HALL OF FAMER Much to remember about Larry Doby

Doby, the first black player in the American League, passed away this week.
By BOB VANDERBERG
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
CHICAGO -- The news came Wednesday night that Larry Doby had passed away, and right away the memories came rushing back.
An August afternoon in 1956, sitting in the stands on the third-base side at old Comiskey Park, looking right down the first-base line. A powerfully built left-handed batter, with a No. 14 on his back, hitting not one but two truly vicious line-drive doubles down that foul line and into the right-field corner. Feeling glad I was sitting where I was and not in the path of those line drives.
A spring afternoon at Wrigley Field, 20 years later, interviewing the Montreal Expos' batting coach, him still wearing that No. 14 but carrying a few more pounds than he had on that long-ago day on the South Side. Suggesting it was time to come back to Comiskey Park now that old friend, Bill Veeck, was running things again. Being told not to be surprised if indeed he turned up in a White Sox uniform in 1977.
Riding up in the elevator to our room at the Hyatt a few years back with my wife and son. And getting to introduce them to the man with whom we were sharing that ride: Larry Doby.
Memories
Doby spent two full seasons (1956 and 1957) and part of a third (1959) as a player with the Sox, 1977 and part of 1978 as the team's hitting coach and the rest of that '78 season as its manager. But he and Chicago did not share a warm relationship. It probably goes back to his first year here, 1956.
The Sox had just missed out on the 1955 pennant. They were convinced that, with the addition of a solid left-handed bat, they could win it all in 1956. The Cleveland Indians, league champs in 1954, also had just missed in '55. They were convinced that all they needed was better defense, especially at shortstop.
The Sox, knowing their top prospect, a 22-year-old shortstop named Luis Aparicio, was ready for the big leagues, sent All-Star shortstop Chico Carrasquel, and center fielder Jim Busby to the Indians for Doby, then 31 but still an excellent defensive center fielder and a dangerous power hitter.
He had averaged 30 homers and 102 RBI over the previous four years. Walt Dropo had led the '55 Sox with 19 homers; George Kell had led in RBI with 81.
Sox fans were understandably excited: Doby joining Dropo, Kell and old favorites Minnie Minoso and Nellie Fox, plus all that pitching.
Then the season started. Doby slumped. They all slumped. The team was below .500 in mid-May. Larry Doby, AL home run champion in 1952 and 1954, did not hit his first Sox home run until June 13!
Had radio sports-talk formats, Web sites and postgame call-in shows been in vogue in 1956, Doby would have been more vilified in Chicago than Terry Bevington ever was.
Back and forth
He was, my older brother used to say, "master of the rally-killing 4-6-3 double play." His brooding, his moodiness, did not go over well with his teammates or his managers, particularly Al Lopez, who as Cleveland manager engineered the Sox-Indians trade and then, after managing the Sox -- and Doby -- in 1958, traded Doby back to Cleveland.
Doby years later all but charged Lopez with racism, a charge that doesn't hold much water when one considers that two of Lopez's favorites were Al Smith and Earl Battey, both African-Americans.
There was a bright side. When Minoso, for perhaps the second or third time, celebrated his 70th birthday a few years back, Doby said: "Hey, Minnie, how come when we roomed together in '56 I was two years younger than you and now I'm two years older than you?"
He'll be remembered, oddly, as the forgotten man: the second black player in the big leagues (to Jackie Robinson), the second black manager in the big leagues (to another Robinson, Frank).
He also had the misfortune of missing out on the '59 World Series. Veeck sent him to San Diego in the Pacific Coast League on Aug. 1 that year to play himself into shape after being sidelined by a back injury, with the proviso he would be brought back before the Sept. 1 deadline for setting postseason rosters. One week into his rehab, he broke an ankle sliding into third base with a triple. His season was over.
But Larry Doby also should be remembered for two afternoons in old Comiskey Park. On June 24, 1956, he hit two first-inning, three-run homers to power a doubleheader victory over the Yankees and cap a four-game series sweep.
On June 13, 1957, after a pitch sailed behind his head, he cold-cocked Yankees pitcher Art Ditmar with a left hook, precipitating one of baseball's all-time great brawls.
What's there not to like about that?