Albany Baseball: 130 Years Old and Still Going Strong

The history of baseball in Albany is nearly as old as the game itself. As far back as the 1850s the game has been reported by the Albany Morning Times and the Evening Daily Times. While the city has had a somewhat insignificant role in the history of major league baseball, the state capital of New York has been a premier minor league city for nearly a century and a half.

Albany’s first brush with baseball immortality is scarcely known. It occurred on July 2. 1860 when the Excelsiors of South Brooklyn traveled up the Hudson River to play the Champion club of Albany. While the game seems insignificant, it was the first time that a baseball team ever traveled a great distance to play another team. Unfortunately for Albany, the Champion club lost, 24-6.

By the late 1870s, Albany joined the professional ranks with two teams playing in the International Association. One of the teams departed in May 1879 for Rochester while the other finished the year in first place with a 27-13 record.

The 1880s brought numerous attempts to field a professional team with most failing to complete an entire season. The city tried an entry in the International Association again in 1880, but that lasted only 23 games. An Eastern Association team played just 7 games the following year. On July 27, 1885, the Albany entry in the New York State League folded after 44 games, however, the team was able to post a 24-20 record. The Albany Times the following day reported that “the baseball fever has not been severe enough this season to make it a paying investment.” It’s apparent that other Albany teams of this era failed for the same reasons. Albany also tried the Hudson River League in 1886, but that
too was a failure.

Major League Ball

Fans in Albany from 1880 to 1882 did enjoy the only major league baseball hat has ever been played in the city. The Troy Haymakers, an entry in the National League and the forerunners of the New York Giants, played five games at Riverside Park during those years. Riverside was used as Albany’s home field for most of the late 19th century and parts of the early 20th century. (Albany did play some of its 1901 games at a field called Riverside Park on Bonacker’s Island in Rensselaer. This was on a privately owned island across from Albany’s State Street and did not have any grandstands.) The park, complete with large wooden grandstands, was located between Broadway and Quay Street and Herkimer and Westerlo streets near the Hudson River.

Success did not make an appearance for another Albany baseball team until 1891 when Albany fielded an Eastern League team. The team placed second in an eight-team race. In fact, the season was such a success for everyone in the league, that the team owners decided to have a supplementary season with four of the top teams. Albany again finished second.

The team moved back into the New York State League in 1894 after a sixth-place finish the previous year. The move apparently did not work out as on July 5 the team disbanded, again for financial reasons. While the team was a financial disaster, it was superb on the diamond, leading the league when it departed. The failure of another city’s team in 1896 helped Albany to get a franchise in the Eastern League in May 1896. But after 22 games, the team’s attendance was even worse in Albany than it had been in Toronto. so it moved back to Ontario. The last year of the 19th century saw the first of 18 consecutive years for Albany in the New York State Leagues, a very strong league throughout upstate New
York which provided the majors with a number of talented players.

Championship Teams

Success, a winning record and a championship flag came during the team’s third year int the league. Schenectady appeared headed for the championship throughout most of 1901. But the Senators, as the Albany club had been nicknamed almost 20 years before, managed to snatch the championship.

A victory banquet was thrown for the team at Keeler’s on Maiden Lane on Sept. 6. Bill Quinlan, the team’s owner, received cheer after cheer for bringing a victorious team to the city after so many disappointing failures. Team captain and third baseman Jimmy Tamsett, was presented with a silk umbrella while the rest of the team received “an elegant silver match safe suitably inscribed.”

Another exciting pennant race involved the Senators in 1902. Binghamton had the championship within reach by mid-August, but while they lost eight of their last 20 games, Albany was winning 17 of its last 20 to take the flag by one-half game. A 6-0 and 4-0 doubleheader sweep of Schenectady the last day of the season clinched the team’s second consecutive championship under manager Thomas O’Brien.

The Senators also were named champions of New York state as they defeated Plattsburgh of the Northern New York League in September by winning two of three games.

