Career
He finished third in the MVP voting in his first full season, playing for the Boston Braves as a 21-year old in 1913 even though his batting average was just .247 in 143 games with two homers. The following year, Maranville was the runner-up in the MVP voting to teammate Johnny Evers as the Braves won the National League pennant and then went on to sweep the powerful Philadelphia A’s in the World Series. That year, Maranville was the Braves’ cleanup hitter, despite batting just .246 and hitting four home runs. Even at age 41, when Maranville batted .218 in 143 games and hit no homers, he finished in a tie for 12th in the MVP voting.
Over his lengthy career, Maranville played for the Boston Braves (1912–1920, 1929–1933, 1935), Pittsburgh Pirates (1921–1924), Chicago Cubs (1925), Brooklyn Robins (1926) and St. Louis Cardinals (1927–1928). He retired having compiled a .258 batting average, 2,605 hits, 1,255 runs, 28 home runs, 884 RBI and 291 stolen bases. As a shortstop, he finished his career with a positional record 5,139 putouts. He won his only World Series championship in 1914 as a member of the Braves, and won his only other National League championship in 1928 as a member of the Cardinals.
Maranville was known as one of "baseball's most famous clowns" due to his practical jokes and lack of inhibitions. When he was appointed manager of the Chicago Cubs in 1925—one of their worst seasons ever—he did not change his behavior. One night he went through a Pullman car dumping water on sleeping players' heads, saying, "No sleeping under Maranville management, especially at night." Not long after that, he was out on the street outside Ebbets Field in Brooklyn mimicking a newsboy hawking papers. He cried out, "Read all about it! Maranville fired!" And so he was—the next day.
Maranville was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1954, along with Bill Terry and Bill Dickey, in his 14th year of eligibility. His election came just months after his death at age 62.
Read more about this topic: Rabbit Maranville
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“He was at a starting point which makes many a man’s career a fine subject for betting, if there were any gentlemen given to that amusement who could appreciate the complicated probabilities of an arduous purpose, with all the possible thwartings and furtherings of circumstance, all the niceties of inward balance, by which a man swings and makes his point or else is carried headlong.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“Work-family conflicts—the trade-offs of your money or your life, your job or your child—would not be forced upon women with such sanguine disregard if men experienced the same career stalls caused by the-buck-stops-here responsibility for children.”
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“I’ve been in the twilight of my career longer than most people have had their career.”
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