Search Results

Detroit’s Briggs Stadium, renamed after 1935 for new owner Walter Briggs, was a roomy ballpark by 1939 standards. Taking over 23,000-seat Navin Field, which had opened in 1912, Briggs had expanded capacity to over 50,000 in 1938. In response, the Tigers drew 10,121 per game, second in the American League, as the country climbed out […]

In the summer of 1949, preparation was underway for one of the most popular Negro Leagues events: the East-West Classic. The annual all-star game – which had been held at Chicago’s Comiskey Park every year since 1933 – had long been a fan favorite.1 In August 1948, more than 42,000 had turned out to watch […]

For the third time in seven years, the gut-wrenching thud of a baseball hitting a skull reverberated from the batter’s box at Fenway Park, silencing 7,395 fans and leaving Boston Red Sox and California Angels players in a state of shock. As Boston second baseman Doug Griffin squared to bunt in the first inning on […]

Since being swept by the Red Sox in the 2004 World Series, the St. Louis Cardinals had twice been world champions — beating the Detroit Tigers in 2006 and the Texas Rangers in 2011. Boston had won the World Series again in 2007, over the Colorado Rockies. All told, the Red Sox had six world […]

The Boston Americans ran away with the American League pennant in 1903, finishing the season by winning the first World Series between AL and National League champions. The Cleveland Naps spent much of the season in the middle of the AL standings, but a stretch of 13 wins in 14 games in August enabled them […]

“It’s true, ladies, all true. THE game did last almost until dawn’s early light and your old man was not out on the town, even if he may have looked it.”—Morris Siegel1 Open any book about baseball or any page on the SABR website to reveal myriad ways to contemplate the game. Consider that baseball […]

The New York Giants and St. Louis Cardinals had scheduled a doubleheader to close out the 1904 season at the Polo Grounds.1 Unfortunately, a series of events made this a day to forget. The Giants lost both games. Despite an historic performance by Sam Mertes, New York dropped the first game due to “poor fielding […]

Len Boehmer spent most of this Sunday afternoon in the New York Yankees’ bullpen, just hoping for the opportunity to play. The 27-year-old infielder had spent nearly eight years in the minor leagues, save for three at-bats for the 1967 Reds, before surprisingly making the Yankees in the spring of 1969. For the season’s first […]

After seven years out of contention, the New York Yankees started a three-game home series with the Milwaukee Brewers on August 11, 1972, in third place but only two games behind the first-place Detroit Tigers in the American League East Division. Milwaukee was deep in last place, 14 games behind the Yankees. A strike at […]

Switch-hitter Mickey Mantle banged out a single, double, triple, and home run, accomplishing the 12th cycle in New York Yankees history. His home run almost escaped Yankee Stadium and caused a tremendous roar by the crowd, but his triple with the bases loaded in the seventh inning was the decisive blow, leading the Yankees to […]

Willie Mays hit the 660th and final home run of his career against Cincinnati Reds left-hander Don Gullett. (New York Daily News)   Willie Mays hit his first big-league home run in New York City on May 28, 1951, connecting off Boston Braves ace Warren Spahn in the first inning of a game at the […]

When Dodgers player-manager Leo Durocher had Frenchy Bordagaray pinch-hit for him in the bottom of the fifth, the 5,010 paying fans at Ebbets Field witnessed the Lip’s final game as a player. During the offseason, Durocher signed a player-manager contract under which he not only managed Dem Bums for the 1945 season, but promised to […]

Some music is so well known that you can listen to it in a dark room and immediately associate it with an event. The tooting of a calliope immediately brings to mind the circus or a merry-go-round. “The Wedding March” lets passersby outside a church know that some guy’s bachelorhood just bit the dust. And […]

Roberto Clemente’s greatness transcended the diamond. On it, he was electrifying with his penchant for bad-ball hitting, his strong throwing arm from right field, and the way he played with a reckless but controlled abandon. Off it, he was a role model to the people of his homeland and elsewhere. Helping others represented the way […]

Willie Harris batted only once for the Chicago White Sox in the 2005 World Series. The speedy left-hander used that plate appearance to earn a place in White Sox history. The White Sox were tied with the Houston Astros 0-0 in the top of the eighth inning of Game Four. White Sox manager Ozzie Guillén […]

Equally at home rounding the bases or rounding up cattle, Dave Philley played major-league baseball with the same no-nonsense efficiency he successfully utilized in operating his 557-acre ranch and managing his other business enterprises. David Earl Philley was born on May 16, 1920, in Garret’s Bluff, a suburb of Paris, Texas, in the northeastern part […]

Gary Kroll, a hard-throwing right-hander who once pitched 20 consecutive hitless innings in the minors, made his big-league debut for the Philadelphia Phillies on July 26, 1964. Less than two weeks later, the 22-year-old pitcher was gone, traded to the New York Mets for 35-year-old slugger Frank Thomas. Kroll had been regarded as a tremendous […]

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 […]

James Elbert Greene, who went by the first name Joe, was one of the iconic catchers of the Negro Leagues. Greene was born on October 17, 1911, in Stone Mountain, Georgia, an Atlanta suburb. The 5-foot-11, 190-pound Greene was a durable and solid receiver who caught Satchel Paige and the balance of the elite pitching […]

George Stovey came of age just as overhand pitching became legal. A left-hander, he hit the top minors in 1886 at the age of 20 and dominated, winning 50 games over two seasons. He struck out more than 300 batters and posted stellar 1.13 and 2.46 earned-run averages, respectively. Surely, a major-league club could use […]

On September 23, 1913, the Boston Globe reported that Edward Kelly was one of 37 ballplayers placed on the reserved list by the Boston Red Sox. Kelly was a right-hander, born in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, on December 10, 1888, and standing an even 6 feet tall, with a reported weight of 173 pounds. His father, […]

In a poll of National League sportswriters conducted in April 1964, Larry Bearnarth was tabbed as the New York Mets’ best young pitcher.1 The franchise’s first bonus player and the first hurler to win four consecutive major league decisions, the tall blond right-hander established a club record with 58 appearances during his rookie season. Bearnarth’s […]

For Jim Kern, the 1979 season was unlike any other he had experienced in the major leagues. Not only had he established himself as one of the top relief pitchers in baseball, but he was finally on a contending team. After years in Cleveland, where the organization’s perennial mantra was “wait until next year,” Kern […]

By Andrew North Some 70 cranks from Canada and the United States gathered on November 3-4, 2018, in London, Ontario, for the third annual Canadian Baseball History Conference. The Conference featured 14 half-hour research presentations, in addition to these special events: A tour of Labatt Park, the world’s oldest continuous use baseball park. Named Tecumseh […]