Scarce c. 1948 Babe Ruth SPORT Magazine "November 1922" Cover + Article Pages For Sale

Babe Ruth SPORT Magazine "November 1922" Cover Page & Article Pages – Vintage c. 1948

Please note: SPORT magazine began publishing in 1946, so there was no 1922 issue. This is a common misunderstanding among collectors who own or are looking for this scarce piece, and it has been sold as a 1922 cover before. This is the original c. 1948 printing of the sought-after "1922 cover," not a modern reproduction or poster.

Description: A special "November 1922" retrospective supplement printed inside a SPORT magazine issue c. 1948. It is laid out as a 1922 issue of SPORT – The Magazine for Sport Spectators: a color cover page of Babe Ruth with the cover story "What Happened to the Babe" by Grantland Rice, and cover credits for Heywood Broun, Damon Runyon, Ring Lardner, Hype Igoe, Allison Danzig and W.O. McGeehan.

Includes the article pages, not just the cover. Examples rarely come to market, and when they do, it is usually the cover page alone. This one still has the Grantland Rice and W.O. McGeehan article pages and the 1922 quiz page attached, just as they were found in an old scrapbook (see Provenance page – "November 1922," Babe Ruth in Yankees pinstripes

Provenance: The cover page and article pages are held together along the spine with old tape. It is unclear whether the tape reinforces the original fold or rejoins pages that separated at some point. They were taped (not glued) to a page deep inside a thick scrapbook binder started in the 1920s or 1930s, and were carefully removed together as one piece. The fourth photo shows them in the scrapbook before removal, and the fifth shows the same page after removal. The facing scrapbook page is from The Sporting News, dated September 1, 1948.

Background

These pages look back on the worst postseason of Ruth's career.

• A troubled season: Commissioner Landis suspended Ruth for the first 40 days of 1922 for barnstorming after the 1921 World Series. After his return he was suspended four more times for disputes with umpires, and in May he lost the Yankees captaincy only days after being named to it. His home runs dropped from 59 in 1921 to 35.
• The 1922 World Series: For the second straight year the Yankees met the New York Giants, and lost without winning a game (0-4, with one tie). Giants manager John McGraw had his pitchers throw Ruth slow curves low and away, and Ruth hit .118 (2-for-17) with one RBI.
• Press reaction: Sportswriters openly criticized Ruth's conditioning and his life off the field. The Rice and McGeehan columns reprinted here are part of that coverage, written more bluntly than the press would write about a star of Ruth's stature today.
• The turnaround: That November, at a baseball writers' dinner, state senator Jimmy Walker told Ruth he had let down the children who looked up to him, and Ruth publicly promised to change. In 1923 he hit .393 with 41 home runs and won the AL MVP, then hit .368 with 3 home runs in the World Series as the Yankees beat the Giants for the franchise's first championship.

These pages document the low point that came right before Ruth's comeback.

With its full-color portrait of Ruth and bold design, this piece would look great framed and displayed.

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