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Owing to their 87 wins in 1965 and their first winning season since 1959, the Cleveland Indians braced for an even more successful 1966. They started the season red hot and won their first ten games. Getting ready for the rubber match of a three-game series against the California Angels in the Angels’ newly christened […]

“I got the name Show Boat in St. Louis with the Cards in 1930,” wrote George “Showboat” Fisher in a 1985 letter. “The show ‘Showboat’ was in St. Louis most of the summer, the fans liked what they saw, so they started to call me ‘Show Boat.’ I hit .374 to lead the club, and we won […]

One of the best pitchers of the 1970s, Dock Ellis feared success nearly as much as he feared failure. He both angered and amused. His antics cut across racial and cultural lines, as he challenged old prejudices and “normal” ways of doing things. Ellis pitched a no-hitter in 1970 and the next year led the […]

Some baseball players evoke a position. Recall catcher Mickey Cochrane. Others define managing: Connie Mack comes to mind. Many broadcast as a color analyst or play-by-play man, like Bob Uecker and Bob Costas. Few have performed all of the above at one time or another as well as the Blue Jays’ John Albert “Buck” Martinez, […]

Harry Byrd Highway runs west from US 401 for about five miles along South Carolina Route 34/151, and past Darlington Raceway, NASCAR’s first paved superspeedway. The 1.25-mile egg-shaped oval, built in 1950, is a shrine for stock-car racing comparable to what Wrigley Field is for baseball. Many racing fans visiting the Darlington Raceway Stock Car […]

Tom Butts stood 5-feet-8 and weighed just 142 pounds, but his size was not the reason he acquired the nickname Pee Wee. Rather, the strong-armed shortstop’s defensive prowess reminded observers of his White contemporary, Pee Wee Reese.1 “I’d compare Butts with Reese or [Phil] Rizzuto or anyone I’ve seen in the big leagues,” opined Roy […]

In his lifetime Herman Bell was a highly regarded defensive catcher for the Birmingham Black Barons, but one who could not catch a break. His career in the Negro Leagues was marred by untimely injuries and complicated by unexpected happenstances and the harsh reality of being an African-American baseball player in the Jim Crow South. […]

Catcher “Oil” Smith, a bench-jockey and brawler extraordinaire, played on five World Series teams in the 1920s. Behind the plate, he perfected tactics that distracted and intimidated hitters. A potent left-hand batter himself, he finished his 12 seasons in the majors with a .303 lifetime average. “He probably was involved in as many fights as […]

Throughout his 12-year major-league career, Ted Sizemore was known for his versatility and competitiveness, as well as for his love of baseball. When he was playing youth sports, some skeptics told him he was too short to be a major leaguer (sources would later claim he was either 5-feet-9”1 or 5-feet-10”; but in high school, […]

Al Smith was an accomplished ballplayer whose major-league career spanned 12 seasons with four American League teams. Primarily an outfielder, he played six positions as a major leaguer and was a fine defender with a strong arm and good speed. Smith finished with a .272 lifetime batting average, hit 164 home runs, and reached base […]

As of the end of the 2014 season, 18,400 players are recognized by Baseball-Reference as having played in the major leagues. Of this group 595, or a little over 3 percent, share an interesting distinction: They played their first major-league game for a team that won the World Series that year. Eleven of this group […]

The numbers for Nippy Jones in the 1957 World Series don’t look like much: three games, three plate appearances, two at-bats, no runs, no hits, one hit-by-pitch. But the “shoe-polish incident” in the tenth inning of Game Four, when Jones was able to confirm that a pitch from Tommy Byrne had struck his foot by […]

This lanky pitcher was the first Mexican player to win a World Series ring. El Ejote – The Stringbean — was a member of the Oakland A’s bullpen in 1973. His motion was quirky and memorable: Whipping the ball from a low side-arm/submarine angle, Piña then swung wide and landed hard with his trailing right foot. NBC’s […]

In his youth, Will McEnaney was a mischief-maker. In his adulthood, mischief became roistering, somewhat to the detriment of McEnaney’s career as a National League pitcher. Still, he posted a few achievements, including sterling performances as a reliever for the Reds in the 1975 and 1976 World Series. William Henry McEnaney was born, with twin […]

Mention brothers from the Dominican Republic who were major-league outfielders in the 1960s, and most people will understandably think of Felipe, Matty, and Jesús Alou. But Manny and Elvio Jiménez also fit the description. While Elvio appeared in just one game, Manny Jiménez spent all or parts of seven seasons (1962-1964, 1966-1969) with the Kansas […]

Mothers will do anything for their children. If you were Patty Kendall, those selfless duties would have included hitting ground balls to your son Jason, sometimes for hours on end, until he missed one. “That was the deal,” said Patty. “If he missed one, I went in. He used to keep me out there for […]

The year 1933 was one of the low points of the Great Depression. Even Babe Ruth was not immune to economic circumstances, as he took a pay cut of $23,000 from his previous year’s salary of $75,000. The Single-A Eastern League had folded in July of 1932 and with it the Hartford Senators. This was back when […]

Popular broadcaster Al Michaels has informed and entertained American sports fans for over half a century. His intelligent commentary and friendly demeanor can make a viewer or listener feel part of a sporting event as much as, or even more than, being in actual attendance. Alan Richard Michaels (only his mother calls him “Alan”) was […]

Growing up in the shadow of his father – a Los Angeles Dodgers star and the 1962 National League MVP – could be a challenge for Bump Wills. Often referred to as the “son of Maury Wills,” Bump did not let that sway his focus and competitiveness. He spent six seasons (1977-1982) of his own […]

In 1911, Angie Tullar, a prominent resident of Wellsville, New York, gave her community the use of a parcel of land for public recreation. Over time, this generous donation provided the residents of her small village with a front-row seat to watch baseball players ranging from Ty Cobb to Tony Conigliaro. Tullar Field, a ballpark […]

Here is a list of all known players to have hit four or more home runs in a single professional game, first published by SABR founding member Bob McConnell in The Minor League Research Journal, Volume 2 (1997), updated in Going for the Fences: The Minor League Home Run Record Book (2009), and now maintained […]

April 1966 was a great time to be a Minnesota Twin. The Twins were the reigning American League champions – a title reserved for the New York Yankees in 14 of the previous 16 years. Only the seventh-game brilliance of Sandy Koufax had prevented the Twins from being fitted for World Series rings.1 Minnesota was […]

Pete Mackanin has spanned the Western Hemisphere as a player, coach, and manager from Canada to Venezuela. He may be best remembered as manager of the Philadelphia Phillies from 2015 to 2017, although Bob Fowler of the Minneapolis Star once referred to him as a “non-fiction Casey at the Bat” for a feat Mackanin performed […]

Buffalo hadn’t hosted a major-league baseball game in over a century. The Queen City was once home to the National League’s Buffalo Bisons, who last played on October 10, 1885,1 and the Federal League’s Buffalo Blues, who last played in Buffalo on September 8, 1915.2 While Buffalo witnessed several successful minor-league teams throughout the twentieth […]