TicketsMiller Huggins was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on March 27, 1878. The youngest of three sons and the third of four children, his parents Sarah and James were both born in England. His father, described as a "strict Methodist," wanted his son to eventually help run the family business as soon as he finished school.
Miller had other plans. He was in love, like most kids in school. However, in his own words: "The object of my love, tho, was no lady; it was, instead, baseball." He began playing at an early age on semi-pro teams and was the captain of the baseball team at Walnut Hills High School. It had all of his attention from the very beginning.
James Huggins had no patience for it. Miller's sister, Myrtle, described their father as someone who "abhorred frivolity and listed baseball as such." As such, Miller's odds of playing baseball professionally, let alone at all, were minimal.
He devised compromises and fake last names to sneak by his father. He would play under the name Miller Proctor, allowing him to compete on Sundays––something his father strongly opposed. He also agreed with his parents to go to law school, should his baseball career falter. He enrolled at the University of Cincinnati.
Huggins' career on the diamond seemed unlikely from the start. He was small in stature. John Sheridan wrote in the Sporting News that Huggins was "grievously handicapped by his lack of size," and was truthfully much smaller than his listed height of 5'6". (Some believe he was as short as 5'1".) John McGraw, one of the most legendary baseball managers of all time, had a chance to sign Huggins to his Baltimore Orioles in 1901. When he saw Huggins' stature, McGraw remarked, "That shrimp? He's too little to be of any use as a big leaguer."
Still, Miller kept with his one love. He was so invested in the sport that he was even summoned in front of his professors at UC to justify why he should stay in the program. He joined the St. Paul Saints of the American Association in 1901, after playing for the Mansfield Haymakers of the Class B Interstate League for two years. It was during his stay in Minnesota that he figured out how he could survive in baseball. After starting his career as a right-handed hitter, he experimented with becoming a switch-hitter to overcome his offensive struggles. He also moved to second base to properly use the speed and agility of his smaller frame.
Around this time he also graduated from the University of Cincinnati. He received his law degree and had to decide between a career as an attorney or a career in baseball. He realized that if he was able to make the major leagues, he would make far more money than he would as a lawyer.
One particular UC law professor gave him a final push in the right direction. Eight years before he was elected President of the United States, William Howard Taft encouraged Huggins to chase his dreams on the diamond. That was all he needed. He was admitted to the bar but never practiced law. He was taking the biggest gamble of his life, something his Methodist family would disagree with.
It began to pay dividends. In 1902 for St. Paul, he committed zero errors at second base the entire season. In 1903, he pulled off the first recorded delayed steal in baseball history. Intelligence, craftiness and attention to detail separated Miller from the rest. "Because he was so small and slight," wrote Frank Graham, "he must overcome by clear thinking." He studied the game in and out and knew almost every trick in the book, and the big leagues took notice. Rumors of him landing in Major League Baseball picked up during his time in St. Paul, with the Chicago White Sox reportedly offering $3,000 for him in 1903. It was only a few days later that the Cincinnati Reds announced they had purchased the rights to Huggins, and he would play for the team in 1904. His dreams were becoming a reality in his hometown.
Leading up to the 1904 season, the Cincinnati Post gave an "expert opinion" on Huggins, predicting that he would bat "about .265 or .270," and "in running bases, he will be a revelation to the old-timers." He was also scouted as a "star bunter" and "one of the finest fielders that ever guarded the second bag."
Earning the nickname "Mighty Mite", Huggins was more than serviceable as a big-league ballplayer. While his batting averages never went above .292 in any season as a member of the Reds, his on-base percentages were fantastic due to his crouched batting stance and patience at the plate. He led the National League twice in walks during his time in Cincinnati and posted a remarkable .392 on-base percentage in 1905. His power was almost non-existent, as all nine of his career home runs were inside-the-parkers. That didn't matter though, as his style of play thrived in the dead-ball era of the sport. Huggins mastered the art of "inside baseball", the idea of keeping the game within the diamond. He even admitted to Commissioner Ford Frick, years after his playing career, that he would put the game balls in the freezer the night before to "deaden" them.
