Search Results

The 1968 season is remembered as “the Year of the Pitcher,” and for good reason. For the first time since the Deadball Era, both the American and National Leagues posted ERAs under 3.1 Only one AL hitter, Carl Yastrzemski, finished with an average of .300 or greater, and major-league batters as a whole averaged just […]

The San Francisco Giants exuded a sunny disposition for the 1985 season. They hired popular former All-Star third baseman Jim Davenport as manager – his easygoing personality a vast contrast to his predecessor, intensely competitive Frank Robinson1 – and they traded slugging outfielder Jack Clark, who had a habit of clashing with managers and netted […]

As areas of urban and suburban Baltimore simmered without electricity on the steamy afternoon and evening of Tuesday, September 22, 1970, the lights at Memorial Stadium shone brightly – and so did Earl Weaver’s Baltimore Orioles. Sweltering end-of-summer heat and a shortage of electrical capacity forced Baltimore Gas and Electric, along with other East Coast […]

The Boston Beaneaters came to Cleveland, Ohio, for a two-game series, July 8-9, 1891, against the Cleveland Spiders. Boston’s John Clarkson pitched a gem in the first game, allowing only five hits in a 4-1 victory, which extended Boston’s winning streak to six games. Boston was in third place and Cleveland was in fifth place […]

National League hitting and scoring declined during the early 1890s, with pitchers like Cy Young of the Cleveland Spiders on the rise. To boost offense, the NL adjusted its rules in 1893, most prominently by increasing the distance between batter and pitcher to 60 feet 6 inches. In their first game at the new distance, […]

On a clear and cool day, the Cincinnati Redlegs and Chicago Cubs prepared for an early May finale of a five-game series at Wrigley Field. A Cubs vice president estimated that the team lost at least 100,000 fans to unstable Chicagoland weather during this 10-game homestand.1 Another small crowd (5,936) entered the turnstiles at Clark […]

In 1892 Colonel Thomas P. Robinson was the 30-year-old owner and manager of Oakland’s entry in the four-team California League. Was he a colonel? Probably not,1 but the press called him “Colonel,” and his team was called the Colonels. The year before, the Oakland Colonels had played home games in Emeryville, about three miles north […]

It was early in the 1964 season. The visiting Baltimore Orioles had a record of 5-4 and the Boston Red Sox were 4-6. They played a frigid Tuesday afternoon game at Fenway Park on April 28. It drew only 2,085 paying customers, leaving the park more than 93 percent empty, The year before, the New […]

“Erv’s superior hurling in the last weeks of the 1950 campaign was partly responsible for the last-ditch fight of the Dodgers which took them to the final day of the season before being eliminated from pennant contention.” – 1951 Bowman baseball card (No. 189)   Any story about Erv Palica and the 1950 baseball season […]

Super Scout: Thirty-five Years of Scouting was the name of Jim Russo’s 1992 memoir. The title was simple and apt. Russo worked full-time for the Baltimore Orioles franchise from 1951, when it was still the St. Louis Browns, until 1986. As the club rose to prominence in the ’60s, he gained acclaim as one of […]

Sam Jethroe was the National League Rookie of the Year in 1950, playing for the Boston Braves, and the first African American to play major-league baseball in Boston. Five years earlier, he’d tried out for the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park, along with Jackie Robinson and Marvin Williams, but the Red Sox pursued none […]

California native Red Worthington was a hard-hitting outfielder with a powerful throwing arm. A top prospect in the St. Louis Cardinals organization, Red, who threw and batted right-handed, appeared to be on the fast track to major-league stardom. Before his ascent to the major leagues, a sportswriter wrote of Worthington, “This young man from the […]

Few people have the talent and good fortune to have successful careers in two such diverse fields as professional sports and the film industry. Ernie Orsatti was one of those lucky few. In his nine-year career with the Cardinals (1927-1935), Orsatti hit .300 or better in six seasons, twice hit over .330, and finished with […]

On November 29, 1971, the Cleveland Indians dealt pitcher Sam McDowell to the San Francisco Giants. Sudden Sam had struck out more than 2,000 batters in his 11 years with the Indians, but his career spiraled downward in 1971, when he posted a 13-17 record with a 3.40 ERA. His 192 strikeouts were his fewest […]

Buzzie Bavasi had a ball running a ball club. In 18 years directing the baseball operations of the Dodgers in Brooklyn and Los Angeles, he assembled four World Series champions and eight pennant winners (and two more clubs that tied for first), more than any team except the Yankees. He had the benefit of owner […]

During a stellar career at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, Charlie Moran1 was “considered the crack college shortstop in the country”2 and had several major league clubs bidding for his services. Once he entered the professional ranks he soon developed a reputation as a trouble-maker and malingerer, wearing out his welcome with such celebrated managers […]

People who saw Carl Furillo play most often talk about his throwing arm. He was given nicknames because of it, including “The Reading Rifle,” and “The Arm.” On August 27, 1951, Pirates pitcher Mel Queen learned about Furillo’s arm the hard way—thrown out at first base after hitting an apparent single to right. It was […]

Racial discrimination did not miraculously disappear in 1863 with the Emancipation Proclamation, nor did it cease with Civil War’s end in 1865. However, even as race relations remain a topic in 2011, the process for dealing with race faced an evolution. Speaking to this evolution, Jerry Malloy, in his Introduction to Sol White’s History of […]

“Running! turning! leaping! like little Al Gionfriddo — a baseball player, Doctor, who once did a very great thing.” The great thing novelist Philip Roth described took place on October 5, 1947. It was Game Six of the World Series. Outfielder Al Gionfriddo, a little-used reserve, made a racing, twisting catch in deep left-center at […]

“When I lost Frank I lost one of my best friends. Baseball lost one of its best managers. He was one of the best catchers we ever saw.” — Buck O’Neil1 Frank Duncan’s legendary Negro League career lasted 27 years and his unquenchable zest for life was etched across each and every one of them. […]

He was a high-school phenom who found himself pitching in the major leagues while barely out of his teens. Connie Mack had heard about him when he was just 16 years old.1 But for every Bob Feller there are countless Lafayette Henions. Unlike Feller’s long and successful career, Henion’s experience in the major leagues consisted […]

Once a gem, its luster long since faded along with its utility, Hinchliffe Stadium stands as a relic of a working-class city proud of its baseball heritage and teeters on the precipice of revival. Paterson, New Jersey, lays claim to this storied facility, once the renowned site of Negro League games, but it is hardly […]

Although the home grounds of the Baltimore Orioles of the nineteenth century occupied several locations, the team found a permanent setting at Union Park between 1891 and 1899. Baseball in Baltimore began around 1855. In 1882, as a charter member of the American Association, they were known as the Lord Baltimores. They won only 19 […]

The idea of a winter retreat appealed to many in the baseball business. The men the game attracted were by their nature sportsmen. Unless a man resided in a remote area during the winter, he gravitated towards his baseball companions, especially if he was a bachelor, to partake in any number of activities such as […]