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BOSTON BRAVES
...
SPAHN & SAIN and PRAY FOR RAIN ...
Johnny Sain
wins his fifth in a row
June 19, 1948 ... Johnny
Sain served up nine goose eggs over nine innings, to keep the Braves
in first place in the red-hot scramble in the National League. Sain
notched his fifth consecutive victory, by a 5 to 0 score over the
Cincinnati Reds, as the Tribe won their fourth game in a row, to make
it a happy Saturday night at Braves Field for 24,425 fans. The
shutout was Johnny's third. He gave up six hits, as he recorded his
eighth victory of the year. During his last five complete and winning
games, Sain has held the opposing team to just four earned runs.
Right at the beginning of the game, the major league leader in home runs, Hank
Sauer along with two other teammates, were thrown out of the game for disputing
a couple of called strikeouts. After Frank Baumholtz and Stan Wyrostek singled,
Grady Hatton was walked to load the bases. Up came Sauer and Sain had a three
and two count on him. Then Sauer was given a curveball which he watched sail
over the plate. Thinking it was a ball, he started for first but umpire Larry
Goetz threw up his arms and called it a strikeout. Sauer erupted, got in the
umpires face, and complained all the way back to the bench. There he kept his
attack up on Goetz and was finally thrown out. At that point Ewell Blackwell
took up the attack, and was ordered to join Sauer. The run scoring threat ended
as Babe Young rolled into a doubleplay.
In the Braves half of the first inning, they scored a run on a base hit by
Tommy Holmes around a couple of walks and a ground ball to short, that scored a
runner. Opening the Reds second inning, Virgil Stallcup was waived out on
strikes and some more comments were directed at the Goetz. He too was asked to
leave the game, and that set off the entire Reds bench, until manager Johnny
Neun ordered them back to their seats.
The commotion died out in the third inning when the Braves came to bat and
added two runs. Earl Torgeson walked and took second on Bob Elliott's single,
moving to third when Augie Galan fumbled the ball. Jim Russell singled to center
to add two runs and make it 3 to 0. In the fifth inning, two more runs were
added on a walk to Elliott, and singles by Jeff Heath and Jim Russell that
scored Elliott. That brought in Walter Cress to pitch for the Reds and he
immediately uncorked a wild pitch that moved up the runners. Russell scored when
Alvin Dark hit a sacrifice fly and made the score 5 to 0.
Tonight's win was the fourth straight for the Braves and boosted their home
record to the .500 mark, with 13 wins in 26 starts. Tommy Holmes had two hits to
raise his average to .352. Earl Torgeson stole second base in the sixth inning,
for the 12th time without being caught. |
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