Yankees vs. Grays

Yankee Stadium hosted the first game of the 8-team Tournament of Champions. Waite Hoyt started for the 1927 MLB champion New York Yankees. Tom Parker took the hill for the 1948 Negro League champion Homestead Grays. According to tournament rules, all pitchers are limited to three innings in this round.

Grays centerfielder Luis Marquez led off the game with a single and then stole second. One batter later Luke Easter singled to put Homestead on the board. The game remained 1-0 heading into the fifth, causing many observers to speculate about a possible upset. In the bottom of the frame, New York put two men on with two outs. The Yankees eighth-place hitter, catcher Pat Collins, drilled a liner into the left-center field gap to give his team a 2-1 lead. The flustered Homestead pitcher Garnett Blair then walked Yankee hurler Herb Pennock. Earle Combs and Mark Koenig delivered singles to drive home two more runs. Babe Ruth then blasted a three-run shot into the left field seats. Lou Gehrig followed with a solo homer to tally eight runs in the inning for the Bombers.

Homestead plated a run in the seventh and again in the eighth off Dutch Ruether to chip away at the deficit, but it was too little, too late. The 1927 Yankees advance to the semifinals. The Player of the Game is Pat Collins. Though the least-heralded member of Murderers' Row, the catcher went 3 for 3 with two key RBIs and a run scored.

New York Yankees 8, Homestead Grays 3

Next up, the 1927 Chicago American Giants vs. the 1948 Cleveland Indians