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From calling baserunners safe to keeping schoolchildren safe, Luther Derr Sahm had a long and eventful life – much of it spent under a professional alias. He called himself Doll Derr,1 and it is under that distinctive name that he appears in major-league records as an umpire in the National League for 28 games in […]

Hector Headley Lopez, the Panamanian-born third baseman for the Kansas City Athletics, saw his solid career shift to a better team when the A’s traded him to the New York Yankees on May 26, 1959. After more than four seasons in Kansas City as a regular infielder, mostly at third base, Lopez continued to play […]

Though Mose YellowHorse toed the rubber for two underachieving Pittsburgh Pirates teams in 1921 and 1922, he left an indelible mark on the club and its fanbase. Because of his off-the-field antics and on-the-field accomplishments, YellowHorse was a longtime fan favorite. Those in executive and administrative positions with the Pirates were not so quick to […]

Of the 22 men who played for the Boston Red Stockings over the five years from 1871 through 1875, 17 were American-born and the other five were born in other countries. There was one Canadian, one Irishman, and three from England. George Hall (Stepney) and Harry Wright (Sheffield) were both English natives. So was Samuel […]

Quietly dependable though seldom spectacular for most of his five full major-league seasons as an infielder, Steve Yerkes grasped immortality when he played a central role in one of baseball’s legendary episodes. In the bottom of the 10th inning of the deciding game of the epic 1912 World Series, Yerkes raced home with the winning […]

The first American to win both a World Series ring and an Olympic gold medal, Pat Borders played parts of 17 major league seasons (1988-2005) for nine different teams.1 When the Blue Jays won consecutive championships in 1992 and 1993, he caught more innings than any American Leaguer both years and earned 1992 World Series […]

Right-handed pitcher Cory Bailey was a 15th-round draft pick of the Boston Red Sox in 1991 at the age of 20. His lengthy career ran through 2008 and featured stints in both the American League and National League, as well as Japan’s Central League, Taiwan’s Chinese Professional Baseball League, and Venezuela’s winter league. In the […]

Right-hander Walt Masterson labored many years for the Washington Senators, almost always with losing records for a series of losing teams despite an earned run average of 3.98 over his 11 seasons with Washington. He also pitched in four seasons for the Boston Red Sox and in one (his final season) for the Detroit Tigers. […]

Jack Ryan was actually born as Jack Ryan; his first name was not a nickname. He did acquire some colorful nicknames in baseball, however: “Gulfport” was one, but he was also known as “Coffee Grounds” and “Mud Artist.”1 And the Red Sox once traded Cy Young to get him. Later in his career, he was […]

Variously called the Candy Kid, the LaCrosse Lulu, the Big Bohemian, and even Edward the Mighty—but known in boxscores simply as “Koney”—Ed Konetchy led his league’s first basemen in fielding eight times and batted .281 in 2,085 games. His 2,150 hits included 344 doubles, 182 triples (15th all time), and 74 home runs. Koney was […]

Center field at Yankee Stadium is hallowed ground. Once upon a time, Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle patrolled this section of the House That Ruth Built. Now, granted, Bernie Williams — whose 16-season New York Yankees career lasted from 1991 to 2006 — may at best be a borderline Cooperstown inductee, but he is a […]

Frank Carswell was a right-handed pitcher whose career began in 1944 with the local Dan Montgomerys of Buffalo, New York; included stints in the Negro Leagues with the Cleveland Buckeyes, Harlem Colored Giants, Harlem Globetrotters, Chicago American Giants, and Indianapolis Clowns; and ended with a postseason barnstorming gig with Jackie Robinson’s New York All-Stars in […]

After eight years as a Boston regular, longtime third baseman Larry Gardner was sent by the Red Sox to Philadelphia in early 1918 as part of the Stuffy McInnis trade. Including McInnis, nine men were used at third base by Boston during 1918. Playing the most games at third (41) was 25-year old Fred Thomas. Thomas […]

Big Bill James’s involvement, if any, in the 1919 Black Sox Scandal remains curiously unexplored by most baseball historians. Yet the tall right-handed pitcher from Michigan pops up in three different game-fixing incidents during the Deadball Era. As a member of the Chicago White Sox for just two months in 1919, James saw little action […]

A celebrated base ball character” was A. G. Spalding’s succinct description of Bob Addy, who was his teammate on three separate clubs.1 Others who knew Addy well referred to him as a philosopher or as a wag or as the “Honorable Bob.” The reasons behind that last tag remain unknown, but it certainly sounds like the sort […]

“His rise from the ‘bushes’ to the big show has been phenomenal,” gushed one report about Big Bill Steele.1 Two years removed from the sandlots, Steele jumped from a Class B league to the majors, debuting with the St. Louis Cardinals as a September call-up in 1910. That fall the spitballer won his first three […]

Cupid Childs was one of the best hitting major league second basemen during the late nineteenth century, not to mention a better-than-average fielder who possessed great range on the diamond. Only four other second basemen in the history of major league baseball have averaged more total chances per game than Childs. His all-around outstanding play […]

The 2002 World Series was the first between two wild-card teams.1 This Series had no Cy Young Award winners, 2 and as of 2024, none of the participants had been inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. One team, the Anaheim Angels, had never reached the World Series in their 42-year history.3 The other, […]

The NL dominated the headlines on the last day of the 1951 regular season. With identical 95-58 records, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants squared off against their respective opponents, Philadelphia and Boston, on the road with the chance to claim the pennant or end the season in a tie, thus necessitating a […]

Elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2025, left-handed reliever Billy Wagner had a career 2.31 earned-run average in 853 games over 16 major-league seasons. He was a seven-time All-Star with 422 saves, eighth-most in big-league history through the 2024 season. He pitched for five different teams, working the longest with the Houston […]

Dave “Beauty” Bancroft made his name primarily on defense during his Hall of Fame career as a shortstop. One of his biggest days as a hitter came on June 28, 1920, when he went 6-for-6 in the New York Giants’ 18-3 win over the Philadelphia Phillies at the Baker Bowl in Philadelphia. Bancroft’s six-hit game […]

The Boston Red Sox lost to the Cleveland Indians on August 9, 1953, but for Red Sox fans there was something to savor – after being away for more than 15 months, Ted Williams was back in a Red Sox uniform and he’d hit his first home run. It was home run number 325 of […]

This material was gathered and re-typed from the original newspaper stories by Bill Nowlin, in 2016, to accompany publication of the SABR book Boston’s First Nine: The 1871-75 Boston Red Stockings.   Some Newspaper Coverage of the 1874 European Tour of the Red Stockings and Athletics The bulk of the material presented here is comprised […]

Imagine two strangers stranded on a South Sea island from Taos, New Mexico, and Butte, Montana. They differ in age, race, income, and religion. Their common denominator is the Colorado Rockies major-league baseball club that did not exist until a quarter-century ago. For a long time, however, the prospect of such a team in the […]