1945

Nick (Polachanin) Polly was born on April 18, 1917, in Chicago. He went to the Lane Technical High School for four years. Lane Tech at the time was a baseball powerhouse, city champions in 1933.

He also played American Legion baseball and made the National Tea Post team in Chicago in 1933. The team won locally and regionally, then beat Stockton, California, for the Western section title at Topeka. They went to New Orleans to face the Trenton, New Jersey, team for the national championship.

Nick was also a star guard and captain of the Lane Tech basketball team, which made it to the city finals in early 1934.

He played some semipro baseball, but first signed professionally with the Davenport Blue Sox (Class-A Western League) and played for the Blue Sox again in 1936.

In 1937, Polly played for Brooklyn farm clubs in Dayton and Elmira and in September, he was one of seven players the Brooklyn Dodgers bought from Elmira. He had, at the time, the best record of any player in the Dodgers’ minor-league system. In all, he appeared in 10 September games for Brooklyn and was 4-for-18.

Nick was released by Brooklyn in April 1938, and spent the season playing for three different clubs in the Texas League. He was out of Organized Baseball for all of 1939, returning in July 1940, with the Columbia (South Carolina) Reds of the Class-B South Atlantic League. In a full 1941 season, he was selected as the league’s all-star third baseman and placed second in league MVP balloting.

Columbia was in the Cincinnati Reds system. With the back-to-back successful years, the Reds moved him up to Class-A1 ball and placed him with the Birmingham Barons of the Southern Association in 1942. There he struggled a bit, but in his second year with Birmingham (1943) he recovered.

That November the Boston Red Sox selected him in the 1943 minor-league draft and placed him with Louisville for 1944. He enjoyed an exceptional year, hit a career-high 20 home runs, led the league in runs batted in with 120, led all of Organized Baseball in bases on balls, and hit for an average of .290. There was one time in 1944 when he hit home runs on five consecutive days. In August, his contract had been purchased by the Boston team for delivery in the spring of 1945.

Given all that he had going for him, and given the loss of third baseman, Joe Cronin, with a fractured leg right in the third game of the regular season, it might seem surprising the Red Sox didn’t use him more. He replaced Cronin in the seventh inning of an April game and started at third base the next day. A month passed before he played again, pinch-hitting in back to-back games in May. That ended the second and final chapter of his major-league career.

He was released on option back to Louisville and near the end of July, he was traded to Toledo.

Nick Polly died in Chicago, on January 17, 1993, at age 75.