Fred Drury McMullin (October 13, 1891 – November 20, 1952) was an American
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), ...
third baseman
A third baseman, abbreviated 3B, is the player in baseball or softball whose responsibility is to defend the area nearest to third base — the third of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. In the scoring system us ...
. He is best known for his involvement in the 1919
Black Sox scandal
The Black Sox Scandal was a Major League Baseball game-fixing scandal in which eight members of the Chicago White Sox were accused of throwing the 1919 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds in exchange for money from a gambling syndicate l ...
.
Early life
Fred McMullin was born to Robert and Minnie McMullin, the first of nine children. The family grew so big that eventually they migrated to Southern California, where Fred attended
Los Angeles High School
Los Angeles High School is the oldest public high school in the Southern California Region and in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Its colors are royal blue and white and the teams are called the Romans.
Los Angeles High School is a pub ...
. McMullin played for the school's baseball team, which boasted another future major leaguer ball player in
Johnny Rawlings
John William Rawlings '' ed' (August 17, 1892 – October 16, 1972) was a second baseman and shortstop in Major League Baseball who played for six different teams between the and seasons. Listed at , 158 lb., he batted and threw right-han ...
.
Career
McMullin got his first taste of playing pro ball when he signed a contract to play for the
Long Beach Sand Crabs of the short lived Trolly League. The teams were often short on funds and many times, players weren't paid. The league folded after a few months. After that McMullin bounced around from minor league to minor league until he signed with the
Seattle Giants of the Northwestern League, which was at the time considered a launching point for future major league players. McMullin played for Seattle until his contract was sold to the
Tacoma Tigers. His career began to blossom in Tacoma under the guidance of ex big league pitcher
Joe McGinnity
Joseph Jerome McGinnity (March 20, 1871 – November 14, 1929) was an American right-handed pitcher in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the late 19th and early 20th century. McGinnity played in MLB for ten years, pitching for the National League's ...
. McMullin replaced team captain
Bill Yohe when Yohle was released to give McMullin more playing time.
He began his major league career on August 27, 1914, as a
shortstop
Shortstop, abbreviated SS, is the baseball or softball fielding position between second and third base, which is considered to be among the most demanding defensive positions. Historically the position was assigned to defensive specialists wh ...
for the
Detroit Tigers. He spent most of 1912–1915 in the minors before making the
Chicago White Sox
The Chicago White Sox are an American professional baseball team based in Chicago. The White Sox compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. The team is owned by Jerry Reinsdorf, and ...
team in 1916. In 1917, he won the
World Series
The World Series is the annual championship series of Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, contested since 1903 between the champion teams of the American League (AL) and the National League (NL). The winner of the World ...
with Chicago, while batting .125 in six games against the
New York Giants.
McMullin was only a utility infielder for the
1919 AL Champion White Sox, and as such he didn't play enough to have much potential for
throwing games (he recorded just two plate appearances in the eight-game series). However, he became a part of the conspiracy when he overheard several other players' conversations and threatened to report them unless included.
McMullin was also Chicago's advance scout for the World Series, which may explain how and why he earned an equal share in the winnings ($5,000) from the fix.
It is entirely probable that, as a means to cover himself and his co-conspirators, McMullin delivered a flawed scouting report to all the "clean" Sox about what to expect from Cincinnati's pitchers.
A look at the statistics shows little disparity between Black Sox and Clean Sox; for example, ringleader
Chick Gandil batted .233 to future Hall of Famer
Eddie Collins' .226.
For his role in the fix, McMullin was banned for life from organized baseball, along with seven other players, by
Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis
Kenesaw Mountain Landis (; November 20, 1866 – November 25, 1944) was an American jurist who served as a United States federal judge from 1905 to 1922 and the first Commissioner of Baseball from 1920 until his death. He is remembered for his ...
.
Later years and death
McMullin never spoke publicly about his involvement in the Black Sox scandal. He went on to hold a variety of jobs throughout his life such as a carpenter, office jobs, traffic manager and Los Angeles County deputy marshal. McMullin became the deputy marshal in 1940. One of these duties involved serving as a bailiff, and the other was serving eviction notices. One of these was on a blind woman, for whom McMullin delayed service of the eviction notice when he noticed that she was struggling to pack up the belongings of her children.
McMullin’s final years were plagued by ill health caused by
arteriosclerosis
Arteriosclerosis is the thickening, hardening, and loss of elasticity of the walls of arteries. This process gradually restricts the blood flow to one's organs and tissues and can lead to severe health risks brought on by atherosclerosis, which ...
. On November 19, 1952, just over a month after his 61st birthday, he had a fatal stroke. McMullin was buried at
Inglewood Park Cemetery.
In popular culture
In the 1988 film ''
Eight Men Out
''Eight Men Out'' is a 1988 American sports drama film based on Eliot Asinof's 1963 book ''Eight Men Out: The Black Sox and the 1919 World Series''. It was written and directed by John Sayles. The film is a dramatization of Major League Baseball' ...
'', McMullin was portrayed by
Perry Lang
Perry Lang (born December 24, 1959, Palo Alto, California) is an American director, writer and actor.
Acting
Lang has appeared in several films and television shows, such as '' Teen Lust'', and directed himself in ''Men of War'' (1994). He had ...
.
References
External links
SABR biography*
{{DEFAULTSORT:McMullin, Fred
1891 births
1952 deaths
Major League Baseball third basemen
Baseball players from Kansas
Detroit Tigers players
Chicago White Sox players
Burials at Inglewood Park Cemetery
Sacramento Sacts players
Seattle Giants players
Tacoma Tigers players
Los Angeles Angels (minor league) players
Sportspeople banned for life
Los Angeles High School alumni