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Although no more than that of a journeyman, the six-year major-league playing career of Bert Niehoff was not without its highlights. In 1915 he combined with future Hall of Fame shortstop Dave Bancroft to form the middle infield of the pennant-winning Philadelphia Phillies. The following year, Niehoff led the National League in doubles and was […]
On June 23, 1931, sportswriter Walter W. Smith encountered George Watkins, the St. Louis Cardinals right fielder, in the lobby of Philadelphia’s Franklin Hotel, where the team was staying for a series against the Phillies. Both men were relatively new to their jobs; Smith had begun covering the team for the St. Louis Star the […]
In the one season he played baseball at the major-league level, George Schmees played right field in 20 games, center field in 19 games, left field in nine games, and first base in four games. And he even pitched in two games. He committed one error in right field, one error in center field, one […]
Baseball fans love streaks. And though the number 8 is not as recognizable as 56 or 2,632, it is nonetheless a cherished part of the national pastime’s lore. After bouncing around the minor leagues for 11 seasons, 30-year-old Dale Long was the unlikely center of national media attention in 1956, his second full season with […]
Vada Edward Pinson, Jr., star center fielder for the Cincinnati Reds in the 1960s, was born in Memphis, Tennessee, on August 11, 1938. When he was seven, his family moved to Oakland, California. His father found work as a stevedore at the Bay Area docks, while his mother did domestic work. In 1952, Pinson enrolled […]
Carl Owen Hubbell, one of the top pitchers of the 1930s, is rated one of the greatest pitchers in the game’s history. Born in Carthage, Missouri, on June 22, 1903, he spent his early years on a pecan farm near the small community of Meeker, Oklahoma. After his graduation from Meeker High School, Hubbell went […]
Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd starts his autobiography recalling back in 1964 when he was 5 years old, and his uncle Frank Boyd brought three civil-rights workers by the family home. Later that same year, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were discovered murdered. Dennis believes they were killed just after they left the Boyd […]
The school system in Jackson, Michigan, discontinued the baseball program about the time Benny Frey reached high school. Undaunted, Benny learned to pitch on the sandlots and from his brothers. He played summer ball for a variety of teams in Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio before being signed by the Toledo Mud Hens of the Double-A […]
Unlike quite a number of major leaguers, World War II veteran Art Schallock didn’t play baseball during his time in the service. He worked as a radio operator in the United States Navy in the Pacific Theater of Operations, serving aboard the USS Coral Sea. Per the aircraft carrier’s tribute site, the Coral Sea saw […]
“I’ve done football for fun,” Lindsey Nelson once said. “I did baseball for a living.”1 He made an extravagant living as one of network television’s premier college and pro football broadcasters while following the New York Mets from worst to first and back for the first 17 years of their history. During three decades he […]
In 1932 the MVP winners in both the American and National Leagues plied their trade in Philadelphia. A’s first baseman Jimmie Foxx won the AL award by blasting 58 home runs, more than any other hitter in the city’s professional baseball history. A mile away, Phillies outfielder Chuck Klein gained the NL’s accolade by slugging […]
Charles Lindbergh’s nonstop solo flight across the Atlantic in May of 1927 brought him overnight worldwide acclaim. No more than a thousand well-wishers saw the former stunt pilot take off from Roosevelt Field on Long Island, New York, but as many as 150,000 were on hand when his Spirit of St. Louis touched down in […]
Roberto Clemente, the first great Latin American baseball star to enter major-league baseball and make it into the Hall of Fame, debuted for the Pittsburgh Pirates in right field as a 20-year-old on April 17, 1955. This was only one year after the Pirates’ acquisition of Curt Roberts, the African American second baseman from the […]
On Saturday, August 18, 1956, the Cincinnati Redlegs and Milwaukee Braves combined to hit 10 home runs, tying a major-league record (at the time) as the Redlegs came away with a 13-4 victory at Crosley Field in front of a crowd of 30,244, fans, including 8,772 ladies night guests. It was an early-arriving crowd; the […]
The Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins celebrated the Fourth of July in 2008 “with plenty of fireworks, combining for 43 hits and 35 runs.”1 Colorado overcame a nine-run deficit and defeated the Marlins, “their expansion brethren,”2 with a bases-loaded, walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth inning. And then the commercial fireworks began. […]
The 1928 National League season was approaching its waning stages on September 13, with just 17 days remaining in the 154-game schedule. It had turned into a three-team dogfight for the pennant between the St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants, and Chicago Cubs, with St. Louis holding a three-game lead over both rivals. The Cardinals […]
It has been said that one of the great things about baseball is that in any given game you’ll see something that has never happened before. That may not be literally true, but it was true for the 7,922 fans who came to Sportsman’s Park to watch the fifth-place Detroit Tigers and the eighth-place St. […]
The New York Giants began the 1930 season with seven straight wins, including two in walk-off fashion, but followed with six losses in their next nine games. Entering play on May 8, John McGraw’s squad (10-6) had the best winning percentage in the National League (.625), yet they stood a half-game behind the Chicago Cubs […]
My dear Mr. Whitman, While “days” for baseball players are in vogue, I would like to suggest some sort of a testimonial of appreciation to Fred Hoey for the splendid service he has rendered to baseball and to the thousands of fans who cannot always be at the game. I am sure that great numbers […]
A relatively small crowd of 23,1181 assembled at RFK Stadium for the Fourth of July festivities and a baseball game. As always in DC, the Fourth was a day game so the fans could head home before the fireworks over the National Mall. Neither team was going anywhere: The Marlins (35-44) and the Nationals (36-48) […]
The Minnesota Twins were scheduled to open their 1962 home season on Friday, April 13. The date proved unlucky for a ballgame as six inches of snow blanketed the Twin Cities, forcing a postponement to the next day. It took a flamethrower, sprinklers, and a helicopter hovering over the outfield to melt the snow and […]
Editor’s note: This essay is from SABR’s “Pitching, Defense, and Three-Run Homers: The 1970 Baltimore Orioles” (University of Nebraska Press, 2012), edited by Mark Armour and Malcolm Allen. The seed that sprouted into the powerful Baltimore Orioles teams of the 1960s and ‘70s was planted by two baseball lifers who despised each other. Together they […]
Sportsman’s Park was home of the St. Louis Browns from 1902 to 1953. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library.) Introduction Achieving on-field success has often proved elusive to owners of the Baltimore Orioles and its predecessor teams, the St. Louis Browns and Milwaukee Brewers. The franchise, dating back to the inception of the American […]
Early in the morning of September 13, 1948, an Oroville, California, telephone operator told police the phone was off the hook in the Myers Street apartment that was the home of the Oroville Red Sox’ business manager Julian Wera, the former New York Yankees third baseman. Wera’s wife, Ruth, and her nine-year-old daughter, Jerry, had […]