Happy Birthday to Dodgers great Roy Campanella

December 4, 2023 William A. Gralnick

From left, in a July 12, 1949, file photo, Roy Campanella, Larry Doby, Don Newcombe and Jackie Robinson pose at the 16th annual All-Star Game at Ebbetts Field in Brooklyn, New York. AP Photo/File

Share this:

Which is the Roy Campanella to write about in his birthday month? Is it the Campanella, who as a disabled individual, became an invaluable mentor to so many young ballplayers, especially catchers? Is it the Roy Campanella whose Hall of Fame Career made him an indelible memory for baseball in general and Brooklyn in particular? Or should it be Campenella the person, whose mild-mannered personality coupled with his never-stop work ethic in large measure made everything else possible? The answer is the challenge this writer faces as he tries to do justice to a man and ballplayer who meant so much to him when he was a kid.

Let’s start with a taste of the stats that can be summed up in one word: great.

Campanella played for the Dodgers from 1948 through 1958 as their regular catcher. While he had several numbers on his back, he finally settled on number 39, the number forever associated with him.

Campanella was selected to the All-Star Game every year from 1949 through 1956. With his 1949 All-Star selection, he was one of the first four African Americans honored. In 1950 Campanella hit home runs in five straight games. The only other Dodgers to homer in five consecutive games are Shawn Green (2001), Matt Kemp (2010), Adrian Gonzales (2014–15), and Joc Pederson (2015).

Campanella received the Most Valuable Player award in the National League three times: in 1951, 1953, and 1955. In each of his MVP seasons, he batted more than .300, hit more than 30 home runs, and had more than 100 runs batted in. His 142 RBIs during the 1953 season exceeded the franchise record of 130, which had been held by Jack Fournier (1925) and Babe Herman (1930). Today it is the second most in franchise history. Tommy Davis broke it with 153 RBIs in 1962. That same year, Campanella hit 40 home runs in games in which he appeared as a catcher, a record that lasted until 1986 when it was exceeded by Todd Hundley. During his career, he threw out 57% of the base runners who tried to steal a base on him. It was the highest by any catcher in major league history. Campanella had five of the seven top caught-stealing percentages for a single season in major league history.

In 1955 (Campanella’s final MVP season), he helped Brooklyn win its first World Series championship. After the Dodgers lost the first two games of the series to the Yankees, Campanella began Brooklyn’s comeback by hitting a two-out, two-run home run in the first inning of Game 3. The Dodgers won that game, getting another home run from Campanella in a Game 4 victory that tied the series, and then went on to claim the series in seven games when Johnny Podres shut out the Yankees 2–0 in Game 7.

Campanella caught three no-hitters during his career: two by Carl Erskine and one by Sal Maglie. “In my no-hitter…I only shook Campy off once,” Maglie recalled. “He was doing the thinking, calling the pitches just right for every batter in every situation, and all I had to do was check the sign to see if I agreed and then throw.” Thanks to the diligent researchers at Baseball Reference.com, SABR, and The Britannica. Their work enables me to make word pictures out of their statistics.

At 5’9” tall and weighing 190 lbs., squat would be the best description of Campanella. His home run power came from a stance that slanted down into his prodigious back and rear. His home runs were not moon shots, but rifle shots. Bang! Zoom! Would describe them. Never a threat to steal, he gave it a try one day when I was in the stands. It was clear to all that the throw was high and late; Campanella was safe. Ebbets Field went wild. The only person in the stadium not to see it that way was the ump who called him out. Fans began to boo. The boos turned into a storm of negative sounds. Feet began to stomp. The stadium began to shake. I began to quiver. To quiet things, after a brief go at the ump, Campy trotted off the field to an ovation.

I heard another side of him. One day I had box seats just up from the screen behind home plate. Chasing a foul ball, Campanella raced towards me. As his glove reached in over the railing a fan’s hand reached out for a souvenir. The ball bounced off both glove and hand. What then followed was a torrential outpouring of words that had they brought them the mothers in the stands would have produced bars of soap for washing out his mouth.

In ’58, I fell prey to the vicious, racist rumor after the accident that ended the Campanella career. The owner of a liquor store in Harlem from which he was returning home, the buzz was that the catcher was drunk. In those days it was a common stereotype of black men. I was embittered and angry. Then came the truth. Yes, he was on his way home from the store, yes he lost control of the car the accident breaking his neck, and yes paralyzing him. He was sober as a judge on his way home to Glen Cove in Long Island. The car hit a sheet of black ice that caused the car to airplane off the road. The NY Herald Tribune recounts his hitting, what must be the telephone company’s most famous pole, #28. The force flipped the car over on its right side. So ended his career, but through it all, rehab, and then being a player advisor/mentor there was that smile.

Another word other than squat I would use to describe our birthday boy would be “gentleman.” Winning his third MVP in 1955, beating out Duke Snider by four points, he told the AP that he really wished Duke could have won it, that he’d already won it twice. “Duke,” he said, “is such a great hitter.”

Unlike the Eddie Stankys and Billy Martins of the game, Roy Campanella made people feel good about baseball. He deserves all of us to blow out the candles on his cake.