June 21, 1903: ‘Biff, bang, smash’: Buck Freeman hits for first cycle in Red Sox franchise history

Part of the 1903 schedule had the Boston Americans and Cleveland Naps playing seven consecutive games against each other in June. The first three were played in Boston (the Naps won twice), and then a four-game series was scheduled to take place in Ohio.

The first three of these were played at Cleveland’s League Park. Cleveland took the series opener, and Boston won the second and third games. The clubs then traveled 60 miles south of Cleveland to play the final game of their home-and-home set on June 21. According to the Boston Globe, “The rigid enforcement of the blue laws in Cleveland made it necessary”1 for the two clubs to play the Sunday game at Mahaffey Park in Canton, Ohio, instead of in Cleveland.2

A crowd of 6,000 showed up (many traveling from Cleveland), filling the ballpark “to its full seating capacity,”3 hoping to see Cy Young – who had grown up in nearby Gilmore and made his professional debut in 1890 with Canton’s club in the Tri-State League – pitch against the Naps.4

Instead, the spectators witnessed a “slugging match billed as a baseball game.”5 Right-hander Long Tom Hughes was given the start for Boston. The 24-year-old Hughes had come to the Americans the year before, purchased from the Baltimore Orioles. Hughes had won his last three decisions, including a victory over the Naps in Boston on June 17. Cleveland’s “giant southpaw,”6 Ed Walker, “was sent to the slab.”7 This was just his fourth major-league appearance. Born in the United Kingdom, the 6-foot-5 left-hander had pitched in one game in 1902 and twice earlier in 1903.

The feature of the game for Boston was right fielder Buck Freeman’s terrific hitting, described in the papers simply as “biff, bang, smash.”8 Freeman has been called “the first legitimate home run hitter in baseball history.”9 In 1903 he led the major leagues in home runs (13), runs batted in (104 – he had also led the league with 121 RBIs in 1902), extra-base hits (72), and total bases (281).10 Combining the 1903 campaign for Boston with his amazing 25 homers in 1899 while playing for the National League’s Washington Senators, Freeman became the first hitter ever to lead both the National and American Leagues in home runs.11

After a quiet, three-up, three-down first inning, Cleveland scored in the second. Charlie Hickman led off with a double and moved to third on a sacrifice by Jack McCarthy. He scored on a fly ball by Elmer Flick.

Walker “kept the Beaneaters from scoring for two innings,”12 but that changed in the third. Hughes “had been given free transportation”13 to first by Walker on a leadoff walk. Then Patsy Dougherty and Jimmy Collins had back-to-back singles, and Hughes scored. Jack O’Brien was retired, advancing the runners, and Freeman’s two-run single made the score 3-1.

The Naps tied the score in their half of the third. Walker reached first14 but was forced at second on a grounder by Harry Bay. Bill Bradley singled and when Nap Lajoie hit a hard grounder to shortstop Freddy Parent and Parent couldn’t make a play, Bay scored. Hickman launched a liner to right, and Freeman fell down trying to catch it, allowing Bradley to tie the game on Hickman’s double.

Boston had made only four hits off Walker, but Cleveland manager Bill Armour made a pitching change at this point, feeling that his starter “would not be able to hold down the ‘sluggers’ from the ‘Hub.’”15 Walker gave way to Gus Dorner. The right-handed reliever yielded a single tally to the visitors in the fourth.

Cleveland answered with the equalizer in the fifth. Bradley drew a base on balls, moved to third on a single by Lajoie, and scored on Hickman’s fly ball. It was a 4-4 game through five innings.

In the sixth, the Americans broke the game open with four runs. The Boston Post reported that Dorner “was wild most of the time.”16 He had pitched a shutout over the Americans on June 16, but in this game, he was not so fortunate. Hughes, Collins, and O’Brien started the inning with back-to-back-to-back singles, and all scored on Freeman’s 10th triple of the season.17 Freeman then scored when Parent lined a pitch to second and Lajoie muffed the catch.

“Fine stick work”18 gave Boston a run in the seventh inning and another in the eighth, when Freeman doubled for his third hit and scored on a single by Hobe Ferris. The Naps rallied with two down in the bottom of the eighth. Hughes was tagged for three runs as Bay singled and Bradley, Lajoie, and Hickman each “sent the sphere into left field territory”19 for doubles. According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, all three landed in the left-field bleachers.20

With the score 10-7, Boston added two more in the ninth. Collins was on first base when Freeman “lifted the ball over the fence”21 for his fourth home run of the year. The round-tripper also resulted in Freeman’s hitting for the cycle.

The Americans pounded out 16 hits and “improved their batting averages to a marked degree.”22 Every batter except Parent garnered at least one hit. In hitting for the cycle, Freeman accounted for two singles and a double, triple, and home run, but all of his teammates contributed just singles to the offensive attack. Freeman’s six RBIs produced half of the team’s 12 runs scored.

Dorner was charged with the loss, his third of the season. Although he had allowed 12 hits and three walks, only two of the nine runs he gave up were earned. The Cleveland Press reported, “Boston hammered Gus from the time he began operations until runs were no longer needed.”23 This turned out to be pitcher Walker’s final game in the majors. He resurfaced in the minors, playing from 1906 to 1911.

