Cutting costs in Philadelphia

A’s pitchers Eddie Plank, left, and Charles Albert Bender

Believing two of his best pitchers are past their prime – and he eventually will be proven right – and always wanting to cut costs, Philadelphia Athletics manager Connie Mack asks for waivers 109 years ago today on Eddie Plank and Charles Albert Bender.

Never mind that the A's are winners of the 1914 American League pennant with Plank and Bender combining to go 32-10 during the season.

Connie Mack

To Mack, Plank, the left-hander from Gettysburg, is 38 years old and Bender, the right-hander from Carlisle, is 30.

Both Plank and Bender jump to the upstart Federal League for one year before returning to the majors in 1916 for a couple of more seasons to finish out their Hall of Fame careers.

The parsimonious Mack also cuts Plank and Bender because he has two rising young lefties in 20-year-old Herb Pennock and 19-year-old Rube Bressler.

Pennock, though, founders at the start of the 1915 season, quickly ends up with the Boston Red Sox and jump starts what turns out to be a Hall of Fame career.

Bressler loses 17 of 21 decisions for the A's in 1915 before eventually being dispatched to Cincinnati, where he helps the Reds win the 1919 World Series.

As for Mack's team, the A's will not return to the World Series until 1929.