The Lip: Leo Durocher

A Word from Mark Timmons: Dodger Fans need a break from all the scandals, charlatans and cheating. Evan Blade is the man with a plan. Enjoy!

In 1976, upon hearing that the Japanese Pacific League Saitama Seibu Lions had hired Leo Durocher to manage their ball club, the reserved Vin Scully who rarely said anything negative about anyone said it best.  “It took the U.S. 35 years to get revenge for Pearl Harbor.”

Leo Ernest Durocher could be described with almost every bombastic adjective in the dictionary.  He was about as controversial as they come.  Colorful and outspoken.  Certainly not dull.  No person maintained as prominent a place in Dodger history during the ’30s, ’40s, ’50s and ’60s as Leo Durocher.  As a player, manager, coach, hated rival, hero, and even saboteur, this man played all roles and never minced words.  Durocher could easily be labeled as a gambler and gutsy baseball strategist, a philanthropist and a philanderer, a manipulator and a motivator, a charmer and a cheater.   Leo and controversy went hand in hand, all the way back to the 1920’s when he was a young ballplayer fighting Ty Cobb up until the 1970s when Cesar Cedeño was being motivated by him.

He was a gold glove type infielder and weak hitting batter who in his best year hit .286.  Born and raised in tenement housing in West Springfield, Massachusetts.   Durocher grew up on the streets with mobsters as friends.  As a teenager, Leo learned to gamble, shoot pool and hustle with the best of them.  It is said he learned the tricks of the scamming trade from the experts in those tough streets.  By the time he had broken into baseball, he was skilled at cheating in cards, hustling schemes and collecting debts.  He also was a good enough ballplayer to crack the major leagues.

In 1925 he was playing in the minors with the Hartford A-league club when Hartford Manager Paddy O’Connor caught him red-handed with marked bills when he suspected his young shortstop was stealing.   Reports of missing money from other ballplayers pointed towards their young and brash shortstop.  With his teammates wanting to beat him to a pulp, O’Connor insisted the Durocher remain with the club until the pennant race was over, with the promise that he’d get rid of him once the season ended.

Hartford won and O’Connor kept his word, selling off Durocher to the Yankee organization for $12,000.

Durocher continued in his controversial ways.  He was up with the Yankees briefly in 1925 and eventually to stay with the Championship team in1928.  There his arrogant style, living above his means, and his show-offish nature rubbed teammates the wrong way.  Nicknamed “Fifth Avenue” due to his flashy style and expensive tastes.  He had a penchant for dressing to the nines, something that his rookie wages could not afford.   Durocher was always in debt and someone known for passing bad checks.  The only thing that kept Durocher with the ball club was Manager Miller Huggins, who took a liking to the loud-mouthed youngster.

Leo was a gutsy player on the field.  Legend has it that he took on the great Ty Cobb during that 1928 rookie season.  Cobb was player/manager of the Philadelphia Athletics and could still bring it on the field.  Thirty years after the fact, there were stories circulating that Durocher purposefully collided with Cobb as he rounded second heading for third, causing the Georgia Peach to stumble and fall, only to be thrown out at third base.  Cobb was said to have threatened to end the rookie’s career then and there.  Cobb claims it never happened.  Frankie Frisch says that a gutsy Durocher yelled at Cobb, “that’ll hold you, you old goat!”  Durocher claimed in his 1975 autobiography Nice Guys Finish Last, that no such words were said and that it was an unintentional collision:

”Now, in those days, the Yankee dugout was behind third base – not first base as it is now and as I’m passing Cobb on the way in, he says to me, “You get in my way again, you fresh gusher, and I’ll step on your face.”  I hadn’t said a word to Cobb, and I still didn’t.  Hell, this is Ty Cobb.  But Ruth, who was coming in from left field, wanted to know what Cobb had said.  ‘Well kid,’ Ruth said – he called  everybody kid – ‘the next time he come to bat call him a penny pincher.’  I’d never heard that word before, but just from the way everybody on the bench started to laugh I had a pretty good idea what it meant. What I didn’t know was that Cobb had a reputation for being a very tight man with a dollar and had been ready to fight at the drop of a ‘penny pincher’ for years.”
 
