Shown here is Durocher’s original card from the 1933 Goudey set. The former infielder has signed the card just below his chin.

Pete Reiser broke in with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1940. In his first two seasons he played alongside veteran shortstop Leo Durocher.

No stranger to elite talent, Durocher spent 43 years as a big league player and manager. The first of his three World Series titles came with a Yankee team that featured 10 future ten who went on to the Hall of Fame. After playing with Ruth and Gehrig, Leo played on the famed Gas House Gang 1934 Cardinals that had 7 Cooperstown men of their own.

Durocher also managed Willie Mays in his first four big league seasons. In his first season the Say Hey Kid earned the Rookie of the Year. Then in 1954 Mays won his only batting crown while slugging 41 homers on his way to the NL MVP.

With all the great players he saw up close, Durocher maintained none was better than Pete Reiser. Leo described his lifelong friend in his autobiography Nice guys Finish Last.

“Pete Reiser just might have been the best baseball player I ever saw. He could throw as good as Willie…You think Willie could run? You think Mickey Mantle could run? Name whoever you want to, and Pete Reiser was faster. Willie Mays had everything. Pete Reiser had everything but luck.”

Shown here is a government postcard signed by Reiser in his final season as a player in 1952. For more on Reiser click here.

In the Dodgers spring training of 1947, manager Leo Durocher was set to pilot the Dodgers as Jackie Robinson broke the color line. The Brooklyn skipper since 1939, Leo had full control of the clubhouse.

Upon hearing of a potential petition against Jackie by the team’s southerners, Durocher called a team meeting.

“I don’t care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a…zebra. I’m the manager of this team, and I say he plays,” Durocher said. Underscoring his position, Leo offered to trade any players who weren’t on board.

Six days before the Dodger opener, Commissioner Happy Chandler suspended Durocher for conduct detrimental to the game. Leo’s choices finally caught up with him.

The above image depicts original artwork of Chandler showing Durocher the door in ’47. It is signed by both Cooperstown men. The next two letters go into great depth on the Chander-Durocher feud.

In the collection is a letter with remarkable content. Here Happy Chandler rails against Leo Durocher who he suspended for the 1947 season. The letter is to Hall of Fame columnist Jim Murray of the Los Angeles Times.

Murray called Chandler into question in the LA Times. In a scathing column, the writer wondered if in the handling of Durocher the commissioner had overstepped his authority a la Kenesaw Landis.

“Baseball paid him [Durocher] off on the Q.T. because the action was as illegal as lynching and everybody knew it, except the commissioner, Happy Chandler, who had read one too many chapters of the life of Judge Landis.”

Chandler scolds Murray, telling him “This is a highly inaccurate statement. You must have read too much Red Smith.”

The commissioner continues, “The suspension of Durocher was legal and proper and overdue. I just wanted you to know that even years after the official order of suspension was made, it was on the lenient side.”

The rest of the content is equally harsh on Leo the lip. It’s a must-read for any fan of Durocher, Chandler, or baseball.

On page two of the letter, commissioner Happy Chandler signs his name boldly and ads a post script. In it he lets Murray know that former governor of Michigan and Supreme Court Justice Frank Murphy was against Durocher managing the Dodgers in 1947, the year of Jackie Robinson’s debut.

Chandler writes that, “If Durocher was permitted on be the ball field during that year, they [Murphy] would recommend that the little Catholic children in Brooklyn not be permitted to attend the game.”

Jim Murray wrote columns for the Los Angeles Times for 37 years. He was the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Sportswriter of the Year award 12 consecutive seasons and 14 overall.

In 1987 he was awarded the JG Taylor Spink Award by the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 1989. In typical modesty Murray said, “Correctly quoting Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda shouldn’t merit a Pulitzer Prize.”

Here is the envelope that housed the letter from Happy Chandler to Murray.

Dusty Rhodes had a 15-year professional playing career that featured eight years in the minors and seven seasons with the New York Giants. Though he never had as many as 250 at bats in a big league season, Rhodes left his mark on baseball history in 1954.

That year he had posted career highs in homers, runs batted in, total bases, average, and both on-base and slugging percentage. The Giants won the pennant and earned a Fall Classic showdown with the 111-win American League champion Cleveland Indians.

