Assembling a Great Team

Lou Gehrig, Miller Huggins, Yankee Manager, Babe Ruth.

When Jacob Ruppert purchased the Yankees, he hired Wild Bill Donovan, one of the “most likeable” men Ruppert ever knew to manage the team. But when the Yankees finished the 1917 season with a disappointing 71-82 win / loss record, Ruppert made the tough decision to fire Donovan. He had to do it, “if we meant to build up a pennant-winning team.”

5’4”, 120 lb. Miller Huggins was an unlikely candidate for manager of the Yankees. Huggins did not made a good first impression but Ruppert asked for advice, listened and hired Huggins.

When 50-year-old Miller Huggins suddenly died of a staph infection on September 25, 1929, Jacob Ruppert had a monument - the first - built in the outfield in memory of ”a splendid character who made priceless contributions to baseball.” The Yankees’ spring training field in Florida was renamed Huggins Field.Jacob Ruppert, who couldn’t stress enough how important Huggins was to the Yankees, Ruppert said “Those eight straight World Series victories in 1927 and 1928 stand as a perpetual monument to Miller Huggins.”

Learn more about the New York Yankees here.