That the Boston Red Sox let a 19 year-old kid take the mound for the first time. The Boston Red Sox's had purchased his contract from the Baltimore Orioles two days earlier for around $25,000.00 dollars (the actual amount is disputed). They brought him up as a pitcher. And he did pretty well as one. He went 2 and 1 with a 3.19 ERA in 4 games. Two years later, he would win 23 games.
But then someone noticed, probably the next season, that the kid from Baltimore could hit as well as pitch. In 1914, he batted .200 in 10 at-bats. The next year, in 92 at-bats, he would hit .315 with 4 home runs and 21 RBIs. That would be 1 home run every 23 at-bats during the deadball era. Arguably, if he had 400 at-bats, he would have had 17 home runs. As it was, the home run crown in 1915 was won with a total of 7 home runs.
Eventually, the owner of the Boston Red Sox, Harold Frazee, would need funding for a play he was producing. Following the 1919 season, when the Red Sox finished sixth, he sold the player to a team that had never finished higher than 2nd place in the American League and had already undergone a name change from the New York Highlanders to the New York Yankees.
With the Yankees, he would no longer be a pitcher, instead converting him primarily to being an outfielder.
And eventually he would call his shot in a World Series game.
Babe Ruth broke into professional baseball on this day in 1914.
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