For Those Who Think <i> These </i> Dodgers Are a Bad Team . . . : Baseball: The 1944 Brooklyn bunch lost 16 in a row with a strange collection of wartime characters.

Well before Jose Offerman, there was Tommy Brown.

The young Dodger shortstop was summoned to Brooklyn in the middle of the 1944 season. His first start came in a doubleheader against the Chicago Cubs.

He threw his first ground ball into the upper deck.

“Our first baseman was 6 feet 6 1/2 inches tall . . . and I still threw it at least 20 feet over his head,” he recalled.

Tommy Brown soon had the reputation for being so wild that souvenir-hunting fans at Ebbets Field would bypass the outfield during batting practice.

They would congregate in the seats behind first base instead.

That was their best chance of catching a ball.

“At least they didn’t do what they did in the minor leagues,” Brown said. “During those games, everybody behind first base would be wearing a glove.”

Brown was 16 years old, a number that soon became part of Dodger lore for another reason.

By the time he started feeling comfortable, the Dodgers had lost 16 in a row, the worst losing streak in franchise history.

Memories of that team recently were renewed when the current Dodgers lost 10 consecutive games, equaling the franchise’s longest losing streak since then.

Although separated by 3,000 miles and nearly 50 years, there are several similarities between the clubs.

“Same situation now, as then,” said Mickey Owen, the 1944 catcher. “They were rebuilding, we are rebuilding.

“They got some guys that maybe are not ready for the big leagues . . . we had plenty of those guys.”

But for those who would dare carry the comparisons too far, Tommy Brown offers himself as a living reminder.

“These Dodgers are hurting, but I believe they would beat us,” Brown said. “I mean, for a time I was one of their starters, and about the most I knew about baseball was that the ball was round.”

Round, and sometimes filthy.

A pitcher named Les Webber was so upset after giving up four consecutive hits in one game, he turned his back to the plate, bent down to the mound and covered the ball with dirt.

“And that’s how he threw it, covered in dirt,” said Bobby Bragan, the team’s veteran shortstop. “I’ve never seen anything like it, bits of dirt flying everywhere.”

Bragan paused, and added: “I’m not quite sure if the batter got a hit. But I would imagine he did.”

It seemed as if everybody reached base against those Dodgers, who had a league-high earned-run average of 4.68 and committed 197 errors in 154 games.

Their only reason to cheer was Dixie Walker, who won the batting championship with a .357 average.

“I think without question, it was the worst Dodgers team of the modern era,” said Tot Holmes, Dodger historian and publisher of several Dodger-related magazines.

It was not even a team, but a wartime collection of old men and high school kids brought together as part of Branch Rickey’s effort to reshape the club after taking over as general manager one year earlier.

In a matter of two seasons, they had lost future Hall of Famers Joe Medwick, Arky Vaughan, Pee Wee Reese and Billy Herman. They had nowhere to go but down, and it showed.

They finished 63-91 and 42 games behind first-place St. Louis. No Dodger team since 1905 has played a full schedule and won as few games or finished as far out of first place.

“It was certainly the most unique team in Dodger history,” Holmes said. “Branch called everybody who had ever played and begged them to come out of retirement, then he spent the rest of the time scouting 12-year-olds.”

The result was a team that included Brown, a 17-year-old infielder named Eddie Miksis and 18-year-old pitcher Cal McLish.

The youngsters would team with veterans like pitcher Curt Davis, 40, and outfielders Paul and Lloyd Waner, 41 and 38, respectively.

The older players were known for sleeping at the end of the bench until it was time to pinch-hit.

“When he needed a batter, (Manager) Leo Durocher would tell me, ‘Go nudge that guy and tell him to go to the plate,’ ” Bragan said.

The younger players, most of whom dropped out of high school to join the team, were known for their innocence.

“I remember one night our third base coach, Charlie Dressen, told me to go home and eat a big steak with butter because I was pitching the next day,” McLish recalled. “I told him I wasn’t going to eat anything, because I was broke. When I signed my contract for $150 a month, I never expected to be in the major leagues.”

The Dodgers tore up his contract the next day so he could eat. But it seemed as if nothing they did that season would overcome the misfortune that was inherent in the team’s makeup.

Durocher would be suspended for alleged gambling ties three years later.

Owen, the catcher, had suffered through his famous dropped third strike three years earlier.

Making his major league debut was pitcher Ralph Branca, seven years before he would throw the most famous pitch ever.

And for five games, the Dodgers used an 18-year-old infielder named Gene Mauch.

“Basically, we went out every night expecting to lose,” Brown said.

Even when they won, it wasn’t as planned.

Once with the bases loaded in the 13th inning against the New York Giants, Howie Schultz was given a request by Durocher.

“He told Howie, ‘If you go up there and get hit in the butt and force in a run, I’ll give you $100,’ ” recalled Clyde King, a pitcher.

But Schultz wasn’t quick enough to jump in front of the ball. He desperately swung at it, knocked it up the middle and drove in the winning runs.

“Leo still gave him the $100,” King said. “It was worth it to him just to win.”

When they won, it was cause for celebration, which ultimately made second baseman Eddie Basinski valuable.

Basinski was best known not as a hitter or fielder but as a concert violinist. He would bring his violin to the clubhouse and play long, mournful concertos as the team sank deeper and deeper in the standings.

“Then one day we won, and when we ran back into the clubhouse, Frenchy Bordagaray had taken the violin and was playing “Turkey in the Straw,’ ” King recalled. “We all had a great time.”

Not that winning cured all.

“The two guys got into an argument over whether it was a violin or a fiddle,” King said.

King didn’t stick around long enough to see how the argument ended. Like other young players on this team, he was one of the first to arrive in the clubhouse in the early afternoon and the first to leave afterward.

“I got there early because I didn’t want them giving my uniform to somebody else,” King said. “I left fast because I didn’t want to give Leo time to call me in and tell me I was being sent to Montreal.”

The season’s horrors culminated with the 16-game losing streak, spanning 18 days and five opponents from June 28 to July 16.

They were outscored, 110-44, during the streak, which included four doubleheader sweeps.

The streak was so long, it left some players dazed.

“I knew we had lost 14 games in a row, but 16?” McLish said. “That’s the first I’ve heard of it.”

The streak became so infamous, it was even immortalized in a poem.

Roscoe McGowen, longtime baseball writer for the New York Times, would add one verse to the poem for every loss. It could be sung to the tune of “Bless ‘em All.”

This verse was the favorite of Bragan, who sang it over the phone.

Lose ‘em all, lose ‘em all

Can this thing go on till fall?

Miksis will fix us, said Rickey the boss.

Put him at shortstop and chalk up a loss, lose ‘em all.

The streak built up so much momentum, it couldn’t be stopped by a mere victory. After it ended, the Dodgers lost 11 of their next 13 games.

“The best thing that happened during that time was that Leo (Durocher) avoided a nervous breakdown,” Owen said.

But the players agree that without the streak, this would have been merely another team.

Without the streak, perhaps nobody would care that Tommy Brown was so frustrated that he would walk over to Rickey’s seat during pregame warm-ups and beg to be sent to the minor leagues.

“Mr. Rickey would apologize, but said he had no choice but to keep me in the major leagues,” Brown said. “I guess looking back, I’m glad he did.”

One year later, at age 17, against the Pittsburgh Pirates, Tommy Brown became the youngest player in baseball history to hit a home run.

The Dodgers lost the game, 11-1.