June 21, 1883: Athletics end season’s longest losing streak, retake first place

It had been a very long week for the Philadelphia Athletics. They had played five games from June 13 to 20 and had dropped all five, scoring a total of only nine runs while allowing40. They had lost an extra-innings game at home to the Louisville Eclipse and had been shut out twice on the road by the Cincinnati Red Stockings.

Philadelphia was in its second season as an American Association franchise. In 1882, the Athletics had never lost more than four games in a row en route to a second-place finish. They had started the 1883 season by winning their first four games, 14 of their first 15, and 17 of their first 19. They were 18-3 in the month of May, but that month had ended. Suddenly, the Athletics pitching staff was allowing more runs, their offense wasn’t scoring, and Philadelphia started the month of June by suffering defeat in five of eight games. Its lead in the American Association evaporated, and after losing the first three games of a four-game series with the Red Stockings, Philadelphia was tied with Louisville for second place, both a half-game behind the St. Louis Browns.

The defending champion Cincinnati squad, meanwhile, had also won its first four contests in 1883, but had won only 13 of 24 leading up to this series. By taking the first three games, the Red Stockings had climbed into fourth place, but they were only a game out of first. The race for the pennant was tight.

Philadelphia and Cincinnati faced off on a Thursday afternoon in the final game of the series. The New York Tribune wrote, “The Athletic nine, after playing in wretched form the past week, rallied here today in their game with the champions.”1 Philadelphia’s Times started its account of the game with, “The tables were turned this afternoon.”2 Cincinnati manager Pop Snyder sent right-hander Harry McCormick to the mound. The Red Stockings’ top starter was Will White,3 and White had started and won the previous four games for Cincinnati, so Snyder decided to rest his ace. McCormick was making just his 10th start of the year. Philadelphia’s skipper, Lon Knight, countered with righty Fred Corey, a utility player who occasionally pitched. This was only his third start of the season, as Bobby Mathews was the usual workhorse on the mound for the Athletics.

Before a crowd of 3,200 at Cincinnati’s Bank Street Grounds, Snyder won the toss and opted to bat first. The Red Stockings jumped on Corey in the first inning, scoring four runs. Hick Carpenter rolled a grounder to third base, but third baseman George Bradley missed it. Carpenter moved to second on a passed ball. Charley Jones walked and both runners advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored when Corey made a fielding error. John Reilly reached on Cub Stricker’s miscue at second base and scored when Bradley dropped a pop fly by Joe Sommer. Phil Powers followed with an RBI triple to deep center, the only true hit of the inning. Powers kept going, trying for an inside-the-park home run, but he was tagged out at the plate. The fans were cheering, as their team was ahead, 4-0. After this frame, Bradley was moved to center field, switching positions with Jack O’Brien, prompting the Times to report, “Both men played faultlessly from that point on.”4

In the bottom of the first inning, Jones misjudged Harry Stovey’s fly ball to center. The ball bounded over Jones’s head and Stovey raced around the bases all the way to third. The Athletics scored two runs on two hits and a Cincinnati error.

Three Philadelphia runners reached in the second (two hits and a walk), but none of them scored, as two were caught trying to steal second. In the third, though, Stovey again started things with a single to left. He moved to second when Sommer made a high throw back to the infield. Knight lined a pitch to Sommer in left and the outfielder misplayed it, plating Stovey. Knight reached second on a passed ball and then scored when shortstop Chick Fulmer couldn’t cleanly play a grounder by O’Brien. O’Brien later came around to score. In the fourth inning, three errors and one hit (Stovey’s third of the game) led to two more Philadelphia tallies, and the score was 7-4, Philadelphia.

In the top of the fifth, Cincinnati’s McCormick and Jones stroked back-to-back three-baggers, getting one of the runs back, but in the bottom half, the Athletics scored twice more on Mike Moynahan’s triple, a double by O’Brien, and a single by the pitcher Corey.

The Red Stockings threatened in both the sixth and seventh innings without success. For the game, they left four runners on base. Philadelphia added a solo run in the sixth (on “two hits and a couple of errors”5), but in the seventh, the wheels came off the Cincinnati defense. Four runs came across the plate on several more errors and just four base hits. The final two frames were scoreless. When the game ended, Cincinnati was “most serenely drubbed by the Philadelphians by a score of 14 to 5.”6

McCormick had trouble as the Cincinnati twirler. Too often he grooved the ball where the Athletics could hit it, and “the result was the boys in the field were kept busy chasing the sphere. The visitors pounded the cover off of one ball and badly damaged another.”7 Corey held the Red Stockings to just four hits, although three of them were triples. Otherwise, he was effective as he “sent in the balls with gun-shot speed.”8 Together, the two pitchers made four wild pitches and their batterymates allowed three passed balls.

According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, only three of Philadelphia’s 14 hits “were gained by good work. The rest were gifts from an accumulation of muffed flies, passed balls, wild pitches, fumbled grounders and wild throws.”9 Of the Red Stockings players, only Bid McPhee was solid in his defense, “the only one of the Cincinnatis who played up to the standard throughout.”10 Five Athletics players reached first on errors, either on fumbled grounders or bad throws.

Philly’s Bradley was branded by the Cincinnati Enquirer as a dirty player. (“There is no more unpopular tosser in either association.”11) While running to first on a grounder, Bradley hit Cincy first baseman Reilly in the mouth. It might have been an accident, but from the Cincinnati viewpoint, Bradley “can play ball, but he can’t play the gentleman.”12

When the day’s other games had ended, Philadelphia found itself once again in first place. The Browns had been defeated by the New York Metropolitans. After this victory, the Athletics won their final five games in June, and they went 39-21 during the final three months, never losing more than three games in a row. Philadelphia (66-32) held on to win the pennant by one game over St. Louis (65-33), while Cincinnati finished third (61-37).

Sources

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

Notes

1 “Baseball News,” New York Tribune, June 22, 1883: 2.

2 “Game for the Athletics,” Philadelphia Times, June 22, 1883: 4.

3 Cincinnati’s White led the American Association in wins (43), shutouts (6), and earned-run average (2.09) in 1883. Two of those shutouts came in this series against Philadelphia.

4 “Game for the Athletics.”

5 “An Off Day,” Cincinnati Enquirer, June 22, 1883: 5.

6 “An Off Day.”

7 “An Off Day.”

8 “An Off Day.”

9 “An Off Day.”

10 “A Victory for the Athletics,” St. Louis Globe-Democrat, June 22, 1883: 6.

11 “An Off Day.”

12 “An Off Day.”