However, George Hall, an outfielder for the Philadelphia Athletic Club, may have hit for the cycle six seasons before Foley. In the first of a three-game series that “resulted in a complete success for the Athletic,”2 the Philadelphia home team defeated the visiting Cincinnati Red Stockings, 20-5. According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Red Stockings “collided with the Athletic Base-ball Club, and before they got out of the catastrophe the damage was distressing.”3 Although lots of runs were scored, the defense in this match was sloppy on both sides. The two teams were playing each other for the first time in this, the inaugural season of the National League, and the game had been delayed for one day, because of rain. The estimated attendance was 500.4 Philadelphia’s team entered the contest with a 5-15 record and had won only once in its last 13 games. The Cincinnati squad “sported a balmy 4-17 record.”5 After a 3-2 start to the season, Cincinnati had lost 15 of 16 coming to the Jefferson Street Grounds.

Cherokee Fisher took the mound for Cincinnati, but he was knocked around for 12 runs, prompting Amos Booth to come on in relief. However, when the Athletics rallied in the seventh inning, Fisher re-entered the game and “took the pitcher’s plate again.”6 Lon Knight pitched for Philadelphia, striking out seven and allowing but one earned run.7 George Zettlein came in to pitch the final frame for the Athletics, allowing one hit.

Philadelphia scored six runs in the bottom of the first. The Athletics hit two triples in the second, but Wes Fisler overran the bag and was tagged out, and the Athletics were kept off the scoreboard. In the bottom of the third, the batting “was terrific, two singles, a two and a three-baser and a home run being the record.”8 Six more runs were added, giving Philadelphia a 12-1 lead. The Athletic team continued to pound the Red Stockings, scoring in every inning except the second and ninth.

According to the box score printed in the Philadelphia Times (see below), only six of Philadelphia’s 20 runs were earned, while only one of the five for Cincinnati was earned. A total of 32 errors were reported, with 17 by the Red Stockings. Fergy Malone, Knight’s batterymate, “had many errors, and could not, it was apparent, catch.”9

Philadelphia banged out 23 hits; every batter had at least one safety and scored at least one run, except for first baseman Zettlein, who went 0-for-5. The Athletics had 42 total bases on clean hits.10

The story of the day was the batting of Philadelphia’s left fielder Hall. He hit a home run in the fifth inning and finished the game with a 5-for-6 performance. His possible achievement as the first batter to hit for the cycle is somewhat controversial. The Times emphasized that Hall was a star at the plate, writing, “One hit of Hall being to the fence at right field, the ball bounding over and giving him a home run. Besides this he had two three-basers, a double and a single.”11 According to the Philadelphia Enquirer, Hall “made the longest hit ever made on the grounds”12 when he knocked the ball over the right-field fence, but there is no description of his other four hits. (No box score was printed with the short recap of the game.) The Cincinnati Enquirer told a slightly different tale: “Hall picked up the bat only six times, but managed to baste the ball for fourteen bases.”13 That doesn’t quite jibe with the Times’s version, in which the five hits total 13 bases. The New York Clipper also reported that Hall had five hits, “once making a clean home-run by driving the ball over the right-field fence, and making, besides, three three-basers.”14 Only extra-base hits were listed by the Clipper, implying that Hall had a home run, three triples, and a single. This combination of five hits would total 14 bases (matching the Cincinnati Enquirer’s total), but without a double would not constitute the first cycle.

It is difficult to know which newspaper account is the most accurate. All of them credit Hall with five hits, two of which were a home run and single. He had at least two triples. The Times specifically stated that he hit a double, but the Clipper reported three triples and no double. In an endnote in Hall’s SABR biography, Matt Albertson writes, “Major League Baseball Historian John Thorn agrees with the information provided in both the Clipper and [Cincinnati] Enquirer. The accepted first cycle in the major leagues was completed by Curry Foley in 1882.”15 What might complicate the issue is that the two newspapers not from Philadelphia are those that do not give credit for the double. As an aside, both baseball-reference.com and retrosheet.org (as well as other websites) credit Hall with accomplishing the first cycle.

Three other Philadelphia batters had a good day at the plate. Fisler, Ezra Sutton, and Malone each had four hits in the game. For the Red Stockings, Dave Pierson had three hits and scored three runs.

The two teams met again on June 15 and 17, and Philadelphia won both games, by scores of 11-6 and 23-15, respectively. The team’s winning streak was short-lived, however. Philadelphia lost 19 of its next 22 games. Cincinnati continued to lose as well. The Red Stockings posted a 13-game losing streak before beating the Athletics twice in early July. Then they proceeded to lose another 18 games in a row. The two teams finished the season at the bottom of the National League. Philadelphia’s record was 14-45 (with one tie), despite averaging 6.30 runs per game (third best in the league), while Cincinnati’s 9-56 mark was worst in the new league. The Red Stockings scored an average of 3.66 runs per game but allowed 8.91.

The 5-foot-7-inch, 142-pound Hall led the circuit in home runs in 1876 with five, making him the first home-run king in the National League. He batted .366 in 60 games. However, he was involved in a scandal in 1877, accused of throwing games, and he was subsequently banned from playing in the league.

There is one final note from the Times. Despite the multitude of hits and widespread poor fielding, “the umpiring was excellent, the best we have had this year, the judgment on balls and strikes being fair and discriminating.”16 Interesting choice for the last descriptor; the umpire was John McMullin.

Here is the box score from the Philadelphia Times;17 the box score from the Cincinnati Enquirer18 follows. There are discrepancies in total bases and hits. (Did Charlie Sweasy have two hits or one?)

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the notes, the author consulted baseball-reference.com, mlb.com, retrosheet.org, and sabr.org.

Notes

The Buffalo squad had just returned from a road trip and their meeting with Cleveland was the fourth time the two teams met in 1882. Hugh Daily took to the mound for the Bisons against Cleveland’s George Washington Bradley. According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, “it was a regular walk-over from the word ‘go.’”1 After Daily retired Cleveland in the top of the first inning, Blondie Purcell led off the bottom half with a single to left field. With one out, Dan Brouthers singled, and with two outs, Deacon White singled, loading the bases for Foley, who “sent the ball over the left-field fence for a home run.” According to the Buffalo Commercial, “that’s how the ice was broken.”2

In the bottom of the second, Buffalo sent 11 batters to the plate and they combined four singles, three doubles, and a triple (by Foley) to bring home eight more runs. The Bisons added two runs in the bottom of the third, on hits by Brouthers, Richardson, White and Foley, raising their lead to 14-0.

Buffalo added a run in the fifth, aided by Foley’s double, and then iced the cake with five runs in the seventh inning. Cleveland avoided the shutout by getting a run in the top of the sixth. Fatty Briody reached base on a passed ball, Fred Dunlap doubled him to third base and he scored on a fly ball by Jack Glasscock. In this thrashing, Buffalo scored 20 runs on 28 hits. The Cincinnati Enquirer box score listed Buffalo as having 13 earned runs, while the box score in the Chicago Tribune gave the Bisons credit for 12 earned runs.

Foley was clearly the hero for the Bisons on this day. He hit a grand slam in the first inning, a triple in the second, a single in the third and a double in the fifth. He had 10 total bases in six at-bats. He became the first player to hit for the cycle. Foley also scored four runs. The Blues’ Bradley, victim of the Buffalo onslaught, had pitched 16 shutouts for St. Louis in 1876. Every Bison in the lineup had at least two hits; Brouthers had five and Foley had four. Foley’s home run was the only one of the game. Bill Phillips and Orator Shafer each hit triples for the Blues, but neither came around to score. Buffalo’s winning pitcher, Hugh Dailey, held the Blues batters to six hits. He “took everything as cooly as though playing a practice game with an amateur nine — but they couldn’t hit him.”3 Unfortunately, Bradley did not have the same success. The Bisons “sent it all over and outside the pastures until the fielders’ legs were weary and their courage gone.”4

The Cincinnati Enquirer wrote of the Cincinnati defeat: “The game proved a Waterloo for the visitors, and was robbed of all interest at an early stage by the terrific slugging. Nothing like it was ever seen before.”5 The Chicago Tribune said, “The Buffalos today showed some of the batting ability which they seemed to have kept in store all the season, and scored twenty runs while the Clevelands were perforce constant with a solitaire.”6 The Buffalo Commercial gave all the statistics: “In slugging it was a Jumbo-of-a-game. The Buffalos went to the bat 52 times in eight innings, made 28 hits with a total of 40 [total bases], reached base 33 times, and ran 103 bases, making 20 runs and earning 13.”7

In two previous seasons, Curry Foley had been a pitcher for the Bisons. During the 1882 season he played right field. He pitched once that year.8 Foley was described as “a below-average pitcher but an above-average hitter.”9 He was also one of the very few left-handed pitchers in the National League’s early seasons.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted baseball-reference.com, mlb.com, retrosheet.org, and sabr.org. The author thanks Dirk Lammers of nonohitters.com for his valued assistance with obtaining box scores. In addition, I referenced the following:

Dirk Lammers, “Foley 1st to hit for cycle 132 years ago today,” http://nonohitters.com/2014/0525/foley-1st-to-hit-for-cycle-132-years-ag….

Entering 2020, only nine players, including Curry, have a grand slam as part of their cycle:

Photo credit

Curry Foley, SABR-Rucker Archive.

Notes

1 “A Pitcher’s Heart Broke,” Cincinnati Enquirer, May 26, 1882: 5.

2 “The Clevelands Sustain a Waterloo Defeat,” Buffalo Commercial (Buffalo, New York), May 26, 1882: 3.

3 “A Great Game,” Buffalo Express (Buffalo, New York), May 26, 1882: 4.

4 Buffalo Express.

5 Cincinnati Enquirer.

6 “Buffalo 20, Cleveland 1,” Chicago Tribune, May 26, 1882: 7.

7 Buffalo Commercial.

8 Brian McKenna, “Curry Foley,” http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/d8a0584a.

9 “Curry Foley,” http://baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Curry_Foley.

The Athletics had charged out of the gate with an 18-3 record during the month of May but had dropped off the pace. Standing at 38-18, the Athletics were second in the American Association standings, 1½ games behind the St. Louis Browns and 4½ games ahead of third-place Cincinnati.

It was an ideal day for baseball. Afternoon temperatures were in the mid-70s under fair/clear skies and an unseasonably low humidity of 60 percent. The game featured “fine fielding and heavy batting” by Philadelphia.2 There is no play-by-play available for the game, but according to newspaper accounts and the box scores, the home-team Athletics batted first, as they won the coin toss and elected to bat.3 Approximately 6,000 spectators packed the Jefferson Street Grounds to watch the match, and “the enthusiasm was kept up throughout the game.”4 Starting for St. Louis was right-handed rookie Bob Barr.5

Philadelphia wasted no time and put three runs across the plate in the first inning. With one out, Harry Stovey singled and stole second. Knight followed with an RBI single to center. Knight then stole second. Barr walked Mike Moynahan and Jack O’Brien, loading the bases. Fred Corey laced a double, plating two runners.6 Barr then worked out of the jam, holding the damage to three runs.

