1934-1936 Diamond Stars: #88 Geo. Selkirk

George Alexander Selkirk

New York Yankees

Outfield

Bats: Left Throws: Right Height: 6'1" Weight: 182

Born: January 4, 1908, Huntsville, Canada

Major League Teams: New York Yankees 1934-1942

World Series Appearances: New York Yankees 1936-1939, 1941-1942

Died: January 19, 1987, Fort Lauderdale, FL (79)

In 1935, George Selkirk had the unenviable task of taking over regular right field duties from Babe Ruth (#109) and he also assumed Ruth's uniform number, #3. He more than held his own, batting over .300 in five seasons and making the American League All-Star teams in 1936 and 1939. Selkirk was also a regular for the Yankees team that won four straight pennants and World Series titles between 1936 and 1939. Selkirk's best two seasons coincided with his All-Star seasons. He batted .308 with 18 home and a career-high 107 RBIs in 1936, and followed that up in 1939 by batting .306 with 21 home runs and 101 RBIs. In six different World Series he batted .265 (18 for 68) with a pair of home runs. For his career, Selkirk batted .290 with 810 hits, 108 home runs and 576 RBIs.

His playing career was cut short due to his military service in World War II, and when he returned from the war he began a long minor league managerial career. Selkirk managed in the Yankees and Braves systems until the mid-1950s, winning American Association Manager of the Year honors in 1953. He worked in the front offices of the Athletics and Orioles before becoming the second general manager in the history of the expansion Washington Senators in 1962. He was fired from the team prior to their transition to become the Texas Rangers. Selkirk returned to the Yankees as a scout for his final act in baseball, and he was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 1983.

Building the Set

February 27, 2023 from New Wilmington, PA - Card #74

On Wednesday night, February 22nd, I sat in the parking lot outside my oldest son Doug's baseball practice between 8:30 and 10pm, too tired to read and bored by what I was scrolling through on my Twitter feed. As is usually the case in these circumstances, and with no other options to pass the time, I turned to eBay and did some shopping for our growing Diamond Stars set. We're nearly two-thirds of the way through the set, as I'm focused on my version of a master set - the 108 base cards and 11 notable variations. I know the set-building is going to slow down considerably once I get down to needing 30 cards or so as the last remaining cards will be expensive, hard to find or both.

By the time the night was over, and Doug and his teammates lumbered outside to find their rides home, I had ordered three more cards for our set, including this Selkirk card from eBay seller Hall of Hobbies, located in New Wilmington, Pennsylvania.

Variations Available

1 - 1936 / blue back / 1935 statistics / 1936 copyright

Gehrig, DiMaggio, Dickey and Selkirk
The Card / Yankees Team Set

Honestly, this might be the best card we've added to our set in terms of overall condition and if the card didn't measure up perfectly with other cards from the set I'd seriously suspect this card of being trimmed. The corners are sharp, there's zero surface wear on the front or back and the card is incredibly crisp. If I was the kind of collector who was in to having cards graded (I'm not), this would be an excellent candidate.

This is the only card in the set where the player's name is abbreviated on the front, and National Chicle could have easily fit George had they wanted to cover the red support column holding up the grandstand roof. Two Yankees teammates are making tiny cameos on the bottom left of the card. This is also Selkirk's first mainstream baseball card appearance, although his 1939 Play Ball card is cited as his rookie card.

The back of the card contains all you need to know about Selkirk, including his task of attempting to replace Ruth. He fared better than Ben Chapman (#38) and Roy Johnson (not Johnston), both name checked as Selkirk's outfield mates. Chapman was an All-Star between 1933 and 1936, but then fell off sharply beginning in 1936 when he was dealt to the Senators. Johnson played in 75 games for the Yankees between 1936 and 1937, batting .273 with one home run. Selkirk was good, but the trio of Selkirk, Chapman and Johnson wouldn't come close to Murderer's Row. The Yankees greats named at the end of the write-up are Earle Combs, Tony Lazzeri (#74), Lou Gehrig (#130), Ruth and Bob Meusel (not Muesel), all members of the famed 1927 squad.

Random thought as I'm finishing up this post . . . Selkirk's profile here looks a lot like Gehrig, and both were left-handed hitters. I wonder if National Chicle had started down the path of trying to get Gehrig into the set and then pivoted to Selkirk instead?

1936 Season

As mentioned above, this was one of Selkirk's finest seasons, and among Yankee regulars only Gehrig, Bill Dickey (#11) and Joe DiMaggio (#126) had higher bWARs than he did at 9.7, 5.9 and 4.8, respectively. Selkirk's bWAR was 4.2. He made 109 starts in right field and 21 starts in left field. In the World Series, won by the Yankees in six games over the Giants, Selkirk played every inning in right field and batted .333 (9 for 26) with three doubles and three RBIs.