Family dinners and home run heroics; World Series sibling rivalries

Much fanfare has surrounded the upcoming Super Bowl brother-versus-brother matchup between Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and Jason Kelce, center for the City of Brotherly Love's team, the Philadelphia Eagles.

But sibling matchups are nothing new for baseball's World Series.

The then-Cleveland Indians, their pennant secure after several members of the White Sox were banned in the Black Sox scandal, suited up for the 1920 World Series to face the Brooklyn Dodgers, also dubbed the Robins after their manager, Wilbert Robinson.

The series was notable for the first brother-against-brother matchup in the World Series, a fact that wasn't lost on the news media.

Prior to the first game at Brooklyn's Ebbets Field, Cleveland first baseman Wheeler "Doc" Johnston and Brooklyn third baseman Jimmy Johnston, "posed for the movie men," according to one newspaper account. But the brothers otherwise proved hype resistant.

"Doc and Jimmy are brothers but the brotherly love thing was scheduled to be set aside for a while. They both want the winners' end of the world's series coin," said one press account.

On Oct. 1, 1920, in an article titled, "This Brother Stuff Doesn't Worry Johnston Boys From Tennessee," Dean Snyder wrote, "They have no sentimental feeling about battling each other if they are sent in against each other in the big money series."

"'What's the diff?' says 'Doc.'

"'It's only a baseball game,' according to Jimmy."

Cleveland wound up winning the series, which was notable not so much for the brothers' feats as for Cleveland's Bill Wambsganss completing an unassisted triple play in game five.

By the time of the 1921 World Series between the New York Giants and the New York Yankees, the brother-against-brother matchup was beginning to look like an annual affair.

This time, though, the Yankees' Bob Meusel and his brother, Emil "Irish" Meusel of the Giants, fed into the hype - literally.

They bet that the player with the least hits in the series would pay for the Meusel family's Thanksgiving dinner.

The Giants edged the Yankees 5-3 in the last of the best-of-nine-game series - a short-lived tradition that began with the ill-fated 1919 series. Pouring salt into the wound, Bob, also known as "Silent Bob" and "Long Bob," with six hits and a .200 batting average, lost the bet to Irish, who had 10 hits and a .345 mark.

Silent Bob subsequently embarked on a barnstorming tour with teammate Babe Ruth, leading one writer to speculate, "Perhaps the Yanks' Meusel is barnstorming to get the money for the family dinner he lost to the Giants' Meusel."

The Meusels would clash two more times, as the Giants and Yankees met in the World Series in 1922 and 1923.

Irish would tell The Sporting News in 1963 that his biggest thrill in baseball was playing in three World Series against his brother.

"Bob's family and my family lived in the same apartment building in New York," he said. "We'd go home after each Series game in 1921, '22 and '23 and we'd sit down and rehash the games. The guy whose team had won that day would have himself a good time bragging and the loser would have to stand for some ribbing. Bob and I had some good times."

The streak of four straight sibling World Series matchups ended in 1924, when Irish Meusel's Giants faced the Washington Senators.

The next brother-against-brother battle occurred in 1964, when the Yankees faced the St. Louis Cardinals. This time the focus of the sibling rivalry was the hot corner, with Cardinals' third-baseman Ken Boyer and his brother, Yankees third-sacker Clete Boyer.

It would be a memorable series, with the underdog Cardinals upsetting the Yankees in seven games. The Boyers made their contribution, becoming the only brothers to hit homers in the same World Series game.

In the fourth game, Ken hit the game-winning grand slam homer, as the Cardinals beat the Bronx Bombers 4-3. During his tour of the bases, Ken passed by Clete.

Ken told reporters, "You know, when I rounded third on that homer, I was kind of looking for Clete to say something. He didn't say a word, and I didn't think it my place to say anything. I looked right at him, and he had sort of a puzzled look on his face."

Then, in the seventh and deciding game, both Boyers played their own version of Home Run Derby. Ken hit a round-tripper in the seventh inning that provided some needed insurance for the 7-5 victory that sealed the series.

In the ninth inning, Clete hit a solo shot off Bob Gibson that made the score 7-4. Two batters later, Phil Linz tagged Gibson for another solo homer. But it was too little, too late.

Back home in Alba, Missouri, mother Mabel Boyer, maintained a diplomatic stance.

Clete told the Tulsa World, "When they asked my mother who she was rooting for in the Series, she told the media, 'the fellow on third base.'"