Morris “Moe” Berg was an American professional baseball player, scholar, and spy. Although he played 15 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a catcher for teams including the Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, and Boston Red Sox, Berg was better known for his intellect and later, his work with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II. Fluent in multiple languages and educated at Princeton and Columbia, Berg became a unique figure in American history: a man who excelled in sports, academics, and espionage.

Early Life and Education

Morris Berg was born on March 2, 1902, in New York City to Jewish immigrant parents from Ukraine. His family later moved to Newark, New Jersey, where Berg was raised. His father, Bernard Berg, was a pharmacist who ran his own drugstore and encouraged educational advancement, although he reportedly disapproved of Morris’s passion for baseball.

Berg graduated from Newark’s Barringer High School in 1918 and was accepted into Princeton University, where he majored in modern languages. He excelled academically and graduated magna cum laude in 1923. He was known for his intellect and reportedly could speak a dozen languages with varying degrees of fluency, including Latin, Greek, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Sanskrit, and Japanese.

After Princeton, he attended Columbia Law School, earning his law degree in 1930 while continuing to play professional baseball. He also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris and in Heidelberg, Germany.

Baseball Career

Moe Berg’s baseball career began in 1923 when he signed with the Brooklyn Robins (later the Dodgers). Over the next 15 years, he played as a backup catcher for several teams, including the Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Washington Senators, and Boston Red Sox.

1929 Kashin baseball card of Berg while with the Chicago White Sox

Though his batting average was unremarkable (.243 lifetime), Berg was considered a skilled defensive catcher and a master of the intellectual side of the game. Teammates and sportswriters often referred to him as “the brainiest man in baseball.” His knowledge of the game and multiple languages made him a favorite in the clubhouse and among journalists.

Notably, Berg was selected to participate in a 1934 American All-Star baseball tour of Japan, which featured players like Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. While there, Berg conducted clandestine filming of Tokyo and its harbor from the roof of a hospital under the pretense of visiting a sick Japanese diplomat. The footage he captured would later prove useful to U.S. military planners during World War II.

Espionage Career

Office of Strategic Services (OSS)

During World War II, Berg was recruited into the Office of Strategic Services (OSS)—the precursor to the CIA—because of his language skills, international travel experience, and intellect. His work primarily involved intelligence gathering in Europe.

Passport photo of Morris “Moe” Berg, 1923

Among his most notable wartime assignments was a mission to assess the progress of the German atomic bomb project. In December 1944, Berg traveled to Switzerland to attend a lecture by Werner Heisenberg, the German physicist and Nobel laureate. Berg’s task was to determine whether the Nazis were close to developing a nuclear weapon. He carried a pistol and was instructed to assassinate Heisenberg if the scientist revealed they were making significant progress. After attending the lecture and analyzing Heisenberg’s comments, Berg concluded that Germany was not close to building the bomb and chose not to carry out the assassination.

He also helped debrief European physicists who had fled Nazi-occupied territories and assisted with Operation Alsos, a mission aimed at capturing German scientific personnel and preventing them from falling into Soviet hands.

Later Life

After the war, Berg declined several job offers, including one from the CIA. He reportedly lived off a series of friends and admirers, never settling into a permanent career. Despite his fame, Berg lived a reclusive and somewhat nomadic life in his later years, moving between relatives’ homes and living in modest conditions.

He died on May 29, 1972, in Belleville, New Jersey. His final words were reportedly, “How did the Mets do today?”

Legacy

Moe Berg remains one of the most unusual and intriguing figures in American sports and intelligence history. His life has been the subject of numerous books, documentaries, and a 2018 biographical film titled The Catcher Was a Spy, starring Paul Rudd.

Honors

  • Inducted into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame
  • Commemorated by the U.S. intelligence community and baseball historians alike

In Popular Culture

Moe Berg is often cited as an example of the Renaissance man—an individual who crossed cultural boundaries and defied stereotypes. His life has inspired a niche but passionate interest among fans of baseball, intelligence history, and Jewish-American heritage.