Inducted in 2007
Professional Baseball Player, Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball Executive
"Fordham Johnny"

Induction Video

They called him “Grandma” Murphy, either because of his rocking chair motion on the mound, or because of his fastidiousness both on and off the field — so the baseball historians debate. They called him “Fireman,” a term that would enter the baseball vernacular on account of his moniker — when the Fireman came to the mound in the late innings, he could put out the opponent’s fire, extinguish any chance of a rally, and close out the game. But there was one more nickname for the boy from Valentine Avenue who had spent his high school and college years at Rose Hill: they called him “Fordham Johnny.” 

John Joseph Murphy was born on July 14, 1908, the son of Thomas Murphy, who worked for the New York City Water Department, and Susan White Murphy, a homemaker. He grew up in the Bronx with two sisters, Anna and Elizabeth, and an older brother, Thomas, Jr., who would become a notable figure in his own right, a graduate of Regis High School and Fordham Law School who would serve as the lead prosecutor in the well-known Algar Hiss case of the late ‘40s. 
 
Baseball was in Johnny's blood. In fact, his grandfather, John “Honey” White — the son of Prussian immigrants and a tile man by trade — was captain and shortstop for the New York Stars, a team sponsored by Tammany Hall in the late 1800s. The Murphys and the Whites — Johnny’s grandparents lived just a few doors away — belonged to Our Lady of Mercy Church, an old Bronx parish whose first home was actually Fordham's very own University Church, and from which fellow Hall of Honor inductee Maurice Cunniffe would make his way to the Prep a generation later. Murphy attended the parish grammar school before coming to Fordham Prep in 1921.
 
Johnny first came to the notice of New York Yankee head scout Paul Krichell while pitching for the Prep, from which he graduated in 1925. He played at the University for legendary Fordham coach, Jack Coffey, and, athletic prowess aside, was well-liked and respected among his peers during his Rose Hill years, even voted “Most Popular Student” as announced in a May issue of the Ram from his senior year. Murphy signed with the Yankees on the eve of his final college game, graduating in 1929. 

On New Year’s Eve in 1931, John married Elizabeth Havern. They would have two children, Thomas and John, Jr. Together, the Murphys shared the sacrifices and successes of a major league career. Johnny once remarked in the Yonkers Herald Statesman, “"The other night at dinner I was saying [to my wife] that this is my 40th year in baseball. She said that it was her 37th." 
 
In 1934, his rookie year in the majors, the six-foot-two-inch, 23-year-old Johnny won 14 of his 20 pitching starts. He reluctantly accepted a move to the bullpen during the next season, a move that would ultimately see Fordham Johnny Murphy immortalized as one of the game’s greats. For the remaining 11 years of his major league career, he was one of baseball’s top bullpen specialists, paving the way for the relievers of today.
 
Johnny was a member of some the most formidable Yankee teams of all time, which won consecutive World Series championships between 1936 and 1939, as well as repeats in 1941 and 1943. Back on Campus, Murphy’s fellow Maroons followed his career year after year, proud to have the Fordham name linked with one of the most well-known moundsmen of the day. From the October 22, 1943 Ram:

The third game of the Series was an All-Fordham one, with Hank Borowy and Johnny Murphy of the College, and George Stirnweiss of the Prep all seeing action for the Yankees. Incidentally, ain't it funny how we Yankee fans can sit back so easily when Fireman Johnny takes that long walk from the bullpen?

The writer was echoing a popular New York sentiment in those days. Yankee manager Joe McCarthy called Johnny his “pennant insurance.” 

At various points, Murphy’s teammates included Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Bill Dickey, Red Ruffing, Babe Ruth and pitcher Lefty Gomez, who not only was half of the nearly undefeatable Gomez-Murphy duo, but also became one of Johnny’s closest friends. As the story goes, one time, when asked how many games he would likely win in the upcoming season, Gomez replied, “Ask Murphy.”

During the last year of the Second World War, Johnny put himself on the voluntarily retired list to serve his country. He returned to the game in 1947, his final year in the American League, playing for Boston. 
 
Overall he appeared in 415 games, winning 93 and losing 53 for a winning percentage of .637. His earned run average was 3.50. He led the AL in wins for a relief pitcher seven times and had 73 wins in relief overall. Murphy led the AL four times in saves (an unofficial statistic in those days) and had 107 lifetime saves, with a personal record of 19 saves in 1939, the year he was one of nine Yankees on the AL’s All-Star squad. Murphy pitched in eight World Series games in six different series and 16 1/3 innings of play. He won two games, lost none, and saved four, for an ERA of 1.10. His cool in desperate game situations was legendary. As The New York Times described him decades later, Johnny Murphy was “the game’s first fully glamorized relief pitcher.” Johnny went directly from the mound to the front office after he retired from play. Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey made him director of Minor League Operations, a position he held for 13 seasons. 

In 1962, Murphy joined a National League expansion team, the New York Metropolitans, as a scout. He eventually became vice president and then general manager after the 1967 season. While Johnny was GM, he helped the Mets acquire some luminary pitchers of that era: Tom Seaver, Nolan Ryan, Jerry Koosman and Tug McGraw, to name a few.  He also brought manager Gil Hodges on board from the Senators.

During the legendary 1969 season, the team they called "The Miracle Mets" cruised to the NL East title, marched past Atlanta to win the NLCS, and defied conventional wisdom to defeat the favored Baltimore Orioles in five games and take the World Series crown. It had taken more than 25 years, but one of Murphy’s teams had won another world championship. 
 
Only months later, John Joseph Murray would suffer a heart attack and pass away on January 14, 1970. He was 61 years old.

From the January 16, 1970 column of noted sportswriter Arthur Daley, Class of 1922, a friend of Murphy and today a fellow member of the Prep Hall of Honor:

The first World Series game Johnny ever saw involved the Giants and Yankees in 1921. A student at Fordham Prep, he was still in short pants. He arose at 6AM and walked from Fordham to the Polo Grounds to buy a bleacher ticket. Little did he dream that he later would be pitching for the Yanks in seven World Series or that the incredible day would arrive when he would be the front-office boss of the Mets for their first World Series exposure and triumph.

Johnny was my admired friend from his days at Fordham Prep and I grieve at his departure.