In 1909, he faced his worst season as a pro, batting only .214 and appearing in only 57 games due to a sore arm. Once the season was over, Reds manager Clark Griffith traded Huggins to the St. Louis Cardinals in a move that was widely rejected by Reds fans. "Cincinnati fans are so touchy over the deal that sent Huggins to the Cardinals that they will never forgive Griffith," wrote sportswriter Fred Lieb. "Some think the proper thing would be to secure the return of Huggins and make him the manager in place of the man who traded him."
The prospect of Huggins becoming the manager may have been why Griffith traded him in the first place. There were rumors that Griffith saw Miller as a threat to his job. Griffith was fired the following season due to poor performance. Reds owner Garry Herrmann would later admit that the trading of Huggins was his biggest mistake.
Huggins was now a stranger in St. Louis, shipped away from the city he had known his whole life. Instead of wavering, he ended up having the best years of his career. He posted a .399 on-base percentage in 1910 and had arguably the best season of his career in 1911 when he finished sixth in MVP voting with a .385 on-base percentage and .961 fielding percentage.
It wasn't without drama, though. In 1912, he once again faced the threat of a trade, this time from manager Roger Bresnahan. Bresnahan, who was also a catcher for the Cardinals at the time, put Huggins on the trade block, sparking rumors once again of a manager fearing Huggins' potential ability as a skipper. Helene Britton, Cardinals team owner, had no interest in dealing Huggins, and trade talk was shut down. He finished with a career-best batting average (.304) andwas finally made player-manager of the team in 1913 after Britton fired Bresnahan.
Huggins did not have an easy time in his managerial debut. He excelled as a player (his .432 on-base percentage was a career-high), but the team trudged to 99 losses and a last-place finish. Amidst the team's struggles, and lingering support for Bresnahan in the clubhouse, he even considered resignation.
With the upstart rival Federal League poaching multiple Cardinals starters, Huggins began to show off his skills in player acquisition. Looking to purchase players for cheap due to the team's financial constraints, he signed a 19-year-old infielder from Texas for only $600. That player ended up being Rogers Hornsby, widely regarded as one of the greatest baseball players ever.
In 1916, Britton was looking to sell the Cardinals and gave Huggins the first chance to buy it. When he went back to Cincinnati to get his finances together, the club was sold to a group in St. Louis. To make things worse for Huggins, Branch Rickey was hired as president and he assumed all player management decisions.
Huggins returned as the manager in 1917 and led the Cardinals to a third-place finish, but he was no longer interested in staying in St. Louis. His playing career was over (he finished with a career batting average of .265, which proved the expert analysis of his game from his earlier years correct), and he wanted the chance to prove himself as a manager who could acquire talent like no one else. In October 1917, a young ball club with loads of money but little history gave him the chance to call the shots. He signed a two-year contract, giving him the chance to lead an organization the way he wanted to.
He packed his bags and headed for New York after being named manager of the Yankees.
In 1917 the Yankees had little success to point to, but owner Jacob Ruppert was impressed by Huggins' knowledge of the sport and trusted him to take the club to new heights. With a team in the big city that had a bigger payroll, expectations were extremely high. While Huggins was skilled at finding diamonds in the rough, the Yankees had focused on purchasing established players in the major leagues. In Miller's first season in charge in 1918, they finished 60-63, following up with an improved 80-59 record in 1919. However, it was only good enough for a third-place finish, way below the team's expectations. Huggins was called to be axed as Yankees' manager by both the media and the fanbase, and resentment only grew with each season without postseason play. He was constantly disrespected by his players, in part due to the fact he did not intimidate anyone with his shorter frame. Something needed to change. His dead-ball style of play was on life support.
Enter The Great Bambino.
