September 7, 1911: Reds catcher Larry McLean’s caught-stealing streak snapped at 14 baserunners

When Chicago Cubs rookie Vic Saier stole second base against the Cincinnati Reds in the second game of a doubleheader on September 7, 1911, few recognized the significance of the event. Reds catcher John “Larry” McLean was unable to throw out the fleet-footed Saier, snapping his streak of 14 baserunners caught stealing.1 As of the start of the 2025 season, it may have been the longest such streak in National or American League history.2

Although he was known more for his outstanding defense than his hitting, McLean went 3-for-3 with an RBI in the game, raising his batting average to .306. McLean’s RBI single — moments before his caught-stealing streak ended — gave the Reds a 2-1 lead. But the Cubs, led by slugger Frank Schulte and second baseman Johnny Evers, rallied for three runs in the bottom of the eighth and held on for a thrilling 4-2 victory.

Remarkably, the Canadian-born and New England-raised McLean nabbed the 14 potential basestealers in just five days.3 The streak began when he tossed out four Cubs at second base in a September 2 game.4 The next day the 30-year-old backstop threw out four Pittsburgh Pirates in Cincinnati and in a September 4 doubleheader in Pittsburgh, he snuffed out four more stolen-base attempts.5 Two days later, McLean capped his spectacular run by nailing speedy Pirates outfielder Vin Campbell at second base in two consecutive plate appearances.6

Campbell was the most brazen — and stubborn — of McLean’s victims, getting thrown out four times during the streak.7 The four caught-stealings were even more impressive considering that the 23-year-old Campbell was one of the fastest men in baseball. “A sprinter at college of the 10-second type,” observed Sporting Life. “The lad gets over the base paths in whirl-wind style.”8 Yet Campbell’s speed was no match for McLean’s rocket arm.

The Cubs were in second place coming into the September 7 doubleheader, 2½ games behind the New York Giants, the heavy favorites to win the pennant when the season began.9 The Cubs, winners of four pennants and two World Series in the previous five seasons, were now the NL’s oldest team.

The Reds had finished in the second division in five of the previous six seasons  in a row and that trend seemed likely to continue. Cincinnati began the day in sixth place, 19½ games out of first.10

In the opener of the twin bill, Ed Reulbach led the Cubs to a 3-0 win with a four-hit shutout. Reulbach, who had tossed back-to-back shutouts in a doubleheader three years earlier, lobbied 34-year-old player-manager Frank Chance to let him start the second game. His plea fell on deaf ears and Chance sent 25-year-old righty King Cole to the mound instead. Cole was more than capable, having won 20 games and the NL ERA title as a rookie in 1910.11 He was 12-6 so far in 1911.

Right-hander Art Fromme got the start for the Reds. Fromme had won 19 games for the Reds in 1909 before injuries limited him to just 11 appearances in 1910. He had won his previous two starts, raising his record to 9-8.

Saier was the first Cubs batter to reach base off Fromme when he led off the third inning with a line-drive single to right-center field.12 After a sacrifice advanced Saier to second, he scored on a two-out single by Evers, who had returned to the lineup just five days earlier after missing much of the season with a mental health issue.

Cole, meanwhile, kept the Reds off the scoresheet by scattering a walk and three singles in the first four innings. Cincinnati shortstop Jimmy Esmond led off the fifth with a single to center field.13 About that time, the fans at the West Side Grounds cheered as the scoreboard flashed the news of the Giants’ loss at the Polo Grounds,14 moving the Cubs to within 1½ games of first place.

The celebration was short-lived, as the next batter, Dick Egan, tripled down the right-field line to score Esmond with the tying run.15 One out later, McLean poked his second consecutive single to plate Egan and give the Reds a 2-1 lead.

In the bottom of the fifth, Fromme issued a leadoff walk to Saier. The 20-year-old heir apparent to Chance at first base stole second, snapping McLean’s streak of 14 baserunners caught stealing.16 Saier was stranded on the basepaths and the score remained 2-1.

