Morrie Martin
Plus: Day In Review May 31, 1941
Morrie Martin
This game wasn’t even close.
You might wonder why in the world I’d write about a 19-3 game.
The reason is Morrie Martin, the Dodger’s starter. For some strange reason, the computer manager decided to leave him in for 6 1/3 innings and 161 pitches.
Martin gave up 16 earned runs and 17 hits, walking 9 batters in the process. He pitched horribly. There were numerous Brooklyn pitchers who could have come in to relieve him, but the computer manager decided not to make a move.
It wasn’t until the scoreboard looked like this that something happened:
But why?
Who Was Martin?
It turns out that Morrie Martin actually did have an outing like this in 1949.
Martin’s real life difficult outing came on July 3rd against the Giants. It wasn’t a start, however, and he only went 1 2/3 innings:
This was Morrie’s worst outing of 1949. I mean, it’s not too surprising to me. 8 hits, 2 walks, 4 doubles (including 3 in a row to end it), and a grand slam home run don’t make for a great time on the mound.
In fact, Martin’s SABR biography mentions this game:
The Daily News expressed just how bad this outing was for Martin:
Now that you know this, put the game I just played into perspective. Martin gave up twice as many runs in this start, going almost 170 pitches with no relief at all. If you think the rookie’s real life 1949 relief outing was bad, how would he have felt after this one?
Settings
To show you that nothing strange is going on, here are what Martin’s player profile is set to in Diamond Mind:
I’ve complained about how confusing this is before. Basically, the game is set up (by default, I might add) to frequently replace Martin when he’s in the box. Apparently that didn’t happen here.
Here are the settings for the team. Again, there’s nothing strange going on here — no setting telling the computer to not take the pitcher out.
I’m not sure what caused this result. I can’t explain it.
Other Action
Giants 19, Dodgers 3: At New York, see above.
Phillies 4, Braves 1: At Philadelphia, Curt Simmons holds the reigning National League champions to 6 hits in a complete game victory.
Standings
How about those Giants? They’re pushing on towards a .700 winning percentage. It’s amazing how long they’ve kept this up.