Early Wynn- Life Begins at Thirty

Early Wynn was called by the great Ted Williams "the toughest pitcher I ever faced". One day, late in his career, his own son, who was a promising player, took batting practice against Early Wynn; after a couple of long drives the boy was sent sprawling in the dust at home plate by a knockdown pitch. Early Wynn began his baseball career with the lowly Washington Senators, and then escaped the fate of being with a perennial loser when he was traded to the Cleveland Indians. It was in Cleveland that Early Wynn met a coach who would turn his life in baseball from that of just another pitcher into one who would win 300 games and go on to the Hall of Fame.

Born in 1920 in rural Alabama, Early Wynn escaped the fate of working for a living in the cotton and peanut fields through his right arm. A gifted pitcher in high school, Early Wynn was signed at age seventeen by the Senators after a local tryout. Wynn did not even finish high school, and he went 16-11 in the minors in his first year in pro ball in 1937. He was with the Senators by age nineteen and made his big league debut on September 13th, 1939. The next season Wynn was sent back to the minors for more experience, precipitated when he bunted into a triple play in a big spot. When 1941 came along, Early Wynn was in the Eastern League with a 16-12 record. Early was recalled to the Senators for the end of the campaign, but suffered the loss of his wife Mabel in an automobile accident.

As part of the Senators' pitching staff from 1942 through 1948, Early Wynn had his ups and downs. Wynn had seasons of 18 and 17 victories, but also lost 19 games one year and 17 another. Washington was a horrible team, but did manage a second place finish in 1943 when Early Wynn went 18-12 and led the American League in games started with 33. But it was not until Wynn was traded to the Indians after the 1948 season that his career blossomed; he would win twenty or more games five times after the age of thirty.

Wynn himself would credit his success to the coaching of Mel Harder, who taught him how to throw his breaking pitches better and with more consistency. Harder had been a pitching standout for Cleveland in the Thirties and early Forties, and he took the barrel- chested Wynn, with his 72-87 career record up to that point, and turned him into a winner. After going 11-7 in 1949 during a period of adjustment, Early Wynn started to find his rhythm on the mound and in 1950 he went 18-8. The Indians had a plethora of pitching talent at this time, with the likes of Bob Feller, Bob Lemon, Mike Garcia, and later on, only briefly before he was injured, Herb Score. The team would win 111 games in 1954 and go to the World Series, but were swept away by the underdog New York Giants, with Wynn losing Game Two by a 3-1 score.

Always among the leaders in baseball in games started, Early Wynn led the AL in earned run average in 1950, and then won twenty games for the first time in 1951. Wynn went 23-12 in 1952 and followed that with seasons of 17, 20, 17, 20, and 14 victories. Early was named to the All-Star team every year from 1955 through 1960 and was known throughout the game as one pitcher that batters should never dig in at the plate on. In an interview while he was at the height of his profession, Early Wynn said, "That space between the white lines - that's my office, that's where I conduct my business. You take a look at the batter's box, and part of it belongs to the hitter. But when he crowds in just that hair, he's stepping into my office, and nobody comes into my office without an invitation when I'm going to work." He supposedly answered the question of whether he would throw at his own mother by saying "it depends on how well she was hitting at the time."
After suffering a 14-17 campaign in 1957, even though he had more strikeouts and innings pitched than any other pitcher in the circuit, Wynn was traded to the White Sox. Early Wynn had his last great year, going 22-10 for Chicago in 1959, as they won the pennant and he won the Cy Young Award. Wynn shut out the Dodgers in Game One of the World Series, but the right-hander's pitching arm stiffened due to the cold weather and he was ineffective for the remainder of the Series. The Dodgers won in six games, and Early Wynn never again got close to the post-season.

Besides being a great hurler, Wynn could handle a bat. He was often used as a pinch-hitter, and Early finished his career with a lifetime .214 average and 17 homers with 173 runs batted in. He had nine seasons where he had double figure RBI totals. After the 1959 season, in which he was 39 years old, Wynn became less and less dominant, as one might suspect for a man of his age. After he went 7-15 in 1962, Chicago released him; Wynn was one game short of 300 career victories and determined to get it. The Indians gave him the chance, signing him in May, and he pitched the required minimum of five innings on July 13, 1963 to get credit for the elusive 300th. He left the game with a 300-244 record and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1972. Wynn became the pitching coach for the Indians, replacing the man who had helped him to greatness, Mel Harder. He also coached with the Twins and became a broadcaster. He was a proponent of increased pension benefits for the players that toiled before the free-agency era.

Early Wynn passed away in 1999 from the effects of a stroke, in Venice, Florida. Wynn was such a competitor, he hated coming out of the game. His manager with the White Sox, Al Lopez, found this out the hard way when Wynn arrived in Chicago. When asked how he would take Wynn out of a game, Lopez remembered, "I usually stick out my hand and hope he puts the ball in it. Except this one time I went out to take Early Wynn out. I stuck out my hand and he hit me right in the stomach with the ball."