Harmon’s Histories: MLB pitcher Bugs Raymond lost it all to the bottle
Jim Harmon
“No Booze for Bugs,” read the headline in newspapers across the country, including the local Daily Missoulian.
The “Bugs” in question was Arthur Lawrence "Bugs" Raymond, a Major League Baseball pitcher who had a bit of a drinking problem.
The problem became so bad that in 1910 the New York Giants hired Pinkerton detective Dick Fuller to keep “Bugs” from getting drunk.
A national story, carried in the June 5, 1910 local paper noted that “Fuller kept Bugs' pocketbook and bought him a drink whenever it was ‘necessary.’ ”
Detective Fuller was described as “over 6 feet tall and weighs several pounds over 200.”
Bugs said of his companion, “Well, I have one consolation; even if I get drunk, I know my side partner is always ‘Fuller.’”
Raymond played for the Detroit Tigers, St. Louis Cardinals and the New York Giants in a career that spanned seven years (1904–1911).
His nickname, Bugs, resulted from some of his “zany antics” on the mound.
He was also known for his “spitball.”
Giants manager John McGraw “did everything he could (including fining him so there wouldn't be any money left for drinks, as well as hiring detective Fuller to trail him) to keep Bugs sober enough to win 18 games” in 1909.
The Raymond/Fuller relationship “began well but ended in a street chase and fistfight between the two men on a hot day in St. Louis, with Fuller giving Bugs a black eye,” according to a report by the Society For Baseball Research.
“Raymond went to the ballpark to complain to McGraw, who promptly punched him in the other eye. Fuller quit in disgust and Bugs finished the season with a 4-9 record.”
But by 1910 Bugs', win-loss record dropped to 4-11. He was dropped from the team in 1911.
The following year, he was picked up by the Cincinnati Pippins of the “short-lived United States League.” It turned out to be his final season in baseball. He just couldn’t stay away from the booze.
Christy Mathewson, a well-respected baseball player/manager, was quoted as once saying "after a night out, don't get too close to Bugs, his breath will stop a freight train.”
Frank Russo, in his online blog, "The Deadball Era," wrote, “Bugs also had a bit of a temper. He liked to do things his way. If he wanted to stay out late, he was ‘gonna stay out late.’ "
Bugs returned to his hometown of Chicago in 1911, where Russo says “he did a little pitching and some umpiring in semi-pro circles.”
Raymond died September 7, 1912, found by a maid in a Chicago hotel room. It was thought that he died of a heart attack but a coroner later determined that he had a “fractured skull and died of a cerebral hemorrhage.”
Bugs apparently had gotten into a brawl with several men some weeks earlier “and had been rapped in the head several times with a baseball bat.”
In addition, just days before Bugs' death, a Chicago man “confessed that he had gotten into an argument with Raymond at a baseball game several days earlier and had pummeled Raymond about the head.”
A sad ending for a man once considered by New York Giants manager John McGraw as “one of the greatest pitchers he ever managed.”