After the 1919 season, Huggins reportedly nudged Ruppert to look into purchasing Babe Ruth from the Boston Red Sox. Coming off a season with 29 home runs, Ruth embodied the complete opposite of Huggins' "inside baseball." He was at the forefront of a new generation, focusing on the long ball and ticket sales.
The Red Sox, of course, ended up selling Ruth to the Yankees for $100,000. The move immediately paid off, with Ruth hitting an unfathomable 54 home runs in 1920. However, it wasn't enough to get over the hump in the American League, as the Yankees finished three games behind Cleveland.
The pressure to win was immense and Huggins seriously debated walking away amidst increasing poor physical and mental health. He suffered from neuritis and insomnia but somehow endured to return to the Yankees in 1921. After nearly dying of blood poisoning, he kept his Yankees in the AL pennant race deep into the season, at long last getting over the hump and beating Cleveland by four games. They reached the World Series, prepared to face McGraw's New York Giants.
The 1921 Series was a showcase of the old-timers' style of baseball against the new era of slugging. The best-of-nine series (the last to feature the format) would be exclusively played at the Polo Grounds, as both teams called the stadium home.
The powerful Yankees got off to a hot start, winning the first two games by a combined score of 6-0. In Game 3, disaster struck. Already down multiple runs in the eighth inning, Ruth slid into second base and injured his elbow. The Yankees fell 13-5, and eventually lost the series as Ruth battled injury to play sparingly.
The Yankees responded in 1922 by once again winning the pennant, this time by only one game ahead of the St. Louis Browns. Unfortunately, they would once again run into the New York Giants in that year's World Series. This time, it wasn't as close. In the first World Series with a permanent best-of-seven series, the Yankees were outclassed. They lost 4-0 with a tie (the last in Series history), and tensions in Upper Manhattan were at an all-time high. Pitcher Joe Bush yelled at Huggins towards the end of Game 5, and co-owner Til Huston (who had his issues with Huggins from the very beginning) shouted in a bar after the game that Huggins was "through" as Yankees manager.
Ruppert disagreed so much that he extended Huggins' contract and later bought Huston's share of the Yankees in 1923. With Huggins having full support from Yankees ownership, the team dominated the American League that season, claiming the pennant by a whopping 15 games. And once again, the Yankees would face McGraw's Giants in the Fall Classic.
Rookie first baseman Lou Gehrig, who had reached the Yankees' roster during the season, was not able to play. Teams would need permission from both the commissioner and the opposing team's manager to allow a player to join the postseason roster, and McGraw refused to let the Yankees add Gehrig to their World Series squad. Fueled by this and the disdain that had grown from the previous two years, the Yankees were determined to get over the hump. The sides split the first four games of the series before a huge first and second inning in Game 5 propelled the Yankees to a 3-2 series lead.
In Game 6, Ruth opened the scoring at the Polo Grounds with a first-inning home run before Yankee luck turned sour. The Giants responded with four unanswered runs, and it was 4-1 Giants heading into the eighth. The Yankees stormed back with five runs in the frame, and "Sad" Sam Jones pitched two shutout innings for the Yankees to clinch their first world championship in team history.
Huggins, who was told by McGraw he was too little to be of any use in the major leagues, finally conquered him on the biggest stage in the sport, ushering in a new era of baseball. McGraw would say of his rival manger "there is no smarter man in baseball today than Miller Huggins."
The team was not only made up of the game's biggest superstars but also key members discovered by Huggins' scouting prowess. He specifically targeted arch-rival Red Sox players, trading for pitchers Waite Hoyt and Herb Pennock, who both struggled in Boston. They became core pieces of the 1920s Yankees and eventual Hall of Famers.
The Yanks failed to claim the 1924 pennant, with Huggins believing the team had become complacent.
Huggins' struggles with Babe Ruth heightened over the next couple of years. Ruth collapsed before the 1925 season and stayed in a New York hospital for an extended period. He only hit 25 home runs and the Yankees finished with a disappointing 69-85 record. Tensions hit their peak when Huggins fined Ruth for not bunting when instructed to during a game. Ruth had gained a larger-than-life reputation and believed he was above any punishment from the Yankees' management. Huggins fined him $5,000 and suspended him after multiple incidents the next few days after the game. Ruth was irate with Huggins and swore he would never play another game for him, but when Ruth met with Ruppert, he realized he was outnumbered. The Bambino apologized and was reinstated into the lineup.
