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The Moose from Moosup – an easy nickname to pin on a 6-foot-5, 220-pound ballplayer who hailed from the village of Moosup, Connecticut. Right-handed-hitting Walt Dropo played for parts of 13 major-league seasons, with a solid .270 average (.326 on-base percentage, .432 slugging average), and 152 career home runs.  Dropo easily won the 1950 Rookie […]

He played in only forty-one games in his Major League career, but took home two World Series rings. During his ten years playing professional baseball, he earned such nicknames as Iron Man, Buster, and Butch. No matter what they called Charley Wensloff, one thing was certain: He knew how to pitch. His fastball, curve, and […]

On the very last ball he fielded as a major-league ballplayer, Pete Smith initiated a triple play. It happened in the seventh inning of the Red Sox game against the visiting Los Angeles Angels on September 28, 1963. It was a Saturday afternoon game at Fenway Park. There weren’t many fans in attendance – official […]

First baseman Candy LaChance was a switch-hitting 33-year-old veteran when his Boston Americans won the first World Series, in 1903. He played in every one of his team’s 141 regular-season games that year and each of the eight World Series games as well. That kind of “iron man” endurance wasn’t so uncommon at the time; […]

New York Yankees infielder Gil McDougald led a life of accomplishment both on and off the diamond. During his ten seasons in pinstripes, McDougald was the 1951 American League Rookie of the Year, a five-time All-Star team selection, and a member of eight American League pennant winners. Although often overshadowed by Cooperstown-bound teammates like Mickey […]

It took right-hander Johnny Welch more than five years to get his first major-league win for the Chicago Cubs. After 172 big-league games, he was 35-41 with a career 4.66 earned run average, all but two of the wins being for Boston Red Sox teams in the early to middle 1930s. He was born as […]

Charlie Small’s time in the major leagues consisted of 22 times he was asked to pinch-hit, twice he was asked to pinch-run, and once he was asked to play center field. He wasn’t particularly successful hitting–he sacrificed twice, walked twice, and hit safely three times in 18 at-bats. One of the hits was for extra […]

At the tender age of 20 he was playing in the major leagues. At 24 he helped the Cincinnati Red Stockings win their first pennant. Harry Wheeler appeared to be a happy-go-lucky, free-spirited young man. He was said to be one of the best harmonica players in the country and enjoyed joining his colleagues in […]

Mastering the art of the line drive but unable to master his own temper, Heinie Manush burst onto the major league scene with the Detroit Tigers and quickly became one of the fiercest and most feared hitters in the game. Born July 20, 1901, in Tuscumbia, Alabama, Henry Emmett Manush was raised in the Deep […]

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 […]

Just five short years after the Pittsburgh Pirates won the 1979 World Series championship, the team had fallen to last in the National League East. They were on their way there again in 1985 – but a rebuild was under way, as the trade for Bob Kipper that August showed. The deal in which the […]

The St. Louis Cardinals captured three National League pennants during the 1980s. The team’s stalwart second baseman during the successful run was Tom Herr, a line-drive hitter who played outstanding defense and had a knack for getting on base. In his All-Star season of 1985, Herr hit .302 with career bests in home runs (8) […]

Luis Eleuterio Tiant (1906-1976) was one of the finest pitchers that Cuba has ever produced. So was his son, Luis Clemente Tiant, who won 229 games in the major leagues from 1964 through 1982 – more than any of his countrymen. When asked about his namesake, Luis C. said in 1974, “He was a better […]

In only his fifth start in the major leagues, 20-year-old Kerry Wood turned in a pitching performance for the ages on May 6, 1998. Under cloudy, drizzly skies, the Texas native struck out 20 Houston Astros at Wrigley Field and allowed only one hit–a single off Cubs third baseman Kevin Orie’s glove in the top […]

Grant Thatcher packed a lot into his five-game career with the Brooklyn Superbas in 1903 and 1904. He won his first three appearances with complete-game victories. His only major league loss was a four-inning complete game. Thatcher’s fourth and final career win occurred in his last outing, a nine-inning relief outing when the starting pitcher […]

Praised for his outfield defense and savvy base running skills, Matty McIntyre was the starting left fielder and leadoff hitter on two Detroit Tiger pennant winning teams. Although a broken ankle in 1907 somewhat diminished his defensive abilities, McIntyre was still able to contribute with the bat upon his return and was considered to be […]

Wet, wild, and weird — with a dash of pine tar. So went the third game of the 1988 National League Championship Series at Shea Stadium on a damp, frigid Saturday afternoon in October. There were players stumbling and skidding all over the field — recorded in the official box score as “soaked.”1 In the […]

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 […]

The White Sox players were fighting mad. They had just gotten their first hits of the game to take the lead in the top of the sixth against the Athletics on a wet, sloppy field. A ferocious downpour erupted minutes later and the umpire halted the game. When he declared it official after the required […]

The Montreal Expos hosted the Pittsburgh Pirates for a two-game midweek series that completed Montreal’s next to last homestand of the season. The 73-71 Expos were third in the National League East Division, 13½ games behind the division-leading New York Mets. Montreal had clobbered the St. Louis Cardinals in their preceding two games, 14-2 and […]

When Sandy Koufax started his seventh major-league season, in 1961, the verdict was still out on whether he should keep a spot in the Los Angeles Dodgers’ rotation. He had struggled with control issues since the time he was signed as a 19-year-old bonus baby from the University of Cincinnati by the Brooklyn Dodgers. His […]

“Torture” was the theme for the 2010 San Francisco Giants. In April 2010, after disappointing back-to-back losses to the San Diego Padres, Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper started the craze during the next day’s broadcast, saying: “Giants baseball … [pause] … torture!”1 Torture was thoroughly embraced by Giants fans. The slogan was used to describe heartbreaking […]

The summer of 1980 was undoubtedly the high-water mark in the brief history of the Double-A Eastern League’s Holyoke Millers franchise. Affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers, the organization moved from Pittsfield’s Wahconah Park in 1977 because of drainage issues that temporarily condemned the historic ballpark.1 During the six years the team was based in Holyoke, […]

A paid crowd1 of 28,922 settled in to watch a scheduled doubleheader between the Astros and Mets on a Wednesday afternoon. Less than a week before, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins returned safely in the spaceship Columbia, concluding the Apollo 11 mission and the historic walk on the moon. In 1969 the Mets […]