Search Results

“What I have done after my baseball career and being able to help people with their lives — means more to me than all the things I did in baseball.” — Don Newcombe1   Don Newcombe was the third black pitcher to appear in a major-league game after Dan Bankhead and Satchel Paige. Playing at […]

This infielder was the original “Sugar Bear” — several years ahead of Floyd Rayford, who bore the same nickname in the 1980s. With their pleasant, sleepy-eyed expressions, both men resembled the easygoing cartoon character in the ads for Post Super Sugar Crisp cereal. Yet contrary to popular belief, that is not how Blanks got his […]

When danger arose and duty called, mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent would duck into a telephone booth to change into Superman. The typically phlegmatic Dr. Bruce Banner, if sufficiently provoked, would struggle not to unleash his alter ego, the Incredible Hulk. The metamorphosis of Venezuelan pitcher Roberto Muñoz was far less dramatic and indefinitely less colorful; […]

Charles Francis “Charlie” Berry had one of the most extraordinary sports careers of the 20th century. He was a two-sport athlete who plied his craft as a player and official for more than 40 years. He was a National Football League end, a major-league baseball catcher, a college football coach, a minor-league baseball manager, an […]

Bill Davidson – commonly known as “Davy” – was in the majors as an outfielder from the tail end of the 1909 season through 1911. His career was nothing spectacular, but there he was in “The Show,” in Cubs and Dodgers Blue (Superbas Blue, if you want to split hairs). His 1954 obituary in the […]

A two-out, seventh inning single by New York Mets’ right fielder Ron Swoboda was the margin between a 21-year-old left-hander and a no-hitter – a feat that would otherwise have capped the youngster’s fine, 16-win, 1965 season. Possessing one of the greatest curveballs of his time, his immediate splash in the major leagues had the […]

Brian Daubach was a first baseman-DH who was trapped in the minor leagues from 1990 to 1998. In 1999 he played for the Boston Red Sox and became a 27-year-old rookie sensation, earning the nickname “The Bellville Basher.” From 1999 to 2002, Daubach hit 20 or more home runs for Boston in his first four […]

Fear. Ballplayers don’t like to talk about it. Rarely is a pitcher so fearsome that he can’t be ignored. Walter Johnson was one. Bob Feller. Randy Johnson. Ewell Blackwell was one. Batters weren’t called cowards when they admitted they were afraid of him. Ewell Blackwell was “The Whip,” a long, lanky sidearming right-hander who threw […]

George Magerkurth was a National League umpire from 1929 to 1947, one of the best of the era. “He had bulldog features and disposition to match,” said sportswriter Arthur Daley. “He had many faults but he was a colorful man of unassailable integrity who made rich contribution to baseball lore and legend.”1 The New York […]

At the age of 39, Lester Willis got his first invitation to a major-league spring-training camp. In February 1947 in Tucson, Arizona, Willis, a left-handed pitcher who had spent 13 seasons in the minor leagues, caught the attention of Cleveland Indians manager Lou Boudreau immediately. According to one newspaper account, Boudreau, on the first day […]

On athletic fields – both baseball and football – John Clifford Happenny was eclipsed by Hall of Famers. Only after his retirement from sports did his light fully shine, as the former Chicago White Sox infielder (32 games in 1923) became a senior executive at utility companies in Oklahoma and Illinois, and a leader in […]

The year 2008 was supposed to be the coming-out party for Nate McLouth, then an outfielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He made his first All-Star team, captured his first Gold Glove, and tied for the NL lead with 46 doubles. But the party was short-lived. Due to injuries, McLouth never achieved that level of success […]

His prep school coach almost kicked the youngster off the team, saying he was too hardheaded to ever make it as a ballplayer. The coach was wrong. Dutch Ruether had a long and successful career in professional baseball. He had a number of things in common with his future roommate, Babe Ruth, and outperformed the […]

A hard-throwing, spectacularly talented left-hander who posted the best single-season earned run average in American League history in 1914, Dutch Leonard was also one of the Deadball Era’s most controversial figures. At nearly every stop along his journey in professional baseball, Leonard feuded with management over his salary, and at one point was even suspended […]

Pitcher Roy Patterson is best remembered for throwing the first pitch (and recording the first win) in American League history. The 24-year-old right-hander, who would soon become known as the “Boy Wonder,” took the mound at Chicago’s South Side Park on April 24, 1901. Nearly 10,000 fans saw Patterson and the Chicago White Stockings defeat […]

Glenn Myatt spent 16 years in the majors, 13 with the Cleveland Indians. The Indians released him in 1935 when he was 37 years old. Thinking he still had some game left in him, Myatt sent out telegrams to other teams looking for a job. Bill Terry of the New York Giants signed him. His […]

On Monday evening, September 22, 1947, the “sizzling steaks [were] on the house . . . [and] free gravy down the shirt front” was de rigueur at 600 Flatbush Avenue.1 Pitcher Hugh Casey, proprietor of Hugh Casey’s Steak and Chop House, was optimistically throwing a victory dinner party for his Dodgers teammates. Brooklyn’s beloved “Bums” […]

Left-handed pitcher George Zackert was one of a trio of 1911 St. Louis Cardinals who made their major-league debuts on the same day. He was also released by the same Cardinals organization three times in eight months, and had one trade that was negotiated by unauthorized personnel director Roger Bresnahan get “busted up.” He surrendered […]

A journeyman who spent parts of seven seasons in the American League, Wally Mayer joined the Red Sox in 1917 and spent two campaigns as a reserve catcher.   Although he did not appear in the 1918 World Series, “Kid” Mayer did help Boston get there by smacking a pair of 12th-inning game-winning hits against AL […]

There used to be a ballpark on the edge of Burlington’s Intervale, near the intersection of North Prospect Street and Riverside Avenue. It was known as Athletic Park, and from 1903 to 1906 it was the home of Burlington’s team in the first of Vermont’s legendary Northern Leagues. During those years Athletic Park was the […]

In the time when Giants walked the earth and roamed the Polo Grounds, none was more honored than Christy Mathewson. Delivering all four of his pitches, including his famous “fadeaway” (now called a screwball), with impeccable control and an easy motion, the right-handed Mathewson was the greatest pitcher of the Deadball Era’s first decade, compiling […]

John “Beans” Reardon, left, wearing a flu mask underneath his umpire’s mask, prepares to call a pitch in a California Winter League game on January 26, 1919, in Pasadena, California. During a global influenza pandemic, all players and fans were required by city ordinance to wear facial coverings at all times while outdoors. The catcher […]

Earl Weaver did not go gently. Nearing the end of his disappointing final season in 1986, the Baltimore Orioles’ fiery manager continued to dispute umpires’ calls. On September 21, Weaver received an 11th-inning ejection from home-plate umpire Al Clark while arguing a catcher’s-interference call. It was the 97th and final ejection of the manager’s volatile […]

Already pacing the American League West less than two months into the 2017 season, the Houston Astros broke even further from the pack with 11 wins in a row. The streak’s most improbable chapter was on Memorial Day, May 29—at first a pitchers’ duel, then a rout in favor of the host Minnesota Twins and, […]