Nellie Fox

Some stories in sports history really make you sit back and be amazed at how fate set up so well for a player to succeed. The story of Nellie Fox and his rise in baseball is truly one of those.

Jacob Nelson Fox was born December 25, 1927, in St. Thomas, Pennsylvania which is a little burg about 30 miles west of Gettysburg. This Christmas Day gift to the Fox family would go on to him a hero of baseball hundreds of miles away in the Windy City. The lad would be called Pug by family and friends. He wouldn't have the moniker of Nellie associated as the shortened version of his middle name until he played pro ball. His father Jake had loved to play baseball and ended up learning carpentry even though he grew up on a farm in St. Thomas. SABR.org shares that there is a photograph of a 2-year-old Pug holding a wooden bat crafted by his father. This boy was destined to be a ballplayer.
Growing up Nellie later confessed that he played baseball and soccer as a kid and probably enjoyed soccer a little bit more than playing hardball. Something happened that helped sway that and showed his father and the rest of the citizens of St. Thomas that Pug Fox may have a gift for the game of baseball. Pug loved watching the local team of boys play and after being in attendance at so many games, the team recruited the youngster as their batboy. Pug would pester his father and the team manager to let him get into the batter's box during the game. The players on the field were a bit older, as his father played on the squad, but that didn't fret the ten-year-old Pug. Finally, the coach caved in and sent the younger Fox to face an opposing pitcher that was thought to be one of the tops in the area. With grit and determination, the pre-teen smashed a pinch-hit single and got on base. Mouths dropped, I am sure as this boy had some talent.
As Pug gre older he struggled a bit in school. At the age of 16, he decided that baseball was going to be his career path. An article on SABR.org claims that his mother Mae was so concerned with the teen being baseball crazy that she wrote famed Philadelphia Athletics manager Connie Mack in a sort of scolding way telling the baseball legend that her son would not stop talking about Mack and the A's. Connie Mack even took the time to write the frantic mother back and said if the boy had talent he might just be able to make a living playing ball. The field skipper even went as far as to say he would love to work him out someday to see the talent level. That was all that Pug had to hear.
During World War II, because of travel restrictions, the Athletics held the 1944 tryouts in Fredrick, Maryland. That venue was about 50 miles away from St. Thomas so with the encouraging words in the letter from Connie Mack still very much resignating in Pug's mind, his parents took him to Maryland for the open tryout. After all, the A's skipper said he would love to work with the youngster someday if he had potential.
It was a Cinderella story right out of a Hollywood screenplay. The Fox family met Connie Mack and Nellie Fox indeed had a tryout that impressed the field boss of the Philadelphia AL team. The biggest issue was finding a uniform small enough to fit the 5'-6" frame of the potential big league ballplayer. Before the tryout was over the A's signed the 16-year-old to a minor league contract as one of the shortest first basemen in all of baseball. Nellie impressed the Athletics with his plate appearances and the way he covered the first base bag on low throws.
Nellie quickly advanced from the lower tiers of the A's farm system to the more advanced. It wasn't a straight shot to the top though as he would jump a level and then be called back down. Such is the life of the minor leagues of baseball. Finally, in 1947, Nellie Fox was called up to the Philadelphia MLB squad, but after seven games he went hitless in three at-bats. He was sent back down to the Lincoln Class A affiliate and batted .311 there and was even celebrated by being selected to the All-Star game for the Class A-League.
Fox finally stuck with the Big League club of the Athletics in 1949, playing off the bench as a second baseman. In sport duty, he was productive giving the incumbent players Pete Suder some much-needed rest during the grueling season. Then after the 1949 season, a series of events followed that propelled Nellies' dream of playing baseball. The A's traded Fox to the White Sox. Nellie ended up playing the 2nd base again but was beat out for the starting job by a player named Cass Michaels. Shortly thereafter the wheeling and dealing Sox dealt Michaels away but brought in another veteran infielder, that would fill the vacated starting infield spot in Al Kozar. The thing is that Kozar soon after the trade suffered an injury and Nellie Fox was cast into the starting lineup of the White Sox.
As an everyday player in 1950, Nellie was far from impressive. He ended up batting with an average of .247 with no home runs and 30 RBIs in 130 games. The next year at Spring Training it didn't look good for Fox to make the opening day roster. Nellie even wrote home predicting that he may be shipped back to the minors to start the season. A couple of the coaches on the ChiSox liked Nellie's work ethic. They had former Yankee's second baseman, Joe Gordon work with the youngster and kept him on the roster as a project. White Sox hitting coach Doc Cramer worked with Fox in the batter's box. The drills from his expert mentors were long and tedious but Nellie put in the time and the effort and improved at both skill sets. 

A bio on Nellie Fox on SABR.org sums the results up best about Nellie Fox after that:

"the American League All-Star team every year from 1951 through 1961, Fox led the league in hits four times during the 1950s and scored 100 or more runs in four straight seasons (1954-57). In the field, Fox led AL second basemen in total chances for nine straight seasons (1952-60), in double plays five times and in fielding percentage four times. In the eight-season span from 1952 through 1959, Fox finished in the top 10 of the American League’s Most Valuable Player voting six times."

Nellie Fox in summary became a stud in the MLB. His patience, hard work and perserverance paid off and is a great example to all of us that if you want something, and really want it bad enough, you can achieve your goals.

The banner photo is a cropped version of a "Every child Needs a Good School Lunch" posters circa 1942. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons by an unknown.

A Very Special thanks to information obtained from the following brilliant internet sites: On This Day Sports, SABR.org, the Sports Reference's family of website databases & Stathead.com