If you are not happy with the results below please do another search
In 1949 left-handed hurler Alexander Raymond Kellner joined his namesake, Hall of Famer Grover Cleveland Alexander, among others with a 20-win campaign in his freshman season. The next year Kellner joined a smaller community, losing 20 games in his sophomore year. Through 2015, only 15 pitchers (11 from the 19th century) have won 20 games […]
The fifth-winningest pitcher of all time, Warren Spahn went 363-245 over parts of 21 years from 1942 to 1965. Only by remaining in the game two seasons too long did he fail to finish with an ERA under 3.00 (3.09) and a winning percentage over .600 (.597), and his totals are all the more impressive […]
Cap Anson, baseball’s first superstar, was the dominant on-field figure of nineteenth-century baseball. He was a small-town boy from Iowa who earned his fame as the playing manager of the fabled Chicago White Stockings, the National League team now known as the Cubs. A larger-than-life figure of great talents and great faults, Anson managed the […]
By his second year in the majors in 1958, sweet-swinging Harry (The Horse) Anderson of the Philadelphia Phillies was one of the premier left-handed power hitters in the game. But after his fourth year, he was back in the minor leagues, struggling to regain the batting stroke that had abandoned him as quickly as it […]
A Gold Glove shortstop but perennial weak hitter, Edwin Albert Brinkman played 15 seasons in the majors, the first 10 of them with the expansion Washington Senators. Traded to Detroit in October 1970 in the infamous Denny McLain deal, he led the Tigers to a division title and was voted Tiger of the Year in […]
Mel Nelson entered professional baseball as a right-handed-hitting outfielder, spent parts of six seasons in the major leagues as a left-handed pitcher, and when his playing days were over served as a scout for several teams. He spent more than half a century in professional baseball, including 17 years as a player. Although he didn’t […]
On September 2, 1969, Phil Hennigan made his major-league debut in Minnesota’s Metropolitan Stadium in relief of Cleveland Indians starter Luis Tiant. Entering the sixth inning with his club trailing 5-1 and the Twins threatening more, Hennigan retired the always-dangerous Rod Carew on one pitch by inducing the future Hall of Fame famer to fly […]
Instead of being the good-hitting second baseman and field leader that the Milwaukee Braves expected him to be – the player who would make enough of a difference to help lead them to the National League pennant in 1954, Danny O’Connell turned out to be a disappointment, compiling just a .248 batting average in four […]
On May 26, 1956, the Cincinnati Redlegs and Milwaukee Braves faced off in the second game of a three-game series in Milwaukee. The result was one of the most unusual and memorable games in the history of each franchise. On the mound for the Redlegs was Johnny Klippstein, a hard-throwing right-hander in his seventh season […]
Although generally regarded as a state where football is king, Alabama also enjoys a rich baseball legacy, having produced 13 Hall of Famers. Included among these Alabama-born immortals are some of the game’s most prolific home run hitters: Henry Aaron, Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, et al. The subject of this profile is Charlie […]
Puerto Rico and baseball. From the legendary Roberto Clemente and Orlando Cepeda to Roberto Alomar, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, and Pudge Rodriguez, the small island with only 3.5 million inhabitants has left an indelible footprint on the major-league landscape. As of 2016, the Caribbean nation has produced no fewer than 250 big-league players, including at […]
Written in blue ink on his minor-league questionnaire was Wayne Granger’s ambition in baseball: “To be a steady starter in [the] major leagues.”1 In a major-league career that spanned nine seasons and seven teams, the right-hander never started a game. But his sinkerball and lanky, 6-foot-2 build helped Granger become the model of durability as […]
A biography may be defined as a “remarkable odyssey through life and the lessons learned.”1 This description could have suited virtually anyone, but Bart Mindszenthy adapted it to introduce Ron Taylor before the Empire Club of Canada. Taylor’s odyssey ranged from the University of Toronto (the only alumnus to play major-league baseball), to the Ontario […]
The St. Louis Cardinals teams that won back-to-back National League pennants in 1967 and 1968 included four future Hall of Famers (Orlando Cepeda, Lou Brock, Steve Carlton, and Bob Gibson), not to mention household names like Roger Maris, Tim McCarver, and Curt Flood. Therefore, it easy to overlook the contributions of players such as Ron […]
Charles Wayne Vaughan was born the third son of Gene and Judy Vaughan of Weslaco, Texas, on October 6, 1947 in the nearby hospital at Mercedes. Married in 1941, Judy gave birth to their first son, Richard, in 1944 and bore a second son, Eddie, in 1946. Gene was successful in sales for Burton Auto […]
Maybe it was Leon Wagner’s bad luck to have been born too soon. A major-league outfielder for 12 years, Wagner was a two-time All-Star who averaged 29 home runs and 87 RBIs from 1961 through 1966. Still, because of fielding deficiencies that were either imagined (his opinion) or real (his managers’ views), he always seemed to […]
(Copyright Mike Shuba) George Shuba’s story is in many ways that of an average ballplayer. In seven years in the major leagues, his career batting average was .259, and he played in a total of just 355 games, never more than 94 in a season. Nearly a third of his at-bats were as a […]
“Amazing,” said Ray Crone when asked by the author to describe fan support in Milwaukee in the 1950s.[1] A tall, lanky right-handed pitching prodigy signed by the Braves in 1949, Crone debuted in 1954 and pitched a ten-inning complete game in his first start in the major leagues. However, after four inconsistent seasons and a […]
In 1942 St. Louis Cardinals’ farm director Branch Rickey singled out a particular right-handed hurler among a small army of top-flight pitching prospects: Max Surkont “can become another [Bob] Feller for us,”1 declared the future HOF executive. But by the end of spring training the Cardinals, blessed with the major leagues’ best pitching, assigned Surkont […]
Some music is so well known that you can listen to it in a dark room and immediately associate it with an event. The tooting of a calliope immediately brings to mind the circus or a merry-go-round. “The Wedding March” lets passersby outside a church know that some guy’s bachelorhood just bit the dust. And […]
In April 1954, as Philadelphia Athletics third baseman Jim Finigan was launching his major-league career, The Sporting News contributor Art Morrow characterized him “as a fellow who could not miss major league stardom.”1 Earle Mack, a son of future Hall of Fame skipper Connie Mack, echoed the sentiment five months later: “[Finigan] played good, steady […]
He neither slugged like Aaron nor pitched like Spahn, but Lou Perini made his own indelible mark on baseball history. In fact, one can argue that few men ever made a greater impact on the game without playing professionally than the construction giant who moved the Braves from Boston to Milwaukee. For a half-century from […]
Disco music peaked in the United States with the top six songs on the Billboard Hot 100 chart during the week ending July 21, 1979. At the time, “Disco Dan” Ford was starring for the California Angels club that was headed for that franchise’s first postseason appearance.1 Although the musical genre quickly fell out of […]