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John Kennedy listed two goals when he completed a questionnaire for statistician William J. Weiss in 1951: “To become a major leaguer & one of the greatest.” Kennedy completed his first goal. He earned a roster spot as a shortstop for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1957, becoming the first African American member of the team. […]

Throughout his 18-year major-league career, Lew Burdette was known for his antics as much as for his success on the mound. One of the best control pitchers of the 1950s, the right-hander paired with his roommate and best friend Warren Spahn to form one of the greatest and most durable pitching combinations in baseball history. […]

James Lee “Jimmie” Newberry was a starting pitcher for the Birmingham Black Barons from 1942 to 1950. Most newspapers and historical sources refer to “Jimmy” as the diminutive of Newberry’s first name. However, the best evidence, which includes two autographs, signed “Jimmie Newberry,” is that he preferred to use the variant “Jimmie.”1 Newberry was born […]

A standout in three sports, he was considered one of the greatest athletes in the history of his college. Yet in his career as a professional baseball player, he failed to achieve stardom. Jimmy Stewart was seemingly a substitute with no position to call his own, but he carved out a 10-year career in the […]

Right-handed-hitting outfielder Ken Hunt and one-time major-league single-season home-run leader Roger Maris1 were boyhood friends while growing up in Grand Forks, North Dakota. After the Maris family moved to nearby Fargo, the two all-around athletes were high-school sports rivals. During Hunt’s senior year in football, his team lost one game, a 7-6 setback to Fargo […]

Although Jack Dittmer may not have achieved the level of major league stardom many predicted for him, he was an outstanding athlete who was liked and admired for both his performances on the field and his cheerful, outgoing personality. He was a nationally recognized athlete in high school and college who played football, baseball, and […]

He neither slugged like Aaron nor pitched like Spahn, but Lou Perini made his own indelible mark on baseball history. In fact, one can argue that few men ever made a greater impact on the game without playing professionally than the construction giant who moved the Braves from Boston to Milwaukee. For a half-century from […]

Before Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders made “two-sport athletes” a vogue term in the 1980s and ’90s, there was Dick Groat. Groat lacked the power of Jackson or the speed of Sanders. But what he lacked in physical gifts he more than made up in guile and spirit. His collegiate career at Duke University earned […]

“Carmen Fanzone always led a double life.” That’s how Jerry Crowe led a story about the former ballplayer and trumpeter that ran in the Los Angeles Times.1 Primarily a third baseman on the diamond, Fanzone played in parts of five seasons (1970-1974) for two major-league teams that suffered nearly century-long droughts between World Series wins: […]

The earliest known connection between dentistry and the Boston Red Sox is Fred Anderson, a pitcher. You’ll find him in the record books, as playing for the Red Sox in 1909 and then again in 1913. It is said that he passed up an opportunity to join the Red Sox until he finished his dentistry […]

A life in baseball is how one might best describe the life of Fred Mitchell. He pitched in the very first game ever played by the Boston Red Sox franchise (an exhibition game in Charlottesville, Virginia), and 18 years later managed the Chicago Cubs against the Red Sox in the 1918 World Series. His major-league […]

Charlie Moore played in the major leagues for 15 seasons, spending the first 14 with the Milwaukee Brewers and finishing up with a short stint with the Toronto Blue Jays. He is remembered as a key member the young Brewers teams that reached the American League playoffs in 1981 and the World Series in 1982. […]

When Cincinnati Reds manager Dave Bristol got in the face of third-base umpire Bill Williams on May 9, 1969, at Montreal’s Jarry Park, he wasn’t just making a complaint about Williams’s umpiring.1 He was making an obscure bit of major-league history. Williams’s ejection of Bristol during a fifth-inning argument made Bristol the first person ever […]

A freak ankle injury sidelined Roberto Clemente for four games in May 1955, momentarily sidetracking his spectacular rookie-year emergence in Pittsburgh. The 20-year-old native of Puerto Rico returned on May 29 with five hits in the Pirates’ curfew-interrupted 11-5 win over the Philadelphia Phillies in the second game of a doubleheader — but lost his […]

The St. Louis Cardinals were in a fight for the National League pennant late in the1926 season. If they prevailed, it would be the first for the franchise in the modern era. Their chances looked promising on September 16: As they faced the Philadelphia Phillies, they were a half-game behind the Cincinnati Reds. On the […]

Few baseball writers predicted big things for the 1926 Boston Red Sox. The consensus was that the Red Sox were still in dire need of improvement after three eighth-place finishes in four seasons.1 But manager Lee Fohl ignored the naysayers and remained optimistic about his team’s prospects. Fohl insisted the Red Sox would do better […]

The Pittsburgh Pirates were slumping when they arrived in the Gateway City for a four-game series with the St. Louis Cardinals in June 1933. Skipper George Gibson’s Bucs (27-21) had lost eight of their last 11 games to fall from first to third place, three games behind the New York Giants. The Redbirds, however, were […]

“There haven’t been many — if any — finer finishing touches put on a no-hit performance,” gushed sportswriter Jack Hernon after the Chicago Cubs’ Toothpick Sam Jones struck out the side with the bases loaded in the ninth inning to author a no-hitter against the Pittsburgh Pirates.1 Jones “put a bizarre finish to the greatest […]

When the San Francisco Giants took the field at Candlestick Park on Friday, October 1, 1965, their season was hanging in the balance, and precariously so. The Giants trailed the first-place Los Angeles Dodgers by two games with only three games left in the season. Just a week and a half before, on September 20, the Giants had enjoyed […]

On their way to the World Series championship in 2018, the Boston Red Sox won more than 50 regular-season games at home (57) and more than 50 on the road (51). They won precisely twice as many games as they lost, 108-54. The 108 victories were the most in franchise history; the prior high had […]

The opening of the 1972 season was unforgettable in many ways, but especially for North Texas. The Washington Senators were moving to Arlington, Texas, to become the Texas Rangers, and the fans were looking forward to Opening Day. The Rangers spent their spring in Pompano Beach, Florida, trying to sort out who was going to […]

“Before Sandy Koufax became Sandy Koufax, before Clayton Kershaw was invented, there was Karl Spooner.” — George Vecsey1   It was the last week of the 1954 regular season, a disappointing one for the Brooklyn Dodgers. The archrival New York Giants were in town, grabbing the opportunity to clinch the National League title in the […]

Inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1939, Eddie Collins is considered one of the best second basemen of all time. Renowned manager John McGraw, whose New York Giants clubs were defeated by Collins’s teams in three World Series, said, “Eddie Collins is the best ballplayer I have seen during my career on […]

In Game Four of the 1946 World Series, the visiting St. Louis Cardinals had rapped out 20 hits. In Game Five, they got only four.1 It was the Red Sox who hit into double digits this time — but won only thanks to a three-run flurry in the seventh inning. Unheralded Joe Dobson, 13-6 during […]