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The stage was the fifth game of the World Series, on October 15, 1970. The Baltimore Orioles had taken a three games to one Series lead over the Cincinnati Reds. Brooks Robinson had already delivered a game-winning home run in the opener, robbed Tony Perez and Johnny Bench of base hits with a pair of […]

“Judy Johnson was the smartest baseball player I ever came across.” — Ted Page1   Despite his father’s aspirations for William “Judy” Johnson to become a boxer, Judy never entered the ring. Instead, Johnson took his game to the diamond. For that, baseball owes him a debt of gratitude. In the Negro Leagues, if Satchel […]

Those who served during World War II were collectively known as the Greatest Generation. Many young, and not so young, men went into the service during that time and returned home to resume their lives. But for those whose lives had been baseball, they often found that their days of playing major-league baseball were over. […]

Several incidental details about William P. “Baldy” Louden Jr.’s life have been muddied by the march of time. Meticulous research failed to discover, for example, what the middle initial “P” stood for, or how a man with a full head of hair acquired the nickname Baldy. Even his date of birth is uncertain. Though various […]

More than anything, Ben Chapman is remembered these days for the vitriol he heaped on Jackie Robinson in April of Robinson’s first year in the majors. Chapman was the Phillies’ manager that day in 1947 and “decided to make Robinson’s color an issue and encouraged at least three of his men to do the same.”1 […]

To tell the story of Buck O’Neil, one needs only to retell the stories by Buck O’Neil. He told stories of Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, and other Negro League greats forgotten to history because of the color of their skin. He told them with a twinkle in his eye, a smile from ear to ear, […]

On September 21, 2001, amid heavy security, 41,235 fans1 filed into Shea Stadium for the first baseball game to be played in New York City after the September 11 terrorist attacks. Only a week before, the ballpark had served as a staging and relief area for rescue workers, and at the time there was debate […]

In Jim Bouton’s revelatory 1970 book Ball Four, he describes a late September 1969 scene at San Francisco’s Candlestick Park. “A group of terrorized pitchers stood around the batting cage watching Willie McCovey belt some tremendous line drives over the right-field fence. Every time a ball bounced into the seats we’d make little whimpering animal […]

Duke Farrell played for two major-league teams in Boston, with 11 seasons in between. He led the American Association in home runs and runs batted for the 1891 Boston Reds, and then played in the first World Series ever staged, in 1903 for the Boston Americans, who became the Boston Red Sox. Both teams finished […]

Editor’s note: This article was selected as a winner of the 2012 McFarland-SABR Baseball Research Award.   In the early 1880s prosperous tobacco merchant John B. Day re-established the national pastime in New York – operating teams in both major-league circuits with great success. In 1884 Day’s New York Metropolitans were American Association pennant winners […]

Few post-1960 sportscasters have enjoyed a broader national impact in the United States than Dick Enberg. During his 60-year career, Enberg was a fixture for NBC and CBS television networks, delivering his signature exclamation “Oh My!” while announcing NFL football (including eight Super Bowls), college basketball (including four Final Fours), Wimbledon tennis, and events in […]

Richard John McAuliffe was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on November 29, 1939. He grew up in the tiny town of Unionville, a burg “not exactly a breeding spot for major league athletes,” according to Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray, another Connecticut native. “Chickens are more along its line. … Unionville has about nine months […]

Left-hander Ron Perranoski’s sinking fastball, sharp-breaking curve and ability to thrive in critical situations made him one of baseball’s top relievers. Over 13 seasons (1961-1973) with four teams, mostly the Dodgers and Twins as well as the Tigers and Angels, he pitched in five postseasons and three World Series — earning championship rings with Los […]

For generations, many American fathers have raised their sons with dreams of emulating their baseball hero, Mickey Mantle. Chipper Jones’s father was no different. From an early age, his son reminded him of The Mick: a small-town country boy with charming good looks, a Southern drawl, and a preternatural ability to hit a baseball from […]

Nellie Fox was the heart of the 1959 Go-Go White Sox, the team that brought Chicago’s South Side its first pennant since the tarnished Black Sox season 40 years earlier. The image of Little Nel in his batting stance has become iconic — a choked-up grip on his bottle bat with a wad of chewing […]

The 1970 All-Star Game, at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati, was tied at 4-4 with two out in the bottom of the 12th inning. For the National League, Pete Rose was on second base and Billy Grabarkewitz on first. When Jim Hickman lined pitcher Clyde Wright’s offering to center field, hometown hero Rose broke from second […]

Charlie Rivera was a third baseman, second baseman, and shortstop who played with several clubs in the Negro leagues for parts of five seasons, from 1939 to 1944. He was a right-handed hitter who stood 5-feet-9 and weighed 155 pounds.1 Carlos Manuel Lavezzari y Sierra was born to Manuel Lavezzari and Trinidad Sierra on September […]

Jocko Conlan always wanted to be a ballplayer. He never dreamed about becoming an umpire until the opportunity presented itself by accident. He parlayed that chance into a Hall of Fame career that spanned 25 big-league seasons. A Sporting News book once wrote of Conlan, “He was a master psychologist in the charged-up world of […]

In the days before radio, Billy Sunday was the most successful evangelist America had ever known. The renowned preacher and temperance crusader found the Lord while playing for the Chicago White Stockings in the 1880s. He was an exciting player, speedy and daring on the base paths and acrobatic in the outfield. His earnest and […]

At the turn of the 20th century, baseball truly was America’s game. The Boston Daily Globe put it this way. “Once more baseball is king. From the National League to the [local] nine purchasing uniforms on the instalment [sic] plan, all is bustle. Never was [sic] there so many leagues and independent teams in existence […]

This article appears in SABR’s “Pride of Smoketown: The 1935 Pittsburgh Crawfords” (2020), edited by Frederick C. Bush and Bill Nowlin.   Baseball and music have a long history together. Many songs, such as “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” or “Talkin’ Baseball,” have been written specifically about the game. The National Anthem is […]

As a kid growing up in Pasco across the river, being able to stand on the mound at Sanders Field was as big for me as going to Yankee Stadium. — Bruce Kison1 Sanders Field, circa 1953 (Photos courtesy of the Eastern Benton County Historical Society)   Sanders-Jacobs Memorial Field, originally known as Sanders Field, […]