Right-hander Bobby Mathews pitched for the Athletics. The Athletics’ diminutive 31-year-old ace, who had come over from the National League’s Boston Red Stockings, was in the process of resurrecting his career, which had been sidetracked by a sore arm.7

The visitors put runners on base in each of the first two innings but did not capitalize. In the top of the third, Knight doubled to right field. He advanced to third on a wild pitch and came home when O’Brien tripled. The Athletics added two runs in the fourth, even though Knight popped out to Barr. In the bottom half, Joe Battin “sent the ball over [Bob] Blakiston’s head for a home run.”8 The score was now 6-1, Athletics.

In the top of the sixth, Mathews reached on an error by third baseman Battin. Barr threw another wild pitch, moving Mathews up a base. Stovey doubled to left, driving in his pitcher. Knight “followed with a hit to center field for three bases”9 and a run batted in, and then he scored on a fly out by Moynahan. Three more runs for the home team.

Stovey led off the top of the eighth with a single and trotted home on “Knight’s terrific line hit to extreme left center for a home run.”10 Knight had just hit for a natural cycle. O’Brien scored on a hit by Corey. The Allegheny club posted two runs in its half of the eighth, on two hits, a passed ball, a walk, and an error.

The game was out of reach in the ninth, but Philadelphia was not finished. Consecutive singles by George Bradley, Mathews, and Jud Birchall loaded the bases. Stovey lined a single to center, and two runners came home. Knight followed with his second two-bagger, adding two more runs batted in to his line for the day. For the visitors, Ed Swartwood and Billy Taylor singled to start the last of the ninth, and Swartwood scored the game’s final run on a passed ball. The game ended with a score of 17-4. Only 12 of Philadelphia’s runs were earned, and only two of Pittsburgh’s.

The Philadelphia Inquirer informed its readers that three Athletic players, Knight, Stovey, and O’Brien, starred on offense, and that Knight made “a total of eleven bases, on a home run, a three-bagger, and two doubles.”11 However, the paper’s box score listed him with five hits and 12 total bases (which accounted for the missing single). The Times, also a Philadelphia newspaper, gave its readers the straight scoop, noting that “Knight led for the home club in work with the willow, making a single, two two-baggers, a triple-bagger and a home run.”12 In addition to accomplishing the rare feat of hitting for the cycle, Knight had scored five runs and had driven in six.

Further, “the heavy batting of the home club really demoralized the visitors and their fielding was not first-class by any means.”13 The Athletics had six runners reach because of Pittsburgh errors. Every Philadelphia player except Blakiston got at least one hit. Mathews picked up the victory. By the end of the season, Mathews had pitched 381 innings and finished with a record of 30-13, the most victories he had posted in nine years. For the losers, Barr ended the 1883 campaign with a record of 6-18. One bright spot for the Alleghenys was that four batters – Swartwood, Taylor, Battin, and Frank McLaughlin – each collected two hits.

First baseman Stovey was was 5-for-6 with a double in this contest. Although he didn’t homer in this game, Stovey’s 14 round-trippers set a league record for the most home runs in a season, eclipsing Boston Red Stockings left fielder Charley Jones’s 1879 mark of 9.14 O’Brien, the team’s catcher, was 4-for-5 with a triple.

As of the end of the 2021 season, only 16 batters have hit for the cycle in natural order, an achievement rarer than a perfect game.15 The most recent was the Texas Rangers’ Gary Matthews Jr., who accomplished the feat on September 13, 2006, in a game against the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park. Montreal’s Brad Wilkerson is the only player to accomplish a natural cycle in just four plate appearances.16

The 30-year-old Knight had been playing professional baseball since 1875, but this was his first season with Philadelphia’s Athletic Club.17 On a team that batted .262 for the season, Knight’s .252 average was only seventh-best among the regular players. This was his only home run of the season and just the second of his eight-year career, but it was enough to hit for the cycle.18

The umpire was listed as John O. “Kick” Kelley and the game lasted 2 hours and 10 minutes, prolonged by the 23 base hits and two or three bases on balls collected by the Athletics.19 The Allegheny club had nine hits. The win by the Athletic club, coupled with a 6-5 loss by the Browns to the Eclipse of Louisville, saw the Athletics take first place in the standings, by the narrowest of margins, .684 to .683.20 They were still two games behind the Browns in wins but had two fewer losses. By season’s end, the 66-32 Athletics edged the 65-33 Browns by exactly one game, five games ahead of third-place Cincinnati.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the notes, the authors consulted Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org.

Notes

1 A good listing of cycles is available at baseball-almanac.com/hitting/Major_League_Baseball_Players_to_hit_for_the_cycle.shtml. Twenty-six players have hit for the cycle more than once. See a listing at mlb.com/news/players-who-hit-for-multiple-cycles-c295035814. Four are “tricyclists” – each with three cycles to his credit: John Reilly, Bob Meusel, Babe Herman, and Adrian Beltre. One cycle has been hit in postseason play – by Brock Holt of the Boston Red Sox on October 6, 2018. It was the second cycle for Holt – his first was on June 16, 2015. Christian Yelich of the Milwaukee Brewers hit for the cycle twice in a 20-day stretch (August 29 and September 17, 2018).

2 “Base Ball,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 31, 1883: 2.

3 “Heavy Work at the Bat,” Philadelphia Times,  July 31, 1883: 4.

4 Philadelphia Inquirer.

5 The Alleghenys finished in seventh place in the eight-team league, with a record of 31-67.

6 The Inquirer says it was hit down the right-field foul line, but the Times said it was the left-field foul line.

7 Mathews was 5 feet 5½ inches tall and weighed about 140 pounds.

8 “Base Ball.”

9 “Base Ball.”

10 “Base Ball.”

11 “Base Ball.”

12 “Heavy Work at the Bat.”

13 “Heavy Work at the Bat.”

14 Stovey held the single-season home-run record for just one year. In 1884 Chicago White Stockings third baseman Ned Williamson socked 27 home runs, a single-season mark that stood for 35 years until 1919, when Boston Red Sox outfielder and pitcher Babe Ruth hit 29. Stovey was also the major leagues’ career home-run leader from 1889 through 1894, when he retired with 122.

15 Given the available play-by-play data. The 15 players who hit for a natural cycle are:

Lon Knight, Philadelphia (AA), July 30, 1883

Pete Browning, Louisville (AA), August 8, 1886

Bill Collins, Boston (NL), October 6, 1910

Bob Fothergill, Detroit (AL), September 26, 1926

Tony Lazzeri, New York (AL), June 3, 1932

Charlie Gehringer, Detroit (AL), May 27, 1939

Leon Culberson, Boston (AL), July 3, 1943

Jim Hickman, New York (NL), August 7, 1963

Ken Boyer, St. Louis (NL), June 16, 1964

Billy Williams, Chicago (NL), July 17, 1966

Tim Foli, Montreal (NL), April 21, 1976

Bob Watson, Boston (AL), September 15, 1979

John Mabry, St. Louis (NL), May 18, 1996

Jose Valentin, Chicago (AL), April 27, 2000

Brad Wilkerson, Montreal (NL), June 24, 2003

Gary Matthews Jr., Texas (AL), September 13, 2006

16 Mabry and Matthews had the four different hits in just four at-bats, but each also drew a walk in the game.

17 Knight played in 1875 and 1876, but then played on minor-league clubs in New England until he returned to the National League in 1880. He retired after the 1885 season.

18 Knight hit two home runs in a three-year American Association career and one in his five years in the National League.

19 Accounts differ.

20 retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1883/07301883.htm#1.

With the American Association’s success in 1882, two new professional associations, the Northwestern League (NWL) and the Interstate Association (ISA), organized, developing club structure, protection policy, and a championship schedule. Further, before the 1883 season, two new teams2 were added to the AA. Cincinnati spent much of the 1883 season battling for the top spot in the standings, while Pittsburgh was fighting to stay out of last place.

As the schedule entered its final month, it called for eight consecutive games between the Red Stockings and the Alleghenys, split between home-and-home series in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati. From September 3 through 6, Pittsburgh hosted a four-game series, winning three of the games. The two clubs then had a three-day break until September 10, when they met again for four games on Cincinnati’s home field, the Bank Street Grounds. The Red Stockings won the first two games.

The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that “a thousand of the faithful”3 came out to watch the series’ third game, played on September 12. This was considered to be a rubber match of the season’s series, as the two clubs had split the previous dozen games played against each other.4

In a slugfest for the home team, the Red Stockings scored nine runs in the first innings and rolled to an easy win. First baseman John Reilly led Cincinnati with six hits, comprising three singles, a double, a triple, and a home run.

A Cincinnati native, Reilly had made his professional debut with the National League’s Cincinnati Reds in 1880, batting just .206 in 73 games for a team that folded after the season. With no professional team in Cincinnati in 1881, Reilly spent the season with amateur and pickup teams, then signed with the independent Metropolitans of New York in 1882.

He wound up signing contracts for 1883 with both the AA’s Red Stockings and a new National League team the Mets’ ownership had founded, which eventually became the New York Giants. The February 1883 peace agreement between the AA and NL assigned him to the Red Stockings. Back in his hometown, he batted .311 in a league-high 98 games in 1883. Forty-four of his 136 hits went for extra bases, as he posted a .485 slugging percentage (sixth-best in the majors). He hit two home runs on September 10 against the Alleghenys and continued his batting spree two days later.

As he did 65 times in the Red Stockings’ 98 games in 1883 – and in 10 of the 12 previous games against Pittsburgh, Will White started on September 12. The younger brother of future Hall of Famer Deacon White, Will was the Red Stockings’ workhorse. The primary pitcher for the NL’s 1879 Cincinnati Reds (who folded after the season) and 1880 Reds (who also folded), White had rejuvenated his career in the American Association. In the Red Stockings’ pennant-winning season of 1882, White had led the team and league in innings pitched (480), wins (40), complete games (52), won-lost percentage (.769), and shutouts (8). In 1883 he increased many of his totals, to 577 IP, 64 CG, and 43 W. His 2.09 earned-run average also led the AA.

Jack Neagle started for the Alleghenys, looking for his third win of the season with Pittsburgh. Neagle had pitched in two games in White’s place for the NL’s Cincinnati Reds in 1879,5 but then he disappeared for a few seasons, returning to the majors in 1883 with the NL’s Philadelphia Quakers, for whom he appeared in 18 games as a pitcher and outfielder until June 15. He then played for the AA’s Baltimore Orioles, appearing in nine games in the month of July, before landing with the Alleghenys. His first start in Pittsburgh was on July 28 against the Philadelphia Athletics. He was ineffective at all three stops, finishing 1883 with a 5.94 ERA in 221? innings.

