Baseball Way Back: Greenberg, Koufax put faith first

The baseball schedule isn't always the friendliest for Jewish baseball fans.

Some significant games run right into the holiest days of the year, Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

Unlike Christmas, neither is a national holiday. If one falls on a weekday, I take the day off. Sometimes, because these holidays move around each year on the common calendar, I will miss a village board meeting I have to cover as a reporter - governments don't always recognize the High Holidays either.

I was at my synagogue - Chicago Loop Synagogue at Madison and Clark streets - for Yom Kippur services on the evening when A.J. Pierzynski reached first on what was called a dropped third strike in Game 2 of the 2005 ALCS against the Angels.

A friend later handed me a tape of the game.

Three years later, I learned during a post-Rosh Hashanah service dinner that Jim Thome and the White Sox had indeed prevailed against the Minnesota Twins in the "blackout" game.

As spectators have had to make the choice whether to work or observe, so have baseball players.

Baseball history offers two famous examples of players who chose the sanctuary over their respective green cathedrals when needed for important games.

On Sept. 10, 1934, Hank Greenberg's Detroit Tigers, battling for their first World Series berth since 1909, were scheduled to face the Boston Red Sox at Navin Field.

The first baseman, who led the league with 63 doubles and drove in 139 runs, was a key cog in the pennant push.

And in the year after Hitler took power in Germany and in a Detroit that had seen the publication of Henry Ford's anti-Semitic Dearborn Independent and heard Father Charles Coughlin's anti-Jewish diatribes on the radio, Greenberg was a hero the Jewish community could embrace.

The question was whether Greenberg would play Sept. 10, which was also Rosh Hashanah.

Checking with Leo Franklin, Detroit's renowned rabbi, Greenberg was given the green light to play on Rosh Hashanah.

In heroic fashion, Greenberg beat Boston single-handedly 2-1 with 2 solo homers, including a walk off.

The Detroit Free Press was jubilant, printing a picture on the front page of Greenberg crossing the plate with the winning run accompanied by the words "A Happy New Year for Everybody," while a Cleveland writer wrote that Greenberg "blew the shofar twice, and the ears of the Boston Red Sox are still ringing."

Greenberg did, however, miss the game on Sept. 19 to spend Yom Kippur in synagogue. Hank told the Detroit Free Press, "We have the pennant won. So why should I play?"

With Greenberg out of the lineup, the Yankees won 5-2, preventing the Tigers from clinching the pennant the team would eventually win.

When Sandy Koufax skipped a Yom Kippur start in 1965, it wasn't just for any game - it was the World Series opener against Minnesota.

He told sports writer Milton Richman, "A man is entitled to his belief and I believe I should not work on Yom Kippur. It's as simple as that and I have never had any trouble on that account since I've been in baseball."

Indeed, it wasn't the first time Koufax traded a uniform for a tallit.

Koufax chose to observe Rosh Hashanah rather than take part in a workout in Los Angeles on an off day during the 1959 World Series between the Dodgers and the White Sox.

But it was a different Koufax in 1965, and the Dodgers needed him badly. The lefty won 26 games and only lost 8. He also had a 2.04 ERA, 27 complete games and 382 strikeouts.

Still, Koufax had the support of the Los Angeles Jewish community, with Rabbi Max Mussbaum of Temple Israel Hollywood saying, "Yom Kippur is the one day in the year, in fact, he should not pitch because it is the Day of Atonement, the most sacred day in all Jewish life."

So while Koufax fasted, the Twins feasted on Dodger pitching, taking the opener 8-2, with starter Don Drysdale giving up 6 runs in the third, including three on a Zoilo Versalles homer that came after Drysdale made a bad throw that allowed Mudcat Grant to reach on a bunt.

During the game, according to reports, Drysdale asked Alston if he wished he had also been Jewish and couldn't pitch.

When Koufax returned for Game 2, he had little to atone for with his performance, giving up 2 runs with 9 strikeouts in six innings. But the Dodgers still lost 5-1, giving the Twins a 2-0 advantage.

But the Dodgers rebounded to win the series in seven games.

Koufax was stellar, and even threw on two days' rest in Game 7 as he shut out the Twins 7-0 in Game 5 and 2-0 in the finale.

Both were complete games, with Koufax recording 10 strikeouts in each.

In the end, Koufax not only inscribed himself in the book of life, but in the annals of baseball history.