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If laughter is the best medicine, then Lou Costello should have won a Nobel Prize. Costello’s legacy of laughter rests on a body of work encompassing burlesque, Broadway, radio, films and television. Its anchor is a baseball comedy sketch derived from a burlesque staple — straight man explaining to a friend that words known primarily […]

For a player who endured nicknames such as Twiggy Mini-Hawk, and Mighty Mouse for his light weight and short stature, Bud Harrelson is perhaps best known to the casual baseball fan getting into a fight. There’s no doubt that Pete Rose got the better of him in their brawl at second base during Game Three […]

After winning the American League pennant by 12 games in 1946, the Boston Red Sox had slipped to third in 1947, finishing 14 games behind the champion New York Yankees and two games back of the second-place Detroit Tigers. In an attempt to improve their hitting and pitching, the Red Sox pulled the trigger on […]

Grantland Rice called it “The Greatest Game Ever Played in Dixie.” He was referring to the September 19, 1908, showdown between the New Orleans Pelicans, tossing their 39-year-old ace, Ted  Beitenstein, and the Nashville Volunteers. Nashville manager Bill Bernhard bypassed his more experienced pitchers and sent Vedder Sitton to the hill. Sitton had begun the […]

A hard-throwing right-hander, Fred Beebe began and ended his major-league career in fine style. As a rookie in 1906, he posted 15 wins and led the National League in strikeouts. Ten years later, he provided excellent spot starter-relief work as a midseason Cleveland Indians call-up. In between, Beebe suffered from bouts of wildness, arm problems, […]

On a summer afternoon in 1935, 17-year-old Ed Head was on a bus to Mer Rouge, Louisiana. Head, a left-handed pitcher for the semipro Pioneer (Louisiana) team, was on his way to play a game against the Mer Rouge team. He and his girlfriend were seated on the left side of the bus (facing forward), […]

Fresno High School in California has produced eight major-league pitchers, most notably Tom Seaver, a 1962 graduate who earned a plaque in Cooperstown with 311 wins in 20 seasons. In contrast, the big-league career of 1926 alumnus Howard Craghead consisted of 15 mop-up appearances out of the Cleveland Indians bullpen in 1931 and 1933. The […]

When he arrived upon the major league scene in early 1906, the attribute of left-handed pitcher Carl Druhot that most intrigued big city sportswriters was his diminutive size. Press reports and game accounts so regularly identified him as “Little Druhot” that baseball fans might well have supposed that the descriptive was the newcomer’s first name. […]

Entertaining and irritating by turns, outfielder Chuck Carr was known for his speed and cocky personality. Carr’s running ability was what made him fun to watch. He made many circus catches and stole a lot of bases. That made him a fan favorite in Miami, where he enjoyed his best year in 1993 for the […]

Harold Wolfe is among the several baseball players from northern Ohio to make it to the big leagues via the minor-league Duluth (Minnesota) White Sox in the second decade of the 20th century. The White Sox player-manager from 1909 to 1916 was Cleveland native Thomas J. “Darby” (aka “Dook”) O’Brien (1876-1964). O’Brien recruited boys from […]

An integral player on the 1971 World Series Championship team in Pittsburgh, a three-time All-Star and Most Valuable Player vote-getter in Philadelphia, Dave Cash spent his 12-year career as a reliable and often stellar second baseman. Cash has been credited with coining the phrase ‘Yes We Can’ as the Phillies ended their 26-year postseason drought […]

Across the decades, various New York Yankee, New York Giant, and Brooklyn Dodger baseball names have acted on-screen. Babe Ruth, for one, appeared in silent-era features; played himself in The Pride of the Yankees (1942), the Lou Gehrig biopic; and starred in various short subjects. Gehrig was toplined in Rawhide (1938), a B-Western. Jackie Robinson […]

Fernando Valenzuela is probably the most famous Mexican-born player ever to compete in major-league baseball, but that distinction is closer than one might expect. Or at least there is a strong argument that Valenzuela deserves company atop the Mexican ballplayer hierarchy. Vinny Castilla ended his 16-year big-league career as the all-time leader among Mexican-born players […]

Win Noyes was one of several ballplayers for whom service in World War I interrupted a promising big-league career. His brief stint with the 1919 White Sox was merely a footnote in a long, if not especially distinguished, baseball career. Various baseball references say Winfield Charles Noyes was born on June 16, 1889, in Pleasanton, […]

Half of the most famous version of the “Pretzel Battery,” catcher Heinie Peitz was a noted “coacher”—more of a bench jockey in modern parlance—whose mouth gained him nearly as much attention as his play. For nine years of his 16-season (1892–1906, 1913) career, he was a Cincinnati Reds mainstay. When he retired, Peitz ranked 12th […]

If a player collects six hits in his first day in the majors and no one sees or reads about it, did it still happen? Unfortunately, rookie first baseman Guy Sturdy’s stellar doubleheader debut on September 30, 1927, for the seventh-place St. Louis Browns occurred on their last home date of the season, and one […]

Doug DeCinces spent the first part of his major-league career shaking off comparisons to a Baltimore Orioles legend. Then, before he could make his mark in Baltimore, he was traded to make room for another Oriole icon. DeCinces essentially bridged a path between two Hall of Fame infielders, Brooks Robinson and Cal Ripken Jr.   […]

In his 92 years of life, Clarence Eldridge wrote for big-city newspapers, practiced law, held leadership roles at an automobile manufacturer, worked in New York’s advertising world, occupied senior positions at two well-known food companies, and served as a marketing and management consultant with such sagacity that he was eventually elected to the American advertising […]

On November 12, 1982, Joe Altobelli was named the seventh manager in Baltimore Orioles history. Piloting one of the 26 major-league teams was surely an enviable position to hold. Unfortunately, for Altobelli, he was supplanting a legend. Earl Weaver, Baltimore’s field manager from mid-1968 to 1982, led the Orioles to six division titles, four pennants […]

During the winter of 1935-1936 Connie Mack completed the destruction of his last winning dynasty. Since capturing his third straight pennant in 1931, Mack had traded or sold six of his regular position players and his top three pitchers to raise the cash he needed to keep his Philadelphia Athletics afloat during the Depression. The […]

Venezuelan infielder Dámaso Blanco was 30 years old and in his 12th pro season when his dream finally came true with the San Francisco Giants. He told me the story in 2010. “The most important moment in my baseball career as an active player came on May 26, 1972. That day I played in my […]

On July 27, 1955, the players and staff of the Cleveland Indians presented a brand-new $3,000 Oldsmobile to coach Red Kress for his untiring work with the team. The Indians’ third baseman, Al Rosen. summed it up by saying that the team wanted to do something for Red to pay him back for all he […]

On October 14, 1965, the Minnesota Twins lost a heartbreaking World Series Game Seven to Sandy Koufax and the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2-0. While the disappointment was palpable, there was every reason to believe the Twins would soon be back in the Series. The team had won the pennant convincingly with a record of 102-60, […]

Editor’s note: This article first appeared in the SABR Baseball Research Journal, Vol. 37, in 2008.   When the Boston Red Sox won the World Series in 1918, it was their fifth triumph in the fifteen years of the modern classic. The club had the best player in baseball, outfielder-pitcher Babe Ruth, another top hitter […]