”Well, naturally, I can’t wait for him to get up again so I can go to work on him and holy cow, he turns in the batter’s box, pointing his finger, and the umpire has to restrain him.  Now, the game is over and the umpires don’t have a care anymore.  Both clubs have to use the third-base dugout to get to the locker room, and Cobb races over to cut me off.  He’s out to kill me and I’m looking for a place to run because I am not about to tangle with Mr. Cobb.  Finally, Babe came running in and put his arm around Cobb, and he’s kind of grinning at him and settling him down. ‘Now what are you going to do? You don’t want to hit the kid, do you?’  And while Babe has his attention – boom – I’m up the stairs like a halfback and into the locker room.”

Given the moniker “the All-American out” by Babe Ruth. Leo didn’t take a liking to the ribbing by the Babe.  For the most part, the two had a stormy relationship in their years as teammates.  Stories floated around that Durocher stole the Babe’s watch, picked his pocket and took his money, etc.  There is the tale of Leo helping an inebriated Ruth to his hotel room, only to rob him blind before he left.  “Why would I take a few bucks from him,” said Durocher many years later when asked about the accusation, “If I was gonna steal from the fat guy, I would have stolen his Packard.” 

The Ruth-Durocher feud would re-surface years later when they were both with the Dodgers, but in 1929, when Miller Huggins passed away, Durocher’s playing career looked to be over.  The Yankees placed him on waivers and no American League club wanted to touch the arrogant, slap hitting shortstop that had an unsavory reputation.  This was quite the story because though Durocher wasn’t much of a hitter, he was already known as probably the slickest fielding shortstop in the league.

The National League’s Cincinnati ball club claimed him and he was told to be on good behavior by Red’s Manger Dan Howley.  Durocher played well in Cincinnati but continued to get in trouble by passing bad checks, getting knee-deep in a paternity lawsuit and alienating those that came in contact with him.  Three years later, the Cardinals Branch Rickey traded for him when his shortstop, Charley Gelbert, nearly shot off his foot in a hunting accident.

Durocher thrived with the Cardinals and played a key role in their World Championship in 1934.  Red Barber called him the “best shortstop of his era.”  His best playing years were as a red bird.  Leo also gets credit for naming the 30’s Cardinals the “Gashouse Gang.”  The story goes that sportswriter Frank Graham overheard Durocher telling Dizzy Dean that the ragtag Cardinals with their rough demeanor, dirty uniforms, a blue-collar reputation that tended to get in a lot of on and off-field trouble wouldn’t be accepted in the other league (American) because they looked like a bunch of “gas house ballplayers.”

Rickey was concerned with Leo’s debts.  He continued to live above his means, writing post-dated checks and making enemies both outside and inside the lines.  Commissioner Landis got involved this time around and Rickey assisted getting Durocher an off-season managing gig with the U.S. Naval Academy to help him pay off some of his debt.   It was there that Durocher got a taste for managing and he liked it.

By 1937, Durocher was convinced that he could do a better job managing the Cardinals than current skipper Frankie Frisch and he was very vocal in expressing his opinion.  The Red birds had fallen into fourth place.  Branch Rickey, in an attempt to release club tension, traded Leo away to Brooklyn in 1938.   This didn’t stop Durocher in his quest to become an on-field player/manager.   It was over this spat, while with the Dodgers, that Durocher and Babe Ruth went head to head.

Ruth and Durocher in Brooklyn

After two years at the helm of the Dodgers, Burleigh Grimes was on the way out after two sub 70 win seasons.  Ruth had come over to Brooklyn in June of 1938 with aspirations of becoming the on field Manager to replace Grimes.  Brooklyn President/General Manager Larry MacPhail had brought on Ruth as a first base coach as a possible gate attraction with a latent promise that he would be considered for a future managerial position.  Truth was that the Babe was a gate attraction, but the fans mainly loved watching him take batting practice periodically.  MacPhail would play a part in shattering the Babe’s dream of managing.  A determined Leo Durocher wanted the managerial job just as much.  The two men already had a stormy relationship over the years with each other.  This was a conflict that was to be of “Ruthian” proportions (pun intended).  

