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(Photograph by Duane Rieder) After winning three straight games at home, including Nelson Briles’ masterful two-hit, 4-0 shutout in Game Five, the Pirates returned to Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium with the hope of clinching their fourth World Series championship in Game Six. A win in Baltimore was a tall order, 6-feet-3 to be exact, which was […]

The first years of the 1970s were turbulent ones on American college campuses. In some places the upheaval even invaded that seeming bastion of order and tradition, the baseball diamond. The University of Vermont was a case in point. In mid-May 1971, Edward C. Andrews Jr., president of the financially troubled flagship state university, announced […]

In the first two contests of the 1970 World Series, Baltimore had come away with two one-run victories (4-3 and 6-5). The Orioles defense, particularly the stellar play of Brooks Robinson at third base, had made the headlines. In Game Three, that defense “continued to amaze, Brooks Robinson and Davey Johnson making sensational diving stabs […]

The 76th World Series in 1979 featured the two teams with the best records in their respective leagues; however, before this clash between the Pirates and Orioles could begin, the weather first took center stage. Game One was to have been played on Tuesday, October 9, in Baltimore, but a torrential downpour resulted in the […]

The Philadelphia Phillies’ modern, circular, multipurpose, Astroturfed playing field, Veterans Stadium, 19 years old in 1990, had at least one thing in common with Connie Mack Stadium, the more traditional grass and grandstand ballpark where they played from 1938 to 1970.1 Neither ballpark had ever seen a no-hitter by a Phillies pitcher. In fact, no […]

After the Baltimore Orioles won the first game of the 1969 World Series by a score of 4-1, most fans and sportswriters were expecting them to dominate the NL champions. The two teams returned to Memorial Stadium on the afternoon of October 12 to face off in the second game of the Series. Both teams […]

The New York Mets stopped being the laughingstocks of baseball and became unlikely World Series champions on the afternoon of October 16, 1969. After the Mets joined the National League in 1962, they spent most of the decade known as a bunch of lovable losers. All that ended on a pleasant fall afternoon with temperatures […]

More than one football coach has used the adage “A tie is just like kissing your sister.”1 On May 28, 1964, the Cincinnati Reds and Los Angeles Dodgers must’ve felt the same, after their 17-inning, 4-hour and 58-minute marathon at Cincinnati’s Crosley Field ended in a 2-2 tie. This was the longest game of the […]

“That is the way this game is — you win, you lose, you celebrate and you suffer.”1 – Vin Scully Before divisional play came to the American and National Leagues in 1969, the pennant winners – the soon-to-be World Series opponents – were determined during the regular season. The turning of the calendar to the […]

The Los Angeles Dodgers entered Game One of the 1966 World Series against the Baltimore Orioles on October 5 as 8-to-5 favorites.1 They had swept the New York Yankees in 1963 and had defeated the Minnesota Twins in seven games the previous season, so it was understandable that the oddsmakers predicted a third title in […]

Mike Schmidt began 1987 needing five home runs for admission to baseball’s 500-home-run club. On a sunny April afternoon in Pittsburgh, he punched his ticket with a ninth-inning game-winner, rescuing the Phillies from collapse and sinking a Pirates’ comeback. Already entrenched among the game’s all-time greats,1 Schmidt bolstered his legend in 1986 by posting a […]

After winning the World Series in 1946, the St. Louis Cardinals had two straight second-place finishes and in 1949 were trying to capture the National League pennant once again.1 With five games to play in the season, the first-place Cardinals held a 1½-game lead over the second-place Brooklyn Dodgers. The Cardinals had just swept a […]

“(Curt) Motton has been Baltimore’s best pinch-hitter ever since I’ve been managing this club. He was an automatic choice in this spot.” — Orioles manager Earl Weaver after Motton’s game-tying double helped Baltimore come from behind to beat Oakland’s Vida Blue in the 1971 American League Championship Series1   Curt Motton grew up in the […]

Pack your bags. Frank Lane’s in town. The compulsive trader known as Frantic Frank shuffled at least 690 players in 414 transactions with five teams.1 Wherever Lane went, turmoil followed. He traded one manager for another. He traded a home run champion for a batting champ. He traded local heroes and future Hall of Famers. […]

The light-hitting, 5-foot-6 shortstop William Benjamin Fuller parlayed his excellent fielding into a nine-year career in the majors (1888-1896), beginning with a 49-game stint with the National League’s Washington Nationals. In 1889 he began a seven-year stretch as a starting shortstop, first with the American Association’s St. Louis Browns and then later back in the […]

Outfielder Charlie Frisbee was a switch-hitter who threw right-handed. His first year in the minors was as a catcher, but then he took up work in the outfield. He played two seasons in the majors, in the National League for the Boston Beaneaters in 1899 and for the New York Giants in 1900. After leaving […]

Jack Matchett made his debut with the Kansas City Monarchs in Memphis on May 12, 1940; he shut out the Birmingham Black Barons.1 In 1942, when the Monarchs swept the Homestead Grays in the best-of-seven Negro Leagues World Series, Matchett won Games One and Three. The first game was a two-hit shutout. He was one […]

George Scott’s professional baseball career spanned 41 years beginning in Class-D ball at Olean of the New York-Penn League in 1962. His travels were highlighted by his 14 seasons in the majors, starting with the Boston Red Sox in 1966. Scott also played for Milwaukee 1972-1976, Boston 1977-1978, and split his final year between Boston, […]

The older brother of a similarly short-tenured major leaguer, Frank Bell was a 10-game catcher/utilityman for the 1885 Brooklyn Grays of the American Association. Bell was out of baseball several years after his brief big-league audition and working in security when his life came to an abrupt end at age 28. He was fatally shot […]

Throughout baseball history, careers have often been defined by a specific play or events. Joe DiMaggio is recalled for his 56-game hitting streak; Willie Mays for his catch in the 1954 World Series. Likewise, players can be maligned for ineptitude, real or perceived. Fred Merkle’s race-altering baserunning gaffe in 1908 and Bill Buckner’s inability to […]

Sam Nahem was a so-so pitcher who logged a 10–8 won-loss record and a 4.69 ERA in four partial seasons with the Dodgers, Cardinals, and Phillies between 1938 and 1948. Despite this unremarkable record, Nahem was a remarkable major leaguer in many ways. He was the only Syrian and one of the few Jews in […]

Wealthy and able, Edwin A. McAlpin was a man of many interests: family, commerce, Republican Party politics, the New York State National Guard, the Presbyterian Church, and the American Boy Scouts (an early rival of the Boy Scouts of America). For a relatively brief period beginning in 1889, McAlpin also took an active part in […]

James Lee “Jimmie” Newberry was a starting pitcher for the Birmingham Black Barons from 1942 to 1950. Most newspapers and historical sources refer to “Jimmy” as the diminutive of Newberry’s first name. However, the best evidence, which includes two autographs, signed “Jimmie Newberry,” is that he preferred to use the variant “Jimmie.”1 Newberry was born […]

“Wish we had him. He is not colored.”1 Those were the words that Frank Bancroft, the Cincinnati Reds’ business manager, wrote to team president and National Commission Chairman Garry Herrmann in 1911 about Rafael Almeida. The Reds were in the midst of acquiring Almeida and fellow Cuban player Armando Marsans, and, as the first two […]