Tommy McCarthy

Tommy McCarthy batted .292 over thirteen major league seasons, a respectable figure that does not, by itself, explain why the Hall of Fame inducted him. His case rested on something harder to measure. He popularized the hit-and-run play, perfected the trapped ball trick so thoroughly that the National League adopted the infield fly rule partly in response, and formed one half of the Heavenly Twins, the outfield partnership with Hugh Duffy that carried the Boston Beaneaters to pennants in 1892 and 1893. John McGraw called him "the best man in the business at the trapped-ball trick." Bill James called him "the worst player in the National Baseball Hall of Fame." Both statements are defensible.

South Boston

Thomas Francis Michael McCarthy was born on July 24, 1863, in Boston, the eldest son of Daniel and Sarah McCarthy, Irish immigrants. He grew up in South Boston's Irish enclave, worked in clothing and piano factories, and played sandlot ball whenever he could. He stood five feet seven inches and weighed 170 pounds, nearly identical in build to the man who would become his twin.

McCarthy's early professional career was erratic. He debuted with the Boston Reds of the Union Association in 1884, pitching (0-7) and playing outfield. The Beaneaters gave him 40 games in 1885, and the Philadelphia Quakers used him sparingly in 1886 and 1887. He was released each time. His career nearly ended in the minor leagues before Frank Selee, managing at Oshkosh in the Northwestern League, developed his game. McCarthy batted over .340 for Selee, and Oshkosh won the 1887 league championship. Charles Comiskey then purchased him for the St. Louis Browns of the American Association.

St. Louis

McCarthy found his footing with the Browns. He batted .274 in 1888, .291 in 1889, and .350 in 1890, stealing 83 bases that season. When Comiskey jumped to the Players League in 1890, owner Chris von der Ahe made the twenty-six-year-old McCarthy player-manager. Von der Ahe fired him, rehired him, and fired him again, cycling through managers with carnival abandon. Despite the chaos, McCarthy posted his best statistical season. He played four years in St. Louis and batted .306 with 270 stolen bases across that stretch.

The Heavenly Twins

In 1892, Frank Selee brought McCarthy to the Boston Beaneaters, reuniting him with the manager who had developed his game at Oshkosh. In Boston he found Duffy. Tommy McCarthy and Hugh Duffy were remarkably similar. Both were five feet seven, New England-born, Irish Catholic, and temperamentally well matched. Duffy played center field. McCarthy played right field. Boston fans dubbed them the Heavenly Twins.

Together they anchored the outfield that carried the Beaneaters to pennants in 1892 and 1893, with a postseason championship over Cleveland in 1892. McCarthy batted .346 with 111 RBI in 1893 and .349 with 13 home runs and 126 RBI in 1894, the year Duffy batted .440.

Their innovations were more consequential than their batting lines. John Montgomery Ward credited McCarthy with popularizing the hit-and-run play, which the Heavenly Twins executed with precision that no other pairing could match. McCarthy also developed the trapped ball trick, deliberately letting short fly balls drop in front of him and fielding them on the bounce to fire to the infield for force plays and double plays.

On August 15, 1894, McCarthy turned a triple play using the trapped ball trick against Pittsburgh. With runners on first and second and no outs, Billy Merritt lofted a popup into short right field. McCarthy let it drop, grabbed it on the bounce, and fired to second baseman Bobby Lowe, who tagged one runner and stepped on the bag to force another. McCarthy then raced in, called for the ball back, and applied the tag on Merritt with an assist from catcher Charlie Ganzel. A newspaper described it as "a wonderful piece of heady, tricky, intelligent, wide-awake and scientific ball playing." In one game, McCarthy executed the trapped ball trick twice for double plays, with future Hall of Famer Wilbert Robinson as the victim both times.

McCarthy's tactics forced the National League to adopt the infield fly rule in the mid-1890s, though the rule initially covered only infield fly balls, leaving McCarthy's outfield version technically legal until further amendments closed the loophole.

After Baseball

McCarthy's skills declined in 1895. He had co-owned a saloon and bowling alley with Duffy in Boston since 1893, and the lifestyle contributed to weight gain and diminished hustle. Boston sold his contract to Brooklyn for $6,000 in November 1895. He hit .249 in 1896, his last season. His wife Margaret died of pneumonia on February 26, 1897, and McCarthy, choosing to stay in Boston to raise their three young daughters, retired from professional baseball.

He later coached baseball at Holy Cross, Dartmouth, and Boston College, compiling a combined college coaching record of 107-53-3, and scouted for the Cincinnati Reds, the Boston Braves, and the Boston Red Sox. He and Duffy remained lifelong friends. Both are buried at Mount Calvary Cemetery in Roslindale, Massachusetts.

McCarthy died of stomach cancer at his home in Dorchester, Massachusetts, on August 5, 1922, at fifty-nine. The Old Timers Committee elected him to the Hall of Fame in 1946, one year after Duffy's induction. His case has served as a touchstone for Cooperstown critics, often cited as the foremost example of Veterans Committee generosity. The counterargument is that McCarthy's contributions changed the rules of the game itself, and that the infield fly rule, the hit-and-run play, and the Heavenly Twins partnership affected more games than any batting average could.