For Boston, Hughes allowed 11 hits, including four doubles, but he confined the damage to the third and eighth innings, and most of Cleveland’s hits came with two outs,24 as the home team left 10 men on base. All of Cleveland’s seven runs were scored by Bay, Bradley, and Lajoie. Hughes improved his record to 6-3. In 1903 Hughes won 20 games, helping Boston to the pennant.

After striking out in his first plate appearance, Freeman collected 11 bases on two singles, a double, a triple, and a home run. In the seven games against Cleveland, Freeman had 10 hits, half in this contest. For the season he batted .313 against the Naps. Freeman became the second player in 1903 to hit for the cycle, joining Pittsburgh’s Fred Clarke, who hit for his second career cycle on May 7, against the Cincinnati Reds.25 Two more players – both of whom played in the June 21 Boston-Cleveland game – joined the list of 1903 cyclists: Freeman’s teammate Patsy Dougherty accomplished the rare feat on July 29 against the New York Highlanders, and the Naps’ Bradley hit for a reverse natural cycle on September 24 against the Washington Senators.

With the victory, Boston moved into a tie for first place in the AL with the Philadelphia Athletics (both teams had 32-20 records). They won six of their next seven games, securing the top position in the standings, and they won the AL pennant, finishing 14½ games ahead of the Athletics. (Cleveland finished in third place, a game behind Philadelphia.) The Boston Americans went on to win the first World Series between the American and National Leagues, five games to three, against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Author’s Note

Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org had box scores but did not have play-by-play from the 1903 season when this article was completed in April 2023. The author instead relied on box scores and game accounts published in several contemporary sources on June 22, 1903, including the Boston Globe, the Boston Post, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Cleveland Leader, the Cleveland Press and the Cleveland World. Both Boston newspapers claim that the Naps scored three runs in the bottom of the third (and none in the second), while three of the four Cleveland papers give the Naps credit for one run in the second and two runs in the third. Both Baseball-Reference and Retrosheet mirror the Boston box scores, with the Naps scoring three times in the third. In the Boston accounts, Walker reached first (and he was not given credit for any hits in the game) and was forced at second on Bay’s grounder. Bradley singled, and Lajoie’s grounder was muffed by Parent, loading the bases. “In attempting to field a hot one from Hickman’s bat, Freeman fell, and three runs were tallied.”26

In any event, the score at the end of the third inning was tied, at 3-3. The author chose to use the Cleveland write-ups in explaining the action, using the four local accounts.

Acknowledgments

The author sincerely thanks Terry Metter, subject department librarian at the Cleveland Public Library, for assisting with scans of articles from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Cleveland Leader, the Cleveland Press and the Cleveland World, all of which provided some of the game’s play-by-play.

This article was fact-checked by Laura Peebles 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.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CLE/CLE190306210.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1903/B06210CLE1903.htm

Notes

1 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games,” Boston Globe, June 22, 1903: 3.

2 The Naps played all but three home games at Cleveland’s League Park (71 games total). They also played two games at Canton’s Mahaffey Park and one game at Neil Park, in Columbus, Ohio.

3 “Easy for the Beaneaters,” Cleveland Leader, June 22, 1903: 2.

4 Despite leading the AL in innings pitched, Young missed at least one start between June 13 and June 23, so he did not pitch at all in the seven games against the Naps. In fact, he did not make the trip to Cleveland. Before the final game of the series, Young “telegraphed [manager Jimmy] Collins that he would report in time for the Detroit series.” See “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.” Young finished the 1903 season with the most wins (28), his third consecutive season leading that category.

5 “Boston Well in the Lead,” Boston Post, June 22, 1903: 3.

6 “Cleveland’s Only Chance,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, June 22, 1903: 3.

7 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.”

8 “Cleveland’s Only Chance.”

9 Eric Enders, “Buck Freeman,” SABR Biography Project, found online at sabr.org/bioproj/person/buck-freeman/.

10 Freeman hit 12 home runs in the Boston Americans’ inaugural American League season (1901). He hit twice as many homers as anyone else on the team.

11 As of the end of the 2022 season, Sam Crawford (1901 NL and 1908 AL), Fred McGriff (1989 AL and 1992 NL), and Mark McGwire (1987, 1996 AL and 1998, 1999 NL) have also joined this list as batters who led both leagues in home runs.

12 “Easy for the Beaneaters.” Notice that the Cleveland newspaper referred to the American League team from Boston as the Beaneaters, even though the Beaneaters were the NL team that eventually became the Braves.

13 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.”

14 The Cleveland newspapers credit Walker with a hit in the box score, but the Boston papers do not; nor do Retrosheet and Baseball-Reference. According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, “Walker in some unexplainable manner singled over second.”

15 “Easy for the Beaneaters.”

16 “Boston Well in the Lead.”

17 He ended up with 20 triples, third in the league behind Detroit’s Sam Crawford (25) and Cleveland’s Bill Bradley (22.) In 1904 his 19 triples led the American League.

18 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.”

19 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.”

20 No mention of ground rules was made. See “Cleveland’s Only Chance.”

21 W.A. Kennelly, “Buck Freeman Won the Game,” Cleveland World, June22, 1903: 5.

22 “Boston Well in the Lead.”

23 “Boston Smashed the Hoodoo,” Cleveland Press, June 22, 1903: 8.

24 “Cleveland’s Only Chance.”

25 Clarke’s first cycle occurred on July 23, 1901, also against Cincinnati.

26 “Boston Defeats Cleveland for Fourth Time in Seven Games.”