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Referral to the glossary of statistical terms in the first edition (1989) of Total Baseball by John Thorn and Pete Palmer allows one to easily find not only the meaning and utility of numerous baseball statistics but also the persons credited with inventing them.1 For example: Assist average. Assists divided by games played. Stat created […]

A no-hitter turns a pitcher into an instant celebrity in the baseball world. Regardless of what he did before or what he does after, he’ll always be a member of an elite group, a fraternal brotherhood that links Cy Young and Nolan Ryan with the likes of Jose Jimenez, Mike Warren, and Bobo Holloman. What […]

Dodger Stadium hosted the Olympic baseball tournament in 1984. Japan beat the USA in the championship game. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)   Though baseball’s history as an “official” Olympic event is short and fragmented (1992-2008, 2020, 2028), the sport was on the roster as an “exhibition” game for various decades. Although a dozen […]

First, it is an outlier, as it lies outside the realm of regular expectations, because nothing in the past can convincingly point to its possibility. Second, it carries an extreme impact (unlike the bird). Third, in spite of its outlier status, human nature makes us concoct explanations for its occurrence after the fact, making it […]

  Smile. Tilt your head. Lean back. A little more. You’ve got it. Right there. Beautiful! Snap! With each pose, each shutter click, Marla Collins crossed the line from Chicago Cubs ballgirl to Playboy model. Both paying roles relied on sexuality: one teased and implied, the other overt. And before you hyperventilate about “pornography,” know […]

One day in May 1973, on one large field out in the San Fernando Valley, four baseball games were played simultaneously. In those games, three future Hall of Famers were on the field, with seven other future major leaguers also taking part.

When I first became interested in baseball as a little leaguer in 1960-61, my reading and TV ex­periences eventually led me to San Diego’s Westgate Park (opened two years earlier), home of the Pacific Coast League Padres. There I could see Gary Peters, Suitcase Simpson, and the locals in person. When a player got hurt, […]

Cupid Childs was one of the best-hitting major-league second basemen during the late nineteenth century, not to mention a better than average fielder who possessed great range on the diamond. Only four other second basemen in the history of major-league baseball have averaged more total chances per game than Childs. His all-around outstanding play made […]

Willie Mays and Willie McCovey played together for 14 seasons, including in McCovey’s 1969 MVP campaign. (SABR-Rucker Archive)   Willie Mays and Willie McCovey formed one of the greatest one-two power combinations in baseball history. The pair were teammates on the San Francisco Giants from 1959 to 1972. During that stretch, they won the 1962 National […]

When Brad Lidge announced his retirement late in 2012, some commentators pointed to the home run he gave up to Albert Pujols in the 2005 NLCS as the defining moment of his career. To Phillies fans, though, the image of Lidge on his knees, arms raised in triumph after recording the final out of the […]

John Montgomery Ward, one of the early masters of the curve ball, is also credited with developing the raised pitcher’s mound. He devised many infield techniques as well, including signaling for pitchouts to prevent stolen bases and using the intentional walk to increase chances for a double play. When Ward retired after the 1894 season, […]

We propose to measure overall offensive performance of a baseball player as the ratio of Bases Advanced to Outs Created. This new Overall Offensive Performance (OOP) statistic is deterministic, objective, readily calculated, and easily understood. OOP captures in a single number all aspects of offensive performance included in multiple, existing offensive stats, plus additional aspects […]

Perry Barber was just the second woman to umpire at Yankee Stadium, in 1985. (Courtesy of Perry Barber)   On Sunday, September 9, 1973, Ronnie Bromm became the lone member of the most exclusive club on the planet: Women Who Have Umpired at Yankee Stadium. She held that title all by herself for a long […]

Author’s note: The following compilation of illustrated baseball books has been necessarily limited by my own research interests. I am predominantly a 19th century researcher, though my involvement carries into the early 1900s. My library contains volumes which reflect this bias, and consequently the following short list is strongest in pictorial coverage from 1930 back. […]

During the 2007 baseball season, Jim Reisler interviewed nine former major-league players about baserunning. Following are transcripts of his interviews with three of them—Tim Raines, one of the game’s leading basestealers; Tommy John, a pitcher; and Butch Wynegar, a catcher.   TIM RAINES With 808 career stolen bases, Tim Raines is one of the top […]

Here is the appendix for Pete Palmer’s article “Stolen Bases and Caught Stealing by Catchers” in the Spring 2014 Baseball Research Journal.

In the summer of 1948, two of the nation’s premier major-league pitching prospects were Georgia boys—Willard Nixon of Lindale and Hugh Radcliffe of Thomaston. Both were multisport stars with a special talent for baseball. Both were big, strong, righthanded pitchers who had dominated opposing batters wherever they had pitched. Both attracted the attention of almost […]

One of major league baseball’s most enduring trends over its one and a half centuries has been the distribution of the innings workload among an ever-increasing number of pitchers. When the National League opened for business in 1876, only 34 pitchers (just over four per team) were needed to navigate the 26-week season, in which […]

Edgar Renteria started the Marlins’ walkoff “tradition” with the game-winner off Roberto Hernandez in the first game of the 1997 NLDS. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)   The Marlins won the World Series both times they qualified for the postseason in 1997 and 2003. This was not accomplished without a little drama: Five of […]

Once upon a time in a faraway place—a place so far away no one under the age of sixty today has ever been there—there was a land called Organized Baseball, consisting of two major leagues of eight teams each and fifty-one minor leagues with names like Kitty, Pony, Cotton States, and Three-I. There were six […]

Runs batted in, now one of the most important measures of batting performance, were slow to be recognized by the major leagues. There were no official RBI records until 1920, and they were not carried in many box scores until ten years after that. It is not surprising then that a record such as “Most […]

The 1949 Drummondville Cubs, Quebec Provincial League champions. Left to right: Gerry Cotnoir, Roy Zimmerman, Roger Bréard, Quincy Trouppe, Len Hooker, Sal Maglie, Conrado Perez, Roberto Vargas, Joe Promowicz (Prom), Joe luminelli, Danny Gardella, Stan Bréard, Vic Power, Ernie Sawyer. (Collection of Daniel Papillon)   George Gmelch, then playing for the Drummondville Royals, recalled a […]

The dictionary defines the word “Elysian” as “something blissful; delightful,”1 and for ballplayers, such a place has existed for 140 years in the city of New York. Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs of New York City and if considered as a separate entity would rank fourth in the country in sending players to […]

The baseball Winter Meetings are usually a time when teams reflect on the past season and plan for the next season. However, 1995 was in the middle of a five-year stretch when major-league baseball did not attend the winter meetings. Instead, the majors held general managers’ meetings in November in Scottsdale, Arizona, and owners meetings […]