The guys on MASN — that would be Bob Carpenter and Rob Dibble – have nicknamed the Aflac duck “Medwick,” after Joe “Ducky” Medwick, the ill-tempered and bad-ball hitting Cardinal. Medwick was a cantankerous, bad-to-the-bone and gangly Hall of Famer who won the triple crown in 1937; he was known as a slash hitter and was a controversial high-spikes competitor who never took a walk. He hit the hell out of the ball for the Cards for ten seasons (eight of them during the 1930s) before being traded to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1940. Medwick led the Dodgers to their first pennant in over twenty years in 1941. Medwick apparently enjoyed his reputation as a free-swinger: “. . . doesn’t make no difference to me, high, low, inside, or out,” he once said. “If I liked it, I’d take my riff, and hitting .324 ain’t too bad.” Medwick is remembered best for his high-spikes slide into third base during the seventh game of the 1934 St. Louis-Detroit World Series. When Detroit fans threw bottles, garbage and rotting vegetables at him in the outfield, baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis removed him from the game.

A young brawler from New Jersey (he once threatened Dizzy and Paul Dean with a bat), Medwick turned down a football scholarship with Notre Dame to play baseball for the Cards, who signed him out of high school. The Cardinals sent him to the minors for two years, where he played for the Houston Buffs. In the majors, Medwick played for seventeen years, accumulating a lifetime .324 batting average. A ten-time All Star, he was at the heart of St. Louis’ famed “Gashouse Gang,” and was known for his tough play. He was one of the best hitters of the 1930s and is listed among the top twenty Cardinals of all time. His best year was 1937 when he won the NL MVP award: he hit .374 with 31 home runs and 154 RBIs. Medwick had a signature personality and, apparently, a distinctive way of walking and running. The legend is that in his first year in St. Louis the fans noticed this and began to call him “ducky” or “ducky wucky” (this was the 1930s) and the name stuck. Medwick did not think the name endearing and no teammate could call him “ducky” to his face. He preferred his other nickname — “muscles.”

Medwick was never popular in the clubhouse. He hated it when other ballplayers got between him and a photographer. He decked one Cardinal pitcher who accused him of not hustling on a fly ball. Eventually the Cards had enough of Medwick’s antics and shipped him to Brooklyn. Medwick apparently considered the move a slight; six days after joining the Dodgers, Medwick (and Dodger Leo Durocher) got into an argument with Cards pitcher Bob Bowman in an elevator in a New York hotel. During the argument, Bowman threatened Medwick and Durocher: “I’ll take care of both of you guys. Wait and see!” During the game that afternoon, Bowman beaned Medwick, who was carried from the field. The beaning caused a near-riot and Bowman had to be escorted from the field under police guard. Durocher tried to get Bowman banned for life.

Joe Medwick is carried from the field after being beaned by Bob Bowman in BrooklynÂ

Medwick seemed to mellow a bit in retirement, but the players who knew him best thought this was for show — so that he could get into the Hall of Fame. He was elected to the hall by the Veterans Committee in 1968. There’s a lot of lore on Medwick. While it was said that he hated his nickname, he signed a contract with Louisville Slugger to have it included as a part of his signature on his bats. After retiring he blamed baseball writers for ignoring his career, saying that they purposely kept him out of the hall. While he rejoined the Cardinals after World War Two (after a stint with the Giants and Braves) the beaning in Brooklyn had taken its toll. He was never the same hitter after the incident. Medwick is known for his quip to Pope Pius XII, whom he met during a USO tour in 1944. When the Pope asked him his name, he replied: “Your Holiness, I’m Joe Medwick. I, too, used to be a Cardinal.”