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Even by the Chicago Cubs’ deep-rooted standards of frustration, the second inning of the Cubs-Brooklyn Robins game of May 12, 1915, was one to forget. The Cubs committed four errors and a passed ball in the inning, helping the Robins to five runs and an early 7-1 lead at Ebbets Field. The home team cruised […]

His first time up on August 20, 1960, in the final season of his 19-year career with the Boston Red Sox, Ted Williams drew a walk. It was career base on balls number 2,000.1 Only one player had ever walked more – Babe Ruth, who’d earned 2,062 walks.2 Ted got walk number 2,000 in his […]

To former Los Angeles Dodgers great Tommy Davis, the American League’s adoption of the designated hitter in 1973 was a godsend. “If it wasn’t for the designated-hitter rule … I probably would be [home] in Los Angeles right now, working eight hours a day,” he told The Sporting News three months into the season.1 The […]

“Sal Maglie sat in the Dodger clubhouse and performed the ritual of anointing his pitching hand. First he applied a base of liquid rosin. Then he sprinkled the fingers with powdered rosin. And when he was done he was ready to pitch.”1 September is the time when pennant races are decided. Just months earlier, could […]

The Brooklyn Dodgers and Milwaukee Braves were battling down to the wire for the National League crown in 1956 and both teams were having trouble winning on a consistent basis at the end of September. The St. Louis Cardinals gave Brooklyn an opening to move into the pennant lead when they defeated Milwaukee, 5-4, on […]

“The baseball rule makers made sweeping changes in the playing code of the national game today, and heaped so much additional duty and authority on the shoulders of the umpires that next season the officials will all have to take a rest cure before the season is half over.” – New York Times, February 10, […]

They numbered more than 90,000. To be precise, 93,103 people entered the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on May 7, 1959, to honor a squat-shaped man who played in the Negro Leagues as a teenager, compiled three National League MVP Awards, and earned the devotion of Brooklyn’s baseball fans as the catcher on the 1950s Dodger […]

Like many other ball clubs, the Cleveland Indians opened spring training in 1963 with some question marks at various positions. One issue was third base, where no incumbent was in line to win the job. During the offseason, Cleveland traded Bubba Phillips, who had manned the hot corner for the previous three seasons, to Detroit. […]

Few players have had to overcome more adversity during their major league careers than Lee “Jeep’’ Handley. The 5-foot-7, 160-pound infielder played in 968 games in a 10-year career punctuated by several major injuries, a couple of which nearly cost him his life. Best known for his hustle and defensive acumen, Handley hit only 15 […]

Arguably the first great first baseman of the twentieth century, George Sisler was the greatest player in St. Louis Browns history. An excellent baserunner and superb fielder who was once tried out at second and third base even though he threw left-handed, Sisler’s primary asset was his left-handed swing, which he used to notch a […]

No compilation of baseball’s all-time top left-handed pitchers is complete without Whitey Ford. Indeed, he is near or at the top of any worthwhile list. His 236 wins made him the winningest pitcher in the storied history of the New York Yankees. He incurred only 106 defeats, giving him a lifetime winning percentage of .690, […]

No one chooses to become a professional widow, and Eleanor Gehrig derived little satisfaction in being called one. Yet few ballplayers’ wives maintained a level of such prominence so long after their husband’s death as they had when he was alive. Mrs. Lou Gehrig was married less than eight years; she was a widow for […]

Max Macon was the top pitching prospect in the St. Louis Cardinals’ farm system before he blew out his arm in his first spring training appearance. The left-hander, so skinny he could “close one eye and look like a needle,” was the rare pitcher who hit well enough to make a comeback as a position […]

There are other great moments in Mets history, like The Buckner Ball and The Grand Slam Single, but surely any listing of the most significant moments in Mets history, particularly of the Mets’ first two decades, would have to include these three. The common thread for these three incidents is Cleon Jones, the first consistent, […]

“Rarely has there been a baseball player as good as George Grantham whom it was so difficult to settle in one regular position.” — James J. Long, Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph 1   George Grantham, 5-foot-10 and 170 pounds in his prime, was tough and durable. A perennial .300 hitter despite frequent nagging injuries, he had unexpected […]

“I place a premium on a thinking catcher,” said Gene Mauch, who managed Clay Dalrymple for eight-plus seasons in Philadelphia.1 Mauch and another great tactician, Earl Weaver, both stressed pitching and defense. Thus, while Dalrymple’s hitting declined after his fourth year with the Phillies, his skills behind the plate kept him employed. The Californian handled […]

Deron Roger Johnson, labeled the “next Mickey Mantle,” spent 16 seasons as a major-league slugger. His finest year was not as a Bronx Bomber but as a Cincinnati Red. A dual football and baseball interscholastic sports star, the San Diego native excelled on the gridiron. Johnson played end, linebacker, kicker, and punter for San Diego […]

A towering Southern farm boy with the mind of an engineer, pitcher Ernie Shore is forever linked with Babe Ruth. Teammates on three clubs and in two World Series, they together tossed what many fans and some historians long considered a perfect game—albeit an odd one in which the Babe faced the first batter and […]

Five years after being signed to a minor-league contract by the Baltimore Orioles, Andy Etchebarren found himself starting behind home plate for the Orioles on Opening Day, April 12, 1966, against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. The 22-year-old rookie not only settled into the lineup, but thrived as Baltimore’s No. 1 catcher. Etchebarren […]

“I led the American League in ERA that year [1979]. That’s what I tell everybody.”1 That was Jeff Rineer talking to the Baltimore Sun in 2006, nearly 27 years after his lone appearance in the major leagues. Rineer was the pitcher of record on the winning side in the last game of the ’79 season, […]

For two years, 5-foot, 9-inch Bob Saverine teamed with 6-foot, 7-inch Frank Howard on the Washington Senators. But, that’s not all. The talented pair, along with several other Senators players, formed a basketball team.1 Prior to the 1968 season, newly named manager Jim Lemon watched as they played an exhibition game and defeated a team […]

When the Orioles nearly went from worst-to-first in their “Why Not?” 1989 season, Jeff Ballard epitomized their surprising success. Though he struck out fewer than three batters per nine innings, no major league lefty won more games than Ballard in 1989. By the time Baltimore did return to the post-season seven years later, however, Ballard […]

This article appears in SABR’s “The Base Ball Palace of the World: Comiskey Park” (2019), edited by Gregory H. Wolf. “It makes no difference if the nation is in the midst of a major depression or riding the wave of prosperity, the East-West game is always a rousing success. It is the biggest sporting event […]

This article was originally published in “The First Negro League Champion: The 1920 Chicago American Giants” (SABR, 2022).   As witnessed during commemorations in 2020 celebrating a century of Negro League baseball, the foundation of the Negro National League in 1920 provides a generally accepted starting point for Black baseball’s league era. Black baseball, through […]