MLB Stats for Jimmie Reese

One reason Reese lasted so long as a coach for the Angels likely was his ability to use a fungo bat like a magician. He could hit the ball to any part of the field. Gabriel Schechter, a researcher at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, witnessed Reese's magic with the fungo bat when he visited the Angels' spring training camp in the late 1980s. "One morning I watched Reese wielding his fungo bat while a good-sized group of Angel players gathered around," Schechter recalled. "One player stationed himself behind a home plate about 40 feet away from Reese, while other players caught the ball for him and even dropped it down for him to hit it. Reese started with the bat resting lightly on his shoulder, and when the ball was dropped he would drop the bat effortlessly and thwack the ball to the catcher, crossing the strike zone nearly every time. He wasn't just tapping it, he was hitting it. They said he used to pitch batting practice by hitting the ball with his fungo bat. The man was a magician and the players loved him."

Source: Berger, Ralph. Baseball Historian. SABR Baseball Biography.

"My friendship with Babe meant that I walked the streets of New York with him.

"Everybody wanted to be around him. People would yell his name or just run up and touch him. A lot of times people would ask him for money. Times were hard in those days. Babe would give a guy $10 and say, 'OK, you owe me.' But he knew he'd never see the guy again.

"We went out a side door and got in his 16-cylinder Packard and there was a lady in a parked car. The Babe said we were going to take a little detour.

"We followed her a couple of miles to an apartment. The Babe told me to read a book or two. An hour or so later he came out puffing. He lit a cigar and said we better get to the park.

"Infield practice was on when we arrived. Manager Bob Shawkey said hi to the Babe. But to me he said, 'Where the hell you been, Reese?'

"Shawkey had to come up with something, so he told me, 'Reese, I think you're bad company for Babe to keep.' I all but fell over, but Babe thought it was a howl."