Wid Matthews
| Wid Matthews | |||
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| Outfielder | |||
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Born: October 20, 1896 Raleigh, Illinois |
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Died: October 5, 1965 (aged 68) Hollywood, California |
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| MLB debut | |||
| April 16, 1923, for the Philadelphia Athletics | |||
| Last MLB appearance | |||
| June 7, 1925, for the Washington Senators | |||
| MLB statistics | |||
| Batting average | .284 | ||
| Home runs | 1 | ||
| Runs batted in | 39 | ||
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Wid Curry Matthews (October 20, 1896 – October 5, 1965) was an American outfielder, scout and front office executive in Major League Baseball. Matthews served as general manager of the Chicago Cubs for seven full seasons and became one of the first front-office employees in the history of the New York Mets in 1961, the year before they began play in the National League. A native of Raleigh, Illinois, Matthews stood 5 ft, 8 1⁄2 in (174 cm) tall and weighed 155 pounds (70 kg) in his playing days. He threw and batted left-handed.
After playing in the highest level of the minor leagues — the American Association and the International and Pacific Coast leagues — Matthews made the major leagues for 2½ seasons (1923 through midseason 1925) for the Philadelphia Athletics and Washington Senators, batting .284 with one home run and 39 runs batted in in 192 games played. He did not appear in the 1924 World Series, won by the Senators in seven games.
Matthews' career as a scout and general manager began in 1936, when he joined the St. Louis Cardinals, the pioneers of the MLB farm system. Seven years later, he moved with Redbird GM Branch Rickey to the Brooklyn Dodgers, where he served as the Dodgers' director of Midwest scouting through the 1949 season. As Brooklyn's top scout in the Midwest, Matthews was one of multiple Dodger evaluators who followed Jackie Robinson of the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Leagues in 1945. His glowing assessment of Robinson's ability to "protect the strike zone" was key to Rickey's decision to target Robinson as the first African-American to break the baseball color line that had been in force since the 1880s.
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