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Signage at Avista Stadium in Spokane. (Courtesy of Eric Vickrey)   Native American-themed team names and mascots were commonplace in professional baseball during the twentieth century. Images such as an Indian chief in a feathered headdress or warlike caricatures were often used in logos and advertisements. These depictions were often considered derogatory and misrepresented the […]

The cover of a baseball comprises two strips of leather (identical dog bone–shaped geometrical figures called ovals of Cassini) stitched together with a single continuous red seam. The appearance of that seam during a pitch can provide information about the ball’s spin characteristics, which in turn might make the behavior of the pitch predictable. Therefore […]

In the 1950s, as the population of the United States shifted, the footprint of major league baseball also changed. In 1952, there were 16 major-league teams centered in just 10 cities, but within a decade, existing teams had moved to Milwaukee, Baltimore, Kansas City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and the Twin Cities area. Following the […]

Bacone College in its early years when its name was Bacone Indian College. (Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society)   Although the 1967 Bacone Warriors had a track record of incredible success, winning 42 regular-season games and losing only two, the odds were stacked against this small school in Muskogee, Oklahoma, formed in 1880 to […]

The National League and the American Association entered their respective winter meetings — hereafter called the annual meetings1 — buoyed by the growing popularity and profits of the past 1886 season.2 The owners recognized that to further expand the popularity of baseball and, with the consequent rise in attendance, increase their profits, they had to […]

This article presents those little known but important men who helped to launch so many players from the sandlots of Los Angeles to baseball stardom.  Southern California has long been fertile ground for major-league talent. Walter Johnson, Jackie Robinson, Bob Lemon, Duke Snider, Don Drysdale, George Brett, Tony Gwynn, and Ozzie Smith all began their […]

Warren Ballpark in Bisbee, Arizona, has hosted baseball games since it first opened in 1909. (Courtesy of Jacob Pomrenke)   Today, the term “Cactus League” refers to an annual rite of spring: affiliated professional baseball’s preseason in Arizona. But MLB’s Cactus League was not the first! In 1910, a league far removed from the slick […]

Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in Black Ball: A Negro Leagues Journal, Vol. 2, No. 2 (McFarland & Co., Fall 2009).   In August of 1932, Gus Greenlee added permanent lights to the Pittsburgh Crawfords home field. (NOIRTECH RESEARCH INC.)   The Story of Greenlee Field Any story requires plot, characters, and setting. In […]

Is there widespread racial bias among umpires? In August 2007, a widely publicized academic study said the answer is yes. The truth might be more complicated.Is there widespread racial bias among umpires? In August 2007, a widely publicized academic study said the answer is yes. After taking a close look at the study, I’m not […]

Ford Frick, president of the National League in 1947, is not the first person who comes to mind concerning Jackie Robinson and the integration of baseball, though he deserves more consideration than he has been given. While no other individual rivals the role played by Branch Rickey in breaking the game’s color barrier, other than […]

Since the formation of the National League in 1876, many cities have failed to retain their major league teams. Fifteen such cities were represented in the majors before 1900. Most cities persevered in the minor leagues, but only Troy, New York suffered longer without professional baseball than Altoona, Pennsylvania, whose sole stint in the majors […]

This article was originally published in “From McGillicuddy to McGwire: Baseball in Florida and the Caribbean,” the 2000 SABR convention journal.   It was 1947, and Branch Rickey had two spring training problems, both of his own making. Bud Holman had one, but it loomed large for him. It took Rickey and Holman a while […]

In an atmosphere of uncertainty and anxiety, more than 1,400 officials, representatives, and executives of the major and minor leagues held their annual Winter Meetings in Hollywood, Florida, about a half-hour north of Miami, from December 8 to 12, 1975. Prepared to conduct business, entertain trades, and deliberate possible rule changes, many attendees wondered whether […]

This article was selected for inclusion in SABR 50 at 50: The Society for American Baseball Research’s Fifty Most Essential Contributions to the Game. A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” Although this quote is often attributed to Mark Twain, at least one Twain researcher claims […]

Floyd County, Georgia, in the northwest corner of the state, once supported eight different textile mills, each with a baseball team composed of mill workers. These teams became the formally organized Northwest Georgia Textile League and flourished between the 1930s and 1950s, providing Floyd County with three decades of industrialized community recreation that has not […]

Baseball traveled through rough waters beginning in the late 1960s, as it navigated increasing player unrest and the growing power of their union. Court cases, strikes, hearings, lawsuits — it was challenging to follow baseball in this period without a law degree. The off-field headliners — Curt Flood, Bowie Kuhn, Marvin Miller, Andy Messersmith, Charlie […]

In 1763, literary critic Dr. Samuel Johnson said about women preachers, “Sir, a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.”1 In the early 1900s, that same attitude prevailed when it came to women sports journalists: male […]

Despite the picturesque setting of Honolulu, baseball’s owners were a largely dispirited lot as they headed into the 1982 winter meetings. They were a year and a half removed from a brutal strike in which they had failed to achieve their main objective of direct player compensation for free agents; many teams were losing money; […]

They played six days a week, May through August, under the punishing South Georgia sun and in swamp-like humidity. They traveled by rail, seemingly always on the go. They were off on Sundays, their only day of rest before another round of games and trains. Some played for hometown pride and some played for the […]

The first game played by the Toronto-based professional baseball team that ultimately became the Maple Leafs took place on April 29, 1895, and marked the beginning of a proud franchise that would play in the International League (and its predecessor) continually for 72 years. TORONTO OF THE 1890S During the nineteenth century, Toronto went from […]

Atlanta’s baseball history is dominated by names such as Hank Aaron, John Smoltz, Greg Maddux, Dale Murphy, and Chipper Jones. The Braves also dominated their division in the 1990s, but that is only a small part of Atlanta’s long and storied baseball history. Anyone can look up the history of the Braves and their players […]

Foreword Please do not tell my umpire assignor this: I conceived of the format of this memoir while I was doing the bases at a somewhat boring freshman high-school game last fall in California. Actually, it was something called a “showcase.” Parents of aspiring high schoolers who feel they can make college teams will know […]

By 1942 World War II was already impacting the Philadelphia Phillies’ spring training activities as they prepared for the regular season in the soft sands of Miami Beach, Florida. Air corps stunts were observed above Flamingo Park; the players inspected fighters and bombers at a nearby base; and manager Hans Lobert, who had run the […]