Neagle’s September 12 start in Cincinnati was decided by the end of the first inning. Pittsburgh batted first but went quietly. Conversely, Cincinnati’s hitters jumped on Neagle right away. Hick Carpenter singled to lead off the bottom of the first, and he scored when Reilly tripled into the left-center gap, where Pittsburgh’s Mike Mansell cut off the ball, preventing a home run.

Charley Jones followed with a single that plated Reilly, and Joe Sommer launched a two-run home run. Then “[T]here were a couple of errors and a couple of outs,”6 followed by five straight singles, by White, Carpenter, Reilly, Jones, and Sommer. In all, Cincinnati sent 14 men into the batter’s boxes, and the home team came away with nine runs.

The Alleghenys did not score in the second, either, and before the Reds came to bat, Neagle was off the mound. He was banished to right field, and Billy Taylor came in from the outfield to pitch. For the season, Taylor made 19 appearances on the mound. Bill Morgan also entered the game, replacing Denny Mack as Pittsburgh’s shortstop.7

Unfortunately for Pittsburgh, the pitching change did not make a difference. Chick Fulmer started the offense with a double. Bid McPhee – whose Hall of Fame tenure in Cincinnati had begun with the Red Stockings’ AA debut a season earlier – walked, and Pop Snyder drove both runners home with a triple. White’s RBI single made it a 12-0 score.

Pittsburgh broke up the shutout in the third inning. Neagle walked, and Ed Swartwood, on his way to leading the AA in batting average and slugging percentage, reached on an error by second baseman McPhee. Taylor “drove the sphere into center”8 for a three-run home run.

The Reds kept up their attack, scoring one run in the third and two more in the fourth. In the top of the fifth frame, Pittsburgh managed a run when Cincinnati’s center fielder Jones muffed a fly ball by Taylor, and in the home half, Fulmer hit a triple but was thrown out at home trying to score. That was the only inning in which the Red Stockings did not score. At the end of five, Cincinnati held a commanding 15-4 lead.

In the sixth inning, White needed just three pitched balls to retire the Allegheny batters. Cincinnati had four singles, followed by a double by Reilly, and three more tallies were made. In the seventh, errors by both McPhee and Reilly contributed to another Pittsburgh run. In the bottom of the seventh, “Taylor was all but paralyzed.”9 The Red Stockings exploded in another big inning, sending 11 men to bat. Eight hits, capped by Jones’s home run to the left-field fence, translated into seven more runs for Cincinnati.

In the bottom of the eighth, Carpenter singled and came home ahead of Reilly, who hit a long drive to right-center for a home run. That accounted for the final runs of the Red Stockings’ 27-5 win. It was the fourth round-tripper for the home team. It also meant that Reilly had just hit for the cycle.

In “one of the greatest batting games on record,”10 Cincinnati’s batters banged out 33 hits for a total of 52 bases. Three more reached on walks, and the 27 runs scored were a season high.11 Eight runners were left on base. For the visitors, only six hits were made (five singles and Taylor’s home run), but they did score five times.

Reilly became just the third player in major-league history to hit for the cycle. In addition to his six hits, Reilly had two stolen bases and six runs scored. It was the second time a batter had accomplished the cycle in 1883, following Philadelphia Athletics player-manager Lon Knight’s performance on July 30, also against the Alleghenys.

Exactly one week later, on September 19, Reilly hit for the cycle again. His second rare feat came against the Philadelphia Athletics, as Cincinnati hammered out 17 hits, scoring 12 runs. White pitched another gem, limiting the Athletics to just three runs on five hits. For the second time in five games, Reilly garnered at least 10 total bases. Between September 10 and 22, Reilly collected 19 hits in 41 at-bats, including two doubles, three triples, and four homers.12 He batted .463 and slugged .639 in that span.

Four seasons passed before another Red Stockings player hit for the cycle, when Bid McPhee did so on August 26, 1887. Then, on August 6, 1890 – with Cincinnati in the National League to stay – Reilly became the first player to hit for the cycle three times in his career. This was only the fourth cycle in Cincinnati franchise history, and Reilly had done it three of those four times.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Kevin Larkin and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. Box scores and play-by-play are not available from either Retrosheet or Baseball-Reference.

Notes

1 In November 1881 a committee recommended membership for clubs in Cincinnati, Louisville, St. Louis, Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia into the new American Association. For more details, see Michael McAvoy, “1881 Winter Meetings: The American Association,” found online at https://sabr.org/journal/article/1881-winter-meetings-the-organizational-meetings-of-the-american-association/. Accessed December 2022.

2 The two new teams were the Columbus Buckeyes and the New York Metropolitans. For more on the 1882 Winter Meetings, see Michael McAvoy, “1882 Winter Meetings: Reconciliation and Cooperation,” found online at https://sabr.org/journal/article/1882-winter-meetings-reconciliation-and-cooperation/. Accessed December 2022.

3 “Base-Ball,” Cincinnati Enquirer, September 13, 1883: 2.

4 “Base-Ball.” The Reds won the season series, eight games to six, including five of seven at home.

5 Neagle and White were teammates on the 1879 Cincinnati club.

6 “Base-Ball.”

7 Later in the game, Morgan replaced Hayes as catcher. Hayes, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer, was “given a rest at short.” Three different men played shortstop for Pittsburgh in the game.

8 “Base-Ball.”

9 “Base-Ball.”

10 “Base-Ball.”

11 This was not their largest margin of victory, though. On July 6, the Red Stockings blanked the Baltimore Orioles, 23-0.

12 David Ball, “John Reilly,” SABR Biography Project. Found online at https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/john-reilly/. Accessed October 2022.

For the next four months, the two teams matched each other’s records, almost month-by-month. Cincinnati won 10 games in June, 14 in July, 13 in August, and 12 in September, while the A’s won 9 games in June, 13 in July, 14 in August, and 12 in September. After May, the Red Stockings were 49-29, compared with the Athletics’ 48-29. No matter how well (or poorly) Cincinnati played, it did not gain (or lose) any ground in the standings against Philadelphia.

In the meantime, a third club, the St. Louis Browns, burned even brighter after the season’s first month, winning 45 of 61 games from June 2 through September 3 to pass the Red Stockings and briefly seize first place from the Athletics.

When Cincinnati and Philadelphia opened a three-game series at the Red Stockings’ Bank Street Grounds on September 15, the Athletics had won seven in a row to wrest first back from the Browns. The Athletics held a 3½-game edge over St. Louis; the advantage was 7½ games over the Red Stockings.

Cincinnati had some momentum, having just won four in a row against the Pittsburgh Alleghenys. First baseman John Reilly had clubbed two home runs against the Alleghenys on September 10, then racked up six hits, completing a cycle, two days later.

The Red Stockings had beaten the A’s in seven of 11 games played so far in 1883, and the two teams split the first two games of this series. Cincinnati’s Will White, who started 65 of the Red Stockings’ 98 games in 1883, pitched a shutout in the first contest for his majors-best 39th win of the season, and his team won easily, 11-0. On September 18 Philadelphia won in 10 innings, 13-12, even though Reilly scored three runs.

A crowd of 1,500 came out to witness the final game of the series, on September 19. The fans were treated to an offensive slugfest by the Red Stockings, led by Reilly, who hit for the cycle for the second time in five games.

White, who had taken the loss in the second game of the series, again sought his 40th win in the finale.1 Opposing him was a veteran right-hander for Philadelphia, George Washington Bradley. Bradley was in his eighth season as a major leaguer, pitching for his seventh different club and in his third different league. He began the season with the National League’s Cleveland Blues but was sold in June to the Athletics after appearing in four games, all at shortstop.2 He had already won 15 games for Philadelphia as the A’s primary backup pitcher to Bobby Mathews, while playing third base when not pitching.3

The home team batted first. With one out in the top of the first, Reilly tripled to left field and scored on a wild pitch, giving the Red Stockings a quick 1-0 lead.

White blanked the Athletics in the first two innings, and in the top of the third, Cincinnati struck again. Chick Fulmer reached on an error by the second baseman, Cub Stricker. White singled to right, and both he and Fulmer scored on Hick Carpenter’s home run, a “terrific drive to left center.”4

According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, a frustrated Bradley then tried to hit Charley Jones with a pitch but missed. He did, however, hit Joe Sommer, and then game was delayed, to “allow Joe to have his arm pulled back into shape.”5 Both runners were left stranded as Bradley worked his way out of the inning.

In the bottom of the third, Philadelphia responded. Bob Blakiston led off with a base on balls. Bradley helped his own cause by rapping a two-run home run to right-center field, cutting the deficit to 4-2. This was his only home run of the season and third of his career.6 Jud Birchall singled but was thrown out trying to steal second base, and White retired the side without any further damage.

There was no action until the fifth inning, when White and Reilly each singled, but they did not score. Bid McPhee tripled with two outs in the sixth and was left there. Stricker led off the bottom of the sixth with a single, just the third hit off White. Birchall lined a pitch toward right field, but second baseman McPhee made a sensational catch and then threw to first, in time to double up Stricker and preserve the Red Stockings’ two-run advantage.

In the top of the seventh, Carpenter singled with one out. Reilly then “made a dandy, shooting the ball clear to the carriages in center field”7 for a home run. Cincinnati now led 6-2.

Philadelphia scratched out a run in the bottom of the eighth, when Bradley singled, advanced to third on a wild throw by Cincinnati catcher Pop Snyder, and scored on a wild pitch by White. The Philly pitcher had accounted for all three of his team’s runs.

Leading 6-3, Cincinnati put the game away, “as the fun culminated in the ninth.”8 White and Carpenter hit back-to-back singles. Reilly, who already had a single, triple, and homer in the game, drove Bradley’s offering into left field for a double, plating White. Carpenter stopped at third base.

Jones lined the ball into the same section of left field for a three-bagger, as Carpenter and Reilly scored. An out later, Pop Corkhill doubled home Jones. Snyder singled and stole second base, and he and Jones crossed home plate on McPhee’s single past the mound. The Red Stockings sent 10 batters up to the plate, making seven hits and scoring six runs. The home team’s batters had banged out 17 hits in the game. Every player except Sommer contributed at least one hit.

White allowed a walk in the bottom of the ninth but retired the Athletics without allowing any threat to build. He was again in top form as he earned his 40th victory of the season. No other pitcher in the AA or NL won more than 36 games in 1883.

Sporting Life reported that the Red Stockings right-hander “had the Athletics at his will.”9 He allowed the opponents just five hits, and he limited all of those safeties to three innings. Further, he “took a hand in the batting business,”10 contributing three hits and two runs scored to the Cincinnati offense.

