The Georgia Peach hits his stride: determined to "hurl red hell on his way to a score, " Ty Cobb increasingly became more aggressive and imaginative during his first few seasons with the Detroit Tigers, exhibiting a lethal combination of speed, size, muscle, and guile.

• Author: Bak, Richard
• Position: Athletic Arena - Biography

IN MARCH OF 1907, when the Detroit Tigers' Ty Cobb arrived in camp, it was not as a high-strong rookie eager to make an impression, but as an established, slightly swell-headed lineup regular. His .320 mark in 1906 not only had placed him fifth on the American League batting list, it was 35 points higher than the next nearest Tiger, Sam Crawford, had hit. Although Cobb had played in only 98 games, he still managed to swipe 23 bases and to compile the majors' longest hitting streak, 25 games, since his idol Bill Bradley (a potent hitter for the Cleveland Indians) had reached safely in 29 straight four years earlier. To top it off, Cobb was given a raise to $2,400, making him one of Detroit's better-paid players. (Crawford ended a short holdout that spring by signing for $3,000.)

Whatever else his teammates thought of Cobb, they had to concede him his obvious talent and his growing popularity with Detroit fans. Although several of his teammates continued to simmer with hate and jealousy, the rookie-hazing gradually disappeared. The chief reason was a change of managers.

Dissension, injuries, and Bill Armour's lackluster bench leadership had led to the Tigers' sixth-place finish in 1906. Armour was replaced by Hughie Jennings, a generously freckled, live-wired disciple of John McGraw's storied Baltimore Orioles of the 1890s. The 37-year-old ex-shortstop was one of the most colorful men ever to don flannel, with a large share of his legend revolving around his periodic brushes with calamity and his everyday antics in the coaching box. As Detroit players would learn over the next 14 seasons, during which Jennings would guide them to three pennants and a couple of near-misses, their noisy manager was a warm, but firm, boss--firm, that is, except when it came to Cobb.

Jennings recognized him as a special talent, someone who exhibited the same fire, grit, and desire that he had possessed when he was helping the Orioles hip-check, belt-hold, and base-cut their way to three straight National League pennants a decade earlier. Although they often would feud over the years, a mutual respect grew between these two fierce competitors. Jennings decided from the start to allow his young star to do what he wanted on the diamond. There was little, he conceded, that he could teach him about the game.

The same could not be said for Cobb's off-field deportment. However, he resisted instruction in this area. Just four days after the pair met at spring training and went over ground roles for their relationship, Cobb chalked up the first in a long line of controversial and embarrassing incidents during Jennings' tenure. This time, Cobb's bigotry, one of the ugliest parts of his personality, rose to bite him in the ankle. Perhaps he felt emboldened by the race riot in Atlanta a few months earlier, when white Georgians had rampaged through the streets, killing several blacks. The turn-of-the-century South clearly was no place for a black person to challenge a white, which was what happened one March afternoon in 1907 when the Tigers arrived at Augusta's Warren Park for practice. A tipsy negro named "Bungy," the park's groundskeeper, weaved toward Cobb with an extended hand.

"Hello, you Georgia Peach," said Bungy. Cobb, who had known the old man since breaking into pro ball with the Tourists, tried shooing him away. When Bungy persisted, he slapped him and then chased him toward the clubhouse. There, Cobb ran up against Bungy's large, buxom wife, who started screaming, "Go 'way, white man! We ain't done nothin' to you!" Cobb, his temper boiling, decided to shut the woman up by choking her.

Cobb may have felt he was defending the honor of the South, as at least one local paper later proclaimed, but several witnesses saw it differently--an unprovoked attack on a woman by an out-of-control bully. Charlie Schmidt, a solidly built catcher from Coal Hill, Ark., whose past included stints as a miner and prizefighter, came to her rescue. "Whoever does a thing like that is a coward," Schmidt declared.

"I don't see as it interests you," responded Cobb, who then exchanged some ineffective blows with Schmidt before teammates quickly separated them.

The newspapers played up the feud until Schmidt-Cobb II was a certainty, although the catcher wisely waited until the team had left Georgia before settling the score. The prearranged rematch occurred on an off day at a ballfield in Meridian, Miss., and, judging by accounts, Schmidt administered a fearful beating. Rubber-legged and arm-weary, Cobb refused to stay down until players finally broke up the one-sided fight. Cobb returned to his hotel room with a broken nose and a bouquet of purple and blue bruises. After licking his wounds for several days, during which he missed two exhibition contests, he finally emerged for a game against a minor league team in Little Rock, Ark. Displaying his usual zest, Cobb stole home--with two black eyes.

By then, Detroit management had tried, and failed, to trade him. The morning after the fracas with the groundskeeper, Jennings offered Cleveland a straight one-for-one swap of malcontents: Cobb for Elmer Flick, a 31-year-old former batting champ who was holding out for more money. Flick soon signed, though, squashing any potential deal. Later. Detroit owner Frank Navin received some feelers from the New York Highlanders regarding their part-time outfielder, Frank Delahanty. "Pudgie," one of the five Delahanty brothers to play in the majors, had hit .238 in 1906. New York insisted the offer was serious.

Navin and Jennings, who were not conducting a fire sale, resigned themselves to bringing their raccoon-eyed problem child north. For...