If there was one thing that Leo had as a personal trait, it was an uncanny ability to achieve his goals, no matter what the cost.  As despised as he was by his teammates, team management and the administration of major League Baseball, Durocher’s stubborn nature seldom failed to get him what he wanted.  A determined Leo Durocher more often than not would reach his goals.  

Discrediting the Babe would work in his favor to get the Dodgers managerial job.  He claimed that Ruth missed relaying a “hit and run” sign that cost the Dodgers a game.  (This was confirmed in Claire Ruth’s writings at a later date, who confirmed that the Babe’s poor memory was at fault for the mental error).  The two went to fisticuffs in the club house.   Michael D’Antonio in his book on Forever Blue, described the tense spectacle of Ruth and Durocher’s feud in this way:  “Durocher took every chance to humiliate the aging star (Ruth), right down to slapping him and calling him a baboon during a clubhouse confrontation.  He gradually destroyed the Babe’s chance to become manager and got the job for himself.”  Larry MacPhail, who had his own controversial nature, (was known to have serious problems with associations with gamblers and alcoholism), eventually selected Durocher as Grimes’ successor.  Ruth departed the organization an extremely disappointed and disheartened man, never to be seriously considered for a field manager job again.

The selection of Durocher turned out to probably be the best move MacPhail could have made as Leo was able to improve the Dodgers by 15 games in the standings in 1939, finishing in 3rd place.   It was the Dodgers first winning season in seven years.  Leo then led Brooklyn to its first pennant in 21 years in 1941, finishing with a 100-54 record.  Amazingly, the ’42 Dodgers won 104 games, but failed to take the National League crown as St. Louis finished with 106 wins.

The MacPhail/Durocher relationship was rocky from the start.  MacPhail was known to have drunken temper tantrums in which he’d fire Durocher, only to rehire him the next morning after sobering up.  It was reported that this occurred about a dozen times during their stormy years together with the Dodgers, but in 1942, MacPhail left the team to serve his country in World War II, and once again, Durocher found himself working for his old nemesis, Branch Rickey.  In the next half a dozen years, both Rickey and Durocher found themselves and loyal allies, and men that would impact the baseball world (and the country) in a major way.

Over the next few seasons, Durocher and the Dodgers were identified practically as one in the same.  Leo accepted a lessor role as a player as he approached age 40, but with his personality, “lessor” doesn’t adequately describe his role.   He inserted himself in the lineup a few times during the war years when teams were depleted of players, but for the most part, his playing days were over.  

Leo, the “Nice Guy”

Up from the minors arrived his successor at shortstop, Harold “Pee Wee” Reese who Larry MacPhail had acquired from the Red Sox organization.  Rather than feel threatened by the up and coming shortstop, Durocher took him under his wing and groomed him for the majors.  If there was one thing that Leo liked more than putting himself in the lineup, it was winning.  Author Michael Shapiro quoted Durocher as saying that after he saw Reese field two ground balls for the first time in Spring Training in 1940, he knew then and there who his replacement would be.

As the rookie shortstop committed errors and learned the game in the limelight and pressure of the majors, an impatient McPhail called for his removal from gamers.  It was Durocher that stick with him and encouraged him, giving him that confidence he needed to stick in the big leagues.  Had Leo only cared about himself, he could have inserted himself into games, but he knew that grooming Reese would pay dividends.  And it meant the world to Reese.  Reese always called him Mr. Durocher, Leo and his wife at the time, Grace Dozier, had him stay at their house and they treated him as a son.  It was a vulnerable time for Reese who had just lost his father, who died at age 53.   Durocher got him through this difficult period.