A pennant would not fly again in Albany until 1907 when the team, led by manager Michael Doherty, won nine of its last 10 games to take the pennant. In that stretch of victories was a game Spalding’s Baseball Guide’ called “one of the most brilliant and stubbornly contested battles on the diamond that had ever been seen.” On Sept. 12, 1907, the Senators defeated the Utes 4-0 in 16 innings. Albany pitcher Lee Fairbanks went the distance allowing Utica just two hits while walking two and striking out 16. A week later, he threw 10 more shutout innings against Utica, although the scoreless game was called by rain. Doherty must have enjoyed those two games a great deal as Albany acquired Fairbanks several weeks before after Utica released him.

Most of the credit for the team’s success in 1907 went to Doherty. An Albany Times-Union article after the season said: “His (Doherty) work has been remarkable and is deserving of the greatest of credit. He is a quiet, gentlemanly player and keeps his men in line by the force of his personality without resorting to harsh words. Doherty’s battle cry is ‘Hang in there, boys.’”

The only excitement in Albany the next several years was the outstanding hitting of Bill “King Bill” Kay. The swift outfielder would become the first Albany player to lead his league in hitting when he batted .351 in 1909. Kay, who saw brief action with Washington’s American League team in 1907, led the New York State League in hitting again in 1910 (.363) and 1912 (.341), and placed third in batting in 1911 (.337). Kay led the league again in 1915 and 1916 while playing for Binghamton. In 15 minor league seasons (playing with Albany in part or all of five seasons) Kay batted a lifetime .332.

The moving trucks backed up to Chadwick Park, the Senators’ home Field on Broadway in Menands, on Aug. 22, 1916 as the team moved to Reading, Pa. The team’s record was not terrible at 48-58; however, financial considerations again played a part in the team’s destiny.

Back to the Eastern League

Albany’s chance to again play professional ball came in 1920 when the Senators took the place of the Providence team in the Eastern League to become the only league franchise on outside New England. The league, a highly respected Class A loop, was formed four years before by combining the New England and Connecticut leagues. That season also was the first for the Senators under the leadership of William McCorry, who was soon to become one of the city’s most popular players and managers. McCorry’s only major league experience had come in 1909 when he pitched 5 innings for the St. Louis Browns. But as manager in Albany, the 5-foot, 9-inch McCorry won 944 games — more than any other Albany manager. McCorry later became the New York Yankees traveling secretary.

After McCorry managed the team to a seventh-place finish in 1920, the team nearly averaged a manager a year for several years. McCorry returned in 1925 and the only thing that forced him out of the Senators’ managerial seat was the collapse of the league in 1932 making it the first Class A league to end in mid-season.

As the New York Yankees were tearing apart the American League in 1927, McCorry’s men were involved in a tight pennant race. The team took first place and brought home a championship banner home to Albany for the first time in 20 years. The championship brought good words about Albany as witnessed by the 1928 edition of the Spalding’s Baseball Guide: “When Albany won the championship of the Eastern League more than one old-timer was gladdened because Albany represents that which was best in baseball years ago.” The season also was called one of the most thrilling as the Senators were pressed into winning the season’s last two games from Springfield (Mass.), which had been battling them for the lead.

The Senators then went up against the International League champion Buffalo Bisons in the Little World Series. Before 4.000 fans at Chadwick Park (named for Henry Chadwick) Albany’s Yank Yordy hit a three-run homer late in the game to give the Senators a 5-3 victory in the first game. An exciting game followed the next day, but the Bisons won as 47-year-old former Senator George “Hooks” Wiltse threw a 1-0 three-hitter. Senator Jack Hopkins allowed just two Buffalo hits. Buffalo won the last game in Buffalo, 7-2, to win the series.

Another postseason series started for the Senators night after they left Buffalo. This one pitted them against second-place Springfield in the Eastern League. It was the league’s first try at a championship series. The series was a dismal failure for the Senators as they lost all three games. It also was a financial loss as only several hundred fans attended each game. The highlight of the series for Senator fans however, must have been the final game as Bill McCorry started at pitcher and then played one inning at each position.

Albany was the location of memorable games for two of baseball’s greatest players — Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth. For Cobb, Hawkins Stadium was the scene of the next to last game he would ever play for a major league club. Cobb played an exhibition game in Albany on Sept. 13, 1928 against the Senators while a member of the Philadelphia Athletics. He hit two singles in his five innings of play in the 10-6 Albany win. He played another exhibition in Toronto and then retired on Sept. 17.

