| Country: | Great Britain |
| Dates: | 13–20 August |
| Num Teams: | 2 |
| Continents: | 2 |
| Venues: | 5 |
| Cities: | 5 |
| Medal Type: | world cup |
| Champion: | Great Britain |
| Num Championships: | 1 |
| Second: | United States |
| Second-Flagvar: | 1912 |
| Games: | 5 |
| Nextseason: | 1939 |
The 1938 Amateur World Series was the inaugural Amateur World Series, the first edition of the tournament that would eventually become the Baseball World Cup. Originally known as the John Moores Cup, it was contested by the United States and Great Britain over a series of five games from August 13 to 20 in five different cities in England. The tournament was won by Great Britain, four games to one.
Two future Major League Baseball players, Mike "Lefty" Schemer and Mizell "Whitey" Platt, participated in the tournament on the United States team.
After managing to include baseball as a demonstration sport at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, International Baseball Federation (IBF) president Leslie Mann, sought to establish an international tournament for national teams (which, at that time, were entirely composed of non-professional amateur players, in the spirit of the Olympics). Mann had first tried to set up a tournament between the national teams of the United States and Japan in 1937, but was prevented by the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War that same year.[1]
Instead, Mann wrote to John Moores, president of the British National Baseball Association (the precursor to the modern British Baseball Federation) to organize a tournament between the U.S. and Great Britain teams. Though baseball was not overwhelmingly popular in Britain, Moores' efforts to develop baseball in Britain had earned the admiration of many prominent American baseball executives, including National League president John Heydler.[2]
Moores had established a friendly working relationship with the U.S Amateur Baseball Congress (USABC) sent six players across the Atlantic as baseball instructors the year before.[3] Mann had long hoped to establish an international tournament "that would be emblematical of the World's title, the same as the Davis Cup is to Tennis; the Ryder Cup to Golf; the Stanley Cup to Hockey."
The USABC held trials for the United States national team in Lincoln, Nebraska, with over fifty young players in attendance.[4] England selected their team mostly from the professional Yorkshire-Lancashire League, which in those days was attracting crowds of 10,000 people, though many of the players were Canadian.
The first "test match" was played at Wavertree Stadium in Liverpool on August 13. Before a crowd of 10,000, Canadian-born ace Ross Kendrick struck out 16 American batters, out-dueling curveballer Virgil Thompson for a 3–0 Great Britain win. On August 15, the series moved to Kingston upon Hull where, in front of 5,000 spectators, Great Britain won 8–6, thanks to a 5-run fifth inning highlighted by a two-run homer by shortstop Sam Hanna. The third game of the series was played in Rochdale and turned out to be the United States' sole victory, shutting out Great Britain 5–0. The best-of-five series then moved to The Shay in Halifax on August 19; Kendrick struck out 12 and Great Britain won 4–0, clinching the title. The fifth game of the series was played the next day in Leeds, as Britain won 5–3.[5]
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| width=150 | width=25 | width=25 | width=25 | width=25 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | 1 | 20 | 14 | ||||||
| 2 | 1 | 4 | 14 | 20 |
Player/manager: Chummy McNeil[6]
| Pos. | Player | Club |
|---|---|---|
| Irvine Ruvinsky | London | |
| Ken Robinson | Oldham | |
| Sid Bissett | Birmingham | |
| Leeds | ||
| Sam Hanna | Halifax | |
| Frank Cadorette | Halifax | |
| Danny Wright | Halifax | |
| Jack Ritchie | Liverpool | |
| Ross Kendrick | Oldham | |
| — | Jerry Strong | Hull |
| — | Doc Holden[7] | Bradford |
| — | Larry Marsh | Hull |
Manager: Leslie Mann
| Pos. | Player |
|---|---|
| Dean Graff | |
| Lefty Schemer | |
| Leo Benson | |
| John McDermott | |
| Tommy O'Rourke | |
| George Binger | |
| Lloyd Johnson | |
| Whitey Platt | |
| Virgil Thompson | |
| Clyde "Dizzy" Dean | |
| — | Charles Tate |
| — | Ora Linda |
| — | Wendell Ringland |