Many years later, Roger Kahn in The Boys of Summer addressed their relationship in Reese’s rookie year.   “Durocher became Reese’s champion.  He invited Reese to share his Brooklyn apartment and blanketed the rookie with advice and gifts.  ‘Leo was a sharp dresser,’ Reese says, ‘I was a kid with polo shirts.  If I liked one of his sweaters, he’d give it to me. About a year or so ago, he’s managing the Cubs and I saw him in Cincinnati.  He wore a nice orange sweater and I said I liked it.  Damn if not the same thing happened.  I’m getting to be fifty years old and he’s still giving me sweaters and I can’t tell him no without hurting him.’”

Acts of kindness on Leo’s part were common and there are those that loved the man with true loyalty.  Harold Parrott relates that Leo taught his sons the importance of grooming standards and how to properly tip on road trips.  Parrott was a prolific writer with the Brooklyn Eagle for several years before being hired by Branch Rickey to work as the Dodger’s Traveling Secretary in 1944.  He and Leo embarked on a great friendship, as Parrott ghost-wrote a bestseller about Durocher titled, The Dodgers and Me.  Additionally, the column, “Nice Guys Finish Last” would be written by the two for a number of years.  Parrott spoke fondly about their relationship and appreciated how Leo looked after his sons:

“I roomed with Leo, off and on, for three years, and there are so many fine things about Leo that are unwritten.  His affection for children is genuine.  When my two oldest boys made a road trip with us, he’d say,‘Get lost, Dad.  The fellows are in with me in the drawing room.’

“He would no more think of sleeping in the upper berth that he would of flying.  But I knocked on the door one morning to see if I could take the youngsters to breakfast.  There he was in the upper.  He put them in the lower so they could look out the window in the morning.

“He used to take them on spring training trips.  He would talk their mother into letting them stay an extra week.  We were going through Arkansas and Tennessee.  We played games in the afternoon, and every night Leo would take them to see another Hopalong Cassidy movie.  I said, ‘Leo, how can you look at those things?’  

“‘I don’t look at the movie,’ he said.  ‘I just watch the kids faces.  They enjoy it so much.’”

(source: No Cheering In The Press Box, by Jerome Holtzman, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1974, p. 233)

Years earlier, Leo didn’t hesitate to make a public appearance supporting the war effort on what was only a few hours after a heart-breaking World Series defeat.  The Dodgers had just lost game four of the ’41 World Series to fall behind in the Series 3 games to 1. Hugh Casey’s knuckling strike three to Tommy Heinrich squirted past catcher Mickey Owen, starting a historical winning rally for the Yankees.  On that same night, Leo went before 17,000 fans at Madison Square Garden amongst numerous actors and celebrities to campaign for the U.S. war effort.  “We don’t want Hitlerism,” he said before a cheering crowd.  “We want Americanism.  And the Yankees are a great ball club.  Even if we lose, we’ll be losing in a free country.” (Source:http://www.wymaninstitute.org/articles/2003-02-durocher.php)

With Durocher’s managerial position, the teams emerging success and World Series appearance came the celebrity acquaintances.  Leo befriended Jack Benny, Frank Sinatra, Milton Berle and Dean Martin.   He frequented radio programs of the day, as other Gotham city field generals, (Yankees manager Joe McCarthy and Giants’ skipper Mel Ott) had no interest is such public attention.  Durocher loved the national stage and as a result he became a household name.  This didnt’ hurt the Dodgers’ popularity in the least either. 

Leo reveled in taking acting roles, always playing himself in staged arguments with umpires in prepared dialog.  The money was good and it allowed Leo to live in high style by supplementing his baseball income.  He had the best luxury apartment, top of the line clothes, ate in the best restaurants.  It was complete extravagance for “the Lip.”  Durocher dated starlets and was living the high life in the most important city in the world.

