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At age 17, outfielder Greg Blosser was a prime prospect. The Boston Red Sox made him their first selection in the June 1989 draft, ahead of both Mo Vaughn and Jeff Bagwell. Scout George Digby said of the Sarasota (Florida) High School product, “He’s the best hitter to come out of this state since Mike […]

While a catcher for the Seton Hall University Pirates in 1987, Craig Biggio and two teammates – future MLB slugger Mo Vaughn and 1987 NCAA batting leader Marteese Robinson – were dubbed “The Hit Men.” After a brief time in the minor leagues through the first half of 1988, Biggio spent the next 20 years […]

Roger Clemens’ last major-league start, on October 7, 2007 — for the New York Yankees against the Cleveland Indians, the very team against which he had made his major-league debut in May 1984 — ended with him limping off the mound after only 2⅓ innings with a hamstring injury. Clemens had already allowed the Indians […]

The 1924 Cleveland Indians were mired in the second division and put out the call for talent. Eventually they looked at 43 players. Infielder Freddy Spurgeon was brought to town with seemingly no minor-league background. He had been a high-school and college multisport athlete in Michigan, but his name appeared nowhere in baseball annals in […]

Burt Keeley started a trend in 1908. As a rookie pitcher for the Washington Senators, he became the first of four major-league pitchers to throw both complete games of a doubleheader that season. A week after teammate Walter Johnson threw three straight shutouts in four days at New York – the off day was due […]

It is the rare man whose co-ownership of the New York Yankees would go unmentioned in his obituary. Yet such was the case for Bill Devery.1 Largely a silent partner in the club from its founding in 1903 until its sale a dozen years later, Devery had a negligible effect on franchise history, having left […]

In the American criminal justice system, and under the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, a person accused of a crime is considered innocent until proved guilty. But often the mere fact that he is accused can deprive him of his chosen profession and forever alter his life. So it was with Jesse Levis. A […]

The split-finger fastball became a popular weapon for pitchers in the 1980s. Few if any used it better than righty Mike Scott. With the splitter, he went from mediocrity to ace. Though many believed he was doing something else to make the ball move so much — namely, scuffing it — that was never proven […]

The Hall of Fame second baseman is not the only significant figure in New York baseball history to have the name Joe Gordon. Decades before Flash was anchoring the infield of great World War II-era Yankees teams, an earlier Joe Gordon was helping to put the franchise on the map, serving as the first president […]

Richard E. “Dick” Jacobs was the majority owner of the Cleveland Indians from December 1986 until February 2000. He purchased the team with his older brother, David H. Jacobs (1921-1992), from the estate of the late F.J. “Steve” O’Neill in December 1986 for $35.5 million.  Jacobs oversaw the restoration of the Indians to on-the-field and […]

Jason Bay is a member of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame, having worn his country’s colors in both the Little League World Series and the World Baseball Classic. Along with Lou Piniella, he is one of only two players in major-league baseball history to have been traded three times before winning the Rookie of […]

Fielder Jones was an exceptionally talented ballplayer and manager. He played while professional baseball was still in its infancy, from 1896 to 1908 and briefly in 1914 and 1915. He won pennants with Brooklyn of the NL in 1899 and 1900 and with the Chicago White Sox in 1901 and 1906. As the White Sox […]

The resume accumulated by the investor was something less than the model envisioned by Ban Johnson for club ownership in the fledgling American League. Nor was a bankroll amassed via saloon ownership, bookmaking, horse racing stables, casino operation, and service to Tammany Hall the preferred source of the financial wherewithal needed for relocation of the […]

For Larry Colton, one night in June 1968 seemingly devastated everything he had worked for. Just a few weeks after making his big-league pitching debut with the Philadelphia Phillies, a bar fight led to Colton’s shoulder separation, ending his time in The Show. During his one outing at the top level, he allowed one run […]

Pitcher Joe Slusarski rolled with a lot of punches in his career. The college star won medals with Team USA in the late 1980s and made Baseball America’s Top 100 Prospects list in 1990. Two years later, arm problems rooted in a freak accident left “Slu” a journeyman. From 1993 through 1999, he spent roughly […]

Cuban outfielder Leo Posada played in 155 games for the Kansas City Athletics from 1960 through 1962. However, his pro baseball career spanned 16 seasons as a player (1954-69) in the U.S. minors, plus a stint in Mexico. He also spent five winters in his homeland’s league, from 1955-56 until the circuit ceased to operate […]

Corner outfielder Phil Plantier spent most of the 1990s playing major-league baseball, for five different teams. He played 383 games in left field and 126 in right; he was also deployed occasionally as a designated hitter and pinch-hitter. Plantier’s best year by far was in 1993, when he homered 34 times and drove in 100 […]

In Jeff Plympton’s major-league pitching career, he never gave up a run – earned or unearned. Reading a statement such as that, one might correctly guess that his time at the top level was brief. He pitched in 279 games as a professional, but only four in the majors, for the 1991 Boston Red Sox. […]

Deacon White was a baseball pioneer. He caught baseball fever after the Civil War and played until the 1890s. His baseball career spanned the end of the amateur era and the start of professionalism, the establishment and demise of the National Association, the founding of the National League, and a players’ revolt that led to […]

Tom Monaghan has accomplished a great many things in his yet-unfinished life. The billionaire entrepreneur? Certainly. Successful businessman? Sure. Collector? Formerly, but not in any defining sense. Conservative Catholic leader? Definitely. Visionary? Maybe. Twenty-first century evangelist and savior of Western civilization? Possibly, if you talk to him. However you label the owner of the Detroit […]

The Black Sox Scandal shocked the sporting public and led to fundamental changes in the governance of professional baseball. Central to this astonishing fix were eight Chicago White Sox ballplayers, including star center-fielder Oscar “Happy” Felsch. An unpretentious Milwaukee native, the “Pride of Teutonia Avenue” only left his hometown to play ball. Felsch, one of […]

The Boston Red Sox celebrated the 100th birthday of Fenway Park on April 20, 2012. Fenway had already become the oldest park in major-league baseball, and coming off a decade of offseason renovations was envisioned to last for at least another 30 or 40 years past 2012. Fenway has hosted more than 8,000 big-league baseball […]

Before the 1901 season the ballpark called Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds was built for the AL Boston franchise (the team, later called the Red Sox, was known for the first seven seasons as the Boston Americans). The ballpark site was located at Huntington and Rogers Avenues, in the Roxbury section of Boston, and was just […]

There was much ballyhoo when, in 1962, Major League Baseball made its long-overdue move into the Deep South by awarding an expansion franchise to Houston, Texas. This was swiftly followed by a club moving to Atlanta and by two more expansion franchises in Florida. Yet in all the ballyhoo, it was largely forgotten that Major […]