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Monday, August 10, may well have been the most important day of the entire 1981 baseball season. This was the day that regular season play would resume after a two-month players strike had wiped out more than one-third of the schedule. Furthermore, in Philadelphia that night, Pete Rose would become the all-time National League hits […]

On Wednesday evening, September 25, 1974, Ralph Houk was managing an aging Tigers squad trapped in last place in the AL East at 71-83, 12½ games behind the first-place Orioles. The season’s high point had come the previous night. Al Kaline reached “his promised land,” becoming the 12th player to get 3,000 hits.1 Earl Weaver’s […]

Wade Boggs registered the first of three five-hit performances during his Hall of Fame career on Tuesday, May 20, 1986, at Fenway Park, as he led the Boston Red Sox to a 17-7 victory over the Minnesota Twins. Boston’s 27-year-old third baseman slapped four singles and a double in six trips to the plate.  The […]

It was the stuff of boyhood dreams. With two outs in the bottom of the 10th inning and the bases loaded, 25-year-old Tony Perez stepped into the right-handed batter’s box against veteran hurler Jack Fisher with a chance to send the 15,006 Cincinnati fans home happy. Perez had just won the All-Star Game for the […]

When Mike Schmidt retired on May 29, 1989, during his 18th season with the Philadelphia Phillies, he was widely regarded as the greatest third baseman of all time. Selected in the second round of the June 1971 amateur draft, Schmidt, an Ohio University product, reached the majors in 1972. A breakthrough season followed in 1974, […]

The 1984 Kansas City Royals were nobody’s idea of an offensive juggernaut. They pulled off the rather amazing feat of making the playoffs despite being outscored for the season, one of only four teams to do that since divisional play began in 1969. Kansas City finished 11th in the American League in runs scored. Even […]

The Pittsburgh Pirates seemed poised to win their first National League pennant since 1909. They had taken took a big step forward in 1921. The emergence of rookie hurlers Whitey Glazner and Johnny Morrison gave Pittsburgh the best pitching staff in the National League by a wide margin.1 Perhaps more importantly, the offseason acquisition of […]

It’s a storyline practically as old as baseball itself: An aging veteran goes back down to the minor leagues to prove himself, convinced against the evidence that his bat, arm, glove, and legs still have enough left to help a big-league team. In the spring of 1967, it was a future Hall of Famer’s turn […]

It was hot and humid in Washington when the Detroit Tigers took the field against the Senators for a doubleheader on Sunday, August 27, 1961. They were hoping to make ground on the New York Yankees as they prepared to play a doubleheader. (The second game was a makeup of a rainout on June 21.) […]

Camilo Pascual had good reason to be anxious about his start for the Minnesota Twins against the Baltimore Orioles on the final day of the 1962 season. In his ninth major-league season, it was the closest he had come to winning 20 games in a season. With 19 wins under his belt for the first […]

Sam Rice broke into the major leagues in August of 1915 as a 25-year-old pitcher with the Washington Nationals. After moving to the outfield midway through the following season, he became one of the leading hitters in the American League. Over the course of a 20-year career, most of which he spent in Washington, Rice […]

Journeyman right-hander Lynn Nelson was a very good hitter for a pitcher, and was often used as a pinch-hitter during his major-league career. But he may have been saddled with one of the most unfortunate nicknames a pitcher can have. He picked up the moniker “Line Drive,” partly for his hitting prowess, but mostly for […]

Mike Hart was so determined to play in the major leagues that he turned down two lucrative offers to play in Japan. A chance to play outfield for the Yankees was denied when the baseball commissioner nullified his trade to New York. Hart hit over .300 for five teams in Triple-A,1 yet his MLB career […]

In the California winter leagues of 1929, California resident and Toledo Mud Hens manager Casey Stengel spotted a hard-hitting shortstop named Bill Knickerbocker. Stengel convinced the teenager to try out for the Mud Hens in the spring. The youngster hitch-hiked across the country in 1930 to join Toledo at spring training in Anniston, Alabama. Knickerbocker […]

When the topic of discussion turns to great two-sport athletes who played major-league baseball during the last quarter of the 20th century, names like Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders, Brian Jordan, and Danny Ainge often come to mind. However, despite enjoying success in both baseball and golf, Rick Rhoden is often overlooked as two-sport standout. Rhoden […]

Between the two of them, the baseball-playing Bender brothers embodied much of the popular turn-of-the-century American Indian stereotype, both positive and negative. Tall, dignified, and stoic, Charles “Chief” Bender epitomized the Noble Savage. He was also one of the finest pitchers of the Deadball Era. Never the staff workhorse, Chief Bender was manager Connie Mack’s […]

American popular culture has always had affection for the medical profession. Television images of Gunsmoke’s Doc Adams, Star Trek‘s testy “Bones” McCoy and the almost god-like Marcus Welby, have made these characters cultural icons. Media images often conflict with reality, doctors as miracle workers or good guys have an instinctive appeal. Fact often surpasses fiction […]

1986 – a season that tugs at the heartstrings of every Boston Red Sox fan who watched and listened to the American League Championship Series and the World Series. The World Series was a classic seven-game affair. If the Red Sox had kept a two-run lead going with two outs in the bottom of the […]

Trading a promising young outfielder — a future All-Star — for a pitcher with a large contract at the end of his career may be the worst trade Harry Dalton ever made. But the pitcher was future Hall of Famer Don Sutton. The arrival of the 37-year-old Sutton wowed Brewers fans and was the final […]

Catchers may often disagree with the calls made by umpires, but it didn’t take Mickey Devine that long to get himself suspended for the depth or demeanor of his disagreement. On June 1, 1916, in his first year in Organized Baseball, the young New Haven catcher was “ordered from the field for disputing Umpire Stafford’s […]

Peter Patrick “Padney” Gillespie was one of the original New York players whose height suggested a name for the team that today plays in San Francisco. With three fellow Troy players, he signed with John B. Day’s New York franchise for the 1883 season, and the group formed that would become known as the Giants. […]

In the spring of 1986, as he was beginning his ninth professional season, Rick Anderson wondered if he would ever get the chance to pitch in the big leagues. Anderson, who had spent the previous six seasons in the pitching-rich New York Mets’ organization at Triple-A Tidewater, was 29 and knew he was running out […]

Prospects who don’t fulfill their promise are a dime a dozen throughout baseball history. Boze Berger could be the epitome of that kind of prospect. While his major-league service was not exemplary, Berger had a flexible glove in the field, giving him some value to a few American League teams. After spending three seasons with […]

Some pitchers are more intense than others. Randy Johnson hit 190 batters in an era when brushbacks were frowned upon. Lefty Grove threw furniture in the clubhouse after tough losses. Among the fiercest competitors in history, Johnny Allen took his frustrations out on anyone who barred his path to victory. Allen’s temper was so notorious […]