The Red Stockings took the game and series and then won four of their final six games of the season, but they could not catch the Athletics. Philadelphia managed only three wins in its last seven games, but this was good enough to hold off the Browns by a single game. The Red Stockings were third, five games back. It was the Athletics’ lone pennant during their nine seasons in the American Association.

In addition to his four hits in five at-bats, Reilly scored three runs. Reilly had duplicated his batting feat from a week earlier, when he hit for the cycle against the Alleghenys on September 12. In that game, he had gone 6-for-7 and scored six runs.

By September 1883, there had been four games in major-league history where a batter had hit a single, double, triple, and home run in the same game, and Reilly owned two of those rare performances. From September 10 through 22, 1883, Reilly made 19 hits in 41 at-bats, and those hits included two doubles, three triples, and four round-trippers.11 Over these two weeks, he batted .463 and posted a .639 slugging percentage. Seven seasons later, on August 6, 1890, Long John Reilly became the first player to hit for the cycle three times in his career.12

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Stew Thornley and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. Box scores and play-by-play are not available from either Retrosheet or Baseball-Reference.

Notes

1 White earned the victory in this game and in three of his final four decisions. His 43 victories led the league, as did his six shoutouts and 2.09 earned-run average. His 43 wins tied his season-best mark for victories, set in 1879.

2 According to Baseball-Reference, Bradley was sold for “$340 or $500.”

3 According to Bradley’s SABR biography, “In September [1883], when Mathews was out with arm problems, Bradley and Jumping Jack Jones put together a string of pitching performances that enabled the A’s to win seven in a row on their way to the pennant.” See Brian Engelhardt, “George Bradley,” SABR Biography Project, found online at https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/George-Bradley/. Accessed November 2022, January 2023.

4 “Tramped On,” Cincinnati Enquirer, September 20, 1883: 2.

5 “Tramped On.”

6 Bradley ended his career with three home runs in 567 games.

7 “Tramped On.”

8 “Games Played Wednesday, Sept. 19,” Sporting Life, September 24, 1883: 5.

9 “Games Played Wednesday, Sept. 19.”

10 “Tramped On.”

11 David Ball, “John Reilly,” SABR Biography Project. Found online at https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/john-reilly/. Accessed October 2022.

12 As of the end of the 2022 season, that number has increased to six ballplayers. They are Reilly, Bob Meusel (May 7, 1921, July 3, 1922, and July 26, 1928), Babe Herman (May 18, 1931, July 24, 1931, and September 30, 1933), Adrian Beltre (September 1, 2008, August 24, 2012, and August 3, 2015), Trea Turner (April 25, 2017, July 23, 2019, and June 30, 2021) and Christian Yelich (August 29, 2018, September 17, 2018, and May 11, 2022).

Approximately 1,000 people were “at the picnic in Olympic Park,” and they saw a convincing win for the home team, with Hall of Fame-bound Bisons left fielder, leadoff hitter, and manager Jim O’Rourke leading the charge with four hits – a single, double, triple, and home run.2

The 33-year-old O’Rourke had begun his major-league career with the National Association’s Middletown Mansfields in 1872 and then spent six seasons in Boston, first with the NA’s Red Stockings and then with the Boston Nationals (a forerunner to the Braves in the National League). O’Rourke’s Boston teams won five pennants in that six-season span. O’Rourke led the NL three times in home runs while with Boston teams. On April 22, 1876, O’Rourke played in the first-ever NL game and was credited with the first hit (a single) in league history.3

He signed with Providence, which won the 1879 pennant, and returned to Boston for 1880. Buffalo persuaded O’Rourke to join the Bisons for the 1881 campaign, naming him player-manager. In his first year at the helm, the Bisons’ win total improved by 21 from the previous season. His leadership led to competitive play and Buffalo finished within 10½ games of first from 1881 to 1883.

Some of their stiffest competition came from the White Stockings. For three straight seasons, from 1880 through 1882, Chicago won the NL pennant. In 1883, player-manager Cap Anson’s squad fell to second place, finishing four games behind Boston. The White Stockings had struggled early in 1884, beginning the season by winning just five of their first 19 games. The team had a reputation as a “hard-drinking crew,” and their off-the-field controversies, coupled with injuries to several players, contributed to poor performances on the diamond.4

Against the Bisons, Anson started veteran right-hander Larry Corcoran. Standing only 5-feet-3 and weighing a mere 127 pounds, the 24-year-old Corcoran was the workhorse of Chicago’s pitching staff. In his first four seasons (1880-1883), he averaged just over 440 innings pitched and 33 wins per season. Corcoran had a rough beginning to 1884, winning just three of his first 11 starts, and he brought a 7-10 record into this game. Further, he was nursing a sore pitching hand with a “felon”5 – a bacterial infection in his fingertip – which affected his grip of the baseball. According to the Buffalo Commercial, “when a felon is on a pitcher’s right index finger, he has no business in the box.”6

The Bisons countered with their ace, 27-year-old Pud Galvin. In 1883 Galvin had led all NL hurlers by starting 75 games, completing 72 of them. He pitched 656⅓ innings and won 46 games.7 Like Corcoran, he had battled injuries early in 1884, starting with one win in his first five games and then missing eight games because of a pulled muscle.8 By the middle of June, however, the right-hander was back in form and had won five consecutive starts.

Buffalo batted first,9 and O’Rourke reached on an error by shortstop King Kelly to start the game. Corcoran walked Jack Rowe, and after George Myers was retired, Dan Brouthers singled to drive in O’Rourke; Brouthers was thrown out trying to stretch his hit into a double. Deacon White followed with a home run, giving Buffalo an early three-run lead.

Both teams were blanked until the Bisons batted in the third. With two outs, White drew a base on balls and went to third on Jim Lillie’s single to center. Chub Collins hit a grounder to first baseman Anson, who muffed the play, allowing White to score. Davy Force’s single to left field brought Lillie home. It was now 5-0.

In the bottom of the third, Chicago’s Abner Dalrymple hit a one-out home run over the right-field fence.10 George Gore reached on an infield hit, and Kelly was safe on an error. Anson then drove both runners home with a double to right, reducing Chicago’s deficit to two runs.

O’Rourke got one of the runs back by hitting a home run in the top of the fourth. At that point, Corcoran’s sore hand finally “gave out,”11 and third baseman Ed Williamson relieved him in the pitcher’s box.12 Amazingly, according to the Commercial, in the first three frames, Corcoran had “used his right and left hand alternately, but it was no go.”13 Corcoran remained in the game at shortstop, as Anson also moved Kelly from short to third base. In the fifth, both Collins and Galvin reached on fielding errors, and O’Rourke collected two more runs batted in with a single off Williamson.

The White Stockings tallied once in the fifth. King singled, took third on Anson’s single, and scored on a groundout by Fred Pfeffer.

The Bisons made it a rout in the sixth. They scored six runs on five hits, two Chicago errors, and a wild pitch. At some point in the inning, Kelly took over the mound duties and Williamson went back to third base. Buffalo now led, 14-4.

In the Chicago half of the sixth, Silver Flint reached on a walk by Galvin. Corcoran singled, and both runners scored on Gore’s double. Kelly followed with a “rattler to left,”14 and Gore scored. The White Stockings still trailed by seven runs.

Buffalo notched two more runs in the seventh (although the papers give no description), as well as two more in the eighth, when Brouthers hit a two-run home run. All four runs were charged to Kelly. In the ninth, Pfeffer became the fourth Chicago pitcher of the game, and Kelly took over as the White Stockings’ second baseman, his fourth position of the day. Pfeffer, however, didn’t have any better success than his predecessors. Force’s single and back-to-back triples by O’Rourke and Rowe resulted in Buffalo’s last two runs, giving them 20 for the game.

Chicago added solo runs in the eighth (Corcoran tripled and scored on a Galvin wild pitch) and in the ninth. After 2½ hours, the game was finally finished, and Buffalo had won 20-9. The Bisons banged out 20 hits, six more than the White Stockings.

Despite not being able to pitch effectively, Corcoran had led the White Stockings offense with two triples and a single, and he scored twice. He recovered from his hand injury and made 59 starts in 1884, finishing with 35 wins and a 2.40 earned-run average.15

Galvin won his sixth straight start. He won his next two as well, and the future Hall of Famer won 46 games for the second straight season, posting a 1.99 ERA. He struck out 369 batters in 636 innings.

O’Rourke became the second player in Buffalo franchise history to hit for the cycle, joining Curry Foley, who was the first player to ever accomplish the rare feat, doing so on May 25, 1882. O’Rourke was the only batter to hit for the cycle in 1884, a season in which 33 clubs competed in three major leagues. He led the NL in batting average (.347) and hits (162). He also notched his best year to date in RBIs (63).16 At the end of the season, he signed with the New York Giants.

Buffalo won the June 17 game against Chicago, 8-7, on its way to eight wins in a row. The Bisons finished 1884 in third place with 64 wins, 19½ games behind the Providence Grays. Chicago played .500 baseball from the beginning of June through September 1, but Anson’s team miraculously won 21 of its final 25 games to climb back into fourth place in the NL standings, finishing 22 games back.17 That success carried over into 1885, as the White Stockings regained their top form and won the pennant. They captured it again in 1886.

Author’s Note 

With his four base hits in this game, O’Rourke became the fifth player in major-league history to hit for the cycle. Newspaper coverage indicates that – after reaching on an error in the first – he homered in the fourth, singled in the fifth, and tripled in the ninth, but the papers do not report when O’Rourke hit his two-bagger. In fact, not every newspaper credits him in its box score with a double. In every box score of the five newspapers listed in this article’s sources, O’Rourke is shown with four hits in seven at-bats, but only the Buffalo Commercial credits him with a double. The Buffalo Courier, which provided the bulk of the play-by-play, does not credit him with a two-base hit. Nor do the Buffalo Times, the Chicago Tribune, or the Chicago Inter Ocean. Nevertheless, twenty-first-century references such as Retrosheet.org and Baseball-Almanac.com credit him with hitting for the cycle,18 which implies he did get a double.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Joe Wancho and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. With no play-by-play available on Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org, the author based the game’s play-by-play on details found in the Chicago Tribune, the Inter Ocean, the Buffalo Courier, the Buffalo Commercial and the Buffalo Times.

Notes

1 “Sporting News. The Chicago League Team Again Defeated – Providence the Victor,” Chicago Tribune, May 11, 1884: 11.

2 “Four Broken Pitchers,” Buffalo Courier, June 17, 1884: 4.

