Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No. 232

Item Information

Title:
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No. 232
Description:
Specs Toporcer, a shortstop for the St. Louis Cardinals, stands with his feet shoulder width apart and his glove around waist level at Sportsman Park. A baseball is sitting in the middle of his glove.
Creator:
Mann, Leslie
Date:
1922
Format:
Photographs
Location:
Springfield College Archives and Special Collections
Collection (local):
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide Collection
Subjects:
Baseball
Baseball caps
Baseball fields
Toporcer, George
St. Louis Cardinals
Fielding--Shortstop
Sportsman Park, St. Louis, Missouri
Link to Item:
https://cdm16122.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16122coll10/id/110
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
This work is licensed for use under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike License (CC BY-NC-SA).
CC BY-NC-SA icon
Publisher:
Springfield College
Language:
English
Notes:
Specs Toporcer demonstrates the proper way for an infielder to field a line drive hit below waist level that is traveling towards them on their strong side. Strong side means that the baseball is hit on the same side that their glove is on. Toporcer turns the palm of his hand forward, which in turn turns his glove forward. The infielder must judge where the baseball is traveling in order to decide how high or low they should place their glove after turning it. The goal is to place the glove so that the line drive baseball will land in the middle of the glove. This is especially important when catching a line drive baseball, as the middle of the glove acts as a pocket for the baseball. If the baseball doesn't land in this pocket, it could easily hit the glove and then bounce right out. However, if the infielder judges the ball correctly like Toprocer does here, the ball lands right in the glove smoothly and easily.
George Toporcer was born February 9, 1899 in New York, NY. In 1890, Toporcer's parents moved from Austria-Hungary to the United States. His father struggled to make ends meet, becoming an inventor. From a young age, Toporcer was interested in baseball, but his thick glasses and skinny appearance caused him to not be chosen for a lot of games in high school. In the Major Leagues, Toporcer stood 5"10 but only weighed 135 pounds, showing just how skinny he was. Toporcer's father died when he was in eighth grade and Specs was forced to drop out of school to help his family run the shop his father had owned since they were poor. Toporcer played in some semi-pro leagues, and was signed to the Syracuse Stars in 1920, who were a minor league team for the St. Louis Cardinals. In 1921, before even appearing in a minor league game, Toporcer was promoted to the major league team as Milt Stock, their third baseman, claimed he would not be returning for the 1921 season. Toporcer performed very well during spring training in Stock's absence, but Stock returned to the team. He remained with the Cardinals for a portion of the season, but went back to the Minor Leagues near the end of the season because of a lack of playing time. In 1922, Specs performed exceptionally well again in spring training, and attempted to replace Dov Lavan at shortstop since Rogers Hornsby was the second baseman and that was Specs natural position. However, Branch Rickey instead turned Toporcer into a utility bench player, basically meaning that if any of the starters needed a day off or if he ever needed a big clutch hit, he would turn to Specs. Specs only averaged 194 at bats per season, but often came in clutch in the most important times for the team, including when he hit a two run RBI double to help the Cardinals clinch the Pennant in 1926, eventually leading to them winning the World Series. In 1928, Bill McKechnie became the manager of the Cardinals, and he wasn't a fan of Toporcer, causing Toporcer to make very minimal appearances. He was sent to the Class AA Rochester Red Wings minor league affiliate for the Cardinals in 1929. While there, he led the team to four straight circuit championship wins, and won two MVP'S. In 1935, Specs asked for a pay raise and was denied, leading to him joining the Boston Red Sox's AA team, but a severe knee injury in 1936 practically ended his playing career. He coached on numerous minor league teams for the next few years. However, in 1948, Toporcer suffered a retinal detachment, leading to him losing sight in one of his eyes. In 1951, he lost sight in his other eye. His wife became his caretaker, and Specs spent the next few years speaking about the game of baseball. Specs lived until he was 90 years old, where he fell down in his house and suffered serious injuries that led to his death.
I used facial recognition to identify the player in slide 232 as Toporcer.
Good condition;
This digital image is made from two separate digital scans; one scan of the lantern slide (reflective); one scan of the image (transparency); the two images were then combined in Photoshop to create the final image.
Lantern slide from the Leslie Mann baseball instruction course, "The Fundamentals of Baseball"
Skelton, David E. "Specs Toporcer." Society for American Baseball Research, [ https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/7a1e7d76 ]. Accessed 11 Apr. 2018. ___Internet Archive___. [http://web.archive.org/web/20180411161656/https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/7a1e7d76 ].
Identifier:
LANT-BSBL-232-03
232