Bobby Doerr Autographs, Memorabilia & Collectibles

Full name Robert Pershing Doerr
Born April 7, 1918, Los Angeles, California
First Game: April 20, 1937; Final Game: September 7, 1951
Bat: Right Throw: Right Height: 5' 11" Weight: 175

Selected to the Hall of Fame in 1986
Named AL Most Valuable Player by The Sporting News (1944)
Named AL Player of the Year by The Sporting News (1944)
Named second baseman on The Sporting News Major League All-Star Team (1944 and 1946)

BOBBY DOERR
This article was written by Bill Nowlin and is presented in part, courtesy of the Society for American Baseball Research

It was Ted Williams who dubbed Bobby Doerr "the silent captain of the Red Sox" and a more down-to-earth Hall of Famer might be hard to find. A career Red Sox player, Doerr's fame enjoyed a renaissance in 2003 with the publication of David Halberstam’s book about him and his famous teammates.

Born in the city of Los Angeles on April 7, 1918, Robert Pershing Doerr was one of the four Sox from the West Coast who starred in the 1940s - Williams from San Diego, Doerr from Los Angeles, Dom DiMaggio from San Francisco, and Johnny Pesky from Portland, Oregon. Doerr was born to Harold and Frances Doerr. His father worked for the telephone company, rising to become a foreman in the cable department, a position he held through the Depression. The Doerrs had three children - Hal, the eldest by five years, Bobby, and a younger sister Dorothy, who was three years younger than Bobby. Doerr told interviewer Maury Brown, "If she’d have been a boy, she’d have been a professional. She was a good athlete."

Baseball came early. "We lived near a playground that had four baseball diamonds on it and when I got to be 11, 12 years old, I was always over at the ballpark practicing or playing or doing something pertaining to baseball. And when I wasn't doing that, I was bouncing a rubber ball off the steps of my front porch at home." Manchester Playground attracted a number of kids from the area[,] and a surprising number of them went on to play pro ball. Bobby's American Legion team, the Leonard Wood Post, boasted quite a team. The infield alone boasted George McDonald at first base (11 of his 18 seasons were with the PCL San Diego Padres), Bobby Doerr at second base (14 seasons with the Red Sox), Mickey Owen at shortstop (13 seasons in the major leagues), and Steve Mesner at third (six seasons in the National League.) That was quite a group of 14-year-olds.