Fromme limited the Cubs to just one run on five hits and a walk in the first seven innings. With one out in the eighth, left-handed-swinging Wilbur Good pinch-hit for Cole.17 Good singled to right and the crowd “stood up on its hind legs and screamed for more blood.”18

Evers smacked the first pitch he saw just inside the bag at first for a double and Good bounded home with the tying run.19 Schulte, whose two-run homer in the first game made him the first major leaguer in the twentieth century to hit 20 home runs in a season,20 batted with two out and runners on second and third. He singled to left, scoring both baserunners and giving the Cubs a 4-2 lead.

Veteran Mordecai “Three Finger” Brown came on in relief and quickly retired the Reds with a one-two-three ninth inning.21 McLean, 3-for-3 after his seventh-inning single, was left on deck.

The Cubs’ victory, their seventh in nine games since Evers’ return, pulled them to within a game of New York. But the very next day the Giants kicked off an 11-game winning streak, leaving the Cubs in the dust. Chicago ended the season with a 92-62-3 record, 7½ games behind John McGraw’s squad.22 Cincinnati finished sixth, 29 games out of first place.23

The 6-foot-5 McLean — the tallest regular catcher up to that point in major-league history24 — slumped in the last four weeks of the season and finished with a .287 batting average, no homers, and 34 RBIs in 328 at-bats.25 Despite a down season at the plate, McLean’s defense was elite: He was tops in the majors in caught-stealing percentage (61 percent) and he tied for the major-league lead in double plays by a catcher (16).26

It was the third consecutive season in which McLean flashed outstanding defense. In 1909 he led the NL with 53.9 percent caught stealing and was second among catchers in fielding percentage (.978) and double plays (16). In 1910 McLean was second in the NL in fielding percentage (.983) and caught-stealing percentage (53 percent), and he tied for the major-league lead in double plays by a catcher (18).

As measured by Baseball-Reference Wins Above Replacement (bWAR), not only was McLean the best defensive catcher in the major leagues from 1909 to 1911,27 but he was also baseball’s best all-around catcher in that three-year period. McLean amassed 9.9 bWAR despite missing the final 48 games of the 1909 season with a serious knee injury from a vicious home-plate collision.28 On top of several other lesser injuries, McLean, like many of his contemporaries, struggled to control his alcohol use during most of his career.

McLean missed the first four games of the 1910 season because of a suspension for drinking and he finally wore out his welcome in Cincinnati in September 1912 when he got into a heated argument with manager Hank O’Day after missing an exhibition game in Syracuse. O’Day — on his first of two one-year umpiring hiatuses — suspended McLean indefinitely.29 McLean’s contract was sold to the sad-sack St. Louis Cardinals in the offseason.

Esteemed Cincinnati sportswriter Jack Ryder lamented the loss of McLean, the Reds’ primary catcher since 1907. “He has established a reputation for accurate throwing and hard-hitting, which is second to none among the catchers of the league,” Ryder wrote. “Larry has had his troubles with the numerous Reds managers, none of whom showed the tact and courage necessary to handle a man of his disposition.”30

McLean’s stint with the Cardinals was brief.31 In early August 1913, the Giants’ starting catcher, Jack “Chief” Myers, got injured and McGraw quickly traded for McLean.32 The Giants cruised to their third consecutive pennant before losing the World Series to the Philadelphia Athletics in five games. Myers sustained another injury prior to Game Two and McLean filled in admirably for the rest of the fall classic, going 6-for-12 with 2 RBIs.

McLean’s career came to an abrupt halt in June 1915 after a nasty fight with McGraw’s right-hand man, Sinister Dick Kinsella, and several other Giants.33 In his 13 big-league seasons, McLean compiled a .262 batting average, denied 48.3 percent of stolen-base attempts, and turned 105 double plays in just 761 games behind the plate. In the second annual Hall of Fame election, in 1937, one baseball writer saw fit to vote for McLean, who finished in a 40-way tie for 74th place.34 The symbolic gesture gave McLean one more vote than many respected Deadball Era catchers, including Myers, George Gibson, and Ted Easterly.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Ray Danner and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, Retrosheet.org, Stathead.com, Ancestry.ca, and the SABR biographies of Larry McLean, Vin Campbell, Johnny Evers, and Vic Saier. Unless otherwise noted, all detailed play-by-play information for this game was taken from the article “Cubs Take Both Games” in the September 7, 1911, edition of the Chicago Daily News.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CHN/CHN191109072.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1911/B09072CHN1911.htm 

Photo credit

The photo of Larry McLean is courtesy of the Trading Card Database.