3 “Jim O’Rourke Stats, Baseball-Almanac.com, accessed January 6, 2024, https://www.baseball-almanac.com/players/player.php?p=orouji01. Later in his career, O’Rourke had an 11-year hiatus between hits. In 1904 the 54-year-old O’Rourke appeared in his 1,999th and final major-league game. According to O’Rourke’s SABR biography, “With the New York Giants on the verge of their first pennant since 1889, manager John McGraw summoned O’Rourke, the last active member of that old championship team, to catch the title clincher. And the old warrior did not disappoint, handling Joe McGinnity over all nine innings of a 7-5 victory over Cincinnati. He even went 1-for-4 at the plate.”

4 David Fleitz, “Cap Anson,” SABR Biography Project. Anson himself was known as a teetotaler.

5 “Sporting,” Buffalo Commercial, June 17, 1884: 3.

6 “Sporting.”

7 Galvin’s 46 victories in 1883 were third-best all-time to that point, behind Old Hoss Radbourn’s 48 (Providence, 1883) and Chicago’s Al Spalding and New York’s John Ward who each won 47 (in 1876 and 1879, respectively). In 1884, with the increase of about 15 games played per team, Galvin again won 46, but Radbourn set the current record of 60. While Louisville’s Guy Hecker won 52 and Boston’s Charlie Buffinton won 48 games.

8 Galvin supposedly injured himself on May 10 in Providence by “picking up his suitcase at Providence’s Narragansett Hotel, possibly the result of pitching in the cold without his sweatshirt the day before.” See Charles Hausberg, “Pud Galvin,” SABR Biography Project.

9 For more on the history of home teams batting first, see Gary Belleville, “The Death and Rebirth of the Home Team Batting First,” Baseball Research Journal, Vol 52, No. 1 (2023), https://sabr.org/journal/article/the-death-and-rebirth-of-the-home-team-batting-first/.

10 Dalrymple finished third in the NL with 22 homers – more than he hit in his other 11 seasons combined!

11 “Four Broken Pitchers.”

12 In 1884 it was extremely rare for teams to use a relief pitcher. The White Stockings played 112 games that year, and there were 106 complete games. It was similar for the Bisons (114 games played, 108 complete games). In 912 National League games, there were 863 complete games. Corcoran appeared in 60 games, starting 59 and relieving in one. Of his 59 starts, he completed 57. For Buffalo, Galvin started all 72 games in which he appeared, and he pitched 71 complete games.

13 “Sporting.”

14 “Four Broken Pitchers.”

15 Kelly and Williamson made just two appearances on the mound for the season, and Pfeffer made just one. In his 16-year career, Kelly pitched in 12 games. His 1884 ERA was 8.44. Williamson also pitched in 12 games in his 13-year career, posting an 18.00 ERA in 1884. Pfeffer appeared in eight games on the mound. His 1884 ERA was 9.00. Anson had also made one pitching appearance in 1884, but as he gave up four runs (two earned) in just one inning of work, perhaps he felt he should not insert himself as a reliever in this blowout.

16 While with the New York Giants, O’Rourke saw his RBI totals skyrocket: He knocked in at least 80 runs in five different seasons, including 115 in 1890.

17 This stretch of games (from September 2 to October 11) included winning streaks of 10 and 9 games.

18 “Cycles Chronologically,” Retrosheet.org, accessed January 6, 2024, https://www.retrosheet.org/cycles_chron.htm; “Hit for the Cycle,” Baseball-Almanac.com, accessed January 6, 2024, https://www.baseball-almanac.com/hitting/Major_League_Baseball_Players_to_hit_for_the_cycle.shtml.

In 1884 the Metropolitans had won the AA’s pennant,2 but owner John Day maneuvered manager Jim Mutrie, star pitcher Tim Keefe, and third baseman Dude Esterbrook to the National League club he also owned, the New York Giants. At 12-25, the depleted ’85 Metropolitans were in last place in the eight-team league, trailing first-place St. Louis by 16½ games.3

The 1885 Browns, described by SABR’s Bill Lamb as “perhaps the best ballclub in the nine-year existence of the American Association,” were 28-8, including a 17-game winning streak.4 They had swept a four-game series from the Metropolitans in May in St. Louis and won the first two contests of the four-game series in New York. The Browns had scored 259 runs in their first 36 games (just under 7½ runs per game) and the New Yorkers had allowed 281 runs in their 37 contests (just over 7½ runs per game). Fans expecting to see lots of runs were not disappointed, but it was the Mets who provided most of the scoring.

The pitching matchup was a pair of right-handers: Jack Lynch for New York and Bob Caruthers for St. Louis. Lynch had started 53 games for the pennant-winning Mets in 1884, pitched 496 innings, and earned 37 wins to equal Keefe for the team lead. New York had begun the 1885 season with Buck Becannon and Ed Bagley as their starting hurlers, but after combining to lose 12 of their first 18 starts by mid-May, the pair was benched by manager Jim Gifford5 in favor of Lynch, Doug Crothers, and Ed Cushman.6 Entering his ninth start of the season, Lynch was 4-4.

Two days earlier, in the series opener, the 21-year-old Caruthers had limited the Metropolitans to just nine hits. (All three runs scored by New York were unearned.) He was in search of his 16th win of the season, and the Browns had lost only twice when he started on the mound. On this day, however, the New York batters “solved Caruthers’ curves and pounded the life out of him,” observed the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.7

Leading the Metropolitans’ charge was Orr. The 25-year-old Brooklyn native was a big player, standing 5-feet-11 and weighing 250 pounds. He had signed with the Metropolitans in 1883 (played one game), went to the New York Giants in the National League (playing only one game), and then returned to the Mets (playing 12 more games).8 In 1884, his first full season, Orr led the American Association in hits (162), total bases (247), runs batted in (112), and batting average (.354). He continued his strong play at the plate in 1885, pacing the league in triples (21) and slugging percentage (.543) while batting .342.9

Against Caruthers and the Browns on June 12, Orr attained the first cycle in the Metropolitans’ three-season history and tied the major-league record for hits in a game.

According to the New York Tribune, “The local nine took the lead in the first inning and held it easily to the end.”10 The Metropolitans batted first and scored four runs. All were unearned, the results of “errors and wild throwing.”11

New York added a solo run in the fourth. In the top of the fifth, singles by Orr, Frank Hankinson, and Jim Reilly, followed by Ed Kennedy’s triple, resulted in three more Metropolitans runs. The home team had an 8-0 lead.

The visitors cut the deficit in half in the bottom of the fifth. Second baseman Reilly had just joined the New York team, making his major-league debut on June 8.12 He had difficulty in the field and was unable to “hold a ball thrown to him.”13 In the fifth, Reilly committed three errors, which accounted for four St. Louis runs, making it an 8-4 game.

Throughout the game, the Metropolitans “got the range of Caruther’s [sic] pitching.”14 In the sixth, New York added two runs. Steve Brady singled, and then Orr drove a “beauty to left field on the ground,”15 which was deep enough for him to race around the bases for a two-run home run. New York scored once more in the seventh.

In the bottom of the seventh, Reilly again gained mention in the Tribune’s play-by-play account, when it was reported that, “but for his error the [Browns’] three runs would not have been scored.”16 St. Louis had battled back, trailing 11-7.

In the eighth inning, the Mets hit the ball all over the diamond, and four runners crossed home plate. New York tallied twice more in the ninth, and St. Louis scored one final unearned run in the bottom of the ninth. After 2 hours and 15 minutes, the Metropolitans had defeated the Browns, 17-8, snapping the six-game losing streak to St. Louis.

One St. Louis newspaper account described the game as “a tiring one,”17 due to poor fielding. In fact, the Post-Dispatch credited each team with nine errors! The New York reports differed. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle remarked that the fielding made this “a tedious game to watch,”18 while the New York Times told its readers, “At times the fielding was very sharp, and altogether the game was a rather enjoyable one.”19

Lynch, per the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, “pitched a splendid game”20 By all accounts, he did not yield an earned run, meaning that all eight of the Browns’ tallies were allowed by errors (many by Reilly21). Lynch finished the season with 23 wins, accounting for more than half of New York’s 44 victories.

Caruthers took the loss, yielding 20 hits. He rebounded, winning four of his next five starts. He finished 1885 by leading all American Association pitchers with 40 wins and a 2.07 earned-run average. The Browns went on to a 79-33 record, winning their first-ever pennant by 16 games over second-place Cincinnati.22

The biggest star on June 12, however, was Orr, who “made the best batting record ever seen on the grounds.”23 In his six at-bats, he clubbed a home run, a triple, two doubles, and two singles, which translates into hitting for the cycle. He scored four runs. He became the first major leaguer on any New York team to hit for the cycle. He also tied a major-league record, becoming just the 13th player to have six hits in a nine-inning game.24 In 1885, hitting for the cycle was not recognized; more emphasis was placed on total bases. Orr’s 13 total bases were big news. The newspaper accounts did not give descriptions on much of the play; for example, Orr’s triple was on a line drive to center, but the inning or situation was not provided.25

Long John Reilly of the AA’s Cincinnati club was in attendance for Orr’s feat; the Cincinnatis had a day off during a series with the Brooklyn Trolley Dodgers.26 Reilly told reporters that Orr “hits the ball harder than any player in the country, and I doubt very much if there is a man who can handle the bat any better than Dave.”27 This was high praise, coming from the player who in the previous season led the American Association in home runs (11) and slugging percentage (.551), while also posting a .339 batting average. Further, John Reilly hit for the cycle twice in 1883.28

Coincidentally, John Reilly was the first major leaguer to get six hits in a game in which he hit for the cycle (September 12, 1883); Orr was the second. Only eight other major leaguers have recorded six-hit games while hitting for the cycle.29 The Tribune commended this effort, reporting, “When one remembers that six hits are frequently all that a whole nine can make in a game, the tremendous work performed by this one player is realized.”30

Within the span of four days, two more major leaguers collected a single, double, triple, and home run in the same game. The next day (June 13), Detroit’s George Wood (NL) hit for the cycle, and on June 16, Philadelphia’s Henry Larkin (AA) did as well. Detroit’s Mox McQuery (NL) became the fourth batter in 1885 to hit for the cycle when he accomplished the rare feat on September 28.

Orr himself had a second cycle in his future. On August 10, 1887, during what turned out to be the Metropolitans’ final season of existence, he hit for the cycle in a loss to the Baltimore Orioles.31

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Russ Walsh and copy-edited by Len Levin. Thanks to John Fredland for assistance and insights.

Sources  

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. With no play-by-play available on Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org, the author based the game’s play-by-play on details found in the New York Times, New York Tribune, Brooklyn Daily Eagle, and St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The St. Louis Globe-Democrat reprinted the Tribune’s write-up as a Special Dispatch.

Notes

1 “Some Wonderful Batting,” New York Tribune, June 13, 1885: 2.

