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Jimmy Johnston piled up record-setting stolen-base numbers in the minors, played every outfield and infield position, and contributed to the first two Brooklyn World Series teams. In 1920 he battled brother Doc Johnston of Cleveland as part of the first World Series sibling rivalry.1 Rooted in Tennessee, Johnston’s ancestors farmed, prayed, and played baseball. His […]

Porter Riley Charleston was born in Mexia, Limestone County, Texas, on January 8, 1904. Charleston’s life story is filled with gaps. His parentage remains obscure; whether or not he played in one of the Negro/Colored Leagues in Texas is not known.1 When Charleston first traveled to Pennsylvania, where his Negro League career began with the […]

They called him “The Blazer.” As a minor leaguer he drew comparisons to Jackie Robinson. Don Blasingame wasn’t as talented as Robinson, but he was good enough to play 12 years in the major leagues, with appearances in an All-Star Game and a World Series. He married a Miss America finalist, who was the daughter […]

Seventy-three, 61, 60, .406, 104, 130, 1.12, and 383: these are some of the best known batting, baserunning, and pitching marks in single-season history. Another received almost similar respect in the years prior to World War II but has since been nearly forgotten. When Ferdie Schupp turned in a 0.90 ERA in 1916, a standard […]

In the one (and only) year that Bill Wakefield pitched in the major leagues, 1964, he set a Mets team record for game appearances that would stand up for 13 more years, and packed into a single season a full-length career’s worth of excitement and highlights, ending with a nail-biting season-ending game that decided the […]

Darrell Brandon grew up rooting for Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle. On July 5, 1966, the right-hander earned his first big league win, striking out Mantle twice as the Red Sox defeated the New Yorkers, 7-1, in Yankee Stadium. Brandon went on to win 12 more games for Boston, including five for the 1967 pennant […]

Ed Sukla made a career in the game of baseball, first in the 1960s and ’70s as a sinker-balling reliever for the Angels and in the Pacific Coast League, and then for decades with the Major League Scouting Bureau. Though baseball was the sport in which he made his living, he was an all-around athlete, […]

The Olivo brothers, Diómedes and Federico, had very similar careers. Diómedes was a big-league “rookie” at the age of 41 in 1960, though rumors persisted that he was older. Federico – better known as “Chi-Chi” – reached the majors in 1961, at the age of 33. Or was that 34? Maybe 35? Diómedes spent just […]

“Jarvis fires away … That’s a fly ball, deep to left, back, back … HEY HEY! He did it! Ernie Banks got number 500! The ball tossed to the bullpen … everybody on your feet … this … is IT! WHEEEEEEEE!”— Jack Brickhouse, WGN-TV, May 12, 19701 When the curtain rang down on the 1969 […]

Stout left-hander Ed Zmich won only one big-league game, but for a few weeks in the summer of 1910, the Class-D hurler caught the attention of the baseball world, resulting in an unusually fierce bidding war. Edward Albert Zmich was born on October 1, 1884, in Cleveland. His father, Max, emigrated from Germany in 1873 […]

“I’ve seen a lot of powerful hitters in my time but for sheer ability to knock a ball great distances, I’ve never seen anybody better than Easter — and I’m not excepting Babe Ruth.” — Del Baker1   Luscious “Luke” Easter was born August 4, 1915 at 8:15 PM in Jonestown, Mississippi. During his playing […]

Bill Campbell could be excused for deeming life as unlucky as a crooked draw. His mother died giving birth to him on September 7, 1923, in Atlantic City. Dad kept the secret from him till Bill was 11. He lived with his father, a traveling paint salesman, then aunts, then Dad again, changing schools six […]

The most electrifying defensive shortstop of his generation, Mark Belanger set the standard by anchoring a great Baltimore Orioles infield for most of 14 seasons. During this stretch, Baltimore won 90 or more games 11 times with six postseason appearances capped by the 1970 world championship. Belanger and Ozzie Smith are the only shortstops to […]

Reggie Smith was a rookie in 1967 when the Boston Red Sox came back from a ninth-place finish to craft an extraordinary pennant-winning season. The All-Star caliber major-league career he completed in 1982 was a great success that has been muddied by other people’s expectations (too high) and Smith’s media profile (too low). Smith batted […]

Eddie Brown was a great hitter and a superb defender for the New York Giants, Brooklyn Robins, and Boston Braves during the roaring decade of the 1920s. Over the span of 20 seasons in professional baseball, Brown patrolled all three outfield stanchions, covered first base one full season, and handled shortstop another. As a rural […]

Henry Chadwick, baseball’s first historian, tried to capture a game in a chart for his newspaper readers. It was called a box score, and as it evolved over the years, it offered the raw material for the statistically minded to analyze, understand, and appreciate the game. There were dozens who followed, from Ernie Lanigan, longtime […]

The Baltimore Orioles entered the 1983 World Series on an absolute roll. They took the AL East by six games and dispatched the Chicago White Sox four games to one in the ALCS. The White Sox were a very good team — they had won the AL West by a margin of 20 games — […]

As players warmed up for a National League game between the visiting Louisville Colonels and the first-place Baltimore Orioles at Union Park on September 8, 1897, a reporter from the Baltimore Sun approached Louisville player-manager Fred Clarke because he was unfamiliar with the Colonels’ battery. When pressed for details, Clarke seemed almost as confused as […]

Opening Day is usually a day of optimism, celebration, and a big crowd as fans flock to the ballpark after a long winter without baseball. Those very crowds, however, can overwhelm a team with poor ballpark security. Perhaps the modern nadir in Opening Day crowd control occurred in Chicago on April 5, 1974, when the […]

“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 […]

Even before the Baltimore Orioles selected Ben McDonald with the first overall pick of the June 1989 amateur draft, many fans, sportswriters, and baseball executives were already penciling him in as the team’s 1990 Opening Day starter.1 The year that followed his inevitable selection featured injuries, a work stoppage, a record-shattering rookie contract, and threats […]

The Philadelphia Phillies returned home on September 21, 1964, holding first place in the National League after winning six games on a three-city road trip. With 12 games to play, Philadelphia’s lead was 6½ games over the second-place Cincinnati Reds and St. Louis Cardinals. The city and team were looking forward to the World Series. […]

The bankrupt St. Louis Browns were acquired in March 1899 by Frank Robison,1 who already owned the Cleveland Spiders. To maximize his profits and his chance of winning the 1899 pennant, he moved the best players on the Spiders to his new team, which he dubbed the St. Louis Perfectos. The result was a strong […]

Here are the SABR Defensive Index™ rankings through games of June 16, 2019. For the seventh consecutive season, the SDI will be used to help select the winners of the Rawlings Gold Glove Award and Rawlings Platinum Glove Award™, presented by SABR. The SABR Defensive Index accounts for approximately 25 percent of the Rawlings Gold […]