Blowing up the ’43 World Series

One of my new favorite TV shows is Manhattan, based (loosely, I assume) on the men and women who worked on the atomic bomb.

The episode “Overlord” highlights the continuing problems caused by Robert Oppenheimer’s frequent absences from project business as he cavorts with his mistress. One of the main characters, Charlie Isaacs, himself a brilliant physicist, doesn’t want the responsibility of taking over the top spot, believing he lacks Oppenheimer’s political skills to make things move along. He discusses the problem with some of his colleagues.

Louis “Fritz” Fedowitz: There’s no question our efficiency takes a nosedive when Oppenheimer is off campus. 89% of targets met to 81% when he’s away. But if, God forbid, we lost him entirely, we’d hit zero. Zilch.

Isaacs: Oppenheimer is the reason we have Triple A priority. You think we’d slip to AA-1?

Fedowitz: AA-2. We wouldn’t have the metals or the machine tools that we’d need to build a prototype until 1946. If we have any chance of hitting our targets, we need Oppie. We need him on the Hill full-time. And never mind what happens if the Germans accelerate.

Jim Meeks:  Yeah, but that’s not accounting for Stan Musial. Do you remember, uh, remember last year when the Cardinals lost Enos Slaughter to the service?

Isaacs: Yeah, of course. I’m from St. Louis.

Meeks: Right. Everybody thought you guys were cooked. But you put Musial in right field and you won the pennant by 18 games. Now, we’re all assuming that no one can replace Oppenheimer, but what if we had a Musial, someone equal to Oppenheimer or better? For all we know, we could be testing by March.

Fritz: But the Cards still lost the series. By moving Musial to right, they had no one to replace him in left.

Who's on first? Meeks, left, talkin' baseball with Fedowitz.