January Player Stories and Roster Signings As Seattle Gets Ready For the 1924 Season

 Jimmy Welsh would spend 6 seasons in the majors, his career bookended by time in Seattle Jimmy Welsh Minor Leagues Statistics | Baseball-Reference.com

Cliff Brady spent part of 1920, 53 games at 2nd base, with the Boston Americans. He survived a car accident before that Cliff Brady – Society for American Baseball Research (sabr.org).

Rohwer Stays With Seattle; 1924 Coast League Schedule Set

 

ROHWER STAYS WITH SEATTLE; CASH REFUSED

Indians Willing to Trade Outfielder for Players-Season

Will Open and Close One Week Later Than 1923.

Special to The Times.

OAKLAND, Tuesday, Jan. 15 .- Charley Lockard, president of the Seattle Baseball Club, made efforts to interest his fellow directors, at the Pacific Coast League meeting yesterday, in a deal for Ray Rohwer, hard-hitting outfielder.

Lockard was unable to make a deal and decided to retain the former California player. The St. Louis Cardidinals offered cash and Bill Pertica, former Los Angeles pitcher, but their offer was turned down.

"We want players and not cash," said Lockard.

The Seattle chief is still angling to dispose of "Doc" Johnston, veteran first baseman, as It has been decided to open the season with Jimmy Welsh at first.'

Lockard is anxious to obtain another pitcher and an outfielder. The Indians still have a catcher coming from the Cubs. "Kettle" Wirts was offered Seattle, but his services were refused. Very" little - was accomplished at yesterday's meeting, other than the adoption of the 1924 schedule. The meeting will be continued today, at which time the player limit will be considered.

The season will open and close week later this year than in the past. the opening week being April 8. This was adopted against the advice of Williams, who claimed that it would interfere with the football season.

The schedule was submitted by Herbert McFarline, secretary of the Oakland Club. The opening, closing and holiday dates were announced as follows:

OPENING WEEK

Vernon at Sacramento

Oakland at Salt Lake

Portland at San Francisco

Seattle at Los Angeles

Decoration Day.

Sacramento at San Francisco.

Salt Lake at Los Angeles.

Oakland at Seattle.

Vernon at Portland.

Independence Day.

Salt Lake at Oakland.

Sacramento at Vernon.

Lon Angeles at Seattle.

San Francisco at Portland.

Labor Day.

Salt Lake at San Francisco.

Sacramento at Los Angeles.

Vernon at Seattle.

Oakland at Portland.

Closing Week.

Oakland at San Francisco.

Vernon at Los Angeles

Seattle at Portland,

Salt Lake at: Sacramento.

Game 37, Seattle Returns to the Winning Column with the arm of Wheezer Dell

Game played May 16, 1924, reported May 17. Wheezer Dell vs Walter Mails. Wheezer Dell would throw over 1,400 innings for Vernon over 4 PCL seasons later in the decade. His minor league career lasted from 1909 to 1926, with a brief respite for the Brooklyn team of the National League in the mid-Teens.
Walter Mails was also on those teams, along with George Cutshaw (their star 2nd baseman) who was on the Seattle bench for this contest. Duster Mails and Wheezer Dell.

Game 35, reported May 15, 1924, Seattle moves into tie for 4th place

"FOURTH STRAIGHT WIN FOR INDIANS MOVES THEM HIGHER
Seattle Makes Everything Count, Killefer Takes No Chances, and Acorns Are Beaten 4 to 3."

Seattle's hot hitting continued...

Week 1 Recap

The Seattle Indians finished up the first week of the season on Sunday, April 13, 1924. In spite of outscoring the Los Angeles Angels 42-34, they left for Salt Lake City and its Bees on Monday, April 14th with a 2-5 record. Of course, the only reason they had that scoring advantage was a remarkable 20-1 win to finish up their first double header of the season. When they got to SLC it was raining, and it stayed that way for both Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Seattle club had spring training in Southern California, starting at Lake Elsinore (it's along the 15, if you hate taking the 5 from LA to Sandy Eggo, you've passed it) and finishing up the spring in Los Angeles. The season started on Tuesday, April 8, with a 5-1 loss. They lost on Wednesday 6-5 and then on Thursday the 10th by a score of 8-3. The Indians were able to get into the win column finally on Friday, April 11th with a 9-5 win. Saturday saw the Indians again lose, this time 5-3. Finally on Sunday, it seemed as if the Angels tired of scoring at least five runs a game. The Angels took the opening contest 4-1, but Seattle came back with an offensive explosion in the closing game of the series, the 20-1 mentioned above.

The top of the lineup was pretty consistent:
1- Billy Lane, CF, started all 7 games going 7 for 25 with 4 runs
2- Cliff Brady, 2B, started all 7 games going 7 for 28 with 4 runs
3- Captain Sam Crane, SS, started 5 games, missing #s 2 and 3 with an injury, 7 for 22, 1 run
3- Jimmy Welsh, 3B, pinch hit twice going 1-2, started twice finishing the week 2 of 10, 1 run
4- Brick Eldred, RF, started all 7 games, going 8 for 23, scoring 5 runs
5- Elmer Bowman, 1B, started all 7 games, going 8 for 27 with 6 runs
6- Ray Rohwer, LF, hit 7th in the 6th game, went 7 for 26 with 7 runs
Frank Emmer hit 7th in the first 3 games, starting at 3B in the opener and SS in #s 2 and 3, went 2 for 10 with run. Henry 'Ted' Baldwin missed the first three games with an injury sustained finishing up spring training in Los Angeles. He came back for game 4, batting 7th, but hit 6th in game 6, going back to the 7 hole for game 7. He hit 7 for 18 and scored 4 runs.
Earl Baldwin, catcher, hit 8th for five games, and Frank Tobin, the backup catcher, did the same in games 4 and 7. Earl was 4 for 17 with 2 runs and Tobin went 5 for 8 with 5 runs.
The bottom of the lineup saw the pitchers go 3 for 29, with Bill Plummer collecting 1 hit and Suds Sutherland 3 for 7 with 2 runs.

Regarding the pitching, 39-year old MLB veteran Vean Gregg started what would be a very good season for himself (playing himself back into the majors with 1924 World Series winners the Washington Senators) by going 0-2, losing on opening day on Tuesday, and then in the front side of the double-header on Sunday. Suds Sutherland, a 30 year old pitcher and Coast League veteran who'd got one shot at the MLB in 1921 but caught the ire of Ty Cobb in spite of going 6-2 that year, lost game 2, but was the winner in game 7. Wheezer Dell, MLB veteran at the age of 38, picked up the loss in game 3. 22 year old Bill Plummer picked up one of his few career wins in game 4. Another MLB veteran, Jim Bagby, picked up a loss in game 5. Frank Osborn, who came to camp as a reserve outfielder along with George Bogart, pitched in relief 4 times that first week. Percy Jones, Carl Williams, George Steuland, and Victor Pigg also some time in relief. George Bogart would have the shortest career. The former standout at UC Davis, and 27-year old PCL rookie, would get one pinch running appearance in the ninth inning of the third game of the year and was released following the next game on Friday. The reason given by Wade Killefer was, that at the age of 27, Bogart did not appear to have much room to develop.