“Leo Durocher has the uncanny ability to make a bad situation worse.”  -Branch Rickey

Due to the War, 1944 Spring Training was not held in Florida as virtually every industry in the nation, including baseball, was pinching expenses to assist the nation with the war effort.  The Dodgers had their training in nearby Bear Mountain, a mere 40 miles away from Broadway.  Durocher couldn’t resist getting back to the big city each night to indulge in the nightlife.  On one of his nights of retreat back to the Big Apple, Durocher was recording a radio show with Milton Berle and Jack Benny.  Branch Rickey was questioned about it by the local scribes.  “That young man,” he said referring to his manager, “will have to make an election of professions!”  

Harold Parrott related what happened in his work The Lords of Baseball, stating that there was a lot of buzz with Rickey’s quote:  

“The writers loved it.  Bad Boy Durocher was in trouble again.  That night, the Mirror and the News had it in their early editions, which hit Times Square a little after ten, so Leo had read all about the new rhubarb before he started back across the George Washington Bridge and up Highway 9W at midnight.

“The next morning he was resplendent as usual when he came down to breakfast.  The silk shirt bore no traces of a wrinkle, and you could have suffered a severe cut on the crease of his perfectly tailored slacks.  Just a trace of Chanel  No. 5 wafted along with him and his grin was ear-to-ear as he sought out Rickey’s table.

“The Old Man looked up from his morning paper like a startled owl.  ‘Who won the election, Mr. Rickey,’ said Leo mysteriously.‘What election?’ Rickey seemed puzzled. ‘You were running against Milton Berle, and I voted for you, that’s all,’ said ‘Lippy’ with some bravado.

“Rickey snorted, but before the Old Man could say any more, his gabby manager added, ‘What I mean is, I like this job, and I won’t leave camp anymore without your permission.’  He had beaten Rickey to the punch, taken away his ammunition.”

It was Leo’s association with gamblers (and reportedly ties to mobsters), that would get him eventually in trouble.  Always one to engage in card games and billiard wagers, Durocher hadn’t backed off from these activities that dated back to his days on the hard streets of West Springfield, Mass.  He’d spend the off seasons in Los Angeles at the home of actor George Raft. Raft had ties to gangsters and it reported that Durocher was even in the company of Bugsy Seigel while in Los Angeles. 

Upon Larry MacPhail’s return from the war, he obtained a 1/3 interest in the New York Yankees.  MacPhail lured two of Durocher’s coaches over the Yankees, (Charley Dressen and Red Corriden).  Leo wasn’t happy about what his former boss had done and spoke negatively of MacPhail.  MacPhail returned the favor.  Accusations from each side hinted that they each had associations with gamblers that had invaded their clubhouses.  

Leo’s friendship with George Raft was mentioned.  Larry’s issues with the bottle were made public.  MacPhail was insistent that his friend, Baseball Commissioner Happy Chandler do something about Durocher.  Allegations existed that Durocher and Raft had taken a large sum of money from another ballplayer in a rigged crap game.

There was also a scandal with Durocher (twice divorced) involving his quick marriage to a divorcee, actress Laraine Day.  The Catholic Youth Organization (CYO), a large booster of the Dodgers Knothole Gang organization, dropped out of it on moral grounds due to the Durocher domestic situation.  

Happy Chandler held an impromptu investigation and interviewed MacPhail, Rickey, Durocher, Dressen, Parrott, and others.  It was a witch hunt from the word go, as MacPhail was insistent that the Commish put the hammer down on Leo.  What resulted was a one-year suspension for Durocher.  He was to sit out the 1947 pennant-winning season.

Rickey was livid with the decision, but in the end, there was nothing he could do to stop it.  Leo accepted his punishment and sat out the year with Laraine supportive by his side.  The suspension was officially made public for “association with known gamblers.”  There are those that believe that it had to do with the alienation of the CYO.  Whatever the reasons Chandler had, he probably knew coming in that something had to be done to Durocher to show he was an enforcer.

Leo had alienated virtually all of the National League umpires too, often going to the press with his insults and complaints of their performances.  He was still hated around the league and know for dirty tactics.  To top that off, he was a popular figure who was often in the public eye.  Club hopping, radio shows, advertisements, friendships with celebrities…Durocher was a well-known face nationwide.  There were a lot of jealous people in the game and many simply wanted to see Durocher out of it.

