Proud to be Pipped

The Rev. Tom Pipp doesn't have a phobia about taking vacations, although it would be understandable if he did.

After all, his grandfather was Wally Pipp, the first baseman for the New York Yankees who took the day off on June 2, 1925, and never got his job back. His fill-in, a youngster named Lou Gehrig, went on to play 2,130 consecutive games, and Wally Pipp went on to become the answer to a trivia question and be turned into a phrase -- "to be Pipped" -- that's still common today.

Pipp, who recently arrived in St. Paul to set up a regional novitiate for Jesuit priests, said his grandfather never took any of it personally.

"There was not even the slightest indication of bitterness," he said.

The elder Pipp certainly had plenty of reason to feel bitter. He was a star in his own right during the 11 years he played in New York. He was the first Yankee to win the American League home-run title, doing so in back-to-back years, 1916 and 1917, and earning the nickname "Walloping Wallie." (The origin of the intentional misspelling has been lost.) He was such a reliable hitter that he batted behind Babe Ruth -- his roommate when the team was on the road -- as a way of keeping opponents from issuing intentional walks to the Sultan of Swat.

So it might seem unfair that the game he is most remembered for is one he didn't play in, but his grandson said that the opposite is true.

"He was proud of the role he played," he said. When Gehrig showed up at the Yankees fresh out of Columbia University, it was Wally Pipp who took him under his wing and tutored him. "That's a point of pride for me," Pipp said.

At the end of the 1925 season, the Yankees dealt Pipp to the Cincinnati Reds, where he played for three years before retiring.

He was not one of those ex-athletes who spent the rest of his life reliving his glory years. Other than the fact that his grandfather was a regular at the Yankees' old-timers games, as a kid, Pipp wasn't even fully aware of his fame.

"I think part of it was that he was a man of the Depression," Pipp said. "He retired in 1928, and then the crash came in the '30s and he had to deal with all that financial turmoil. He sold insurance, he sold cars, he was a rep for a manufacturing company -- he did what he had to do."

A family memento

It wasn't until after his grandfather's death in 1965 that Pipp developed a true appreciation for his accomplishments through a scrapbook of newspaper clippings his father had copied and bound for every family member.

The clippings paint a portrait of a man who is every bit as gracious as his grandson says he was. The newspaper reports from the day he was sent to the Reds almost read like an obituary.

"As soon as the clerical staff heard the news, they did everything but hang crepe on the door because Wally was one of the most likable men on the team," the New York Times reported. "He was a clean, quiet and modest player," another reporter wrote. A third called him "a thorough gentleman and a sportsman."

The one aspect of his grandfather's legacy that Pipp probably could do without is the fact that the family name has become a less-than-flattering cliché that has even gone international: British reporters covering the Tour de France recently wrote about Lance Armstrong being Pipped. And it's invaded Internet chat rooms, where it refers to someone jumping in and answering a question that is intended for someone else.

"I've heard it my whole life," Pipp said. "It seems as if everyone's been Pipped at one point."

As for following in his grandfather's athletic footsteps, "That chromosome passed me by," he said. But the Yankee gene took. Despite growing up in Ohio and having served in other cities with major league teams, Pipp is and always will be a diehard Yankee fan.

"That's probably not the best thing to say here in Minnesota," he conceded with a laugh. "I have been to Target Field, though. It's marvelous."

He went to see the Twins? "Well," he paused before admitting, "they were playing the Yankees."

Jeff Strickler • 612-673-7392