Ruth had two big days in Albany without knowing the significance of each as they happened. During an exhibition game with the Senators in 1929, he hit what has been called the longest home run in Albany. Then, 10 years later, he hit what probably was the last home run of his career. The Dodgers were playing the Senators in an exhibition game in 1939 while Ruth was a coach with the team. In the first inning, Ruth hit a two-run homer for what was his last home run in a major league uniform.

Five years later, Albany was again without a minor league team as the Eastern League collapsed on July 17, 1932. The second-place Senators defeated New Haven in a doubleheader that day and then discovered that they had no league to play in. Most teams were losing money while others had their financial support withdrawn from major league teams. Senators’ president Samuel Aronowitz. vowed to bring another franchise to the city as soon as possible. He made good on his pledge as the Reading (Pa.) Keys were moved into Hawkins Stadium (which was built in 1928 at a cost of $240.000 on the site of Chadwick Park and was named for the team’s former owner, Michael J. Hawkins) on Aug. 6 and Albany was a part of the International League.

Controversy from Sing Sing

The only excitement that the team managed to stir up during this period came in 1935 when Johnny Evers, the future Hall of Fame second baseman who was the team’s general manager, signed Edwin (Alabama) Pitts after his release from Sing Sing Prison. Pitts had been convicted of robbing a store in 1930. A controversy arose when Charles Knapp, president of the International League, and W.G. Braham, president of the national Association of Professional Baseball Leagues, refused to OK Pitts’ $200 a month contract with Albany. A month later, however, he was granted permission to play. Pitts batted .233 in his only season with the Senators.

The team would stay around the International League until 1936 with very little success. Despite bringing a team comprised mostly of ex-major leaguers to Albany in 1932, the team could do nothing right. By 1938, the team was in the new Eastern League (which had a salary cap of $3,200 per team per month) where they would stay for the next 23 years and would find their most success, both at the gate and on the field, under the ownership of Thomas F. McCaffrey. McCaffrey bought the Eastern League’s Allentown (Pa.) franchise in 1937 and moved the team to Albany where the club was a member of the Eastern League until 1958. During that time, the team won pennants in 1942, 1949 and 1952.

A number of outstanding players got their start here, including Hall of Famer Ralph Kiner who played his first professional ball game in Albany in 1941. One of the best seasons of all time for a minor league pitcher came in 1949 when Orie Arntzen, then a 40-year-old right-hander, went 25-2 and was named baseball’s minor league player of the year. Arntzen took good advantage that season of the Senators fine play in Hawkins Stadium as they went 50-20 at home. A few seasons earlier, another Senator, James “Ripper” Collins, won the same honor as the team’s player-manager batted .369.

Other notable happenings during this period came in 1935 when Hack Wilson closed out his career in Albany with a .263 average and three home runs in 59 games. Four years later, Rabbit Maranville managed the Senators and played six games at second base at the age of 47. Additionally, Al Gionfriddo hit 28 triples in 1944, the highest total in the minor leagues, and Merrill “Pinky” May in 1947 and Herschel Held two years later collected 151 bases on balls.

The last game played at Hawkins Stadium came on Sunday, Sept. 6. 1958. The Springfield Rifles clinched the Eastern League pennant with an 8-4 win over the Senators. Only 800 fans were on hand for the game and ceremony where former Senator Frank Staucet presented McCaffrey with a plaque honoring him for all he had done for baseball in Albany.

Indeed, one of the saddest days in Albany baseball history came in November 1960 when workmen began tearing down Hawkins Stadium, unoccupied for more than a year and in great disrepair. The site is now home to Mid-City Plaza.

In the 1970s, several games were played at Albany’s Bleecker Stadium in an attempt to entice a team to move to the Capital District. That dream finally became a reality in 1983 when the Albany-Colonie A’s — appropriately members of the Eastern League — played their first game on April 26 in Bleecker Stadium. More than 9,000 fans showed up for a memorable inaugural game at the new $1.2 million Heritage park Aug. 20, 1983. The game with the Nashua Angels was called at 1:09 a.m. after 12 innings with the score tied at 7-7. Most fans did not go home unhappy, however, as 66 kegs of beer were consumed that evening.