Branch Rickey later reported that Laraine Day was just what Durocher needed to settle him down.  She was his exact opposite and her influence soothed him. He followed her to become interested in things other than gambling, clubs and being seen in the public eye.  Antiques, the arts, classical music, and literature soon became a part of his life due to her influence.  Laraine didn’t drink, smoke, or swear.  She was church-going and about the opposite of Leo in virtually every facet in life.  They were an inseparable pair that dedicated themselves to their relationship.  As the years went by, she became an enthusiastic baseball fan and his most avid supporter. 

Before the suspension went down, Leo was still in the manager’s seat preparing for the 1947 season in Havana, Cuba when he received word that Dodger players had collected signatures on a petition to oppose the placement on the roster of Jackie Robinson.  It was the early morning, and Durocher immediately called a meeting with his team.  Many arrived at their hotel suite in underwear and pajamas to hear their manager out.  Leo reacted with passionate anger and immediately set the tone in the Dodger clubhouse to those that opposed having Robinson on the team.  He told them that their petition could essentially be used as toilet paper and that he’d personally deliver anyone on the team that wanted Robinson off directly to Rickey so they could be released from the club. He was reported to say:

“I don’t care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a (expletive) zebra.  I’m the manager of this team and I say he plays.  He’s on the team boys.  He’s on the team because he’s going to put money in all our pockets.  And remember this boys, He’s only the first.  There’s more coming and they’re hungry.”

Unfortunately for Leo, his days as Jackie’s manager would be short-lived.   The suspension hit shortly after his tirade with the players in 1947 and by midseason, 1948, he was on his way out and would soon be the Dodger’s nemesis for the next decade.   Essentially Rickey gave Giant Owner Horace Stoneham authorization to hire him at mid-season in 1948.  Quite an extraordinary circumstance, a field manager switching sides to their arch-rival in the middle of the season was unprecedented.   It was an interesting turn of events and one that would forever change the history of the game.

Manager of the Giants and beyond

Durocher’s managerial antics have already been discussed in previous columns.  The 1951 pennant-winning Giants cheated their way to the title.  Complete with a telescope, buzzers, bullpen players flashing signs and an elaborate scheme, Durocher’s Giants overcome a 13 game deficit in August to lead them to the title.  He had no reservations doing it.  Not too much of a surprise considering all the nefarious activities Leo had been involved in since his youth.   It has all been exposed now.  Interestingly, that secret of the Major League clubhouse remained concealed for about 50 years and ten years past the death of Durocher in 1991.

As the New York Giants Manager, Durocher won two pennants and one World Series (in 1954). He groomed Willie Mays into the superstar player that he became, writing his name into the lineup in his rookie season, even though he started in a horrendous slump, (0 for 23).  He encouraged the young man, told him he was the best centerfielder he had ever seen and said he would be in the lineup every day as long as he was managing the team.  Mays would say years later that it was Durocher that instilled in him the confidence that he would make it in the major leagues.  Durocher insisted over the years that Willie Mays was the greatest player that he ever saw, and he had seen many, Ruth Gehrig, Cobb, DiMaggio, Mantle, Williams, Aaron.  Few would argue with him about the Say Hey Kid..

With 1954 came Durocher’s crowning achievement.  A World Series Championship.  The Giants had a stellar season and the Dodgers faltered after two consecutive pennants.  As luck would have it the Cleveland Indians with their 111 wins were able to take the A.L. Pennant and the Giants would not face the juggernaut Yankees in the Series.  The New York Giants swept the fall classic and Durocher was on top of the world. 

‘54 was the crowning achievement of Durocher’s managerial career, and short-lived.  They failed to repeat in 1955 and fell to a third-place finish, and the Dodgers won their first World Series.  Horace Stoneham fired Durocher at the conclusion of the ’55 season and he was out of baseball.  He moved to California and worked in Hollywood for a few years through his connections he had developed over the years, but baseball still was in his blood.  He yearned to return to the dugout.