2 The 1884 Metropolitans lost baseball’s first “World Series” to the National League champion Providence Grays.

3 For more information on the 1884-86 Metropolitans, see SABR member Larry DeFillipo’s article on the inaugural game at the St. George Grounds.

4 Bill Lamb, “Dave Foutz,” SABR Baseball Biography Project, accessed October 21, 2023, https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/Dave-Foutz/.

5 Gifford was in his first season at the helm of the Mets. He had managed the Indianapolis Hoosiers in 1884, as they finished with a 25-60 record, finishing in 11th place. (The Washington Statesmen had a worse winning percentage, but they folded in early August and did not complete the season.) Gifford then skippered the Mets in 1885 and for just 17 games in 1886. After a 5-12 start, he was replaced as manager by Bob Ferguson. Gifford ended his major-league tenure with a record of 74-136.

6 Lynch made his first start on May 16. He and Carothers shared the pitching duties, but in mid-July Cushman (who had begun the 1885 season pitching for the Philadelphia Athletics) joined the rotation. After Gifford decided to use Lynch as a starter, Bagley and Becannon combined to start a total of just six games for the rest of the season. Becannon was released in June, and Bagley made just three starts after May 17.

7 “Slugging the Champions,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, June 13, 1885: 9.

8 According to SABR member Jim Morgan’s biography of Orr, “After only one game, Orr was transferred to the New York Mets of the American Association (both the Gothams and the Mets were owned by the Metropolitan Exhibition Company, and players were sometimes shuttled between the two teams. John Day essentially ran both clubs).” See Jim Morgan, “Dave Orr,” SABR Baseball Biography Project, accessed October 23, 2023, https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/Dave-Orr/.

9 Orr’s batting average in 1885 was second-best in the American Association, behind Louisville’s Pete Browning (.362). Orr’s mark was also fourth-best in the majors, when including the National League’s Roger Connor (.371, New York Giants) and Dan Brouthers (.359, Buffalo Bisons).

10 “Some Wonderful Batting.”

11 “Sports and Pastimes,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 13, 1885: 1.

12 “The Local Nines Beaten at Baseball,” New York Tribune, June 9, 1885: 2. Jim Reilly is described as “a new local amateur engaged by the Metropolitan club.”

13 “Sports and Pastimes.”

14 “Sports and Pastimes.”

15 “Sports and Pastimes.”

16 “Some Wonderful Batting.”

17 “Slugging the Champions.” The Post-Dispatch reported that Comiskey and Gleason were the only St. Louis players who did not make any errors.

18 “Sports and Pastimes.”.

19 “A Great Feat in Batting,” New York Times, June 13, 1885: 2.

20 “Sports and Pastimes.”

21 This was Jim Reilly’s only season in the majors. He played 10 games for New York at second base (and another two as third baseman), making 10 errors. He was released after the game on June 19.

22 Charles F. Faber, “Bob Caruthers,” SABR Baseball Biography Project, accessed October 21, 2023, https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/Bob-Caruthers/.

23 “Some Wonderful Batting.”

24 As of the end of the 2023 season. See “Six Hits in a Game,” Baseball-Almanac.com. Accessed October 2023. This link shows American and National League players who had six hits in a nine-inning game. Orr became the fifth American Association player to do it, following Hick Carpenter (Cincinnati, September 12, 1883), John Reilly (Cincinnati, September 12, 1883 – the same game as Carpenter!), Oscar Walker (Brooklyn, May 31, 1884), and Lon Knight (Philadelphia, July 30, 1884).

25 “A Great Feat in Batting.”

26 The author found no evidence that John Reilly was related to Jim Reilly. Since the Reds did not play on June 12, perhaps John was simply scouting the Browns and Mets.

27 “A Great Feat in Batting.”

28 John Reilly hit for the cycle on September 12, 1883, and again a week later, on September 19, 1883, becoming the first major leaguer to accomplish the rare event twice in his career.

29 The other eight players were Henry Larkin (June 16, 1885 – just four days after Orr’s cycle, Larkin’s was a reverse natural cycle), Larry Twitchell (August 15, 1889), Farmer Weaver (August 12, 1890), Sam Thompson (August 17, 1894), Bobby Veach (September 17, 1920), Rondell White (June 11, 1995), Ian Kinsler (April 15, 2009), and Christian Yelich (August 29, 2018 – this was Yelich’s first of three career cycles).

30 “The News This Morning,” New York Tribune, June 13, 1885: 4. Unfortunately, the Tribune gave the player’s name as Daniel Orr, not Dave Orr.

31 Orr hit .342 in an eight-season big-league career, which ended when he suffered a paralyzing stroke after the 1890 season.

As the 1885 season got underway, Chicago was determined to show its winning ways again.1 The White Stockings won 18 of their first 24 games, all played on the road, capping the trip by sweeping four games from the Detroit Wolverines and outscoring the home team 28-12. 

Chicago’s next 28 games were played at home, at West Side Park. The homestand began with a four-game sweep of the St. Louis Maroons, giving Chicago an eight-game winning streak and a first-place tie with the New York Giants.2 Then Detroit came to the Windy City for four more games, beginning on June 12. At the bottom end of the NL standings were the Wolverines.

Detroit had won only five of its first 28 games. In fact, after sweeping the Buffalo Bisons in the first three games of the season, Detroit had lost 23 of 25 games as it came to Chicago to play the White Stockings. 

Both teams stayed the course in the series opener. Chicago’s 6-4 win made it nine in a row and dropped Detroit even further off the pace. A crowd of 2,000 spectators turned out to the ballpark to witness the second game of the series, played on June 13. Only a week before did the NL revoke an offseason ruling that required pitchers “to keep both feet on the ground while making their delivery.”3 The absurdity of this requirement caused confusion for umpires and injuries to pitchers. Therefore, the fans were treated to a lot of runs, a lot of hits, and a lot of errors. 

The White Stockings had the NL’s best offense, leading in most categories, including team OPS (.705), runs scored (834), and home runs (54 – almost three times the league average). Although the team batting average was .264, Chicago had two everyday hitters batting over .300: team captain Cap Anson (who batted .310 for the season) and George Gore (.313).

They also had John Clarkson on the mound. In 1885 the future Hall of Famer led the league in most pitching categories: games (70), starts (70), complete games (68), shutouts (10), strikeouts (308), and wins (53).4 Clarkson had started 19 of his team’s first 29 games, winning 15 of them, and the 23-year-old right-hander got the mound duties for this game, too.

The Wolverines’ offense was led by George Wood, Ned Hanlon, and Sam Thompson. Wood, a native Canadian, was in his fifth season with Detroit.5 He was primarily an outfielder (left field), but in 1885, he played 13 games as an infielder and even was called on to pitch as a reliever once.

In this second game against Chicago, manager Charlie Morton gave every other regular starter (including Hanlon and Thompson) a day off, which meant that Wood needed to step up. According to the Detroit Free Press, Wood did just that, in that he “had a bad attack of batting,”6 collecting four hits in five at-bats.

Pretzels Getzien did the twirling for the visitors. The 21-year-old right-hander was in just his second season in the majors. Getzien struggled in 1884 and 1885, but by 1886 he became one of the National League’s top pitchers. In 1887 he led the Wolverines to a championship. He had gained his nickname because of his “puzzling twisters,”7 Specifically, batters described “the course of the ball from his hand to their bats as a ‘pretzel curve.’”8 In June 1885, however, Getzien had not yet perfected his delivery.

The home team batted first, and both sides were retired without scoring in the first inning. Chicago’s Ed Williamson led off the top of the second with a walk, and successive one-out singles by Clarkson and Sy Sutcliffe brought Williamson home with the game’s first run. Detroit matched the tally in the bottom of the inning with hits by Frank Ringo and Getzien.

In the third, George Gore drew a base on balls and moved into scoring position on a single by Kelly. Fred Pfeffer’s RBI single gave Chicago the lead again. Williamson plated Kelly with a single, and Clarkson’s second hit of the game scored both Pfeffer and Williamson.

In Detroit’s half, Wood clobbered a solo home run. As reported in the Chicago Tribune, he “sent the ball to the east fence. It showed every inclination to go further but the fence was in the way.”9 Chicago still led, 5-2.

The White Stockings put the game out of reach in the fourth. Gore doubled and scored on Kelly’s single. Billy Sunday reached on an error and Pfeffer’s groundout put two runners in scoring position. Williamson’s single brought Kelly and Sunday home, and then Tom Burns hit a two-run homer. Chicago now had a 10-2 advantage.

Getzien’s batterymate, Ringo, was charged with five passed balls through the first four innings, so when the fifth started, Ringo was banished to play right field, and Jerry Dorgan became the new Wolverines backstop.

Clarkson was in control through five innings. In the top of the sixth, Getzien walked Williamson for the second time, and Burns hit his second homer of the game, making the score 12-2. When Detroit took its turn at bat, “Clarkson let down his speed,”10 and the Wolverines scored two runs of their own, all with two outs. Milt Scott, Ringo, and Joe Quest loaded the bases on singles. Left fielder Burns made an error, allowing Scott to score, and a wild pitch by Clarkson allowed Ringo to cross the plate.

In the seventh, Wood drove the ball deep into the outfield. He made it safely to third, with a triple, but when the ball came to Sutcliffe at the plate, the catcher “failed to hold the ball thrown [to] him,”11 and Wood came home with a run. Stump Wiedman reached on an error by Chicago’s second baseman Pfeffer and scored when Dorgan doubled. Marr Phillips followed with a single, and Dorgan scored the third run of the inning. Detroit had trimmed the Chicago lead to five runs.

By then, however, “the home nine had obtained too great a lead to be overcome,”12 and in the eighth, the White Stockings added to their advantage. Burns walked and moved into scoring position on Clarkson’s third hit of the game. Sutcliffe singled and Burns scored. Abner Dalrymple singled, and on the play both Clarkson and Sutcliffe scored. Another pitch by Getzien got past Dorgan for a passed ball, and Dalrymple scored, making it 16-7. Chicago added a final run in the ninth on multiple Wolverine errors.

Detroit’s last at-bat resulted in a pair of runs. This time, the Chicago fielders couldn’t make the clean plays. Wiedman reached and scored on errors. Two outs later, Scott doubled but kept running when the inept fielding allowed him to score.

A total of 26 runs were scored in the game. The Chicago Inter Ocean reported that the White Stockings’ “Gore, Kelly, Pfeffer, Williamson and Burns kept up their reputation as base-runners by stealing eight bases.”13 The two teams combined for 30 hits, with Chicago getting 17 to go with their 17 runs. Every Chicago player had at least one hit and scored at least one run. Clarkson led his team with his three safeties.

For Detroit, Wood collected 10 total bases with his four hits. Newspaper accounts described only his triple and home run, although all box scores show that Wood also hit a single and double in the game, giving him a cycle.

