Ralph Houk Earned His Pinstripes

By Sal Maiorana

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When Roger Maris smashed his way into the record books during the 1961 season, it could not have worked out much better for the team’s first-year manager, Ralph Houk.

With so much focus on Maris and Mickey Mantle and finally in the end just Maris trying to chase down Babe Ruth’s single-season home run record, no one seemed to pay attention to the Yankees new manager.

And that was extraordinarily good fortune for Houk because with the flap over Casey Stengel’s controversial dismissal following the 1960 World Series loss to the Pirates, the Maris-Mantle home run derby served as perfect camouflage for Houk as he was able to remain contentedly in the background going about his daily business in the most routine manner. Rarely has anyone replaced a legend as seamlessly and quietly as Houk did that year.

Houk, who had been a de facto Yankee coach under Stengel in his last few years as a player between 1950-54 and again from 1958-60, was an entirely different personality than Stengel. He certainly wasn’t as energetic in his dealings with the press as Stengel, and in a way he was suspicious of the media. And of course, because he was not a man to hold court and pontificate the way Stengel did, the reporters - after years of filling their notebooks with Stengel’s stories and malaprops - initially held that against Houk.

Early in 1961 spring training when the Yankees were playing terribly and losing almost every day, there were frequent references made about Houk’s apparent inability to live up to Stengel’s high standard, even though it was still, after all, spring training.

Jimmy Cannon of the New York Post even wondered if Houk was calling Stengel for advice. That pissed off Houk and after denying that was true, he said, “I’m not another Casey. I worked for him most of my baseball life and no man ever had a better teacher, but I’m not Casey. I won’t talk like him and I won’t act like him.”

Pretty soon what he did do like Stengel was win, and, not that it mattered to him, he began to earn the respect of the writers and Stengel slowly became a distant memory.

Houk started with the Yankees as a catcher in the farm system in 1939, but after three decent years, his pursuit of a major league career was put on hold by the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. He received his draft notice in January 1942 and by the end of 1943 he was overseas in the thick of the war.

Houk fought heroically at Normandy, and then was assigned the hazardous duty of riding in the point jeep as his reconnaissance company advanced across Northern France. He was wounded by shrapnel during one mission, but later returned to become his company’s commander. In the Battle of the Bulge he earned a Silver Star, and before the war ended, he rose to the rank of major which later became his nickname in baseball circles.

When Houk came home he resumed his playing career and after one year in the minors he made Bucky Harris’ Yankees in 1947 and even got a pinch hit in that year’s World Series against the Dodgers. After spending 1948 in the minors at Kansas City he returned to the Yankees late in 1949 where he remained until 1954 when he retired as a player.

Houk’s appearances were few and far between, though. He wasn’t going anywhere on the Yankees with Yogi Berra and Charlie Silvera catching in front of him and his career consisted of only 91 games and 158 at-bats with no home runs during parts of eight seasons.

But as he sat interminably on the bench he observed Stengel’s managerial style, he learned the intricacies of the game, and when he decided to retire it was clear that his future was in managing.

In 1955 he was assigned to the organization’s top farm team in Denver and for three years at the Triple-A level Houk excelled, winning the 1957 American Association pennant and the Little World Series. During that time he helped mold future Yankees such as Tony Kubek, Bobby Richardson, Johnny Blanchard, Ralph Terry and Ryne Duren.

When other major league teams began inquiring about his availability, Yankee co-owners Del Webb and Dan Topping grew nervous. They wanted Houk to eventually replace Stengel, so as a way of stashing Houk they promoted him to the Yankees to serve as one of Stengel’s coaches in 1958 with the intention of installing him as manager in 1959.

However, when Stengel led the Yankees past the Braves in 1958 for his seventh World Series title in 10 years, the plan changed because the owners knew there would be a fan and media mutiny if they let the wildly popular Stengel go. They signed him to a new two-year contract and told Houk, who was clearly ready for the job, to be patient.

So even though the Yankees won yet another AL pennant in 1960 and nearly won the World Series before losing to the Pirates on Bill Mazeroski’s walk-off homer in Game 7, the organization wanted to turn the page and install Houk in Stengel’s place.

“I commenced winning pennants when I got here, but I didn’t commence getting any younger,” a bitter 69-year-old Stengel said at the uncomfortable press conference where Webb and Topping announced the change. “They told me my services were no longer desired because they wanted to put in a youth program as an advance way of keeping the club going. When a club gets to discharging a man on account of age, they can if they want to. The trick is growing up without growing old. Most guys are dead at my age anyway. You could look it up.”

It was not a great situation for Houk to make his debut, but once the 1961 season began and the Yankees enjoyed one of their greatest years ever, winning 109 games (Stengel’s best year was 103 wins in 1954), Houk was accepted as a viable heir.

The major won three consecutive pennants and two World Series, then was transferred upstairs to the general manager position when GM Roy Hamey retired following 1963. This, however, was a move that did not pan out. The team started coming unglued in 1964 though it won a pennant under new manager Yogi Berra, and then it crashed with Johnny Keane at the helm in 1965, starting a playoff drought that would eventually extend until 1976.

Houk fired Keane early in 1966 and returned to the field where he remained through the 1973 season, but his second tour of duty wasn’t nearly as fruitful as his first as the Yankees never finished better than fourth.

He left New York after George Steinbrenner bought the team, and later managed the Tigers and Red Sox before retiring for good following the 1984 season. In all those years nothing ever topped his first in 1961.

“That was my best year in baseball,” he said. “It was just a great, great year. It was a pleasure managing that team. They played so good all season. What a season that was.”