Ray Fisher
| Ray Fisher | |||
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| Pitcher | |||
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Born: October 4, 1887 Middlebury, Vermont |
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Died: November 3, 1982 (aged 95) Ann Arbor, Michigan |
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| MLB debut | |||
| July 2, 1910, for the New York Highlanders | |||
| Last MLB appearance | |||
| October 2, 1920, for the Cincinnati Reds | |||
| MLB statistics | |||
| Wins | 100 | ||
| Strikeouts | 680 | ||
| Earned run average | 2.82 | ||
| Teams | |||
| Career highlights and awards | |||
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Ray Lyle Fisher (October 4, 1887 – November 3, 1982) was an American professional baseball pitcher and college coach. He pitched all or part of ten seasons in Major League Baseball. His debut game took place on July 2, 1910. His final game took place on October 2, 1920. During his career he played for the New York Yankees and Cincinnati Reds. He coached the University of Michigan Wolverines baseball team from 1921 through 1958.
Nicknamed "Pick" (short for the freshwater fish pickerel), Fisher was an all-around athlete who played football, basketball, baseball, and competed in track events, though his father only permitted sports if the farm work was done. He played on Vermont's 1904 State Championship football team and was offered multiple college scholarships in football, but his real love was baseball and he stayed on in his hometown attending Middlebury College.
After stellar performances on the college mound, he was offered a position pitching with a semi-pro team in Valleyfield, Quebec in the summer of 1907. In 1908 and 1909 he pitched in the minor leagues for Hartford in the Connecticut League, going 12–1 in his first partial season (batting .304) and 25–4 the following year with 243 strikeouts. Ray jumped at the first major league opportunity to come his way, thinking it might be the only offer he would get, and his contract was sold to the New York Highlanders (Yankees). He soon learned, however, that the New York Giants and Boston Red Sox were also interested in signing him. He reported to the Highlanders in 1910 following his graduation from Middlebury, bringing along- to the amusement of his new teammates- his homemade bat from off the farm.
Dubbed the "Vermont Schoolmaster" because he taught Latin at Newton Academy in New Jersey during his first offseason, Ray pitched for New York from 1910 to 1917, spending 1918 in the Army stationed at Fort Slocum off New Rochelle. As a rookie, the newspapers were frequently comparing Fisher to Highlander's spitball pitcher Jack Chesbro, and early in his tenure with the Yankees Fisher was also cited by Ty Cobb and Nap Lajoie as one of the 12 best pitchers in the American League, both players also listing Ed Walsh, Russ Ford, Walter Johnson and Smoky Joe Wood. His ERA ranked fifth in the league in 1915. Fisher was known for his stamina as a pitcher, considered a "workhorse" for the Yankees, but the following year, 1916, a bout of pleurisy was to cripple his effectiveness. (Doctors later thought that Fisher had probably had tuberculosis.) From 1911 to 1915, during the offseason, Fisher was also employed as Middlebury College's first "Physical Director". In 1915 he was hired as athletic director at Sewanee:The University of the South, in which capacity he would coach the baseball and basketball teams and assist the football team. However, he had to soon resign due to the prolonged illness of his mother.
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