Arts & Entertainment
The Diamond Trade
In 1951, Lou Limmer
of the Philadelphia
Athletics hit a home
Facts, stats, stories and glories behind every Jewish ballplayer.
run off the Detroit
Tigers' Saul Rogovin.
Morton I. Teicher
Special to the Jewish News
W
ould you believe that there
have been 160 Jews who
made it to the Major Leagues?
Howard Megdal, who covers baseball
for the New York Observer and contrib-
utes articles to baseball magazines, has
tracked down each of them from a variety
of sources in a new book, The Baseball
Talmud: The Definitive Position-by-Position
Ranking of Baseball's Chosen Players
(HarperCollins; $22.99).
Going back to the 19th century and con-
tinuing to 2009, he provides commentary
and statistics for each of these achievers,
even including some whose experience
included only one game in the big leagues.
Megdal is expansive in whom he
includes as a Jew, asserting that he is "a
baseball expert, not a Judaism expert"
Accordingly, he includes players with one
Jewish parent, male or female, as well
as converts, and one man who is a self-
described Messianic Jew, accepting Jesus
but celebrating Jewish holidays.
The book begins with an argumen-
tative chapter on the greatest Jewish
baseball player ever. Megdal lists 10 pos-
sible candidates but claims the contest
is really between former Detroit Tigers
first baseman Hank Greenberg and Los
Angeles Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax. He
makes a persuasive case for his selection.
(Longtime Tiger fans will be pleased with
his conclusion!)
Moving forward and with the excep-
tion of his last chapter, Megdal divides his
presentation into discussions of Jewish
baseball players grouped by the position
they played.
When it comes to pitchers, Megdal
offers four categories: left-handed starters,
right-handed starters, left-handed reliev-
ers and right-handed relievers. The play-
ers are ranked with Megdal offering his
opinions and statistics to back them up.
Among pitchers, the "discussion starts and
ends with Sandy Koufax" although Ken
Holtzman, who had a longer career, won
174 games versus 165 for Koufax.
In the final chapter, devoted to his
dream "All-Time Jewish Team," Megdal
lists both of them as starting pitchers. The
author demonstrates his competence with
statistics and supports the claim that "this
team would have been by far the greatest
baseball has ever seen."
Throughout the book, Megdal discusses
players individually, giving a lively dis-
course on their idiosyncrasies along with
anecdotes about them.
For example, he writes at some length
about Moe Berg, who played for four
Major League teams and who was a
"catcher, spy and linguist." Berg studied
at the Sorbonne; earned a law degree
at Columbia; worked for the Office of
Strategic Services, forerunner of the
CIA; served as a panelist on a radio quiz
show; and spoke Japanese so well that
he was the first player selected to tour
Japan with a Major League team. Megdal
offers his judgment that Berg would have
done better to focus more on baseball and
rates him seventh in the list of 16 Jewish
catchers.
An example of the esoteric material
Megdal unearthed in the course of his
research was that Lou Limmer, who played
first base for the Philadelphia Athletics
in 1951 and 1954, was the president of a
synagogue in the Bronx, N.Y. Also, in 1951,
Limmer hit "a home run off the Detroit
Tigers' Saul Rogovin." Joe Ginsberg was the
catcher, making this "the first, and thus
far only, Jewish battery and hitter in Major
League history."
During the 1920s, New York Giants
manager John McGraw diligently searched
for a Jewish player in an effort to appeal
to Jewish fans. He thought he had solved
his problem in 1926 when he signed Andy
Cohen to play second base. Unfortunately,
after a flashy start, Cohen faded and was
sent to the minor leagues, where he had
a respectable career as a player and a
manager. He eventually returned to his
Joe Ginsberg was
the catcher, making
this "the first, and
thus far only, Jewish
battery and hitter in
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fe.adullLi Ciawa
Major League history,"
writes Megdal.
native El Paso, where, with the aid of his
brother, he built a baseball program at the
University of Texas, El Paso. The field there
is named "Cohen Stadium:'
Then there is the story of early 20th-
century second baseman Jimmy Reese.
"Reese grew up Hymie Solomon, and
changed his name, as many Jews did, to
avoid anti-Semitism:' Megdal writes. "The
decision worked out well — in a charity
game, catcher Ike Danning and pitcher
Harry Ruby decided to forgo signs and
communicate in Yiddish. Reese, the covert
Jew, went four for four."
Jewish baseball fans will find this book
to be indispensable. It is a compendium
of facts, figures and fragments that are
appealing, amusing and arcane. The
author begins his book by saying that
Jews like to argue, and he concludes that
those who disagree with his ratings can
start the debate, armed with information
as a consequence of his presentation. He
is right. To quote his final words, "Let the
discussion commence." ❑
Jews
Nate Bloom
Special to the Jewish News
Douglas Honored
Last month, two-time Oscar-winner
Michael Douglas, 64, was honored with
the prestigious American Film Institute
Life Achievement Award. A replay of the
evening's proceedings will be shown
on the TVLand cable channel 9 p.m.
Sunday, July 19.
A highlight
moment came
when Michael's
father, Kirk
Douglas, 94, who
won the same AFI
award in 1991,
gave a moving
Kirk and Michael
tribute to his son,
Douglas
laced with some
humor.
In his speech, Michael paid tribute to
C6
his father and to his non-Jewish mother,
actress Diana Dill Douglas, 86. Michael
attributed his success to the "acting
DNA" he inherited from his parents.
(Michael identifies culturally as Jewish
but isn't religious.)
An incredible collection of "A-list"
Hollywood stars turned out for the gala,
including Jack Nicholson and three of
Michael's past female co-stars: Annette
Bening, Anne Archer and Sharon Stone.
Michael's wife Catherine Zeta-Jones
did a show-stopping performance of
"One" from the musical A Chorus Line,
the film version of which starred her
husband. There was a surprise musical
performance by Bob Dylan.
Karl Malden, who passed away on
July 1 at age 97, was too frail to attend
the gala, but appeared via tape to praise
Michael. Malden, who co-starred with
Michael in the hit '70s TV series The
Streets of San Francisco, said he consid-
ered Michael "an adopted son." After the
tape finished, Michael responded,"I'll be
his adopted son anytime."
Malden, who wasn't Jewish, is sur-
vived by his wife, Mona Greenberg, a
Jewish actress whom he wed in 1938.
New Potter
The film Harry Potter
and the Half-Blood
Prince opened yes-
terday, July 15, with
Daniel Radcliffe, 19,
once again starring as
Harry. Harry's mentor,
Danielle
Dumbledore, teaches
Radcliffe
him new skills to fend
off the evil Lord Voldemort. Meanwhile,
Harry finds time to get really sweet on
Ginny, his old friend.
Radcliffe was the recent subject of a
long profile and interview in the Brit
paper the Guardian. (Read it at www.
guardian.co.uk.) In short, Radcliffe is
now a legal adult and has bought an
apartment and acquired a new girl-
friend, an actress he met while starring
in Equus on Broadway. Right now, he is
in the midst of filming the last two flicks
in the Potter saga.
The Guardian says: "He has pub-
lished some poems under a pen name.
It seems to be Jacob Gershon: Jacob is
his middle name, Gershon the Jewish
version of Gresham, his mother's
Anglicized maiden name" (Daniel's
mother is Jewish; his father is not).
On being Jewish, Daniel told the
paper: "I'm an atheist, but I'm very
proud of being Jewish. It means I have
a good work ethic, and you get Jewish
humor and you're allowed to tell Jewish
jokes."
❑
Contact Nate Bloom at
middleoftheroadl@aol.com.