The Dodgers came calling, again

For some crazy reason, in 1961, Buzzie Bavasi thought that the return of Leo Durocher to the Dodgers as one of Walt Alston coaches would be a good idea.  The two were polar opposites in personality.  One quiet, the other loud-mouthed.  One reserved and the other flamboyant.  They clashed from the beginning and Durocher was with the club for four seasons.

The 1962 pennant chase and the Dodger’s failures to win it was well-chronicled in Durocher’s book, Nice Guys Finish Last.  The team was divided.  Durocher was making managerial decisions and putting on plays as the third base coach without Alston’s direction and he didn’t like it.  Eventually, according to Durocher, he was threatened with fines every time he called his own shots.  Durocher strictly blamed Alston for their failure to win the pennant in ’62 stating that the team went into a nasty slump once he followed Alston’s orders. A book could probably be written on that season alone.  The Dodger team was divided into two camps and many sided with Leo. 

Durocher did stick around for the ’63 championship though and long enough to participate in Mr. Ed, Beverly Hillbillies and Munsters episodes that he was featured in, some with Dodger players and all related to his Dodger position.

Durocher eventually would be hired as a field general again.  In 1966 Phil Wrigley of the Cubs hired him to lead his team.  Leo admitted over the years that he took much of his managerial philosophy from the grooming he received from Hall of Fame manager Miller Huggins back in the 1920s when he was a Yankee.  He used many of Huggins’ old tactics that included embarrassing and angering his players in an effort to get them to improve their performance. This tactic of negative reinforcement seemed to work in the 40s and 50s but by the 1960s, player psyches had changed.  The old school methods used by Durocher would eventually backfire on him.

With the Chicago Cubs, he turned the franchise around to a winning organization.  But they failed in 1969 to win the NL East after blowing a large lead in August and September.  By 1972 he had lost his players.  Ron Santo, Billy Williams, and Ken Holtzman had revolted against him.  In 1973 the Houston Astros signed him and again, his inability to relate to the modern ballplayer cost him his job, primarily Larry Dierker and Cesar Cedeno would protest his leadership tactics.  At the time of his retirement after the 1973 season, Durocher was the fifth winningest manager in the history of the game.

Durocher was out of baseball for good and he hoped to garner enough support for a Hall of Fame enshrinement.  He had a career managerial record of 2,008-1,709 (.540 winning percentage).  During his managerial career, he had turned around four franchises from losing records to winning records.  He was instrumental in developing several Hall of Fame players.  Durocher represented the game in the public eye through his radio, big screen and later television appearances.  His assertive ways gave baseball the publicity that it needed, even in hard times.   He also was instrumental in helping the game integrate.  The black eye of his career will always be the sign-stealing scandal that he got away with and his associations with gamblers and unsavory characters that dated back to his youth.

Leo Durocher died in October 1991 at age 86.  Many baseball luminaries spoke positively of Leo the Lip following his passing:

Don Drysdale”  “Leo was the type of guy you could listen and learn from.  Just talking with Leo taught me a great deal about the game.  Whether you were playing bridge or gin rummy or bowling, he would always talk baseball to you.”

Tom Lasorda: “The most aggressive manager I’ve ever seen. He was my idol, that’s why I took the number 2 jersey.”

Gene Mauch: “He was a great hunch player and manager.  He made a good team better right quick with his great personality.”

Peter O’Malley: “He made a tremendous impact on all of baseball and in particular the Dodger organization.  No one wanted to win more than Leo.”

Willie Mays: “You heard a lot of things about Leo Durocher, how evil he was, how he didn’t like this person or that.  Maybe some of it is true.  I don’t know.  He never treated me anything but perfect.  All I can say is I have lost a dear father.”

Two and a half years after his death, Leo Durocher was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, something he had yearned for before his death.  Ex-wife Laraine Day received his plaque and spoke at his ceremony.  Had he been present, it probably would have been quite a ceremony.  If there was one thing Leo could do, it was talking.  Especially about the game he loved.