It made him just the seventh major-leaguer to hit for the cycle and the first Detroit player to accomplish that deed.14 His feat also marked the first time that a player had hit for the cycle and his team had lost the game.15

The “multiplicity of errors”16 led to many of the runs on both sides. In addition, Getzien yielded four bases on balls, threw two wild pitches, and the pair of Detroit catchers allowed six passed balls.

Chicago kept up its winning ways, earning victories in all four games of the series against Detroit. The White Stockings then won six more (against Buffalo and the Philadelphia Phillies). They had won 18 games in a row, although they had gained only a few games in the standings over the equally red-hot Giants. As September ended, Chicago, with its 85-21 record, was four games better than New York, and the White Stockings went on to capture the 1885 pennant.17 The NL champs then played the American Association’s St. Louis Browns in a postseason series that would “determine the best team in the world.”18 The teams played a seven-game series, each winning three, with one tie.

Detroit struggled in June but then won 15 of 24 games in July. The Wolverines’ losing ways returned in August, when they lost 13 of 16 games. They finished the 1885 campaign in sixth place, a whopping 44 games behind the White Stockings.19

Author’s Note

 In the span of five days in mid-June 1885, three players hit for the cycle, the only time so many cycles occurred in so few games in the history of the major leagues. The first was Dave Orr (New York Metropolitans, American Association), who did so on June 12 against the St. Louis Brown Stockings. Wood cycled the very next day, and then on June 16, Henry Larkin (Philadelphia Athletics, American Association) hit for a reverse natural cycle against the Pittsburgh Alleghenys. On September 28, Wood’s teammate, Mox McQuery, became the fourth player in 1885 to collect a single, double, triple, and home run in the same game, as he “hit for the whole diamond” against the Providence Grays.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Stew Thornley and copy-edited by Len Levin.

 Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. Box scores and play-by-play are not available from either Retrosheet or Baseball-Reference.

Notes

1 In 1884, the National League’s Providence Grays and the American Association’s New York Metropolitans played a three-game series at the end of the season, but it “had not been sanctioned by their leagues and, therefore, was not considered a championship series by either league.” This was not to be the case in 1885. Any postseason series would be sanctioned. Paul E. Doutrich, “Champions, Tantrums and Bad Umps: The 1885 ‘World Series,’” SABR Baseball Research Journal, Vol. 46, No. 2 (2017), https://sabr.org/journal/article/champions-tantrums-and-bad-umps-the-1885-world-series/.

2 Both the White Stockings and Giants were 22-6 at close of play on June 11.

3 Mark Pestana, “1884 Winter Meetings: Collapse of the Union, Return of the Prodigals,” Base Ball’s 19th Century “Winter” Meetings: 1857-1900 (Phoenix: SABR, 2018), 221-231, https://sabr.org/journal/article/1884-winter-meetings-collapse-of-the-union-return-of-the-prodigals/.

4 Clarkson’s 53 wins in 1885 rank second-best in major-league history. (Providence’s Old Hoss Radbourn won 60 games in 1884.)

5 When the Wolverines folded at the end of the 1885 season, Wood was “granted to [the] league,” along with Dan Casey, Deacon McGuire, McQuery, and Wiedman. He was then obtained by the Philadelphia Phillies, and he played for Philadelphia from 1886 to 1889.

6 “Fair Balls,” Detroit Free Press, June 14, 1885: 7.

7 “Notes and Comments: Chas. H. Getzien,” Sporting Life, November 2, 1887: 3.

8 “Notes and Comments: Chas. H. Getzien.” 

9 “Sporting,” Chicago Tribune, June 14, 1885: 10.

10 “National League,” Detroit Free Press, June 14, 1885: 7.

11 “Sporting.”

12 “National League.”

13 “League Contests,” Chicago Inter Ocean, June 14, 1885: 3.

14 Wood’s cycle was just the second to take place in a National League game, following Buffalo’s Jim O’Rourke, who hit for the cycle on June 16, 1884, against the White Stockings.

15 As of the end of the 2022 season, major leaguers have hit for the cycle 339 times. In 278 of those games, the cyclist’s team won the game (82.0%); in 59 games, the cyclist’s team lost the game (17.4%). There have been two tie games in which a batter has hit for the cycle (0.6%).

16 “Sporting.”

17 See Bob Tiemann, SABR Games Project, “September 29-October 3, 1885: White Stockings cap a pennant chase.” Chicago also won the pennant in 1886, giving it six championships in the National League’s first 11 seasons.

18 Doutrich.

19 On September 16, 1885, “a deal was struck whereby Detroit’s owners paid $7,000 for a controlling share” in the Buffalo Bisons, who were leaving the league. The Wolverines thus snagged Buffalo’s star players, consisting of Hardy Richardson, Jack Rowe, and future Hall of Famers Dan Brouthers and Deacon White. See Mark Pestana, “1885 Winter Meetings: A Temporary Stability,” Base Ball’s 19th Century “Winter” Meetings: 1857-1900, 237-246, https://sabr.org/journal/article/1885-winter-meetings-a-temporary-stability/. Detroit was in the 1886 pennant race, finishing in third place but only 2½ games behind the White Stockings.

With a record of 24-16, second-place Pittsburgh trailed the St. Louis Browns by five games, while the Athletics (17-23) were tied with the Baltimore Orioles in fifth in the American Association standings. Philadelphia had no problem scoring: The Athletics’ 269 runs tied them with the Browns for tops in the league at this point. The problem was that the Athletics allowed more than they scored (272), second-most in the American Association.

From the start of the 1885 campaign through May 27, the Athletics had played just five of 28 games at home and had struggled on the road. They were now in the middle of a 16-game home stand, and had won eight of their last 12 games at the Jefferson Street Grounds, their home ballpark. Meanwhile, after beginning the season with seven straight away games, Pittsburgh had played 23 of their next 24 games at home (Pittsburgh’s Recreation Park), and by winning 16 of those home games, the Alleghenys had climbed into second place. They began a four-game series against the Athletics that would end a 13-game road trip on June 20.

Pittsburgh manager Horace Phillips called on 22-year-old left-hander Ed Morris to make the start, his 24th of the season.1  For the home team, player-manager Harry Stovey gave the start to right-hander Bobby Mathews. He was the workhorse of the Philadelphia team, and this was his 15th start of the year. According to Sporting Life, Mathews “was the first to introduce a slow raise [a rising changeup], as far back as ’72.”2

The Athletics batted first and “jumped on Morris in great style.”3 Blondie Purcell led off the game by grounding a ball to third baseman Bill Kuehne, who fumbled it, allowing Purcell to reach. Stovey singled and Larkin smacked a three-run home run, giving Philadelphia the only runs it would need.

In the bottom of the second, Pittsburgh bunched together three singles by Fred Carroll, Jim Field, and Kuehne to produce its first and only run (scored by Carroll) of the game. Philadelphia answered in the top of the third. Larkin led off with a triple. He scored on Knight’s RBI single. An out later, Jocko Milligan hit a Morris pitch “between the fences in left field for a home run.”4 The Athletics now had a five-run lead at 6-1.

In the fourth, Philadelphia added a run when Stovey singled, advanced to second on a passed ball, and scored when Larkin laced a double. An out later, Corey singled, and Larkin was thrown out at the plate trying to score from second base. In three at-bats through the first four innings, Larkin had homered, tripled, and doubled, scored twice, and driven in four runs.

The scored remained 7-1 until the top of the eighth inning. Stovey started the offensive rally with a triple. Larkin, who had singled in the sixth, now hit his second double of the game to produce a run. Lon Knight reached on a throwing error by Pittsburgh first baseman Field. Fred Corey tripled, garnering two runs batted in, and after Milligan was retired, George Strief’s out brought Corey home.

In the ninth, three singles and a double enabled three Athletics players to score. Mathews helped his own cause with a single and advanced on Purcell’s single. Stovey’s out brought home Mathews. Larkin then singled, and Knight’s double plated Purcell and Larkin. That gave the home team a 14-1 lead, which stood as the final score. This was not the highest run total of the season for the Athletics. Just two games earlier, the A’s had scored 19 against the Louisville Colonels. They had now won eight of their last 11 games, after the win over Pittsburgh, and in six of those 10 (including five wins and one loss), Philadelphia had scored at least 11 runs.

Larkin “wielded the ash with great freedom, and, out of six times at the bat, he hit safely every time.”5 The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette claimed that Larkin’s performance was “one of the greatest batting records ever made,”6 comparing him to the New York Metropolitans’ Dave Orr, who had a 6-for-6 day only four days earlier, when he hit for the cycle against the Browns.

Every Philadelphia player had at least one hit. After Larkin, Stovey shined, “making a three-bagger and two singles.”7 Stovey also scored three runs. Only Strief and Cub Stricker did not score a Philadelphia run.

According to the Pittsburgh Daily Post, “The visitors could do nothing with Mathews’ delivery.”8 Mathews “kept the Smoky City men down to five hits,”9 four of which were singles. Outside the second inning, the Philadelphia hurler allowed only two safeties. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that “the visitors seemed demoralized after the first inning.”10 Mathews registered five strikeouts and, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “eleven others had two strikes called on them before they either hit the sphere or went out on base.”11 His teammates played fantastic defense behind him, highlighted by “Stricker’s great running catch of a high-fly off of Tom Brown’s bat, in the eighth, and Purcell’s catch of Pop Smith’s long drive to the left-field fence in the last inning.”12

Larkin had hit for the cycle by the sixth inning, with two at-bats to spare. He added another double and single to his career day at the plate. His accomplishment is termed a reverse natural cycle, as the hits came in the reverse order of total bases (home run, triple, double, and single). This was only the eighth time in major-league history that a batter had hit for the cycle, and the first time it occurred in reverse natural order. As of the end of the 2019 season, 10 players have for the cycle in reverse natural order.13

Larkin’s cycle came only days after two other players hit for the cycle. Orr did so on June 12 against the Browns,14 while George Wood of the National League Detroit Wolverines hit for the cycle against the Chicago White Stockings on June 13. Larkin became the second player in Philadelphia Athletics franchise history to hit for the cycle, joining teammate Lon Knight, who hit for a natural cycle on July 30, 1883. Both Knight’s and Larkin’s successes came on their home field, the Jefferson Street Grounds, and in both instances, the visiting team was the Pittsburgh Alleghenys.

As a final note, Philadelphia’s Times told its readers that “Mr. John Kelly umpired in a satisfactory manner and was frequently applauded by the crowd.”15

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted baseball-reference.com, mlb.com, sabr.org, and retrosheet.org. Play-by-play was taken from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Philadelphia Inquirer accounts of the game.

