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Roberto Clemente’s greatness transcended the diamond. On it, he was electrifying with his penchant for bad-ball hitting, his strong throwing arm from right field, and the way he played with a reckless but controlled abandon. Off it, he was a role model to the people of his homeland and elsewhere. Helping others represented the way […]

Some would call Paul Splittorff the “original Royal” because he was selected in Kansas City’s first amateur draft, started in the franchise’s first game and the first game at Kaufman Stadium, pitched for 15 seasons, and served as a broadcaster for 24 years. The bespectacled blond left-hander with the high leg kick appeared to squint […]

Few players in the history of major-league baseball have displayed each of the prized “five tools,” meaning the ability to hit for average and for power, to run, to field, and to throw. On that  short list belongs the name of Ellis Burks, who began his major-league career as a 22-year-old rookie for the Boston […]

On October 10, 1924, Virgil “Zeke” Barnes stood on the mound in Griffith Stadium, poised within tantalizing reach of a rare and coveted prize, just four outs shy of a Game 7 World Series win. Palpably close, but it was not to be. His moment of reckoning came with an improbable, aberrant bounce of the […]

Marcus Thames made an unforgettable debut with the New York Yankees on June 10, 2002, when he hit a home run off future Hall of Famer Randy Johnson in his first major-league at-bat. Hitting home runs became the trademark for the right-handed slugger, not because of the total number he amassed over his 10-year major-league […]

Among the newcomers on the Brooklyn Superbas roster for the 1903 season was right-handed pitcher Henry Schmidt. At almost 30, he was getting a rather late shot at a major-league career, but had earned a look as a 35-game winner in the California League the season before. Soon Schmidt discovered that getting out National League […]

Marty McManus lived a life in baseball, spanning the years 1920 through 1948. He played as a major-league infielder for 15 years and was player-manager for the Boston Red Sox for most of the 1932 and 1933 seasons. When women began to play pro baseball during World War II with the launch of the All-American […]

Burt Hooton is one of a few quality pitchers who parlayed the use of a devastating signature pitch into a long and effective major league career. Hurlers who relied on a distinctive pitch include Christy Mathewson (“fadeaway”); Carl Hubbell (screwball); Roy Face (forkball); Mariano Rivera (cutter); and Hooton, who baffled big league hitters with a […]

Born June 19, 1949, in St. Louis and then raised there, Jerry Reuss made his major league debut for the team he cheered on as a child; and then was traded by that team because the owner didn’t like his mustache. At his next stop he was considered “the asshole of all time1” by his […]

“I express my thoughts. I’m a screamer, a yeller, and a cusser. I never hold back,” Dallas Green said after he was named manager of the Philadelphia Phillies in 1979.”1 With his no-nonsense confrontational style, attention to detail, unmatched work ethic, and passion for baseball in the “old-school” tradition, Dallas Green led the Phillies to […]

Viola Thompson’s contribution to World War II was a rather unusual one. She didn’t do war work in a factory, or enlist in the armed services. Rather, she became a pitcher in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL), and helped to keep the national pastime going during the war years. She was modest about […]

One teammate said Brad Radke was his hero. Another said Radke had more heart than anyone he ever played with. His pitching coach — after nearly three decades in professional baseball — said Radke was the man he respected most in the game. Stoic toughness. Steady reliability. Big-game guts. Brad Radke displayed it all during […]

Baseball was already a fixture on the Cuban scene by the early 1870s and it had arrived burdened with its own home-grown Cuban apostles and its own full-blown and home-spun creation myths. It is well documented that a pair of Havana-bred brothers named Guilló (often misspelled as Guillot) had returned from Mobile, Alabama’s Springhill College […]

Despite winning three professional batting titles, outfielder Luis Mercedes played only 70 major-league games over parts of three seasons (1991-1993) for the Baltimore Orioles and San Francisco Giants. After retiring, he became a renowned hitting instructor in his native Dominican Republic. Luis Roberto Mercedes Santana was born on February 15, 1968, in San Pedro de […]

Joe Quinn’s 17 seasons between 1884 and 1901 marked the first appearance by an Australian in major league baseball. For 102 years, Quinn was the only player from “Down Under” to feature at the top level of American pro ball, and he remains the only Australian to manage in the major leagues. He played on […]

Jackie Robinson is perhaps the most historically significant baseball player ever, ranking with Babe Ruth in terms of his impact on the national pastime. Ruth changed the way baseball was played; Jackie Robinson changed the way Americans thought. When Robinson took the field for the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, 1947, more than 60 years […]

Sportsman’s Park was home of the St. Louis Browns from 1902 to 1953. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library.)   Introduction Achieving on-field success has often proved elusive to owners of the Baltimore Orioles and its predecessor teams, the St. Louis Browns and Milwaukee Brewers. The franchise, dating back to the inception of the American […]

Ken Griffey Jr. slides in with the winning run for the Seattle Mariners on Edgar Martinez’s 11th-inning double to beat the New York Yankees 6-5 in Game Five of the American League Division Series on October 8, 1995. The excitement of the Mariners’ first playoff appearance helped fuel a political effort to build a new […]

This article appears in SABR’s “The Stars Shone on Philadelphia: The 1934 Negro National League Champions” (2023), edited by Frederick C. Bush and Bill Nowlin.   Ed Bolden’s Philadelphia Stars represented a part of the greater Philadelphia area’s civic and social fabric for two decades. For most of that time, Bolden himself represented the heart […]

  The history of Maple City Park in Hornell, New York, spans everyone from Babe Ruth and Maury Wills to minor-leaguers with a single season’s statistical line. There’s a hefty portion of Brooklyn Dodgers nostalgia mixed into the story, as well as memories of the long-ago days when everyday people could pool their cash donations […]

Few multi-purpose stadiums in North American history can rival Toronto’s Exhibition Stadium for the number, variety and stature of events held there. Set in a vast fairgrounds complex on the shore of Lake Ontario, the municipal facility originally known as Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) Stadium served as the largest sports and entertainment venue in Canada’s […]