Marty Hogan

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Marty Hogan
Born October 25, 1869
Wednesbury, England
Died August 15, 1923
Youngstown, Ohio

Martin Francis Hogan (October 25, 1869 - August 15, 1923) was an Anglo-American right fielder in major league baseball who played for the Cincinnati Reds (1894) and St. Louis Browns (1894-1895). Hogan later served as a minor league baseball manager in Ohio and Pennsylvania. An outstanding judge of pitching talent, he was responsible for signing Stan Coveleski and Sam Jones to their first professional contracts.[1]

Contents

[edit] Early years

Hogan was born in the West Midlands industrial town of Wednesbury, Staffordshire. When he was still a child, his parents, both natives of Ireland, relocated the family from England to Youngstown, Ohio, a steel-production center near the Pennsylvania border.[2] There, his father, Patrick J. Hogan, became a steelworker,[3] while his older brother, Patrick J. Hogan, Jr., worked his way up to the position of "roller" at the Union Steel Company (later consolidated with U.S. Steel).[4] Martin Hogan, on the other hand, moved steadily in the direction of an athletic career and gained early recognition as a "foot racer".[2] He would go on to establish a reputation not only as an athlete, but also as a handler and trainer of major league players.[2]

[edit] Major league career

The 1894 St. Louis Browns (Hogan in second row, second from left).
The 1894 St. Louis Browns (Hogan in second row, second from left).

He began his career as a professional player with the Cincinnati Reds, on August 4, 1894, but played only six games before switching to the St. Louis Browns. By this time, St. Louis had been frozen out of the league championship, after being tied with Cleveland and Boston for first place in April.[5] Hogan participated in 29 games with St. Louis in the 1894 season. According to the 1895 edition of Spalding's Official Baseball Guide, he ranked tenth among league outfielders with a percentage of .941 for put-outs, assists, and errors.[6] Among his teammates, Hogan held the second highest percentage of stolen bases for games played.[7] His obituary indicates that at some point, he held a league record for baserunning.[2]

For reasons that remain unclear, Hogan left the Browns at the close of the 1895 season, concluding a major league career that comprised 40 games over two seasons.[8] He reportedly spent the next several years as a major league trainer before commencing upon his later career as a minor league manager.[2]

[edit] Minor league career

The Lancaster Red Roses (1909), with manager Hogan (standing fourth from right) and future HOF pitcher Stan Coveleski (standing left of Hogan).
The Lancaster Red Roses (1909), with manager Hogan (standing fourth from right) and future HOF pitcher Stan Coveleski (standing left of Hogan).

In 1903, Hogan was hired as manager of the Youngstown Ohio Works, a ball club sponsored by Joseph A. McDonald, superintendent of the Ohio Works of the Carnegie Steel Company. In May 1905, the club was one of eleven teams to join the Protective Association of Independent Clubs, which formed the basis of the Class C Division Ohio-Pennsylvania League. That September, the Youngstown Ohio Works won the league championship, though sources disagree on the team's final record. As baseball researcher John Zajc writes: "The Reach Guide (1906) credits Youngstown with an 84-32 won-lost record where the Spalding Guide of the same year lists a 90-35 record. The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball (1993) tells a third story, giving Youngstown an 88-35 mark".[9]

In 1906, the Ohio Works team ended the season with a creditable 22-12 record, while new player Roy Castleton gained national recognition by pitching a perfect game against a rival club in Akron.[10] A sports writer for The Youngstown Daily Vindicator predicted, in the autumn of 1906, that the "popular" Hogan would serve a fourth season as manager of the club.[11] Hogan, however, seemed unwilling to negotiate the terms of a new contract without leverage and publicly mulled an offer presented by a team in Nashville, whose representatives reportedly followed him to the train station.[12] According to the same newspaper article, Hogan later reached a verbal agreement with Ohio Works co-owners Joseph and Thomas McDonald, announcing soon after that he would remain with the local ball club.[12] By February 1907, however, the Zanesville Signal reported that Hogan had received permission from the McDonald brothers to negotiate a $3,000 deal for the sale of the Youngstown club, including its players, to a group of investors in Zanesville, Ohio.[13] The investors reportedly raised an additional $15,000 to enter the team into the Ohio-Pennsylvania League, though they were forced to settle for the less prestigious Pennsylvania-Ohio-Maryland League.[14] Hogan managed the Zanesville ball club for two seasons. In 1908, his final season, the team was christened as the Zanesville Infants and joined the Central League.[15]

