Giants vs Dodgers vs Yankees

A three way game played on June 26, 1944 was set up to support the war effort with an unusual exhibition game played by the Yankees, Dodgers, and the Giants at the Polo Grounds. Presented by the War Bond Sports committee in connection with the Fifth War Loan. The First War Loan began on November 30, 1942. The Fifth War Loan was the largest of the eight, and by its conclusion on July 8, 1944, $20.6 billion had been raised. $56.5 million contributed by the Tri-Cornered game at the Polo Grounds.

The crowd of 50,000 contributes $5.5 million to attend, while the Bond Clothing Co. pays $1 million in bonds for an autographed program. The overwhelming majority of the money comes from the city of New York, with Mayor Fiorello La Guardia purchasing $50 million worth of bonds.

The three-cornered baseball game started with hitting, running, and throwing contests. In between contests, Al Schacht, the Clown Prince of Baseball, entertained the crowd of 50,000, and admission to the game was by purchase of series E, F, and G war bonds. The 40,000 general admission unreserved seats cost one $25 war bond; the 5,809 reserved seats in the lower stands went for a $100 bond; the box seats both upper and lower cost the fan a $1,000 war bond. Bleacher seats were free to servicemen.

The setup for a three-way nine inning game was simple: The Dodgers and Yankees played the first inning while the Giants sat out; the Dodgers and Giants played the second inning while the Yankees sat out; the Yankees and Giants played the third inning while the Dodgers sat out. The same order continued to the game's end.

The game, which lasted three hours and four minutes, was won by the Dodgers. Here is the line score:

Inning	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R
Dodgers	1	2	X	0	0	X	0	2	X	5
Yankees	0	X	0	0	X	0	0	X	1	1
Giants	X	0	0	X	0	0	X	0	0	0

The Girl Who Struck Out The Babe

Jackie Mitchell was one of the first professional female pitcher in baseball history. Her claim to fame lies in the fact that not only did she strike out Babe Ruth, but followed up that K with a three-pitch strikeout of the Iron Horse, Lou Gehrig.

During the 1931 season, the seventeen-year-old Mitchell pitched for the Chattanooga Lookouts. The Lookouts and the New York Yankees were scheduled to play an exhibition game at the Lookouts home, on April 1, 1931. Rain postponed the game until the next day, and that's when Mitchell took the mound, with the Babe up to bat. The story goes he took the first pitch for a ball. The next two were curves, which he swung and missed at, and the fourth pitch caught him looking for a called third strike. Lou Gehrig was up next, and swung through three straight pitches for the strikeout.

The greatest travesty about this was that a few days after this happened. the commissioner at the time, Kenesaw Landis, voided her contract and declared women unfit to play baseball as the game was "too strenuous." She retired in 1937 at age 23, frustrated that she never received the respect she deserved from the game.

Baseball officially banned women in 1952, a ban which lasted until the 1992 season.