Notes

1 Morris led the Alleghenys and the American Association with 63 starts in 1885 (tied for 33rd most all-time). Every start became a complete game, and he finished the 1885 season with a record of 39-24.

2 Brian McKenna, “Bobby Mathews,” sabr.org/bioproj/person/e7ad641f. Accessed November 2019.

3 “Jumped on Morris,” Pittsburgh Daily Post, June 17, 1885: 1.

4 “A Very Heavy Batting Game,” The Times (Philadelphia), June 17, 1885: 4.

5 “An Awful Slaughter,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 17, 1885: 8.

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid.

8 Pittsburgh Daily Post.

9 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

10 “Heavy Batting,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 17, 1885: 2.

11 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

12 Ibid.

13 They are Henry Larkin (June 16, 1885), Bid McPhee (August 26, 1887), Sam Mertes (October 4, 1904), Gee Walker (April 20, 1937), Arky Vaughan (July 19, 1939), Jackie Robinson (August 29, 1948), Jim Fregosi (May 20, 1968), Luke Scott (July 28, 2006), Carlos Gomez (May 7, 2008) and Rajai Davis (July 2, 2016).

14 New York’s Orr hit for the cycle for the second time in his career on August 10, 1887, but the Metropolitans lost to the Baltimore Orioles, 6-5.

15 The Times.

Detroit had been progressively improving over recent seasons. In 1884 the Wolverines placed dead last in the NL with a record of 28-84-2. They had improved in 1885; with eight games remaining in the season, they already had six more wins than in the entire 1884 season.

Providence had seven consecutive winning seasons from 1878 to 1884, including two pennants. The Grays won the World Series2 over the American Association’s New York Metropolitans in 1884, but in 1885, their luck had run out. Twenty games over .500 (44-24) on August 6, they had lost 29 of 34 heading into their series in Detroit.

Two young pitchers faced each other in the September 28 game. For the Wolverines, 21-year-old Pretzels Getzein had the mound duties. The right-hander had made his first major-league start on August 13, 1884, and was used heavily down the stretch of the 1884 season, eventually making a total of 17 starts (of which he won just five). In 1885 he again secured a spot in the Detroit rotation, sharing turns on the mound with Lady Baldwin, Dan Casey, and Stump Weidman.

Opposing Getzein was left-hander Dupee Shaw. Although 26 years old, Shaw was in only his third big-league season and first with Providence. Shaw had pitched for Detroit in 1883 and part of 1884, amassing a 19-33 record for the Wolverines before moving to the Boston Reds in the Union Association. With the Reds, Shaw won 21 of 36 decisions, posting a 1.77 ERA.3 He spent 1885 with the Grays and made 49 starts (the same number as his teammate, veteran Old Hoss Radbourn).

Leading Detroit’s offensive attack against the Grays was Mox McQuery, the Wolverines’ 24-year-old first baseman. He banged out four hits in five at-bats, a single, double, triple, and home run.

McQuery had started his major-league career with the Cincinnati Outlaw Reds in 1884. He began the 1885 season with the Indianapolis Hoosiers of the Western League and was sold to Detroit on June 15. He quickly became the everyday first baseman for the Wolverines. Although not a power hitter (he had 22 extra-base hits in 278 at-bats), he did establish a respectable batting average (.273) with a team that struggled offensively.

The Wolverines “started run getting”4 in the bottom of the first inning.5 Ned Hanlon and Sam Thompson hit back-to-back singles to begin the game. After Charlie Bennett forced Thompson at second with a grounder, Hanlon scored on a fly out by Weidman, who was playing left field, one of several appearances as a position player around his regular pitching duties in 1885.6

Jim Manning launched a fly ball to deep right field that sent Lon Knight “out to the track after the leather,”7 resulting in a two-run homer and a 3-0 Detroit lead. This was Manning’s only round-tripper for the 1885 Wolverines.8

Two innings later, Detroit struck again. With two outs, Manning launched another fly ball, this time to center fielder Paul Hines, who muffed the catch, and Manning reached safely. McQuery, who had grounded out to end the first inning, brought Manning home with a triple. Jim Donnelly’s single plated McQuery, and the Wolverines led 5-0.

Manning reached on another error (this time by shortstop Paul Radford) to lead off the fifth inning. He scored on McQuery’s double. McQuery then scored from second on a passed ball charged to catcher Barney Gilligan, pushing the lead to 7-0.

The Wolverines put the game well out of reach in the sixth. Hanlon singled. An out later, Bennett reached on a walk. Weidman’s single brought Hanlon across home plate. After Manning flied out, McQuery lined a single which scored Bennett with Detroit’s ninth run.

The two-out rally continued as Donnelly doubled, driving in both Weidman and McQuery. Sam Crane singled, putting runners at the corners. With Getzein batting, Crane took off for second base, starting a double-steal attempt. Gilligan threw to Jack Farrell, who was covering second base, and he tagged Crane out. Donnelly, however, had crossed the plate before Crane was tagged out, so the run counted.

In the eighth inning, Weidman singled with one out. After Manning flied out, McQuery “hit the ball so hard that he crossed the plate before it was back in the diamond.” With his two-run home run. McQuery had hit for the cycle.

The term “cycle” was not in use in the nineteenth century, but the Detroit Free Press told its readers that “McQuery hit for the whole diamond – a single, double, triple and home run.”9 The home team now led 14-0 and had reached Shaw for 18 hits and 28 total bases.

Meanwhile, Getzein blanked the Providence Nine into the ninth inning. He was one out from a seven-hit shutout, but Shaw lined a two-out double in the ninth to start a rally. Singles by Hines and Radford and a double by Cliff Carroll followed, and Providence posted two runs on the scoreboard.

The final score was 14-2 in favor of Detroit. This established a record for the most runs the Wolverines had scored all season.

McQuery’s accomplishment marked the second time a National League batter had hit for the cycle in 1885. Another Wolverine, George Wood, had also done so on June 13 against the Chicago White Stockings in Chicago.10 Two batters in the American Association also hit for the cycle that season: Dave Orr (New York Metropolitans, June 12, against the St. Louis Browns) and Henry Larkin (Philadelphia Athletics, June 16, against the Pittsburgh Alleghenys). Before 1885, there were only five occurrences of a major-league batter getting a single, double, triple, and home run in a game.

McQuery finished the season playing for Detroit, but the following spring he was obtained by the Kansas City Cowboys, a new NL club. He batted .247 in 122 games, but then spent 1887 through 1889 in the International Association, playing for the Hamilton Hams (part of 1887) and the Syracuse Stars (1887-1889). He was on the Syracuse squad when the Stars joined the American Association in 1890.

In 1991 McQuery played for the Washington Statesmen (also in the AA), but he was released on August 1. He finished the season with the Troy Trojans (Eastern Association). Still attempting a major-league comeback as a 31-year-old, McQuery spent 1892 playing for the Evansville Hoosiers (Illinois-Iowa League) and then the Marinette Badgers (Wisconsin-Michigan League). His minor-league stats are incomplete, but in five major-league seasons, McQuery batted .271 with 13 career home runs.

The two teams played three more games over the next three days. Detroit swept the series, outscoring Providence 45-14 in the four contests. The Wolverines ended the season by winning three out of four against the Boston Beaneaters, giving them nine victories in their final 10 games of the year. They came in at 41-67, good for sixth place in the NL, their highest finish since 1882.

Even better days were ahead in Detroit. About two weeks before this game, on September 16, Detroit had shrewdly brokered a deal that paid $7,000 for a controlling share in the Buffalo Bisons club. That gave them the ability to acquire a core of stars known as the “Big Four.”11 Hardy Richardson, Jack Rowe, and future Hall of Famers Dan Brouthers and Deacon White had been Buffalo’s main drawing card since 1881, and now the Wolverines were poised to improve.

They went 87-36-3 in 1886 (finishing second in the NL) and then 79-45-3 in 1887, capturing the pennant and winning the “World Series.” Getzien, who won just 12 games in 1885, became the team’s ace over the next two seasons, winning 30 games in 1886 and 29 in 1887.12

The Grays rebounded after these losses to Detroit by sweeping Buffalo in four straight contests to finish 1885 in fourth place (53-57). Still, it was the first losing season in club history. Perhaps this is why the New York Times reported that “the visitors played listlessly, seeming to care little how the game might result.”13

During the Winter Meetings after the season ended, the National League discussed a need to regroup for the 1886 season. Buffalo’s purchase by Detroit had assured the demise of the Bisons franchise. According to SABR author Mark Pestana, Providence, too, “gave up the ghost, and by the end of November, the Rhode Islanders had been bought up”14 by Boston’s ownership. Two new teams – the Kansas City Cowboys and Washington Nationals – replaced Buffalo and Providence in the NL in 1886.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Kevin Larkin and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources mentioned in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com, Retrosheet.org, and SABR.org. Box scores and play-by-play are not available from either Retrosheet or Baseball-Reference.

Notes

1 “Slugging the Sphere,” Detroit Free Press, September 29, 1885: 8.

2 There was no institutionalized World Series in 1884. The Grays and the New York Metropolitans of the American Association agreed to play a three-game postseason series. The Grays won all three games.

3 Shaw made his first start for Boston on July 16, 1884. In 61 games as a member of the Boston Reds, Shaw pitched in 39, making 38 starts.

4 “Slugging the Sphere.”

5 In 1886 the home team’s captain could decide whether his team would bat first or second; however, in 1885, the visiting team batted first. According to the box scores for this game, Providence, the visiting team, is listed second, but Detroit made only 24 outs (to Providence’s 27), indicating that the Wolverines did not bat in the bottom of the ninth, since they had the lead. See “Baseball Rule Changes,” found online at https://www.baseball-almanac.com/rulechng.shtml. Accessed September 2022.

6 Stump Weidman started 38 games for Detroit in 1885. He pitched 37 complete games, with a 14-24 record and 3.14 earned-run average. He also played seven games in the outfield (making six errors in 13 chances) and one game at second base (one error in his only chance). He batted .157 with one home run and 14 RBIs in 1885.

7 “Slugging the Sphere.”

8 Manning was sold to Detroit for $500 by the Boston Beaneaters earlier in the month. He had hit two homers for the Beaneaters that season, and he ended his career with 8 home runs in 364 games, spread over five seasons.

9 “Slugging the Sphere.”

10 McQuery had joined the Wolverines two days after this game.

11 Mark Pestana, “1885 Winter Meetings: A Temporary Stability,” Baseball’s 19th Century Winter Meetings: 1857-1900, eds. Jeremy K. Hodges and Bill Nowlin, SABR, 2018. Accessed online September 10, 2022. None of the “Big Four” appeared in this game.

12 Getzien’s .690 winning percentage in 1887 (29-13) led the league.

13 “Detroit’s Easy Victory,” New York Times, September 29, 1885: 2.

14 Pestana.