Exit the Genius-Clown

The face that launched a thousand jokes was frozen grey and grim. The voice that frustrated generations of newsmen and an antitrust subcommittee of the U.S. Senate was curiously grammatical as Charles Dillon ("Casey") Stengel, 75, announced last week that he was retiring as manager of the New York Mets. "At the present time," explained Casey, leaning heavily on a cane, "I am not capable of walking out on the ballfield. If I can't run out there and take a pitcher out, I don't want to complete my service."

Ever since he broke in as a bandy legged minor-league outfielder 55 years ago, somebody or other has been suggesting that baseball could get along fine without Casey Stengel's services. During his playing days, in Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, Boston, Philadelphia and New York, he was variously known as "Billiard Ball Stengel" and "Casey the Clown" for 1) his hardheadedness in doing things his way, and 2) his penchant for practical jokes. There was the time, for instance, when he tipped his cap to the crowd, and out flew a sparrow. Such antics made it easy to forget the fact that his lifetime batting average over a dozen big-league seasons was a solid .284, and that he outhit Babe Ruth in the 1923 World Series--batting .417 and winning two games singlehanded with clutch home runs.

Broken Necks. The idea that behind those floppy ears beat the brain of a baseball genius did not occur to the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Boston Braves--whom Casey managed for nine years without ever getting out of the second division. The Dodgers finally paid him for a whole season not to manage. Then in 1949, Stengel took over the New York Yankees-- and the clown became the "Old Perfesser." In twelve years he won ten American League pennants (a record) and seven World Series (another record). Critics insisted that anybody could win with the Yankees. But was that it? "I was just a kid shortstop, 19 years old," says Mickey Mantle, "and Stengel made me into an outfielder in a month." When Billy Martin reported to the Yankees in 1950, his main claim to fame was that he had led the Pacific Coast League in errors by a second baseman. In 1953 Martin led all American League second basemen in double plays, set a World Series record by pounding out twelve hits in six games, including a double, two triples and two home runs.

"Casey was some psychologist," says Martin. "He'd say, 'Look at that little feller--he can do everything.' And I'd break my fool neck trying to live up to it."

Not all of the Yankees were so loyal.

When starting pitchers insisted "I'm not tired," Casey would growl, "I'm not tired either, so I'm gonna bring in a new man before I get tired watchin'." Batters resented being replaced by pinch hitters--sometimes before their first turn at bat. Whenever a Yankee player made a mistake, Stengel would discuss it for hours with New York sportswriters--"my writers"--in that incredible prose known as "Stengelese." "You open a paper in the morning," Third Baseman Clete Boyer once complained, "and you read how lousy you are."

Under the Table. The writers loved Stengel. He could drink most of them under the table. New York fans loved him, too, as the Yankees found out when they fired him after the 1960 season. In 1962 Casey signed on as manager of the National League's fledgling New York Mets. "The amazin' Mets," he called them--and they were all of that. The Mets lost games in the longest (23 innings, 7 hrs.) and shortest (27 straight outs) ways possible. They were the only team since 1899 to lose 120 times in a single season. They finished dead last in 1962, 1963 and 1964, and they are a cinch for the cellar again this year. But there was Casey yakking away in Stengelese, calling his pitchers "plumbers" in front of everybody and standing on the dugout steps shouting "Whommy! Whommy!" to put the hex on opposing teams. So the fans flocked to the park--1,732,597 of them last year, almost 500,000 more than the Yankees drew while winning the American League pennant.

On the eve of his 75th birthday in July, Stengel fell and fractured his hip. Doctors told him that he might never walk properly again, so Casey, who has been quietly salting it away for years, decided to go home to his bank (the Valley National of Glendale, Calif.), his "dozens" of oil wells, his stock portfolio, and his six-story office building in Glendale. He was still on the Mets's payroll as the club's "West Coast vice president"--or, in Stengel's words, "the highest-priced scout you've ever seen." Coach Wes Westrum would manage the team for the rest of 1965. After that--well, the Mets are accustomed to losing ball games, but it will take them a while to get adjusted to losing Casey.

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