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One of the most popular players ever to play for the Boston Red Sox, Rico Petrocelli will always be remembered for his familiar “Fenway Stroke” that sent many an opposing hurler’s offerings into the net atop the left field wall. Although he was not physically imposing at 6-feet and 175 pounds, he hit 210 home […]

In September 1941, outfielder Bill Endicott seemed poised for a major-league career. In his fifth season of professional baseball, he had a stellar minor-league résumé: three All-Star teams, including one that year in the Pacific Coast League.1, 2 He had also won a batting championship three seasons earlier when he hit .354 for Albany in […]

Tookie Gilbert’s baseball career started out in classical “boy wonder” fashion. Coming from a family with strong baseball bloodlines, he was a two-sport all-star in high school in the mid-1940s. He was heavily recruited by five major-league teams, ultimately signing with the New York Giants for a hefty $50,000 bonus. His father used a lottery […]

Some said that baseball owners found Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis on the federal bench, but Leo Durocher got it right when he said, “They got him right out of Dickens.”1 Ruth put the fans back in the parks, but Landis made sure what they witnessed was honest. The Sultan and the Czar worked different sides […]

Vice and dissipation may have had their way. Meridian, Mississippi, was home to “The Father of Country Music,” Jimmie Rodgers, also known as “The Singing Brakeman.” It was also home to gas-station owner Danny Clark, and major-league pitchers Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd and Jay Powell. Clark’s claim to fame came from baseball as well. He […]

“He’s too young to throw a no-hitter!”1 With the words of Cincinnati Redlegs manager Birdie Tebbetts still ringing in his ears, 17-year-old southpaw Dave Skaugstad took the mound on September 29, 1957 at Milwaukee’s County Stadium. Appearing in his second major-league game, he relieved 20-year-old rookie Jay Hook, who’d held the National League pennant-winning Milwaukee […]

Arnold Carl Earley wound up in the same field of work his father had pursued — a policeman. His father, Walter Earley, was a city policeman in Lincoln Park, Michigan, at the time of the 1940 United States census. Born in Lincoln Park on June 4, 1933, to Walter and Edna (Tiedeman) Earley, Arnold was […]

A traveler traversing U.S. 50 across Southern Indiana might not notice anything special about the town of Bedford. But to one of its native sons, the town must have been very special indeed. His affinity for his home town earned Bill Rariden the nickname “Bedford Bill.” In his 12 years in the major leagues, Rariden […]

Eugene Joseph Bremer Sr., sometimes known as Gene, was born in New Orleans on July 18, 1916. He grew up in the city with his parents, three sisters, and grandmother. His father, Joseph, worked as a driver and his mother, Amanda, as a washerwoman. As a youngster he loved all sports and that led to […]

A brilliant, if controversial, military commander, five-star General Douglas MacArthur received many of this nation’s highest accolades, including the Congressional Medal of Honor. But perhaps the award that MacArthur held most dear was a modest laurel: the monogram that he won as a member of the 1901 West Point baseball team. For the remainder of […]

Tommy Umphlett had a superb rookie year in 1953, finishing second to the Detroit Tigers’ Harvey Kuenn, in American League Rookie of the Year voting. It wasn’t close. Kuenn received 23 first-place votes and Umphlett received the other one. Umphlett drove in more runs (59 in 137 games, compared to Kuenn’s 48 RBIs in 155 […]

Four swings made Dusty Rhodes famous. The pinch-hitting hero of the 1954 World Series, when the underdog New York Giants swept the Cleveland Indians, Rhodes delivered key hits in three of the four victories. And he never had to pay for another drink in New York. “You know what Rhodes was?” his manager, Leo Durocher, […]

Nineteen forty-five was the happiest year in American history. The end of World War II brought millions of Johnnies and Joans marching home. Families were reunited. The high barely lasted past Christmas. Nineteen forty-six brought inflation, store shelves bare of many basic consumer goods, and a severe housing shortage. The result was an unprecedented epidemic […]

Dick Mills was a 6-foot-3,195-pound right-handed pitcher who appeared twice for the Boston Red Sox in 1970. They were his only two games in major-league baseball. Mills was a hard guy to pin down at first. Drafted by the Philadelphia Phillies in June 1965, a 13th-round pick, he chose not to sign. Drafted by the […]

Early in his career on the baseball diamond he was a man without a position. Luckily for him, the power emanating from his bat allowed him to hang around the major leagues long enough to settle into the only position he could play reasonably well. He came from Native American – or, in the common […]

Shoeless Joe Jackson was a country boy from South Carolina who never learned to read or write much (“It don’t take school stuff to help a fella play ball,” he once said1) but is widely hailed as the greatest natural hitter in the history of the game. A left-handed batter and right-handed thrower, Jackson stood […]

Dick Williams was regarded as one of baseball’s premier managers and turnaround artists. He was only the second skipper to win pennants for three different teams — Boston, Oakland, and San Diego.1 As a rookie manager in 1967, Williams led the Red Sox from ninth place the year before to the World Series. Both personally […]

On Saturday, August 26, 2017, the Bob Broeg St. Louis SABR Chapter hosted its third annual Research Conference at the Emerson Library on the campus of Webster University in St. Louis, Missouri. Six speakers presented a variety of subjects, hoping to capture the Jim Rygelski Research Award bestowed by the local chapter. The award is […]

The 1969 Padres coaches gather around manager Preston Gomez during spring training in Yuma, Arizona. Left to right are coaches Sparky Anderson, Wally Moon, Roger Craig, and Whitey Wietelmann. (Courtesy of Tom Larwin)   San Diegans rejoiced in May 1968 when the National League announced the awarding of expansion teams to Montreal and San Diego, […]

To Milwaukee fandom, the 1964 home opener represented a potential turning point for their baseball franchise. After back-to-back World Series appearances in 1957 and ’58, the Braves had settled into a string of lackluster campaigns, finishing generally in the middle of the pack. More critically, attendance at County Stadium had declined in the post-Series years, […]

“It was the kind of game that made you talk to yourself,” wrote Lou Smith of the Cincinnati Enquirer.1 Lou Chapman of the Milwaukee Sentinel suggested that the game made fans, players, and the coaching staff “ready for the psychiatrist’s couch.”2 Somehow the Braves were held hitless for 9⅔ innings, yet won the game. Coming […]

The 1966 baseball season was the first for the Braves in Atlanta. After 13 seasons in Milwaukee, the ballclub moved to establish itself in downtown Atlanta, bringing Hank Aaron, Joe Torre, and Eddie Mathews to their new home. Besides those sluggers they brought a 25-year-old pitcher named Tony Cloninger, who on July 3, 1966, became […]

They called it the Chicago showdown. The Minnesota Twins, in first place in the American League since May 30, held a five-game lead over the Chicago White Sox, winners of 26 of 39 games leading up to a crucial two-game series between the two Midwestern contenders on September 8 and 9 at venerable Comiskey Park. […]

With the 1983 World Series knotted after two games, Philadelphia played host for Game Three. Both teams were concerned about their offense as the key hitter in each lineup was in a slump. Eddie Murray of the Orioles had been hitless since his single in the first inning of Game One. More importantly, he failed […]