One of Charlie Brown most captivating character traits Peanut comics is his love of baseball – and that extended to his favorite player and hero, Joe Shlabotnik, whose dismal major and minor league career made him a reflection of the franchise’s protagonist, who is best known for being a loser, but relentlessly optimistic.
Joe Shlabotnik, a fictional player, remained Charlie Brown’s idol despite the tumult of his career, which saw him repeatedly demoted to the minors. He later went from an unsuccessful career as a player to an equally lukewarm career as a coach – but Charlie Brown’s admiration for him never waned.
PeanutJoe Schlabotnik’s cartoons are a great representation of what makes Charlie Brown such a beloved character: a mix of unwavering loyalty, good-natured naivety, and persistence in the face of any and all discouragement.
10
“When he suffers, I suffer”
First published: May 6, 1963
Although he was not named for several months, Joe Shlabotnik made his debut in this Peanut strip, as Charlie Brown noted that his “favorite ball player was left without a hit“in the previous day’s game and”made three mistakes” on top of that.
Here, the as-yet-unidentified Shlabotnik and Charlie Brown fandom serve as the setting for Lucy’s joke about Sam Snead, a real-life professional golfer who, despite being lauded as the greatest of all time, never won the US Open. Of course, Shlabotnik and Snead have little in common other than being professional athletes – as Snead was undeniably talented and Shlabotnik is consistently described as an abjectly terrible player – and the humor of this panel comes from Lucy Van Pelt’s misguided conflation of the two.
9
“What do you do with all the pictures of your hero when he’s sent to the minors?”
First published: May 8, 1963
The day before Peanut panel, Charlie Brown learned that his favorite baseball player was being demoted to the minors, following his disastrous “0 for 5” performance in one game. This cartoon reveals the extent of the character’s fandom, as his bedroom wall is covered in photos of the player to be named later as Joe Schlabotnik, which Charlie Brown doesn’t know what to do with now that his hero has been demoted.
That Peanut The comic strip is notable for its melancholy tone, which eschews a joke in favor of a note of sadness for Charlie Brown, showcasing creator Charles Schulz’s ability to evoke different feelings about childhood and growing up in America, something that contributed most for the success of Peanut than many fans can imagine.
8
“He’s not as cute as I thought!”
First published: August 18, 1963
In this extended Sunday edition of PeanutCharlie Brown’s favorite player finally gets a name: Joe Shlabotnik. Charlie Brown is surprised to learn that Lucy has a Shlabotnik trading card, something he has spent half a decade – that is, most of his life – trying to acquire. Over a series of panels, Charlie Brown proposes a series of increasingly elaborate negotiations, offering cards from the greatest players in baseball history in exchange for his favorite.
At every turn, Lucy rejects him – and finally adds insult to injury by throwing the Shlabotnik card in the trash, after realizing that “he’s not as cute as [she] I thought he was.” This cartoon brilliantly captures the urgency of trading cards for kids while staying true to Charlie Brown’s perennially hapless nature.
7
“Five dollars worth of gum and no Joe Shlabotnik!”
First published: April 12, 1964
In another oversized Sunday edition of PeanutCharlie Brown is determined to finally get his hands on a Joe Shlabotnik trading card, going so far as to buy five dollars worth of gum – in other words, five hundred packs – counting that there must be at least one Shlabotnik among the group. A few panels later, after tearing apart each package, Charlie Brown doesn’t know what to do, as he confirms that there is “no Joe Shlabotnik“to be found, at which point Lucy buys a pack of gum and immediately finds the beloved card.
This is the ultimate example of the comic irony that often governed Charlie Brown’s life, as – like his hero – he was destined to hit over and over again, while watching others hit out of the ballpark on their first swing.
6
“With a .004 batting average?”
First published: July 30, 1964
This Joe Shlabotnik Peanut The strip exemplifies Charlie Brown’s relentless optimism – even in the face of cold, hard facts and figures. At first dismayed to learn that Shlabotnik has been demoted once again to the minor leagues, “play for Stumptown in the Green Grass league”, Charlie Brown quickly rallies and declares: “I bet he leads Stumptown to its first pennant!“
“With a .004 batting average?“, asks his friend Schroeder, in a fun joke, which definitely establishes in Peanut I know that Joe Shlabotnik is not a former great in the twilight of his career, or even a mid-level player battling a streak of bad luck, but that he is, in fact, one of the worst baseball players of all time. Despite this, he inexplicably remains the greatest in Charlie Brown’s eyes.
