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Warren Lahr with the 1949 Cleveland Browns. (Author’s Collection)   In December 1949, Cleveland Browns defensive back Warren Lahr reached out to Cleveland Indians general manager Hank Greenberg with a surprising request—he wanted a tryout. At 26, and despite his potential as a future defensive star in professional football, Lahr was exploring a career change. […]

Lenny Randle (SABR-Rucker Archive)   WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO YOU? Reality check: Playing professional baseball is a job. It requires supreme skill, demanding hours, cultural fit, and a balancing act to win approval from demanding, unpredictable bosses who control when you play, even if you’ll be traded. The pressure can become overwhelming. When you feel […]

In December 2007, a huge collection of documents, most related to the Black Sox scandal and all of them originating in the offices of the lawyers of White Sox owner Charles Comiskey, was purchased at auction by the Chicago History Museum for nearly $100,000. Among the documents are the reports from the detectives whom Comiskey […]

In 1935 the City of Detroit forged a bond to its sporting teams that is an integral part of the psychology of the city, even today.In 1935 the City of Detroit forged a bond to its sporting teams that is an integral part of the psychology of the city, even today. What makes Detroit a […]

Choices … Decisions: A player has already connected for one double, one triple, and one homer in the game and needs only a simple single in his next plate appearance to achieve the cherished cycle—one of baseball’s rarest accomplishments and one that will inscribe his name permanently in the record books. If he comes through […]

As late as the 1980s, the softball/baseball Minneapolis Millerettes were one of Minnesota’s forgotten professional sports teams.1 Eventually, the Millerettes and other female ballplayers in the 1940s and 1950s got the spotlight they deserved. Reunions and the development of a players association led to an exhibit at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, […]

INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT As the twenty-first century began, the commissioner’s office and many team owners were concerned about competitive imbalance. After free agency began in the 1970s, some teams were able to use their financial heft to gain a competitive edge, especially those with lucrative local radio and television contracts; the New York Yankees, for […]

A few days before the 1879 season closed, the Chicago Inter Ocean reported the local White Stockings (who would finish fourth in the National League standings) would probably generate $2,000 to $3,000 profit for the season. Pennant-winning Providence would “make a trifle.” Fifth-place Cincinnati was estimated to lose not less than $8,000. First runner-up Boston […]

Were it not for the Chicago Defender, New York Amsterdam News, Pittsburgh Courier, Baltimore Afro-American, and other African American newspapers, there would have been scant coverage of Black professional baseball. White-owned and -run dailies like the Chicago Tribune, New York Times, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and Washington Post published few informative articles on the African American baseball […]

Jackie laughed. “Baseball isn’t all about home runs,” he said. “It’s a team sport. You have to trust the other players as much as you trust yourself.”1   A Big Day For Baseball (2019), written by Mary Pope Osborne and illustrated by Sal Murdocca. (Courtesy of Penguin Random House)   When Jackie Robinson debuted for […]

In my years as a traveling baseball writer, namely 1946 through 1958, I believe I bridged the gap between the yesteryear of hero worship and the modern adversary era. When I came along, writers were just beginning to find warts on athletes’ faces. Now? Heck, they’re apt to see nothing but. Somewhere, of course, there […]

Ben Yoshiwara, senior photo. (University High School, Chieftain yearbook, Los Angeles, California, 1940) On Sunday, December 7, 1941, at 2:00 PM, Los Angeles Nippons pitcher Ben Yoshiwara stood on the mound in Los Angeles, staring down a lineup of Paramount Studio Cubs.1 In the third inning, FBI agents arrived, and murmurs about the attack on […]

Seattle Nippon and Keio University in 1914. (Rob Fitts Collection)   INTRODUCTION Between 1890 and 1910, over 100,000 Japanese immigrated to the West Coast of the United States. Many settled in the urban centers of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Seattle. Within a few years, each of these immigrant communities had thriving baseball clubs. The […]

Historical Backdrop Although the first all-professional baseball organization, the National Association, was established in 1871, only six years after the Civil War, Major League Baseball began with the establishment of the National League in 1876. MLB’s first seven decades took place against of backdrop of Reconstruction, Jim Crow laws, and lynchings, and MLB was a […]

Shorty Fuller (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)   What is a catch? A player grasps the ball. At some instant the catch is completed. If the player drops the ball before this instant, a catch has not occurred. If he drops the ball after this instant, this does not change the fact of the […]

June 29, 1979, was a night unlike any other at San Diego Stadium. Fans were gnarled in a four-mile-long traffic jam and the start of the game was delayed 36 minutes.1 Gaylord Perry was scheduled to face Houston’s Joaquin Andujar that night. But the capacity crowd of 47,022 was not necessarily there to see baseball.2 […]

The 1984 Winter Meetings in Houston, Texas, took place in the midst of important leadership transitions for both major-league baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association. Baseball had a new commissioner — Peter Ueberroth, an outsider best known for founding First Travel Corporation and for his role in the highly praised and financially successful […]

  The major league baseball clubs of Cleveland and Cincinnati have much in common. They call the same state home. Both have established a proud tradition that dates back to the nineteenth century, and have enjoyed success and endured failure. They are mid-market teams who can afford to compete when managing resources wisely, but can’t […]

For 62 years the Green Bay Packers played a portion of their regular-season home games in Milwaukee. They were an anachronism, the Packers; the last of the small-town football teams that had spawned what became a behemoth in American sports, the multibillion-dollar National Football League. As the league grew in popularity, so too did its […]

Two seasons ago, I witnessed the Florida Marlins attempt to execute a classic Earl Weaver maneuver. It was the fifth inning of a game in Milwaukee. The Marlins, down 1–0, had runners on first and third with two outs. As the pitcher was winding up for the next batter, I nudged my buddy in the […]

Harry Passon, the Jewish owner of a sporting goods store, played a strategic role in promoting both black and white semi-pro baseball in Philadelphia. (Courtesy of the Passon Family)   Semi-professional baseball, black and white, flourished in Philadelphia in the first half of the twentieth century. Harry Passon (1897–1954), a Jewish owner of Philadelphia’s leading […]

On November 8, 1960, John F. Kennedy was elected president, ushering in an era of political comity and refreshed vision. Not to be outdone, the major-league owners were busily ushering in their own visionary plans, culminating in the historic Winter Meetings of 1960. On December 7, the final day of the meetings at the Park […]

Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in Journalism History, Vol. 32, No. 1, Spring 2006.   Had baseball card collecting been popular in the 1920s, fans of the nascent Negro leagues likely would have coveted the cards of Andrew “Rube” Foster, C.I. Taylor, Ed Bolden, and John Blount. Because these men were team owners and […]