Baseball Related Songs: “Tinker to Evers to Chance” by The Carolyn Sills Combo

In today’s episode of “Baseball Related Songs” we pay attention to Tinker to Evers to Chance, performed by the Carolyn Sills Combo, a nice little nothing that is pleasant to the ear.

Coming from Santa Cruz, California, the Carolyn Sills Combo plays a fresh kind of music: Swing with a Country and Western accent but also with some Hawaiian influence, represented by the steel guitar.

According to their own website, their unique take on American roots music is driven forward by guitar twang, swooning steel and her sharp songwriting. She’s released four albums, one doughnut and countless videos to date, all brimming with dueling guitar & non-pedal steel, fun vocal harmonies and witty lyrics.

Of course the song “Tinker to Evers to Chance” is based on the Sad Lexicon, as the poem “Tinker to Evers to Chance” is officially known. This poem, written by Franklin Pierce Adams in 1910, was about the famous double play trio Joe Tinker, Johnny Evers, and Frank Chance. The original poem’s goes like this:


These are the saddest of possible words:
“Tinker to Evers to Chance.”
Trio of bear cubs, and fleeter than birds,
“Tinker and Evers and Chance.”
Ruthlessly pricking our gonfalon bubble,
Making a Giant hit into a double
Words that are heavy with nothing but trouble:
“Tinker to Evers to Chance.”

Fun part of the song “Tinker, to Evers, to Chance” is that parts of the poem are used in the lyrics. For example “a Trio of Bear Cubs”, but also “with nothing but trouble” and “gonfalon.”

To make a long story short, the background of the double play trio is as follows: Tinker, Evers, and Chance began playing together with the Cubs in September 1902, forming a double play combination that lasted through April 1912. The Cubs won the National League pennant four times from 1906 to 1910 and won back-to-back World Series championships in 1907 and 1908, a five-year span that saw them regularly defeat their archrival Giants en route to the pennants and World Series. From 1906 to 1910, the Cubs turned 491 double plays.

The lyrics of “Tinker to Evers to Chance” are as follows:

Some years before Wrigley’s romance
Was Tinker to Evers to Chance
A trio of bear cubs with lightning between gloves
A regular waltz in striped pants

The moment a hit would arise
You’d see lights go off in their eyes
When turning that double they’re nothing but trouble
That’s Tinker to Evers to Chance

[instrumental break]

Three orphans of the Westside Ground
The best friends of those on the mound
Twin killers with ease, just a six, four to three
Then ruthlessly gonfalon bound

The moment a hit would arise
You’d see lights go off in their eyes
When turning that double they’re nothing but trouble
That’s Tinker to Evers to Chance

A trio of bear cubs with lightning between gloves
That’s Tinker to Evers to Chance