1913-1914

Tommy Griffith was from Prospect, Ohio, 40 miles north of Columbus. In 1910, in his second professional season, he won 19 games for the pennant-winning New Bedford club in the New England League. The young right-hander pitcher was thought to be a rising star in the league.

In four seasons with New Bedford, Tommy won 58 games and lost 45. As he developed as a pitcher, he also proved quite skilled with the bat. In 1912 he batted .286 and in 1913, with the Whalers, in desperate need of hitting, he was moved full-time to the outfield.

After 95 games he was batting .346 and in August, the Boston Braves purchased his contract. Two days later, in Boston, Tommy made his major-league debut playing right field against the Cincinnati Reds. Tommy batted .252 in 37 games for the 1913 Braves, but as it turned out, his time with the Braves was short-lived.

While he possessed abundant skills on the baseball diamond, he also displayed another natural talent with a very good singing voice. After the 1913 season, he and teammate Rabbit Maranville went on the vaudeville circuit and sang songs that Tommy had composed. Their partnership lasted about a month before Maranville quit the stage to coach basketball in Springfield, Mass.

Tommy made the 1914 Braves squad in spring training at Macon, Georgia, but when the season began, he would get off to a miserable start and by the middle of May, his average would be around .100, showing no signs of breaking out of the slump. After a particularly bad day at the plate, manager George Stallings told him, “Listen here, young feller, you can’t sing your way through this league.”

The American Association’s Indianapolis Indians, would later offer to buy Tommy’s contract and the Braves agreed to it.