5
“Dear Joe Shlabotnik fans…”
First published: March 8, 1970
In this Peanut cartoon, Charlie Brown takes his appreciation for Joe Shlabotnik to the next level by starting the “Joe Shalbotnik Fan Club News” in anticipation of the upcoming baseball season. This gave Charles Schulz the opportunity to offer some more hilarious details about the player, including that he “made some spectacular catches of routine fly balls“, the previous season and”sent off a runner who fell between first and second.”
In some ways, this comic gives the impression that Charlie Brown knows that his hero is far from impressive on the field, raising the question of why exactly Joe Shlabotnik remains Charlie Brown’s favorite, suggesting that it is not a question of performance, but perhaps instead, a reflection of the character’s own aspirations to one day make it to the big leagues.
4
“I came to see him work on some of his strategies”
First published: June 23, 1975
In the mid-1970s, with his own playing career behind him, Joe Shlabotnik transitioned into coaching in the minor leagues – although Charlie Brown’s admiration did not diminish one bit. In fact, during one of Charlie Brown’s trips to camp, he discovered that Shlabotnik’s team was playing just a mile down the road and sought to catch his hero live and in person.
Once again, this strip is notable less for its humor and more for the sense of nostalgia for America’s pastime that Charles Schulz channels here. Charlie Brown was, of course, in some ways a representative of Schulz himself, and this appears to be the case, as he sits in an old, dilapidated stadium where “everything is made of wood,” and would like to be able to share the experience with his father.
3
“What are you boy, some kind of crazy?”
First published: June 25, 1975
Here, Charlie Brown makes the most of the opportunity to root for his hero, the legendary Joe Shlabotnik – although, as a child sitting next to him observes, the game hasn’t even started yet and the home club’s coach is simply “taking the lineup to the referee.”
Even so, Charlie Brown is thrilled to be rooting for his idol, shouting with enthusiasm “Come on, Jo! You can do this!” Once again, Charlie Brown seems to have some awareness that any victory, no matter how small or simple, for Shlabotnik is a big victory; it’s incredibly captivating, in typical Peanut fashion, the way Charlie Brown desperately wants success for his hero rather than loving him because of his achievements.
2
“Try not to cry into the ball, Joe… It makes the ink run.”
First published: June 30, 1975
Unfortunately for Joe Shlabotnik, successfully handing the lineup over to the referee would be the highlight of the night, as his team was so outmatched that Shlabotnik was fired as coach. Undeterred, Charlie Brown catches Shlabotnik boarding a bus out of town and asks for his autograph, noting “you will always be my hero.”
It’s ambiguous whether Shlabotnik is moved to tears by the fact that he still has at least one fan in the world, or whether he’s crying because his dreams of being a baseball player and coach never panned out the way he thought they would. Either way, though, the moment Charlie Brown finally meets his favorite player takes a melodramatic turn when the boy is forced to tell Shlabotnik: “try not to cry into the ball, Joe,” for fear it might ruin his autograph.
1
“Throw the ball, Joe! Throw the ball!”
First published: July 1, 1975
Hilariously, when Joe Shlabotnik shows a lack of urgency in signing the ball to Charlie Brown – perhaps because he’s not used to signing autographs – it leads to a classic culmination of this historic moment in Peanut tradition. When the bus starts to pull away, Charlie Brown yells for Shlabotnik to throw him the ball, which he does, hitting Charlie Brown square in the head, knocking him down..
Like a rerun of a familiar Peanut joke, this is a solid joke, but even more than that, it’s an effective culmination of Joe Shlabotnik’s longtime Charlie Brown fandom. Despite the less-than-ideal conclusion of their encounter, Charlie Brown continued to love Shlabotnik for decades to come, and after a mild accident with a bully, the autographed baseball became one of his most popular. Peanut‘ Precious possessions of the protagonist.