Little was expected of the 1926 Yankees. They were seen as a younger side led by an aging star in Ruth, who many thought was past his prime. What they were not aware of was Huggins' talent in working with the "scraps" he was given. New York ended up claiming yet another pennant, led by Ruth's 47 home runs. In that year's World Series, Huggins faced his old Cardinals team, led by Hornsby, now player-manager. In one of the greatest World Series ever played, the Cardinals triumphed over the Yankees 4-3, with Ruth being tagged out by Hornsby for the final out while attempting to steal second base.
Huggins' exhaustion managing the most prominent baseball organization in the world continued. Again he contemplated quitting, but, again, elected to stay, gearing up for another run in 1927.
The '27 Yankees ended up being the most dominant team the sport had ever seen. "Murderers' Row", the nickname used to describe the Yankees' lineup, had reached its peak powers. They won an astounding 110 games in the regular season, with Ruth and Gehrig combining for 107 homers. The World Series was a cakewalk, as they swept the inferior Pittsburgh Pirates in four games.
The more the Yankees won, the more Huggins stressed. In the 1928 season, the Athletics marched back from a 13.5-game deficit to take first place in the American League from the Yankees. Ahead of an enormous doubleheader with the A's on September 9, Huggins gave his team an emotional speech. They responded with a sweep, retaking the lead for the pennant and never looking back, battling through injuries to key players such as Pennock and Lazzeri.
The '28 Fall Classic saw the Yankees face the Cardinals once again, but this time, it wasn't close. Ruth and Gehrig combined for seven home runs across four games.
A three-peat was on everyone's minds to open the 1929 season, but the stress Huggins felt had reached an all-time high. The Athletics' budding dynasty took control of first place early in the season and held control all summer. By September, Huggins noticed a boil under his left eye, which worried both coaches and players. One player, future Dodgers manager Leo Durocher, pleaded for Huggins to take the rest of the season off, given that the team was out of the pennant race. Huggins agreed and went to St. Vincent's Hospital for what doctors discovered was a skin infection.
The infection had quickly spread to the rest of his body, and when Huggins came down with the flu, the combination of the two illnesses made matters dire. Doctors administered blood transfusions to no avail. Miller Huggins passed away at the age of 51 on September 25, 1929, just five days after checking into the hospital. His funeral was held on the 27th. The American League canceled all games that day.
"I'll guess I'll miss him more than anyone," said Gehrig. "Next to my father and mother, he was the best friend a boy could have."
"You know what I thought of him, and you know what I owe him," said Ruth.
In 1932, Huggins became the first Yankee to be given a monument beyond the center field wall, the initial piece of what would eventually become the infamous Monument Park. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1964 by the Veterans Committee and was inducted into the UC Athletics Hall of Fame in 1977.
Huggins was at the center of the most iconic dynasty in baseball history. He faced pressure from his father when he chose to pursue his dreams, but he endured. He heard relentless criticism due to his height and lack of power as a player, persevering to become an impact piece for two franchises. In the final chapter of his life as the game's smartest manager for the world's biggest club, he led the Yankees to six pennants and three World Series championships, fighting through personal issues and endless disparagement from the press. No matter what hardships he faced during his baseball career, "Mighty Mite" refused to let it take away his one true love.
"I could have never been happy as anything but a professional baseball player," said Huggins in a 1926 interview about his life. "It's a wonderful profession if one goes at it as seriously as at any other."
"The argument is advanced that it takes the best years of a man's life, the time when he should be laying the foundation of a business career. True enough, but if one intends to stay with baseball the years of his youth only lay the foundation for further work, not perhaps as a player, but in another capacity, the sky is the limit."