Notes

1 McLean was commonly called “Jack” in the early part of his baseball career. “Larry McLean” does not appear regularly in newspapers until 1904.

2 As of the beginning of 2025, Retrosheet had limited play-by-play data prior to 1912. As a result, neither Retrosheet nor Baseball Reference had complete fielding game logs with stolen-base and caught-stealing data before 1912. McLean’s streak was discovered by SABR researcher Mark Rappaport in 2010. A quick manual check by the author in 2025 identified only one other catcher’s streak as long as McLean’s: Joe Astroth of the Philadelphia Athletics threw out 14 consecutive potential basestealers in 30 games behind the plate from April 17, 1953, to June 9, 1953. The streak was broken on June 10 by the speedy Jim Rivera of the Chicago White Sox.

3 McLean was born on July 18, 1881, in Fredericton, New Brunswick. The birthplace of two of his siblings indicate that his family was living in Maine in 1882 and Watertown, Massachusetts, in 1883. McLean went to grammar school in Cambridge, Massachusetts, before attending Cambridge Manual Training School. Ted Jones, “Touching Base with the Legendary Tartars,” Fredericton (New Brunswick) Daily Gleaner, October 23, 2004: B-4.

4 “Story of Second Combat,” Pittsburgh Post, September 2, 1911: 8; “Cubs, 3; Cincinnati Reds, 1,” Chicago Daily News, September 2, 1911: 1.

5 “Babe Adams is Finally Beaten by the Redlegs,” Pittsburgh Post, September 4, 1911: 8; “Same Old Story of Equal Break for Buccaneers,” Pittsburgh Post, September 5, 1911: 10.

6 “How First Game Was Played,” Pittsburgh Post, September 7, 1911: 10.

7 McLean threw out Campbell in the fourth inning on September 3, the first inning of the second game of the September 4 twin bill, and in the first and fourth innings of the first game of the September 6 doubleheader. Campbell stole 6 bases in 42 games in 1911. The other 10 players caught stealing by McLean were shortstop Dave Shean (4 steals in 54 games in 1911), rookie first baseman Vic Saier (11 steals in 86 games), second baseman Heinie Zimmerman (23 steals in 143 games), and right fielder Frank Schulte (23 steals in 154 games) of the Cubs, and rookie center fielder Max Carey (27 steals in 129 games), catcher George Gibson (3 steals in 100 games), second baseman Dots Miller (17 steals in 137 games), first baseman Bill McKechnie (9 steals in 104 games), third baseman Bobby Byrne (23 steals in 153 games), and pitcher Lefty Leifield of the Pirates (1 steal in 43 games).

8 A.R. Cratty, “Campbell of Aberdeen,” Sporting Life, May 7, 1910: 20.

9 “They’re Off; Athletics and Giants Favorites,” Omaha Daily News, April 12, 1911: 8.

10 The Reds were 8½ games behind the fourth-place Philadelphia Phillies.

11 Cole had a 1.80 ERA in 1910, narrowly beating teammate Mordecai “Three Finger” Brown (1.86 ERA) and Christy Mathewson (1.89 ERA) for the ERA title.

12 Sam Weller, “Cubs Beat Reds; Gain on Giants,” Chicago Tribune, September 8, 1911: 12.

13 Esmond was playing shortstop for an injured Tom Downey.

14 Harry Daniel, “Cubs Twice Trim Cincinnati Reds,” Chicago Inter Ocean, September 8, 1911: 4.

15 Weller, “Cubs Beat Reds; Gain on Giants.”

16 It was Saier’s sixth stolen base in his last 12 games. He stole 121 bases in 865 career games. Two other Cubs were caught stealing in the game after Saier’s stolen base. In the sixth inning Fromme picked Joe Tinker off first base and McLean threw Schulte out when he attempted to steal second.

