Everyone who’s ever watched more than four baseball games in their life has probably heard mention of Babe Ruth. Indeed, people who don’t care a whit for the sport know the name of the jovial, carefree slugger. Images of the Bambino, draped in Yankee pinstripes, have become an iconic part of our cultural memory.

And while the more devout baseball fans know that Ruth was initially traded to New York from the Boston Red Sox, how many know that Ruth did not spend the final days of his major league career as a Yankee?

That’s right. The Babe had one more stop on his legendary career before finally hanging up the cleats. Ruth was immensely popular with the New York fans, even as his production began to decline in the first years of the 1930’s. Rather than see another American League franchise snap him up, New York owner Jacob Ruppert arranged for him to play for a National League club in the Babe’s long ago hometown, Boston. He was brought into the fold by Braves owner Emil Fuchs, who was struggling to keep his franchise afloat as a viable draw for fans.

Unfortunately, things didn’t work out as well as either Babe or Boston had hoped. While he could still hit, the slugger’s weight gain and time spent in the outfield had greatly reduced his ability to run. As writer Fred Lieb later said, “The pipestems that served as legs would no longer carry, with any alacrity, the barrel that served as a torso.”

The rest of the team, for their part, was very, very bad. Though many think of the 1962 Mets (40-120, .250) as the worst team of the 20th century, the 1935 Boston Braves finished with an even worse winning percentage (38-115, .248). Ruth appeared in only 28 games, batting a paltry .181.

It was a bad situation, all around. Indeed, the 1936 edition of the Spalding’s Official Baseball Guide had this to say:

“The season began with the acquisition of Babe Ruth and a grand flourish of trumpets, and it ended without Ruth and Boston deeper in the mire of defeat than it had ever been.”

He would have one last shining moment before bowing out of the spotlight. On May 25, 1935, the 40 year-old collected three home runs against the Pittsburgh Pirates, one of which sailed over the roof of old Forbes Field. Despite Ruth’s six runs batted in however, the Braves lost 11-7.

- Taylor Maxwell

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Tags | Babe Ruth, Bambino, Baseball, Boston Red Sox, Braves, Emil Fuchs, Forbes field, Jacob Ruppert, MLB, New York, Pittsburgh pirates, Yankees