Joe Tinker

Lore & Background

Tinker was born in Muscotah, Kansas, and began his professional career in 1900 in minor league baseball. He made his MLB debut with the Cubs in 1902. Tinker was a member of the Chicago Cubs dynasty that won four pennants and two World Series championships between 1906 and 1910. After playing one season with Cincinnati in 1913, he jumped to the Federal League in 1914. After leading the Whales to the pennant in 1915, he returned to the Cubs as their player-manager in 1916, his final season in MLB. Tinker later returned to minor league baseball as a part-owner and manager for the Columbus Senators before managing the Orlando Tigers. He developed a real estate firm that thrived during the Florida land boom of the 1920s, but the 1926 Miami hurricane and Great Depression cost him most of his fortune. He returned to professional baseball in the late 1930s. Tinker was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1946, the same year as Evers and Chance.

In Their Own Story

The dust of the Polo Grounds hung heavy in the afternoon sun as the crowd's roar seemed to vibrate through the wooden bleachers. At shortstop, Joe Tinker crouched low, his eyes locked on the batter's box, his glove worn smooth by thousands of grounders. A sharp crack echoed; the ball rocketed toward the hole between third and short. In a flash of motion, Tinker dove, his body parallel to the earth, snatching the sphere just inches from slipping past. He scrambled up instantly, pivoting with a fluid grace that defied his size, and fired a bullet to second base where Johnny Evers was already waiting. The relay flowed seamlessly to Frank Chance at first. 'Tinkers to Evers to Chance!' the announcer bellowed, the words echoing into history as Franklin P. Adams would later immortalize them in verse.

Reader's Guide

Tinker was a shortstop for the Cubs, part of a great double-play combination with Johnny Evers and Frank Chance immortalized as 'Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance' in the poem 'Baseball's Sad Lexicon.' However, Evers and Tinker feuded off the field. Tinker led all NL shortstops in double plays turned in 1905, led the league with 570 assists in 1908, and led the NL with 486 assists in 1911. He also led all shortstops in putouts in 1911 and 1912. Tinker batted .167 in the 1906 World Series, .154 in the 1907 World Series, .263 in the 1908 World Series, and .333 in the 1910 World Series. He hit the first home run in a World Series following the 1905 rules agreement.

Did You Know?

• Tinker's twin sister died at a young age.
• He began playing semi-professional baseball for Hagen's Tailors in 1898, winning the city championship.
• Tinker and Evers engaged in a fistfight on the field on September 14, 1905, because Evers had taken a cab to the stadium and left his teammates behind.
• Tinker missed several weeks during the 1913 season when he gave blood for his wife's blood transfusion.
• He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1946, the same year as Evers and Chance.