Richard Nixon photo

Remarks at the Baseball All-Star Reception.

July 22, 1969

Mr. Commissioner and ladies and gentlemen:

I want you all to know that of the many receptions that have been held in this room, this is one of the most exciting of all; exciting because like so many who never made the team, I am always awed in the presence of people who have made the team and are the champions.

On this particular occasion I know that last night at the dinner there were many references to the 100 years of baseball, the baseball centennial, and also to the recognition on that occasion that was given to the great heroes of baseball through the years.

I am not going to try to top what was said then. I certainly am not going to top what I hope to see tonight. Incidentally, just to give you an indication of how much I think of this game, they wanted me, in order to get out of San Francisco tonight and get a night's sleep before going out to the splashdown in the Pacific the next day, they said I could leave at the fifth inning. I'll tell you, I never leave in the middle of a game because I know what happens in baseball.

I was just trying to think--you know, on an occasion like this you try to show off a little about your baseball knowledge--I can't pretend to be the expert that Shirley Povich 1 and some of the other experts around here are, but I should point out that my first recollection as far as World Series were concerned, one of the freshest in mind, involved a year that most of the people in this room, particularly those who came from the field that you used to be in, Mr. Commissioner, the field of finance, the year of the big crash, 1929, but I remember that Series so well, because I had always followed the Philadelphia Athletics and the great Connie Mack.

1Sports editor for the Washington Post.

I recall the great pitchers that team had. I was thinking what the Senators would do if we had those three in addition to Joe Coleman and a couple of others. You remember that year he could have started with Lefty Grove or Rube Walberg, two great left-handers, or George Earnshaw, who had won over 20 games with a right hand, and then on the other hand he came up with Howard Ehmke, who fanned 14 men and they won the first game.

But the reason that I learned--and of course all of this was through sports pages in those days before the days of television-that you never left a game--I had never seen a World Series game before that time--was that in one of the games in that Series, I think it was October 12, the Cubs were ahead 8 to nothing going into the eighth inning and the Athletics with, of course, a great murderers row, [Jimmy] Foxx, [Al] Simmons and all the rest, scored 10 runs and won the game, 10 to 8. I stayed all the way through every game after that experience.

So much for that. There are other memories that flash through, of course, the ones that are written about so often. Charlie Root, of course, was a favorite of mine because he came up from Los Angeles which used to be the Cubs' farm team back in the days when they played at Wrigley Field.

He was pitching, you recall, in 1932 in Chicago. The Cubs had done pretty well up to that point. Babe Ruth, pointing to that fence and then hitting one right over the fence against a really great pitcher. Those events come to mind.

We think of catches and stealing and the rest--Carew stealing home--the great ones through the years, and we have some pretty good base stealers and pretty good stealers in other places, too--not in Washington.

But in any event, I think of Pepper Martin going down to second base against one of the great catchers of all time, Mickey Cochrane, and that made an indelible impression in my mind and nothing perhaps could ever equal that, because you remember those days more than you remember the present days.

But I should not say that, because to prove that I am a baseball fan. I have always been for the Senators and, believe me, you have to be a baseball fan to have been for the Senators in those days. Of course there were years, and this year is one of those, when you can be for the Senators and have a better than 50--50 chance that they can win, but it was not always that way I can assure you.

Bobo Newsom comes to mind, pitching against the Yankees. He was a hero. He always lost, but he was a hero, I can assure you, because ,he did so well against a very great team in those years. And of course, Roy Sievers.

I have to mention some of our Washing. ton baseball heroes. A fellow who you may recall had a bad arm because he ran into a fence trying to catch a fly ball, but he could still hit the long ball, and was the best that Washington had and one of the greatest in the American League in his period, and so on through the years.

So when we get to the present time, and I think of the relationship of baseball to politics, I think of the fact, for example, that some of the great political columnists started out as sports columnists. Now I don't know if that is going up or down, but in any event, Bill Henry of the Los Angeles Times used to write sports and Scotty Reston of the New York Times used to write sports, and, of course, Bob Considine used to write sports and now they write politics. As far as I am concerned I just want you to know that I like the job I have, but if I had to live my life over again, I would have liked to have ended up as a sports writer.

I also want to make it clear that if I had been in Boston, I would not have been against Ted Williams, either, as a sports writer.

I have talked enough about my own recollections, but these recollections will tend to bring home the message that I think all of you can get through loud and clear. I didn't see a major league game until the year 1936. I was in law school then and came up to Washington and saw a double-header on July 4 between the Yankees and the Senators and the Yankees won both games--they would with Gehrig and all that great group that they had with them at that time--but I knew baseball, knew it through what I had read. So I pay tribute today to those who have written baseball so well that those of us who never saw a game could learn to like it as well as we did.

Today we see it on television, and, of course, that has enormously increased the baseball audience. So I pay tribute to the poor sports writers, and I also have in mind the fact that they also might become political writers later. So, I will pay that tribute to them.

Secondly, I want to pay tribute too, before going to the players, to the owners and those who run the league and to those who have the toughest job of all. I of course refer to the umpires, and to men like Bowie Kuhn--and I have known many commissioners through the years-who have given to this game in the minds of millions of fans who never see it except on television or hear about it on radio or read about it in the newspapers, have given to it a credibility that is beyond reproach. Baseball is great because anything can happen through the ninth inning. It is great also because everybody knows it is an honest game. And it is great, too, because the men who play it and the men who are in it--and I should say now looking at the owner of the Mets,2 the women who are in it--that as far as baseball is concerned, those who are in baseball are people we can look up to, that our young people look up to. I think that is something we are all very proud of.

2Mrs. Charles (Joan) Payson, director and president of the New York Mets.

I want to say to all the baseball players who are here and all of the former baseball players, that I am proud to be in your company. I am one of your fans, and even though I didn't make the team, I am with you in spirit and I am going to be delighted to meet each and every one of you here today.

Thank you very much.

MR. GILES. I want to try and wean you to the National League. You have spoken entirely about the American League. But the National League proudly extends to you the courtesy of all its grounds during your lifetime.

THE PRESIDENT. Thank you very much. I appreciate that so much. The way the dollar is going, I had better keep this gold.

COMMISSIONER KUHN. Mr. President, may I say a word? I came here today, among other things, to make a presentation to the President, and when you see what the presentation is you will see why I felt it desirable to talk about what a wonderful baseball fan the President is. I had planned to make a somewhat elaborate statement, with the President's permission, about what a fine fan he is. But I think after what we have heard today, I am not going to say another word. I don't think another word is necessary to demonstrate to all of us here in this room, indeed to all America, that I have standing at my left America's number one baseball fan.

It is a great pleasure for me, under these circumstances, Mr. President, to present to you the exact award that we presented last evening, to the greatest baseball players of all time, and we present it to you as baseball's number one fan.

THE PRESIDENT. Well, it took a lot of years, but I finally made it.

COMMISSIONER KUHN. Mr. President, I might say, we think you are very much on the team.

THE PRESIDENT. Mr. Commissioner, I am most grateful, and this award will have a very proud place in the Presidential Library.

Now, I know that we have got to get to the game on time, so let's get this reception going.

Note: The President spoke at 4:43 p.m. in the East Room at the White House.

Warren Giles, president of the National League, presented the President with a gold, lifetime pass to all National League games. Baseball Commissioner Bowie K. Kuhn presented him with a gold trophy inscribed to "Baseball's Number One Fan."

The All-Star game which the President had planned to attend at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium was postponed because of heavy rains. Vice President Spiro T. Agnew represented the President at the game the following day.

Richard Nixon, Remarks at the Baseball All-Star Reception. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/239642

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