Rhodes made the most of his time on baseball’s biggest stage. In Game 1 he hit a 10th-inning pinch-hit walk-off three-run homer off of future Hall of Famer Bob Lemon.

The next night Rhodes’ pinch-hit RBI single in the 5th inning off of 300-game winner Early Wynn tied the game at one apiece. He stayed in the game and came up big again with a 7th-inning solo homer off of Wynn to lead the Giants to a 3-1 win.

Rhodes again delivered in Game 3, this time with a pinch-hit two-run single. Though he didn’t appear in Game 4, the Giants swept the heavily-favored Indians to capture the World Championship.

He finished the Series with four hits in six at bats, two homers, and seven runs batted in. For his efforts, Rhodes received the Babe Ruth Award, the forerunner to the World Series Most Valuable Player Award.

Giants skipper Leo Durocher said of Rhodes, “He thought he was the greatest hitter in the world, and for that one year, I never saw a better one. The best pinch hitter I ever saw, no contest. Every time we needed a pinch hit to win a ballgame, there was Dusty Rhodes to deliver it for us.”

How did Rhodes feel about the Hall of Fame manager Durocher? In the collection is this handwritten note from Rhodes revealing just that.

“I think Leo Durocher was by far the best manager in Base Ball at the time he managed. Today would be a different story.” Rhodes has signed his name below that.

In this handwritten letter Hall of Fame umpire Jocko Conlan recalls the memorable kicking incident with the fiery Leo Durocher in of April, 1961.

Conlan and Durocher had a long-running feud that boiled over in the fourth inning of a game between the Pirates and the Dodgers for whom Durocher was coaching. Los Angeles first baseman Norm Larker hit a popup that bounced foul along up the line along first. Dodger manager Walt Alston argued with Conlan that Pittsburgh catcher Hal Smith touched the ball before it went foul.

As Alston returned to the dugout, Conlan walked over and ejected Durocher, saying the Dodger coach had tossed a towel onto the field. Durocher stormed toward Conlan to confront him. After kicking dirt onto the umpire, Durocher elevated his game and kicked Conlan on the shin. Incensed but unhurt by the blow by virtue of his shin guards, Conlan returned fire, kicking The Lip.

The two exchanged another round of kicks before Durocher left the field having taken the worst of the exchange.

In this letter Conlan writes, “I’ve had a lot of excitement on the field and enjoyed it. Durocher excitement should never have happened. It was a foul ball and he was there only to show off.”

Further evidence is seen as Conlan closes the topic, “Why talk about him?”

Conlan got his start as an umpire after his playing career ended when the National League offered him a job for the 1941 season. Bill Klem was the supervisor of the NL arbiters at the time. Klem quickly took Conlan under his wing becoming his mentor and friend.

In the letter Conlan writes, “I’m glad you put me in with Klem whom I broke in with. He was the greatest of us all.”

Conlan also mentions Billy Evans, another Cooperstown umpire. “Evans was great and a fine man.”

Conlan enjoyed a 25-year umpiring career, officiating five World Series, six All Star games, and four NL playoffs.

Leo Durocher played for four teams and managed three but will forever be linked to the Dodgers. With six years as a player in Brooklyn, and nine more as a manager, Durocher’s career is painted with Dodger blue.

In the collection is his invitation to the 1986 Old Timers’ game at Dodger Stadium. Durocher has signed the bottom along side a facsimile signature of commissioner Peter Uberroth.

Some friendships last a lifetime. In the 1970s four families took their young sons on a trip to the High Sierra in California. During that time one of the boys noticed another reading Leo Durocher’s book Nice Guys Finish Last. Though it was in the early portion of the friendship, both boys felt a bond that would last forever.

The Durocher fan ended up assembling what ESPN calls, “One of the most comprehensive Hall of Fame collections outside of Cooperstown.” When the collector turned 50 his friend Eric Young recalled his fascination with Leo the Lip and gave him the above autographed card as a token of their long lasting friendship.

In the collection is that most thoughtful gift, a Diamond Greats card from 1979 adorned with the autograph of Leo Durocher certified by PSA/DNA with the signature rated as gem mint 10.