Klyd, is it true that one time, in a baseball game, in the bottom of the ninth inning the manager gave Thorpe the bunt sign, but he swung away, hit a home run, won the game for the team, and was fined or suspended for not listening to the manager?
I'll look it up. I know that among his 7 career homers, one came in the top of the 10th inning on 7-9-1918 to beat the Cubs in Chicago, 7-6. But he played most of his career for the NY Giants under John McGraw and that sounds like something McGraw would do. Maybe this was the game it happened.
Thorpe was an amazing athlete, but was a modest baseball player, especially when you compare his baseball exploits with his football career. Over 6 years he played in 289 games and hit .252, largely as a fill-in. Interestingly, 4 of his 7 homers came in the 77 games for which he played for the Reds. Also, in his final season that was spent mostly with the Boston Braves, he hit.327, his only season above .300. After that he spent three more years in the minors.
Certainly, if he weren't involved with football and other endeavors, his baseball career would have been longer and better.
He died penniless in 1953, and his native Oklahoma would not agree to erect a memorial for him, so the PA coal towns of Mauch Chunk and East Mauch Chunk agreed to merge, calling their new town "Jim Thorpe,PA" and Thorpe was buried there with a memorial built for him. Recently, there was a battle where Oklahoma wanted his remains returned for burial there, and I honestly don't know if this is still in dispute.
