The Colonel and Hug: The Partnership that Transformed the New York Yankees

by Steve Steinberg, Lyle Spatz, Marty Appel (Foreword by)

Overview

From the team’s inception in 1903, the New York Yankees were a floundering group that played as second-class citizens to the New York Giants. The team was purchased in 1915 by Jacob Ruppert and his partner, Til Huston. Three years later, when Ruppert hired Miller Huggins as manager, the unlikely partnership of the two figures began, one that set into motion the Yankees’ run as the dominant baseball franchise of the 1920s and the rest of the twentieth century, capturing six American League pennants with Huggins at the helm and four more during Ruppert’s lifetime.

The Yankees’ success was driven by Ruppert’s executive style and enduring financial commitment, combined with Huggins’s philosophy of continual improvement and personnel development. The Colonel and Hug tells the story of how these two men transformed the Yankees in their rise to dominance. It also tells the larger story of America’s gradual move from neutrality to entry into World War I and the emergence and impact of Prohibition on American society. This story tells of the end of the Deadball Era and the rise of the Lively Ball Era, a gambling scandal, and the collapse of baseball’s governing structure—and the significant role the Yankees played in it all. While the hitting of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig won many games for New York, Ruppert and Huggins institutionalized winning for the Yankees.

 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781496219664
Publisher:	Nebraska
Publication date:	04/01/2020
Pages:	582
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Steve Steinberg is the coauthor (with Lyle Spatz) of 1921: The Yankees, the Giants, and the Battle for Baseball Supremacy in New York (Nebraska, 2010), winner of the 2011 Seymour Medal, and the author of Urban Shocker: Silent Hero of Baseball’s Golden Age (Nebraska, 2017), winner of the SABR Baseball Research Award. Lyle Spatz is the author of Dixie Walker: A Life in Baseball. Marty Appel is the former director of public relations for the New York Yankees and author of Pinstripe Empire: The New York Yankees from before the Babe to after the Boss.

 

Table of Contents

List of Photographs
Foreword by Marty Appel
Preface
Acknowledgments
Prologue: A Collaboration Is Born

Part 1. The Early Years
1. Everything He Touched Won First Prize
2. The Colonel Makes a Name for Himself
3. Nothing at All but Ambition and Pluck and Brains
4. No Smarter Man in Baseball

Part 2. Ruppert Buys the Yankees
5. How about the Yankees?
6. The Rocky Road to Ownership
7. The New Owners Get to Work
8. Fritz Maisel Follies
9. Anti-German Hysteria and Two Disappointing Seasons

Part 3. Huggins Arrives
10. An Impatient City with an Unforgiving Press
11. The Nation in Upheaval
12. A Season of Transition
13. A Battle Leads to a War
14. A Home Is No Longer a Home

Part 4. Ruth and Barrow Arrive
15. Buying the Babe
16. The Risks of Ruth
17. Ruth Roars into the Twenties
18. Squabbling Owners and Scandal Lead to Landis Coronation
19. Huggins Stays

Part 5. The Yankees Rise to the Top
20. One of the Fiercest Pennant Battles Ever
21. The Struggles and Troubles of Huggins
22. Huggins Is My Manager
23. This Is the Happiest Day of My Life

Part 6. The Yankees and the Babe Stumble
24. It’s Tougher to Manage a Pennant Winner
25. New Homes for Single Men and Their Team
26. Huggins Waited One Year Too Long

Part 7. The Yankees Rise Again
27. Florida’s Boom to Bust and the Yankees’ Bust to Boom
28. Huggins Silences His Critics, for Good
29. Winning Pennants Is the Business of the Yankees
30. Knowing How to Buy and Knowing How to Build

Part 8. Huggins Exits
31. The Law of Averages Catches Up with the Yankees
32. No Man Ever Struggled Harder
33. Succeeding an Immortal

Part 9. The Thirties
34. McCarthy Is My Manager
35. Repeal, Real Estate, and the Third Reich
36. The DiMaggio Years
37. It Took Time for Success to Become a Tradition
38. The Mystery Lady

