In 1911, verbal abuse among catchers had grown prevalent enough to warrant an edict from National League President, Thomas Lynch. In his statement, the former umpire mentioned a single player by name: Roger Bresnahan. It was an unfortunate – but not entirely surprising – mark on the Hall of Famer’s career, which would draw to a close four years later.
A selection by Cooperstown’s Veteran’s Committee, Roger’s induction into the Hall also arrived with its share of controversy, though the 1905 World Series champion made a number lasting contributions to the game, developing the first batting helmet and helping popularize shin guards among catchers.
Seventy years after hanging up his mask, Roger’s great-nephew was signed by the Seattle Mariners in the 18th round of the June amateur draft. It was, by Dave Bresnahan’s own account, the beginning of a middling minor league career. Three years later, he found himself playing the role of backup catcher for the Williamsport Bills, a Pennsylvania-based AA affiliate of Cleveland. Batting .154, it seemed unlikely the 25-year-old would make it past the end of the season.
On the final day of August, Bresnahan carved out his own unlikely path to baseball infamy, drawing on some vague historic precedent from a decade before to his famous great-uncle’s first appearance for the Washington Senators. Unlike the Bresnahan men, the name of the Staten Island Athletic Club member who pioneered one of the sport’s most notorious plays a century prior has seemingly been lost to history.
“There is a runner on first base and the pitcher is in his box,” The Sporting News wrote of the play at the end of 1888. “The latter throws a potato over the first baseman's head. The runner, thinking it was the ball, starts for second and is touched by the pitcher, who runs over to the line with the ball in his hand. Is the runner out? … Answer-- Yes, he is out.”
With the Bills deep into the season and 28 games out of the first place spot, Bresnahan hit upon a similar notion. "I thought, 'What if we snuck maybe a rosin bag (or for some reason, maybe because I'm Irish) a potato into the game?'" Bresnahan told ESPN decades later. “It was just talk, but then it got picked up the next day and my teammates thought it was funny. They said, 'Well, why don't you do it?' ”
Bresnahan’s below-average numbers afforded no guarantee that he would be behind the plate any given afternoon. But an upcoming doubleheader against the Reading Phillies meant he would almost certainly appear in one of the two games. Bresnahan and his teammates were suddenly committed to the bit.
"The day before, people were like, 'Hey, tomorrow's Potato Day,'" Bresnahan added. "It just seemed to give people a little life, you know, something to talk about. That's all it was."
Before the games, Bresnahan peeled a potato into passable facsimile and tossed it around with roommates to ensure it had the necessary properties. An attempt to draw stitches on with a red pen, however, proved fruitless.
Crouched behind home in the first of two games. Bresnahan spotted an opening in the fifth inning. With a runner on third and two outs, he signaled to the ump for time, claiming to need a replacement mitt, as his had just broken. Those teammates who were in on the scheme could barely stifle their laughter as he hustled toward the dugout to grab a second glove with the potato inside.
Returning to his position, Bresnahan hid the tuber behind his right leg. The catcher fished the next pitch out of the dirt, hurling the potato toward third. What was supposed to be an intentionally poor throw proved accidentally on the mark, but the third baseball played his part by missing the projectile with dramatic flair. “I made a great throw,” he later told The Philadelphia Inquirer. “He did a hell of a job missing it.”
Sensing the opportunity, the runner at third started toward home, where he was summarily tagged out with the game ball. The umpire, the opposing team, 4,000 fans and the Bills’ own manager, Orlando Gomez, were understandably baffled by what had just transpired, as the off-white root vegetable sat untouched in the outfield. Upon investigating the scene, the third base ump shouted home, “It’s a fucking potato!”
At a loss, the umpires ultimately awarded the Phillies a run and charged the potato-hurler with an error for his historic efforts. The following day, Cleveland’s director of player development called the catcher. “Orlando's pissed,” he said, referring to the manager who was still angry from the day prior, “he thinks you did this to make him look bad.”
Bresnahan was fined $50 and released from the team.
The catcher later returned to the clubhouse to tie up loose ends. He left a potato in the lockers of his former teammates and unloaded two additional bags on the manager’s desk. “Of course you don't expect me to pay the $50 fine, but here's at least 50 potatoes,” an accompanying note read. “This spud's for you."
Eleven years later, Bresnahan’s 59 became one of four numbers retired by the Williamsport Bills. In fact, the team would ultimately retire it twice. “Lou Gehrig had to play in 2,130 consecutive games and hit .340 for his number to be retired,” Bresnahan said at the ceremony, “and all I had to do was bat .140 and throw a potato."
Sources:
Time Flies Like a Potato https://www.inquirer.com/philly/hp/sports/20070812_TIME_FLIES__LIKE_A_POTATO.html
Dave Bresnahan https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=bresna001dav
How Pulling off a ‘Potato Trick’ Ended a Player’s Career https://www.sbnation.com/secret-base/21408962/dave-bresnahan-potato-trick
The On-Field Prank That Got a Catcher Released https://www.mlb.com/news/catcher-uses-potato-in-baseball-game