17 Good had been acquired in a trade with Boston’s NL team in June.

18 Daniel, “Cubs Twice Trim Cincinnati Reds.”

19 Jack Ryder, “Walloped,” Cincinnati Enquirer, September 8, 1911: 8; Weller, “Cubs Beat Reds; Gain on Giants.”

20 The NL record at the time was 27 homers by Ed Williamson of the 1884 Chicago White Stockings. Schulte finished the season with a major-league-leading 21 homers and he tied for the league lead with 107 RBIs. He was awarded the 1911 Chalmers (MVP) Award for the NL.

21 Decades later Brown was retroactively credited with his 12th save of the season. He finished the 1911 season with a career high in saves (13) and appearances (53). Brown went 21-11 with a 2.80 ERA, recording the sixth and final 20-win season of his career.

22 New York lost the World Series to the Philadelphia Athletics in six games. The Giants also dropped the World Series in 1912, ’13, and ’17 before winning back-to-back championships in 1921-22.

23 The Reds finished with a 70-83-6 record. Cincinnati finally won its first NL pennant and World Series title in the infamous 1919 World Series.

24 The 6-foot-6 Anton Felch caught two games for the 1884 Milwaukee Brewers in the Union Association, but catcher was not his primary position in the major leagues. The next 6-foot-5 (or taller) primary catcher in the big leagues was Don Bryant, who caught for the Cubs in 1966 and the Houston Astros in 1969-70. As of the end of 2024, only four 6-foot-6 players had ever caught in a major-league game: Felch, Don Gile of the 1959-62 Boston Red Sox, Pete Koegel of the 1970-71 Milwaukee Brewers and 1971-72 Philadelphia Phillies, and Grayson Greiner of the 2018-2021 Detroit Tigers and 2022 Arizona Diamondbacks. McLean is listed at 6-feet-5½-inches on his Sporting News contract card and 6-feet-5 on Baseball Reference.

25 Cincinnati’s home games were played in the Palace of the Fans from 1902 to 1911. According to the Seamheads Ballparks Database, it was by far the most difficult major-league park in which to hit home runs, especially for right-handed batters like McLean. It was 360 feet down the left-field line, 418 feet in left-center field, 400 feet in center field, 375 feet in right-center field, and 450 feet down the right-field line. McLean batted eighth in the order in every game he started in 1911.

26 In 2024 no major-league catcher turned more than eight double plays. As of the end of 2024, the National League record for most double plays in a season by a catcher was 23 by Tom Haller of the 1968 Los Angeles Dodgers.

27 McLean compiled a major-league-leading 6.0 Baseball-Reference defensive WAR (dWAR) from 1909 to 1911. George Gibson of the Pittsburgh Pirates was next with 5.4 dWAR.

28 Roger Bresnahan was second in the major leagues with 8.5 bWAR from 1909 to 1911, his age 30 to 32 seasons.

29 O’Day suspended McLean for insubordination. O’Day managed the Chicago Cubs in 1914 and umpired in 3,985 regular-season games in the majors between 1884 and 1927. Jack Ryder, “Long Larry Through with the Reds,” Cincinnati Enquirer, September 11, 1912: 8.

30 Jack Ryder, “Long Larry Signs Cardinal Contract,” Cincinnati Enquirer, January 24, 1913: 9.

31 This was McLean’s second stint in St. Louis. He hit .167 in 84 at-bats for the Cardinals in 1904.

32 Myers was hurt on August 4; he returned to the starting lineup on August 30. McLean was traded to the Giants for the popular Doc Crandall on August 6. The Cardinals sold Crandall’s contract back to the Giants on August 19.

33 McLean was upset at Kinsella for telling McGraw that he had been drinking, which cost him the $1,000 bonus in his contract for good behavior. McLean considered it “a scheme [for the club] to save $1,000.” According to McLean, Larry Doyle was fined $400 and Jeff Tesreau $200 for their involvement in the fracas. McGraw was also involved in the scrap. “No Gas Pipe; Fists Beat McGraw et al., McLean Says,” Chicago Tribune, June 13, 1915: 3-3.

34 The only players elected to the Hall of Fame in 1937 were Nap Lajoie, Tris Speaker, and Cy Young. They joined the inaugural group of inductees, Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, and Walter Johnson. No catchers were inducted into the Hall of Fame until 1945.