brooklyndodgermemories

I read this very interesting article in the Aug 8, 1951 The Sporting News, It was by Joe King. They put the team together for very little Pee Wee cost the most at $40,000 the others cost next to nothing but now if the Dodgers sold their stars they'd be worth $3,000,000. There most valuable player at $300,000 was Gil Hodges next at $200,000 was Jackie, Campy, PeeWee, Duke,at $150,000 are Furillo, Roe,Newcombe, at $100,000 are Cox, Pafko and Erskine. I found this The Sporting News article in the Paper of Record on Sabr.

I wonder what that would be in today's dollars? Gil Hodges was always held in high esteem by baseballs so called insiders. People who looked beyond raw numbers. Today with all of the fancy Bill James numbers, Gil has good numbers, but not god like numbers. Those numbers fail to take into consideration all the other things a player brings each and every day. Any time a player poll was taken, Gil was always put at the top of the ratings by his peers.

Suffice to say the Dodgers would be worth plenty today. Thinking about all this, I realized how fortunate we were as kids to root for teams that kept most of their players year in and year out. Free agency would have been terrible for a Brooklyn fan in the '40s and '50's. You always knew Campy would be behind the plate next year, and the Duke would be be patroling center.............

Were you guys surprised that they considered Gil the most valuable Dodger back in 1951. I wish I could have put the whole article here but when you take it from the paper of record it comes out in a format not used here. I also read in the 1951 The Sporting News about players suing over the reserve clause, none prevailed of course but they settle with one of the players who went to Mexico.

I wasn't surprised, I have read over the years many polls where Gil was rated very highly by his peers.

The baseball people had high regard for Gil, in their minds he was the most valuable Dodger then why did the newspaper writers not have the same opinion when it came to MVP and then HOF voting.

Campanella won 3 MVP"s,Robinson and Newcombe 1 each.One of them had a big year when Gil had big years. Gil was respected by everyone, but Campy had a special relationship with the writers, Robinson was very colorful and Newk was even bigger then Gil. They overshadowed Gil.As I have said before, once baseball was west of the Mississippi, alot of new writers were eligible to vote for the HOF.When it was time to vote for Gil, most of them only saw Gil in action at the end of his career. If we could see a breakdown of the voting, most eastern voters probably voted for Gil, and western voters did not.You had to be around Hodges every day and see him play to truly appreciate what he meant to his team.

In 1951 Gil Hodges was THE Brooklyn Dodger (among many other star supporters). I dare say, if the Sporting News did that story 3 or 4 years later, it would have been the Duke who was the most valued.

Both you guys are right, Gil was overshadowed even when he had a great year. Yes Pete if it was 4 years later it would have been Duke, but it was 1951 and alot of other teams were after Gil so he was the most valuable player then.

Personally, I wouldn't have wanted ANYONE except Gil Hodges for my Dodger firstbaseman back then. Gil was superb.

We all feel that way Pete, the little things he did at first base helped us win too, plus he was one of our big power guys you couldn't ask for more in a player.

Gil's problem was that he wasn't controversial or colorful enough. He just went out and did his job and didn't worry about whether he got the headlines or not.

He never argued with umpires, was loved by most people and was never booed at Ebbets Field. He was so good that I think they expected him to play a great 1st base, and with his quiet manner he never made headlines.

Lets hope the Historians are the next group to judge Gil"s HOF credentials.

Yes someone who saw him play or is very objective.