Epilogue: A Legacy of Champions
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"A strong dual biography."—Brett L. Abrams, Sport in American History

Sport in American History - Brett L. Abrams

“Miller Huggins and Jacob Ruppert are two of baseball’s all-time great characters, and they finally get the treatment they deserve in this highly entertaining, meticulously researched book. You don’t have to be a Yankees fan to enjoy this wonderful story from baseball’s golden age.”—Jonathan Eig, New York Times best-selling author of Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig

Jonathan Eig

“The foundation of the legendary New York Yankees that we know today was arguably built on the shoulders of three men: Ruth, Ruppert, and Huggins. While Babe Ruth’s exploits have been well documented over the years, we now finally have the definitive story of Yankees owner Colonel Jacob Ruppert and his diminutive giant of a manager, Miller Huggins. . . . A ‘must-read’ for any fan of the history of this great game.”—Vince Gennaro, president of the Society for Baseball Research and professor of sports business management at Columbia University

Vince Gennaro

“Everyone thinks that it was Babe Ruth who turned the suffering Yankees of New York into the Crusaders of Baseball. The Babe helped, surely, but it was two invisible characters—the team’s owner, Jacob Ruppert, and the manager, Miller Huggins—who played major roles in the Yankees' everlasting turnaround. Our blessings to Steve Steinberg and Lyle Spatz for finally bringing Ruppert and Huggins to new generations of fans.”—Al Silverman, former editor of Sport Magazine and editor and publisher at Viking/Penguin

Al Silverman

"This book provides a valuable service in helping its readers better understand the genesis of the greatest dynasty in American sports history."—David Shiner, Inside Game

Inside Game - David Shiner

"The Colonel and Hug explains admirably how the Yankees became the Yankees. Steinberg and Spatz draw heavily on their research to provide a readable, lively narrative."—Bob D'Angelo, Tampa Tribune

Tampa Tribune - Bob D’Angelo

"The Colonel and Hug explores that remarkably fruitful relationship in a meticulous account brimming with quotes from the period."—Edward Achorn, Weekly Standard

Weekly Standard - Edward Achorn

"The Colonel and Hug explains admirably how the Yankees became the Yankees. Steinberg and Spatz draw heavily on their research to provide a readable, lively narrative."—Bob D'Angelo, Tampa Tribune

Tampa Tribune - Bob D'Angelo

★ 2015-02-24
Many baseball fans think it was Babe Ruth who elevated the fledgling (and flagging) New York Yankees team. In this authoritative new work, Steinberg and Spatz (1921: The Yankees, the Giants, and the Battle for Baseball Supremacy in New York, 2010) shine a light on the indispensable contributions of two behind-the-scenes magicians.Surely the Sultan of Swat has secured his place in the record books, but less is known about the owner and manager of those teams: Col. Jacob Ruppert Jr. and Miller Huggins, known colloquially as the "Colonel" and "Hug." Ruppert inherited his father's successful brewery and increased its profitability to become one of New York City's wealthiest men, and in 1915, he bought the Yankees with partner Til Huston. Huggins was a diminutive ballplayer-turned-manager tasked with the impossible job of managing the heavy-hitting egotism of the 1920s Yankees, led by Ruth. Despite leading his loaded team to unprecedented success, Huggins suffered through naysayers, negative press, temperamental players, and a nervous breakdown. Regardless, Ruppert regarded the hiring of Huggins as "the first and most important step we took toward making the Yankees champions." This relationship between owner and manager is what shines throughout the narrative. Though they were from two different worlds, they combined their efforts to change the game of baseball. Every anecdote contributes to a better understanding of these two men and their importance to sports history. The book is not only a thorough dual biography; it is also a lucid, well-written reminder of why we love baseball. "Baseball never operates in a vacuum," write the authors, and they assemble a well-researched treasure of a book that not only chronicles the two men behind the game's most iconic team, but the nation they helped shape as well. A top-notch sports biography.

Kirkus Reviews