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A Sunday crowd of 30,000 fans1 came to the Polo Grounds2 on September 24, 1922, hoping to see their defending World Series champion New York Giants clinch another National League pennant. They might have been disappointed with that expectation, as the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Giants 10-6, but they were still witnesses to history: […]

Perennial contenders during the New York Giants’ four-year National League reign of the early 1920s, the Pittsburgh Pirates began 1925 by getting outclassed by the Chicago Cubs and Cincinnati Reds on the road. Championship qualities finally surfaced in the Pirates’ home opener on April 22, when a crowd of 31,000 saw Johnny Morrison limit the […]

On the final day of the 2008 season, the New York Mets were wrapping up their time at Shea Stadium and preparing to move to Citi Field, which was under construction in the parking lot behind left field. Besides commemorating their 45 seasons at Shea, the Mets had a tangible purpose as they hosted the […]

George Earnshaw “gave an exhibition of pitching mastery that has been seldom equaled in [the] world series,” declared St. Louis sportswriter John E. Wray.1 Pitching on one day’s rest, the Philadelphia Athletics hurler tossed a complete game to win Game Six and capture the club’s second straight title. Lauded as the “the lionhearted leviathan of […]

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 […]

The second Puerto Rican to play in the major leagues was outfielder Luis Olmo, who joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1943, a year after Hiram Bithorn made his debut with the Chicago Cubs. These men led the way for more than 200 boricuas who have since followed. Bithorn’s life ended suddenly at the age of […]

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 […]

In 1947 Clint Hartung, the Hondo Hurricane, was going to be the biggest thing to hit New York baseball since Babe Ruth. Like the Babe, the 6-foot-4, 215-pound giant could pitch and hit home runs out of sight. The Giants signed Hartung in 1941. He had led his high-school team in Hondo, Texas, to the […]

It is largely forgotten that Larry Jansen was the winning pitcher when Bobby Thomson hit his “Shot Heard Round the World” to dramatically win the 1951 pennant in the Polo Grounds. Indeed, without Jansen, it is highly unlikely that the Giants would have even been in the playoff against the Brooklyn Dodgers. With 23 victories […]

When introducing the Orioles’ new manager in 1968, general manager Harry Dalton said, “In short, I believe Earl Weaver is a winner.”1 Weaver was short. And he was a winner. For the next 14½ seasons the Orioles won more games than any other team, piling up six division titles, four pennants, and one World Series […]

Right-handed pitcher Howie “Spud” Krist overcame a series of ailments and potentially career-threatening injuries to post an undefeated season (10-0) for the Cardinals in 1941 after a three-year absence from the major leagues. As an important member of the Cardinals’ World Series teams in 1942 and 1943, Krist sported a 37-11 lifetime record before a […]

If Pants Rowland had gotten his way, big-league baseball would have reached California more than a decade before the Dodgers and Giants crossed the continent. As president of the Pacific Coast League, Rowland campaigned for recognition as a third major league as early as 1945. Personable and unfailingly optimistic, Rowland punched almost every ticket in […]

He had just 11 big-league at-bats in 1990, but Brian Traxler was still a cult figure. Over 13 years as a pro, the first baseman delighted fans across the minors, the Caribbean winter leagues, Asia, and independent circuits. His immediate appeal was visual. “Trax” was rotund — leniently listed at 5-feet-10 and 200 pounds, he […]

On June 23, 1931, sportswriter Walter W. Smith encountered George Watkins, the St. Louis Cardinals right fielder, in the lobby of Philadelphia’s Franklin Hotel, where the team was staying for a series against the Phillies. Both men were relatively new to their jobs; Smith had begun covering the team for the St. Louis Star the […]

Imagine an infielder who played his last game more than half a century ago, who appeared in 1,058 games and batted .262 lifetime. Probably only his family and his most diehard fans would know his name. But that’s not so in the case of William Richard “Billy” Cox. Anchoring the infield on three Brooklyn pennant […]

There are fewer third basemen in the Hall of Fame than players from any other position. One who hasn’t made it is Stan Hack, who held down the post for 16 years with the Chicago Cubs, from 1932 through 1947. Yet Bill James ranks him the ninth best all time at the position, well ahead […]

Since the earliest days of professional baseball, the sport has offered aspiring players not only a chance to fulfill a dream, but also a shot to escape to a better life than what they could imagine in their small towns and urban centers across the country. Perhaps that’s what teenage Al Gerheauser thought. A high-school […]

In the 1951 St. Louis spring training camp, considerable focus turned to Bobby Tiefenauer as the answer to Philadelphia Phillies reliever Jim Konstanty, a high bar for the 22-year-old rookie to reach. Konstanty was the reigning National League Most Valuable Player, It was hoped that Tiefenauer’s knuckleball could match Konstanty’s success with off-speed sliders and […]

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 […]

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 […]

Edythe Perlick (later Keating), the star left fielder for the Racine, Wisconsin, Belles from 1943 through the 1950 season, exemplified the kind of women who played hardball in the All-American Girls Base Ball League, today called the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. A steady and productive hitter, a speedy defensive outfielder with a strong and […]

Robert Cannon came to love baseball as a boy growing up in Milwaukee. His father, Ray Cannon, represented several of the accused Black Sox in salary disputes and took Charles Comiskey to court in 1924 on behalf of Joe Jackson. Ray Cannon also fought on behalf of all the players as head of a short-lived […]

The Cincinnati Reds did not seem a bit concerned about their opponent from the junior circuit. The Big Red Machine were the bullies on the beach, waiting to kick sand in the face of their rival, the Oakland Athletics. Pete Rose viewed the coming 1972 World Series as anticlimactic. “The real World Series was between […]

Catcher Johnny Riddle had one of the more unusual careers in major-league history. His big-league career spanned 19 years, from his debut with the Chicago White Sox in 1930 until his final game with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1948. He played for five major-league teams, but he also spent long stretches of time in the minors, the […]