Dodgers legend Don Newcombe lived a consummately American life

Dodgers legend Don Newcombe passed away on Tuesday. He was 92 years old.

Dodgers legend Don Newcombe, who died Feb. 19 at the age of 92, led one of the most complete lives in American sports history … and possibly in American history period.

Many of the cultural touchstones that we today see as part of the American experience Newcombe lived through and experienced. He was a superb athlete, and a dedicated community leader. He fought racial prejudice, a raging temper, alcoholism, and the breakup of his marriage.
In combination, those disparate facets eventually matured him into the portion of his life that became most important to him: role model and aide.

“What I have done after my baseball career and being able to help people with their lives – means more to me than all the things I did in baseball,” he wrote on his website.

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Figures as prominent as President Barack Obama recognized the way that his contributions superseded baseball. Newcombe, Obama said in 2010, “helped …America become what it is.” Former teammate Maury Wills credited Newcombe with helping Wills overcome his own addiction problems. “He wouldn’t give in and my life is wonderful today because of Don Newcombe,” Wills said.

Life’s lessons did not come easily to Newcombe. But in time he learned them so well that it is easy to look past what a great ballplayer he was. Born June 14, 1926 in Madison, N.J. , he launched his baseball career with the Negro League’s Newark Eagles, and was a prominent member of wave of players who followed Jackie Robinson in the integration of baseball.

Newcombe and Roy Campanella came from the Eagles to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1949, becoming immediate stars. As a rookie, he won 17 games, led the league in shutouts and at one point put together a string of 32 consecutive shutout innings. With Robinson, Campanella and Cleveland’s Larry Doby, he was in the first group to integrate the All-Star game, making the National League team in 1949. For his efforts, he was named Rookie of the Year.

He started two games against the Yankees in that fall’s World Series, but lost both despite allowing only four earned runs in nearly 12 innings. In the opener, Newcombe and Allie Reynolds matched shutout innings until Tommy Henrich ended the game with a home run leading off the bottom of the ninth. In the fourth game, he was pulled after allowing three runs in the fourth inning; Brooklyn eventually lost 6-4.

Newcombe won 19 games n 1950, and went 20-9 with a 3.28 in 1951. He was the starting pitcher in the famous third game of the playoff with the New York Giants, but was pulled with one out in the bottom of the ninth nursing a 4-2 lead. Ralph Branca came on in relief, Bobby Thompson hit a 3-run home run, and Newcombe’s performance was lost in the afterglow of one of sport’s unforgettable comebacks.

The Korean War took Newcombe away for the 1952 and 1953 seasons, and he fought through an ordinary 1954 campaign before recovering his form in 1955. He went 20-5 that World Series winning season, although Newcombe’s own post-season performance was sub-par. He started one game against the Yankees, got shelled and took the loss.

In 1956, he made 36 starts, compiled a 27-7 record, was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player, and won the inaugural Cy Young Award.

In these designated hitter days it would be easy to lose sight of the fact that Newcombe was often his own best friend at the plate. A career .271 hitter, he hit 15 home runs, seven of them in 1955 alone, He batted .359 that season in 125 plate appearances with a 1.028 OPS.

By the mid-1950s, though, the pressures both of stardom and the existing racial animus were wearing hard on Newcombe, and creating tension between him and his teammates. Always known for his temper, Newcombe became impossible to handle in the clubhouse.

Off-field issues also emerged, among them an auto crash — in which the car Newcombe was driving struck a child — the breakup of his marriage, and a rapidly increasing emphasis on alcoholism to help him cope with the accumulation of problems. Finally in 1958 manager Walter Alston gave up trying to handle his star pitcher; Newcombe was traded to the Cincinnati Reds. In 1960 the Reds sent him to Cleveland, where he pitched briefly before being released.

He left the game at age 34 with a career record of 149-90 and a 3.56 ERA. Under the circumstances, no one would have been surprised had Newcombe’s life spiraled out of control…which, for a time it did. In 1965 he declared bankruptcy. But when in 1966 his second wife threatened to leave with their son, Newcombe discovered the motivation to seek help for his alcoholism.

Having stabilized his personal affairs, Newcombe returned to the game in 1970 in a previously unheard-of capacity as director of community relations for the Dodgers, a position he held for the remainder of his life. In 1976 he created Don Newcombe Enterprises, and in 1980 he helped the Dodgers establish a drug and alcohol awareness program that eventually became a model.