Gus Mancuso

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Gus Mancuso bigraphy, stories - American baseball player and coach

Gus Mancuso : biography

December 5, 1905 – October 26, 1984

August Rodney (Gus) Mancuso (December 5, 1905 – October 26, 1984), nicknamed "Blackie", was an American professional baseball player, coach, scout and radio sports commentator. He played as a catcher in Major League Baseball with the St. Louis Cardinals (1928, 1930–32, 1941–42), New York Giants (1933–38, 1942–44), Chicago Cubs (1939), Brooklyn Dodgers (1940) and Philadelphia Phillies (1945).

Mancuso was known for his capable handling of pitching staffs and for his on-field leadership abilities. He was a member of five National League pennant-winning teams, and played as the catcher for five pitchers who were eventually inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Mancuso was regarded as one of the top defensive catchers of the 1930s.

Related links

  • List of athletes on Wheaties boxes
  • List of members of the Italian American Sports Hall of Fame

Coaching and broadcasting career

In , Mancuso became the player-manager of the minor league Tulsa Oilers and in he took over as manger of the San Antonio Missions. In 1950, he was hired as the pitching coach for the Cincinnati Reds.

Mancuso began a career as a broadcaster in with his hometown Houston team in the Texas League. He later moved to St. Louis where he worked with play-by-play announcer Harry Caray on the Cardinals’ radio network until . He then served as a scout for the St. Louis Cardinals and the Houston Colt .45s. His younger brother, Frank Mancuso, also was a major league catcher in the mid-1940s. In Mancuso was seriously injured in a traffic accident which killed his wife, Lorena Mancuso.

Mancuso was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in and was elected to the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame in . Mancuso contracted emphysema and died in 1984 at the age of 78 in Houston, Texas.

Baseball career

Mancuso was born in Galveston, Texas to the son of a Sicilian immigrant and the daughter of German immigrants. His father died in his forties and his mother continued to support the family by working as a midwife. Mancuso first began to play baseball as a nine-year-old. After graduating from high school, he went to work as a teller at a bank although, he was hired more for his talent as a baseball player than as a teller, playing as a member of the bank’s baseball team. He eventually caught the attention of the President of the Houston Buffaloes of the Texas League, and began his professional baseball career with them in . In , he hit for a .372 batting average for the Syracuse Stars in the International League. He made his Major League debut with the St. Louis Cardinals at the age of 22 on April 30, 1928, and stayed with them until July, when he was sent to the Minneapolis Millers in the American Association. He spent with St. Louis’s American Association farm club, the Rochester Red Wings and with Houston.

The Cardinals returned Mancuso to the major leagues in 1930, primarily because of a contract dispute with Branch Rickey that made Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis void Mancuso’s minor league contract. He served as a reserve catcher to Jimmie Wilson who Mancuso considered one of the best catchers of the era. Although they competed for the same job, the veteran Wilson provided Mancuso with valuable help in learning the intricacies of catching in the major leagues. Mancuso became a student of the game, learning to study the daily box scores to learn the strengths and weaknesses of opposing teams. On September 12, Wilson sprained his ankle and would not play for the rest of the season. Mancuso rose to the occasion, ending the season with a .366 batting average during a hitters’ year when the league average was above .300 for the first and only time. The Cardinals won the National League pennant but, eventually lost to Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics in the 1930 World Series. In 1931 Mancuso was once again the reserve catcher to Wilson, leading the league with a 54.3% caught stealing percentage as the Cardinals won their second consecutive National League pennant. The 1931 World Series was a rematch with the Athletics as the Cardinals were victorious in a seven-game series. Mancuso only had one plate appearance during the series as a late-inning pinch hitter. During the 1932 season, Wilson turned 32 years old and shared the catching duties with Mancuso who caught 82 games to Wilson’s 75 and hit for a .284 average.