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The 1887 season saw the American Association and the National League enjoy success on the field. Attendance at American Association games set a league record and attendance at National League games exceeded the attendance of the American Association for the first time since the American Association’s inaugural season in 1882. Still the American Association regular […]

Before we can talk about the future of the rules in baseball, we ought to have a peek at the past. But more importantly we should acknowledge that the reason we’re so interested in the future of the rules right now is because in 2021 anxiety over Major League Baseball’s rules is running high. The […]

It has been noted time and time again that the search for the good old days of baseball is bound to come up dry. In every period of the national pastime, there has been greed, poor sportsmanship, lying, and cheating, to name a few of the lesser offenses. The subject of this article is further […]

The National League and the American Association entered their respective winter meetings — hereafter called the annual meetings1 — buoyed by the growing popularity and profits of the past 1886 season.2 The owners recognized that to further expand the popularity of baseball and, with the consequent rise in attendance, increase their profits, they had to […]

Doug Glanville in his new baseball memoir notes that many players, “rewarded with huge contracts because of their offensive prowess, . . . have developed a kind of attention deficit disorder when it comes to defense. . . . If you put up tremendous offensive numbers year after year, the game will cut you a […]

Lindsey Nelson and Bob Murphy are together on the wall in Cooperstown that honors all recipients of the Ford C. Frick Award for broadcasting greatness. Between Murphy and Nelson is Bob Wolff, who was considered for the inaugural Mets booth. (Courtesy of MetSilverman.com)   The New York Mets were born in sin, cleansed by pain, […]

Chief Johnson was a strong-armed pitcher who had great beginnings to his professional baseball career but met a tragic, untimely end. Johnson was known for hurricane speed and a slippery-elm-laced spitball that baffled batters at all levels of competition. He pitched a shutout in his first major-league start and became a controversial figure when he […]

Catcher Jack Lapp came to the Philadelphia Athletics in 1908 as a late-season gamble recruited from outlaw baseball. He stuck with the team and become part of the “pennant trust” that captured four American League flags from 1910 through 1914.1 Lapp never quite eclipsed Ira Thomas, then Wally Schang, to emerge as the team’s first-string […]

The frail young boy was undersized for his age and sickly. His doctor recommended outdoor exercise. Although he certainly did not look like an athlete, the lad took up baseball, despite the objections of his overprotective mother. Though smaller than his teammates (as an adult he stood 5-feet-7 and weighed 140 pounds), he developed a […]

Ed Moriarty was a .324 hitter, rising star, and fan favorite with the Boston Braves in 1935. Well, in his first eight games, anyway. He then shocked the Boston baseball world by suddenly calling it quits, saying he had a higher calling and was going to enter the priesthood. This player with 34 at-bats was […]

Mike Marshall did everything wrong, according to baseball’s establishment. He looked all wrong for a pitcher, standing just 5-feet-8½.1 He believed in pitching more, not less. He worked out with weights and ran long distances instead of wind sprints. He threw a screwball, which breaks the wrong way from a curve. He refused to sign […]

It took quite an odyssey for right-hander Rex Cecil to get into his first major-league game. It was August 11, 1944, and he was in San Diego. It was a Friday. Cecil had been playing professional baseball since 1937, when he was 20 and pitching for the Vancouver Maple Leafs. He’d never played for a […]

On the evening of September 21, 1964, the Philadelphia Phillies’ Art Mahaffey was pitching a gem of a baseball game. In the top of the sixth inning it was a scoreless duel in between Mahaffey and the Cincinnati Reds’ John Tsitouris at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. With two outs, 25-year-old Reds rookie Chico Ruiz […]

For someone who participated in only 855 major-league games spread over nine seasons, Ed Abbaticchio has had more questions raised about his life than most baseball fans might expect. Was he the first Italian American big leaguer? Was he the first professional dual-sport athlete? Was he the creator of the spiral punt? Why did he […]

Reflecting on the life and career of Pud Galvin, a writer commented that a proper accounting of Galvin’s achievements “would be a task of time and would … require a volume in size almost equal to the dictionary.”1 Galvin pitched for 16 years during a career that spanned three decades, four major leagues, and countless […]

In August 1897, the Baltimore Orioles called up left-hander Morris “Doc” Amole to fortify the club’s pitching staff for a late-season National League pennant run. In spot starter/relief duty, Amole pitched creditably, posting a 4-4 record, with a 2.57 ERA in 11 games. He was traded to Washington in the offseason and big things were […]

On February 27, 1999, Texas Lutheran University in Seguin, Texas, rededicated its baseball park Katt-Isbel Field in honor of Ray Katt, the Bulldogs’ head baseball coach from 1971 until his 1992 retirement.1 For Katt it was a bookend event to a lifetime spent in baseball, including eight full or partial seasons (1952-1959) in the majors […]

In the top of the eighth inning of a game between the Philadelphia Phillies and Brooklyn Dodgers at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City1 on April 22, 1957, with his team behind by two runs and runners at second and third with one out, Phillies manager Mayo Smith sent out John Irvin Kennedy to run for […]

All-Star week in any city is a celebration of baseball’s history, a recognition of its current and future stars, and a time of pure joy for baseball fans of all ages. This week was no exception in Washington, DC. The stars of major-league baseball had not descended en masse on the nation’s capital in nearly […]

“I think these two fellows can help us make some money and win the pennant and the World Series. I am going to say one thing. I don’t care what color you are. If you can play baseball you can play on this club. That’s all I am going to say about color.” – Leo […]

Mike Schmidt began 1987 needing five home runs for admission to baseball’s 500-home-run club. On a sunny April afternoon in Pittsburgh, he punched his ticket with a ninth-inning game-winner, rescuing the Phillies from collapse and sinking a Pirates’ comeback. Already entrenched among the game’s all-time greats,1 Schmidt bolstered his legend in 1986 by posting a […]

As Dodgers fans streamed through Ebbets Field’s turnstiles on October 9, 1949, their mood matched the day’s weather: warm and sunny. “You could not have a finer day for a baseball game,” broadcaster Red Barber said as World Series Game Five began.1 Brooklynites were optimistic that their team of young sluggers, led by Jackie Robinson, […]

Left-hander Jon Lester had enjoyed one of the best careers of any major-league pitcher in the twenty-first century when he signed a $5 million, one-year contract with the Washington Nationals not long before spring training 2021.1 In 15 seasons with the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs, Lester had won 193 games, played on three […]

Editor’s note: This article was selected as a winner of the 2014 McFarland-SABR Baseball Research Award.   The Montreal Expos played 36 seasons (1969-2004). For the last 28, their home was Olympic Stadium – a cavernous concrete edifice built for the 1976 Summer Olympic Games. From the outset, “The Big O” was notorious: hailed as […]