catcher Joe Kracher from San Angelo spent his time with the Phillies. The Aces were replaced by the Clippers in 1955. That year, Skipper Billy Capps would lead his team to an 87-60 win-loss record, well enough for a third-place finish in the Class-B Big State League, affiliated with the Milwaukee Braves. Connie Ryan managed the 1955 club as the Clippers became the League champs. Sibby Sisti and Jack Wilkinson were player-managers with the club though 1957. Other stars who made it to the Majors were Leo Posada, an uncle of Jorge Posada, former New York Yankee catcher, who played for the Kansas City A’s, and Sibby Sisti himself who played for the Milwaukee Braves and starred in the movie “The Natural.” Most of the players for the Aces and Clippers had their careers interrupted by WWII. The Corpus Christi Giants moved from Oklahoma City in time for the 1958 season. They also changed affiliations from the Boston Red Sox to the San Francisco Giants. They were a Class-Double A team in the Texas League attached to the San Francisco club. This team played at the Giants’ Field also once re-
spring training games in San Antonio and Austin. Both Dick Esrey and Lee Stebbins became stars of the hometown Seahawks, but neither was good enough to make it to the “Show.” In 1938, Rod Whitney was managing the new team in Corpus known as the “Spudders.” This Class-D team from the Texas Valley League would post a 9244 win-loss record to win first place, but lose to the Harlingen Hubs in the playoffs. Pitcher “Ox” Miller from George West, Texas, and George Hausmann, from Boerne, were the stars of this club. Miller would become a pitcher for the Senators, Browns, and Cubs, while Hausmann was a second baseman for the N.Y. Giants. The Spudders lasted just one year. It would be another twelve years before pro baseball returned to Corpus. By 1952, the new Class-B Gulf Coast League team in town called themselves the Corpus Christi Aces. This team would be managed through the 1954 season by Jack Trench and eventually “Showboat” Fisher. Three players from this club made the Major League rosters. Tommy Warren was a pitcher and hurled for the Dodgers. Heinz Becker was a fine first baseman for the Indians, and
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