Muddy Ruel, Washington Senators
Image Source: Charles Conlon.
Image Subject: Muddy Ruel posing in front of the visiting dugout at Yankee Stadium. He earned the nickname Muddy by childhood friends when he made a spectacular slide into a mudhole on a rainy day. Ruel was the catcher behind the plate when Carl Mays threw the pitch that killed Ray Chapman.
Fun Fact: After the Chicago Black Sox scandal of 1919, baseball had an image problem. The players attracted to the game at that time game were the rowdies who fought tooth and nail, needled umpires with the crudest profanity, chewed and spat wads of tobacco. But there were exceptions to the rule, like Muddy Ruel. He held a degree in law and was a scholarly, well-spoken man.
When Muddy joined the Senators, he took the aging and struggling Walter Johnson under his wing and coaxed greatness back out of the legend’s right arm. Johnson often regarded Muddy as the reason for his resurgence, allowing him to pace the American League in strikeouts in 1923. But Muddy did more than cajole aging hurlers: he led AL catchers in batting average, runs and hits.
He led all catchers in base hits in 1924 and scored the winning run in the final game of the World Series. Notoriously slow on the base paths, Muddy rambled home on a hit that skipped over Giants third baseman Freddie Lindstrom’s head. Senators’ owner Clark Griffith, after the game, said he thought Muddy would never make his way to home plate.
Painting Detail: Printed on 8 ½ ” x 11” canvas and painted using Schmincke Mussini and Marshall’s oil paints. Finer details were made using Prismacolor pencils.
Acknowledgement: Paraphrased from the website “Hall of Fame Debate: Introducing . . . Muddy Ruel”.