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Pittsfield, Massachusetts, was the geographic center of Boston Red Sox catcher Howie Storie’s life. He was born in the Western Massachusetts city, grew up there, worked there after baseball, died there, and is buried there. He played six games for the Red Sox in 1931 and six in 1932. That was it, Storie’s major-league career. […]

Joe Mulligan began to make headlines in the Boston area while pitching for Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts. Throwing a six-hit shutout against Providence College on June 10, 1933, while striking out 11 and not walking a batter earned some attention. So did being driven off the mound when Boston College scored seven times […]

Fred Burchell pitched in 49 major-league games over four seasons and never once posted an earned-run average as high as 3.00. Burchell was born into a large family at Perth Amboy, New Jersey, on July 14, 1879. His father, William, worked as an engineer, and his mother, Emily, bore at least eight children, of whom […]

Some major league players are blessed with good fortune. Their talents are discovered early, they remain relatively healthy throughout their careers, and they always seem to be in the right place at the right time. Bob Ramazzotti was not one of those guys. His career began late, was interrupted by war, and was stifled by […]

As a player on the great New York Yankees teams of the 1950s and later as a manager with five different major-league clubs, Billy Martin was known to be brash, bold, and fearless. He played the game hard and made no excuses for the way he handled himself on or off the field. Many people, […]

For someone who participated in only 855 major-league games spread over nine seasons, Ed Abbaticchio has had more questions raised about his life than most baseball fans might expect. Was he the first Italian American big leaguer? Was he the first professional dual-sport athlete? Was he the creator of the spiral punt? Why did he […]

Eight major-leaguers died while serving in World War I.1 The third of these casualties, Eddie Grant, had the longest playing career and is also well remembered because he received a plaque in center field at the Polo Grounds. The shortest career on this list belonged to Alexander Thomson Burr, a pitcher who played just one […]

Joe DiMaggio put his name on a book titled Lucky to Be a Yankee. His teammate Arndt Jorgens seconded the emotion. In 10 years as a backup catcher behind Hall of Famer Bill Dickey, Jorgens cashed five World Series checks totaling around $30,000 without appearing in a single Series game. As the Yankees’ second- or […]

In 1883 the Worcester Ruby Legs became the Philadelphia Quakers and shortly the Phillies. From then until 1980, there were no World Series titles for the Phillies. They won just two National League pennants, in 1915 and in 1950, when a quiet, scholarly but rugged man named Eddie Sawyer led the club called the Whiz […]

Jim Thorpe was the greatest all-around athlete of the Deadball Era. In addition to playing major-league baseball for six seasons, the 6-foor-1, 185-pound Thorpe was an Olympic champion in the pentathlon and decathlon and at one point the greatest American football player in history, according to a 1977 Sport magazine poll. One sportswriter called him […]

With his trademark dark glasses and red socks, Bob Addie, the son of a New York City butcher, was a respected and popular fixture on the Washington sports and social scene for almost 40 years. A columnist and Senators beat writer for the Washington Times-Herald and the Washington Post, Addie served as president of the […]

Robert Francis “Bob” McKinney, best known as a member of the 1901 Philadelphia Athletics during the inaugural season of the American League, was born on October 4, 1875, in McSherrystown, Pennsylvania. His father, Joseph Gregory McKinney, was of Irish descent and served in the 22nd Pennsylvania Cavalry during the Civil War. After the war McKinney […]

Eddie McGah’s first visit to Fenway Park was on June 22, 1939. He was there at the invitation of the Boston Red Sox, who gave him a number 15 jersey. He was just 17 at the time, but had made the three-day train trip across the country to join the team and get a feel […]

Right-hander Jimmie LeRoy “Hot Rod” McDonald was undefeated (1-0) as a pitcher for the team that first signed him. He won the only postseason game he ever pitched, Game Five of the 1953 World Series. He had a successful baseball career that ran from 1945 to 1960. McDonald was born in Grants Pass, Oregon, on […]

He made his way from the Moline Plowboys to the major leagues, but John Kroner was unique at the time: the only registered pharmacist in major-league ball. This led to predictable lines such as “Pharmacist Kroner Fills Prescription.” [1] His was a career that saw him a contender for rookie of the year in 1936, […]

The elevator speech for Johnny Barney Wyrostek (pronounced Wy-ROSS-tek) would summarize his career as: outfielder, batted left, threw right, two All-Star Game appearances, three teams, seven seasons in the minors, 11 seasons in the majors, 58 homers, and 1,149 hits. But he was also a father of five, a deputy sheriff, a union carpenter, and […]

Rube Foster was the star of the 1915 World Series, pitching two complete-game wins for the Boston Red Sox in a five-game series against the Philadelphia Phillies and going 4-for-8 at the plate. His ninth-inning single won Game Two. Foster played pro ball for just one team in the big leagues, the Red Sox, with […]

In late season 1910, buoyed by an impressive batting performance in his first 18 games in the major leagues, it appeared that the Cleveland Naps had found a long-term answer to their search for a first baseman to replace longtime incumbent George Stovall in the person of 25-year-old Eddie Hohnhorst. Unfortunately for Hohnhorst, and for […]

The 25,882 fans who ventured to Memorial Stadium in Baltimore on the evening of August 24, 1983, saw an exciting, extra-inning win by the home team in the midst of a tight pennant race. As a bonus, they also witnessed baseball’s version of The Twilight Zone. The Orioles came into that Wednesday night game against […]

For the first time since 1955, the Milwaukee Braves entered the final week of the season with National League pennant hopes out of reach. As they prepared to host the Pittsburgh Pirates on Sunday, September 25, 1960, in their home finale, the Braves’ postseason hopes were already dashed despite their taking the first two games […]

The first-place Reds looked to expand a small lead in the NL pennant race against the perennially downtrodden Astros in a doubleheader at Crosley Field. After jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the first inning of the first game on a double by Vada Pinson and a sacrifice fly by Pete Rose, Cincinnati stopped […]

In Game Two of the 1951 World Series, Eddie Lopat of the New York Yankees bested Larry Jansen of the New York Giants in a 3-1 complete-game triumph at Yankee Stadium, knotting the series after the Giants’ Game One win. But Mickey Mantle’s knee injury, which sidelined the talented rookie for the rest of the […]

Warren Spahn joined the elite group of 300-game winners with a 2-1 victory over the Chicago Cubs on August 11, 1961, ending the longest gap ever between 300-game winners. The Red Sox’ Lefty Grove had won his 300th game 20 years and 17 days earlier, on July 25, 1941. Fans wanted to witness what they […]

In conjunction with SABR’s Eight Myths Out project, here are specific examples of factual errors or misinformation that appear in Eight Men Out, both the 1963 best-selling book written by Eliot Asinof and the 1988 film directed by John Sayles. Certain entries on this list may seem like pedantic nitpicking: surnames misspelled, Abe Attell’s boxing […]