pace to have his finest season. Batting .320 in July, his season was interrupted on July 8 when he broke his right leg in a collision with Bruce Edwards while trying to return to third base during a game. Originally expected to be out for just two weeks, Stanky did not play again for the Braves until September 19 and was used sparingly in the remainder of the regular season. Following the 1951 World Series, in which he played in all six games for the Giants but hit an anemic .136, he was traded to the Cardinals as player-manager. In 1952, his Cardinals won seven more games than they had in 1951 and he was chosen Major League Manager of the Year by The Sporting News. The Cards advanced from fourth to third place in the National League standings, although finishing 15 games behind the pennant-winning Dodgers. But Stanky's time as Cardinal manager coincided with the slow decline of the team and its farm system from its glory days in the 1940s and the ownership transition from Fred Saigh to August "Gussie" Busch. On May 27, 1955, after a 17–19 start, he was fired. Stanky then managed the Triple-A Minneapolis Millers (1956) before returning to the Majors as a coach for the Cleveland Indians (1957–58). He then spent almost six seasons in the Cardinal front office in charge of player development (1959–64), moving on to the New York Mets in a similar capacity in 1965. In , he succeeded Al López as the Chicago White Sox' manager. The White Sox had been runners-up in the American League (AL) for three successive seasons (1963–65), averaging almost 96 victories per year, but Stanky's maiden squad won only 83 games and fell to fourth place. However, his 1967 White Sox team — built on speed and pitching but hampered by an impotent offense — contended for the pennant until the last week of the season in a thrilling four-team race. But they lost their last five games to the lowly Kansas City Athletics and Washington Senators, and finished three games behind the surprise pennant winners, the "Impossible Dream" Boston Red Sox. In 1968, the White Sox got off to a terrible start, losing their first ten games (extending their regular-season losing streak to 15 games dating from 1967). They recovered slightly but were only 34–45 on July 11, when Stanky was fired and