William Thrace "Square Jaw" Ramsey Jr. (October 20, 1920 – January 4, 2008) was an American professional

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

player who was an

outfielder An outfielder is a person playing in one of the three defensive positions in baseball or softball, farthest from the batter. These defenders are the left fielder, the center fielder, and the right fielder. As an outfielder, their duty is to cat ...

for the

Boston Braves The Atlanta Braves, a current Major League Baseball franchise, originated in Boston, Massachusetts. This article details the history of the Boston Braves, from 1871 to 1952, after which they moved to Milwaukee, and then to Atlanta. During it ...

for a single

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

season in 1945. Ramsey was born in

Osceola, Arkansas Osceola is a city in, and a dual county seat of, Mississippi County, Arkansas, Mississippi County, Arkansas, United States. Located along the Mississippi River within the Arkansas Delta, the settlement was founded in 1837 and incorporated in 1853. ...

. He attended the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, threw and batted right-handed, and was listed as tall and . On November 1, 1944, he had been drafted by the Boston Braves from the

St. Louis Cardinals The St. Louis Cardinals are an American professional baseball team based in St. Louis. The Cardinals compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) Central division. Since the 2006 season, the Cardinals hav ...

in the 1944 rule 5 draft. Ramsey was one of many ballplayers who only appeared in the major leagues during World War II. He made his major league debut on April 19, 1945, against the

New York Giants The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Giants compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East division. ...

Braves Field Braves Field was a baseball park located in Boston, Massachusetts. Today the site is home to Nickerson Field on the campus of Boston University. The stadium was home of the Boston Braves of the National League from 1915 to 1952, prior to the B ...

. Besides his outfield duties he was often used as a

pinch-hitter In baseball, a pinch hitter is a substitute batter. Batters can be substituted at any time while the ball is dead (not in active play); the manager may use any player who has not yet entered the game as a substitute. Unlike basketball, America ...

. In a total of 78 games he hit .292 (40-for-137) with 1

home run In baseball, a home run (abbreviated HR) is scored when the ball is hit in such a way that the batter is able to circle the bases and reach home plate safely in one play without any errors being committed by the defensive team. A home run i ...

, 12

runs batted in A run batted in (RBI; plural RBIs ) is a statistic in baseball and softball that credits a batter for making a play that allows a run to be scored (except in certain situations such as when an error is made on the play). For example, if the bat ...

, 16

runs scored In baseball, a run is scored when a player advances around first, second and third base and returns safely to home plate, touching the bases in that order, before three outs are recorded and all obligations to reach base safely on batted balls ...

, and a

slugging percentage In baseball statistics, slugging percentage (SLG) is a measure of the batting productivity of a hitter. It is calculated as total bases divided by at bats, through the following formula, where ''AB'' is the number of at bats for a given player, ...

of .372. He died at Kirby Pines Manor in

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the seat of Shelby County in the southwest part of the state; it is situated along the Mississippi River. With a population of 633,104 at the 2020 U.S. census, Memphis is the second-mos ...

, on January 4, 2008, and was buried at Elmwood Cemetery in Memphis.from the Obituary section published in

The Commercial Appeal ''The Commercial Appeal'' (also known as the ''Memphis Commercial Appeal'') is a daily newspaper of Memphis, Tennessee, and its surrounding metropolitan area. It is owned by the Gannett Company; its former owner, the E. W. Scripps Company, also ...

dated January 6, 2008.

Trivia

*Ramsey's nickname was "Square Jaw." *His tombstone lists his birth date as 20 February 1920

References

External links

Baseball Reference

1920 births 2008 deaths Asheville Tourists players Baseball players from Arkansas Beaumont Roughnecks players Boston Braves players Charleston Senators players Columbus Red Birds players Dayton Ducks players Dover Orioles players Florida Gators baseball players Fremont Green Sox players Grand Rapids Colts players Kansas City Blues (baseball) players Major League Baseball left fielders People from Osceola, Arkansas Sacramento Solons players St. Augustine Saints players Seattle Rainiers players Superior Blues players Toledo Mud Hens players {{US-baseball-outfielder-1920s-stub

Trivia

See also

References

External links