never-ending set. In addition to the individual booklets, I envision there being themed sets, such as the series I did on Minor League Home Run Champions. You can order a Subscription to Season 5 as well. A year subscription includes a guaranteed regular 12 issues at a discounted price, plus at least one extra Subscriber Special Issue. Each subscription will begin with Booklet Number 054 and will be active through December of 2023. Booklets 1-53 can be purchased as a group, too.