The following year, Hogan relocated to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where he replaced local ball club manager Clarence "Pop" Foster, who had managed the Red Roses since 1907.[16] In 1909, the Lancaster Red Roses worked up a 75-39 record,[17] seizing the championship of the Tri-State League.[18] As Spalding's Baseball Guide (1910) reported: "Lancaster, under manager Marty Hogan, won its first pennant in the league, and the top rung of the ladder was only gained by the hardest kind of fighting."[19] A key player in this struggle was a young pitcher named Stan Coveleski, who made his professional debut with the Philadelphia Athletics three seasons later.[20] The following year, however, the Red Roses' performance fell short of the previous season, with 63 wins and 47 losses. And, in 1911, Hogan's last year as manager of the Lancaster team, the club "broke even", with 54 wins and losses, respectively.[21]

The record of Hogan's final years as a minor league manager is somewhat incomplete. In November of 1912, The Youngstown Daily Vindicator reported that Hogan was likely to once again manage the local minor league ball club. The article added that he was also considering an offer from Zanesville.[22] Hogan evidently opted to manage a team in Zanesville. It was there, in 1913, that he signed future Cleveland Indians pitcher Samuel Pond ("Sad Sam") Jones to his first professional contract.[23]

[edit] Final years

Marty Hogan (center), with nephews Edward (right) and Raymond (left), about 1912.
Marty Hogan (center), with nephews Edward (right) and Raymond (left), about 1912.

By the mid-1910s, Hogan had permanently resettled in Youngstown, where he helped to organize the Youngstown Gun Club and became athletic director of Thomas Field, a ballpark owned by the local Brier Hill Industrial Works.[2] (The Brier Hill park featured both baseball and trap shooting.) Meanwhile, Hogan gave his younger relatives the benefit of his celebrated training skills. One nephew, Edward J. Hogan, became a standout in track and field at the University of Notre Dame.[24]

Martin Francis Hogan was just 54 years old when he died at his North Side home from injuries sustained in an auto accident months earlier. Several blood transfusions failed to revive him, and a bout with pneumonia proved fatal. Funeral services for Hogan were held at St. Columba's Church, and he was buried at Youngstown's Calvary Cemetery. His wife, Agnes, survived him along with brother P.J. Hogan. A sister, Mrs. John Dillon, had died several years earlier. Hogan's obituary in The Youngstown Daily Vindicator highlighted his contributions to the community and observed that many young athletes he trained and managed went on to careers in major league baseball.[2]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Roy Castleton. Society for American Baseball Research. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g "Death Takes Marty Hogan: Baseball Star Succumbs After Long Illness--Hurt in Auto Crash", The Youngstown Daily Vindicator, August 17, 1923.
  3. ^ "Patrick Hogan, Father of Baseball Manager, Dies", The Youngstown Telegram, July 16, 1909, p. 20.
  4. ^ "Patrick Hogan Succumbs at 80", The Youngstown Daily Vindicator, January 14, 1938.
  5. ^ Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1895), p. 14.
  6. ^ Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1895), p. 99.
  7. ^ Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1895), p. 114.
  8. ^ Thorn, John; et al. (1989). Total Baseball. New York: Warner Books, p. 1187. 
  9. ^ Ohio-Pennsylvania League of 1905. Society for American Baseball Research. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  10. ^ Roy Castleton. Society for American Baseball Research. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  11. ^ "Hogan Is Popular Here; Fans Glad He Returned", The Youngstown Vindicator, October 14, 1906.
  12. ^ a b "Hogan Remains in Youngstown", The Youngstown Vindicator, October 10, 1906.
  13. ^ "Franchise, Team and Marty Hogan are Coming Here", The Zanesville Signal, February 18, 1907, p. 1.
  14. ^ Schneider, Norris F. (1950). Y Bridge City: The Story of Zanesville and Muskingham County, Ohio. Cleveland: The World Publishing Company, p. 307. 
  15. ^ Central League History Accessed 2007-03-12
  16. ^ 1906-1914: A Rose by Any Other Name. Lancaster County Historical Society. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  17. ^ 1906-1914: A Rose by Any Other Name. Lancaster County Historical Society. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  18. ^ Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 181.
  19. ^ Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 181.
  20. ^ National Baseball Hall of Fame Accessed 2007-03-11
  21. ^ 1906-1914: A Rose by Any Other Name. Lancaster County Historical Society. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  22. ^ "Say Hogan Will Succeed Phillips; Reported That Local Baseball Man Has Chance to Again Lead Locals", The Youngstown Daily Vindicator, November 6, 1912.
  23. ^ Roy Castleton. Society for American Baseball Research. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.
  24. ^ The Dome, University of Notre Dame, South Bend, Indiana, 1924.

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