Stream Corner

Babe Ruth is a player who needs little if any introduction. People the world over know his name and the near-legendary achievements of this man, one of the best known players ever to pick up a bat or glove. You don't need to have been around when Babe was on the Yankees to be familiar with his name and the House That Ruth Built. Even his superstitions are followed to this day. Ruth once said "Whenever I hit a home run, I always make sure that I touch all four bases". Larger than life both in terms of his performance on the diamond as well as in his private life, Babe Ruth is still very much a part of the American psyche. There may never be another player like the Great Bambino in any sport.

George Herman Ruth Jr. was born in 1895 in Baltimore, MD, the son of George H. Ruth Sr. and Kate Schamberger-Ruth. One of two surviving children of eight (the other was his sister Mamie), Babe Ruth has a tough childhood, often being left to care for himself. At the tender age of seven, he was sent to the St. Mary's Industrial School for Boys, which he recalls more as a reformatory than a school. Deprived of parental guidance except on occasions, Ruth quickly earned a reputation among the nuns at the school as an incorrigible.

Ruth never was one for rules and was not a good fit for the strictly ordered life offered by St. Mary's school. However, he did learn his lifelong love of the game of baseball while at the school. Jack Dunn, manager of the Baltimore Orioles (then a minor league farm team for the Boston Red Sox) was amazed by the then nineteen year old Ruth's talent and immediately signed him on. He was given the nickname of "Jack's newest babe" by teammates - a name that stuck.

With the Orioles for only five months, the Boston Red Sox purchased his contract and at 19, he both pitched and played the outfield for six years. During this period, fans took note of Babe's performance on and off the field, with his off the field stories being more colorful through his eating and drinking all-night parties that included many women. Playing in his first World Series Game in 1916, he set a record that still stands today, a fourteen inning game that became the longest in the history of the World Series. His pitching skills at this time left him an astounding record of 29 2/3 scoreless innings in World Series bouts alone, a record that stood for forty-three years. In December of 1919, a weird trade of sorts would land him with the Yankees-leaving the Red Sox in a World Series denial until 2004!

In 1920, he began his Major League career with the New York Yankees where Babe and his teammates would win 7 American League Pennants and 4 World Series Titles, a legacy called "The Curse of the Bambino." Babe hit an amazing 54 home runs in 1920 and was both a fan and player favorite not just for his home run hitting skills, but also for his candor. In 1923, mostly due to the popularity of The Babe, the Yankees opened Yankee Stadium that would eventually be named, The House That Ruth Built-how appropriate that The Babe would hit a home run on opening day, along with yet another World Series Title. Married to Helen Woodford in October of 1914, by 1919, Babe had enough money to buy them a country house and adopt a daughter they named Dorothy. After a separation, but no divorce in 1925, Babe did not remain the good boy when it came to women and continued an affair with model Claire Hodgson. Upon Helen's death by fire in 1929, Babe married Claire and hit her an out-of-the-park homerun in his first at bat in April of that same year.

Ruth's 60 home runs in 1927 are another long standing record the player set - it would stand until Roger Maris' 61 home runs in 1961. Many fans debate the vailidity of Maris' record, being that it took Maris 182 games against Ruth's 154. However, no one will debate Ruth's .690 batting average, which has no equal to date. It wasn't for nothing, after all that he is remembered as The Sultan Of Swat.

Of just as much import was the home run scored by Babe Ruth in the 3rd game of the 1932 World Series against the Chicago Cubs. Legend has it that Ruth said that he would hit a home run over the center stands in memory of Dugout Dora, a stray cat Ruth would feed every time he played at Wrigley Field. Ruth pointed and hit a home run right where he had pointed; it was one of the longest home runs ever hit out of Wrigley Field.

Ruth left the Yankees in 1935 - he had wanted to be manager of the team and he decided to leave rather than stay in another capacity. He instead signed on with the Boston Braves as first base coach and player, with the promise of the manager's chair in the following year. Seeing that the Braves were unlikely to keep this promise, Ruth went out in style. In one of his final games, Ruth hit three home runs against the Pittsburgh Pirates for a career total of 714 home runs. The Babe's 2,211 RBIs, 2.28 career ERA as a left-handed pitcher and his 8,399 at-bats along with all of his many achievements have made him a player who will always be remembered as long as there is a game called baseball.