Andrew Joseph "Jess" Dobernic (November 20, 1917 – July 16, 1998) was an American professional

baseball player 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 te ...

. He was a right-handed

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

over parts of three seasons (1939, 1948–49) with 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 ...

, Chicago Cubs, and Cincinnati Reds. For his career, he compiled a 7–3 record, with a 5.21

earned run average In baseball statistics, earned run average (ERA) is the average of earned runs allowed by a pitcher per nine innings pitched (i.e. the traditional length of a game). It is determined by dividing the number of earned runs allowed by the number ...

, and 55 strikeouts in 109 innings pitched.

Life and career

Dobernic was born in a

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...

n family in

Mount Olive, Illinois Mount Olive is a city in Macoupin County, Illinois, United States. The population was 2,015 at the 2020 census. The city is part of the Metro East region within the St. Louis metropolitan area. Geography Mount Olive is located in southeastern Ma ...

. His first organized baseball was for

Rayne, Louisiana Rayne is a city in the U.S. state of Louisiana, in Acadia Parish. With a population of 7,326 at the 2020 United States census, it is nicknamed the "Frog Capital of the World", as well as the "Louisiana City of Murals". Rayne is part of the Crowley ...

in the Evangeline Baseball League in 1937. For the next four years, he was in the

system including the St. Paul Saints, Waterloo Hawks and the major league team. But difficulty controlling his pitches largely kept him out of the major leagues. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Dobernic spent three years in the

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

including

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

and

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. He returned in the summer of 1945 and pitched for an Army team in

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, winning 19 consecutive games despite his continued wild pitching.

Lee Grissom Lee Theo Grissom (October 23, 1907 – October 4, 1998) was an American professional baseball player. A left-handed pitcher, Grissom played in Major League Baseball between 1934 and 1941 for the Cincinnati Reds, New York Yankees, Brooklyn Dodger ...

and

Burgess Whitehead Burgess Urquhart "Whitey" Whitehead (June 29, 1910 – November 25, 1993) was a Major League Baseball second baseman from 1933 to 1946. He played for the St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants, and Pittsburgh Pirates. Biography Whitehead was bo ...

suggested changes in Dobernic's pitching style which helped, and his

Los Angeles Angels The Los Angeles Angels are an American professional baseball team based in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The Angels compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) West division. Since 1966, the team h ...

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government body. It is the art and science of managing resources of the business. Management includes the activities ...

Bill Sweeney made him a

relief pitcher In baseball and softball, a relief pitcher or reliever is a pitcher who enters the game after the starting pitcher is removed because of fatigue, ineffectiveness, injury, or ejection, or for other strategic reasons, such as inclement weat ...

. In a 1945 game against the San Francisco Seals, he entered the game with the

bases loaded B backdoor breaking ball :A breaking pitch, usually a slider, curveball, or cut fastball that, due to its lateral motion, passes through a small part of the strike zone on the outside edge of the plate after seeming as if it would miss the p ...

and none out in the first inning and pitched nine innings while allowing no

hit Hit means to strike someone or something. Hit or HIT may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Fictional entities * Hit, a fictional character from '' Dragon Ball Super'' * Homicide International Trust, or HIT, a fictional organization ...

s. In 1947, new Angels manager Bill Kelly credited him with saving 26 games and said the Angels would have finished in the

second division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

rather than winning the Pacific Coast League championship. Excluding two poor games, he had a 2.93

in 1947.Baseball Digest
1948, by Dick Hyland of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...

''. Dobernic died in

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

at the age of 80.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dobernic, Jess 1917 births 1998 deaths Chicago White Sox players Chicago Cubs players Cincinnati Reds players Major League Baseball pitchers Baseball players from Illinois Anniston Rams players Dallas Steers players St. Paul Saints (AA) players Wilkes-Barre Barons (baseball) players Shreveport Sports players Waterloo Hawks (baseball) players Los Angeles Angels (minor league) players Milwaukee Brewers (minor league) players Sacramento Solons players Springfield Cubs (Massachusetts) players Toronto Maple Leafs (International League) players Tri-City Braves players American people of Serbian descent People from Mount Olive, Illinois Military personnel from Illinois United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II