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Signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1933, right-handed pitcher Wally Signer quit baseball after five mostly injury-plagued seasons in the minors instead of accepting a demotion in 1938. Over the course of the next five years, the New York City native emerged as one of the best hurlers in the city’s highly competitive semipro leagues. […]

Russ Hall spent 45 years in baseball, starting with semipro ball in his hometown of Shelbyville, Kentucky. During his playing days, he was a baseball rarity. He threw left-handed yet played shortstop and third base. He went on to be a manager, umpire, scout, and owner. His final job was as secretary of the Association […]

Catcher Al Evans is one of many rural Southern boys, among them Art Fowler, Johnny Riddle, and Mickey Livingston, who made his way from textile league baseball to the big leagues, and managed to make a lifelong career of the game of baseball. He was born in Kenly, North Carolina, on September 28, 1916. Kenly is […]

Outfielder Joe Kelley’s sensational play on the diamond earned him the well-deserved title “Kingpin of the Orioles.” He along with John McGraw, Willie Keeler, and Hughie Jennings made up the “Big Four” of the great Baltimore teams of the middle 1890s. Kelley was fleet of foot, sure-handed in the field, and blessed with a powerful […]

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 […]

His baseball ability was once described as good mouth, no hit. Not known for his bat but a solid glove man, Jimmy Smith built an 8-year major league career with his wit and his mouth. Referred to as “Serpent Tongue,” Smith rode a great ability as a bench jockey to remain on rosters while compiling […]

Bespectacled right-hander John Podgajny jumped from a Class C league to the Philadelphia Phillies as a 20-year-old September call-up in 1940. He completed three of his four starts and issued only one walk in 35 innings, suggesting a bright future. The Phillies, however, were at the nadir of their long history, in the midst of […]

Pitcher Wilfred “Kid” Carsey achieved an 81-59 record for the 1892-95 Philadelphia Phillies, working an average of 317 innings per season. He was the antithesis of big hard-throwing contemporaries Cy Young and Amos Rusie. The diminutive Carsey frustrated hitters by delivering deceptive slow curves. He was normally cool and collected, but at times he was […]

Before the 1915 Army-Navy baseball game, 24-year-old Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower led his fellow Army cadets in the “Long Corps” yell: “Rah, Rah, Ray! Rah, Rah, Ray! West Point, West Point, AR-MAY!”1 Playing left field for the Army team was 22-year-old Omar Bradley. By a score of 6-5, Army defeated Navy for the seventh consecutive year […]

A jazz pianist and songwriter who is known to kids for his contributions to the “Schoolhouse Rock!” series, Dave Frishberg is equally prominent with baseball fans for incorporating his boyhood love of the sport into his music, most notably with the song “Van Lingle Mungo.” David Lee Frishberg was born on March 23, 1933, in […]

Was it fate that placed infielder Mel Hoderlein with the 1948 Boston Red Sox rather than the Philadelphia Athletics? Writing in Sports Collectors Digest, Brent Kelley makes the point that Hoderlein probably would have had a much longer big-league career had he been signed to an Athletics contract (that team’s 1948 infield had an average […]

When Jackie Robinson debuted with the Montreal Royals on April 18, 1946, he became the first Black player to appear in what was then known as Organized Baseball in nearly 47 years. Canadians feel a special connection to Robinson because of his year spent in Montreal. What many Canadians don’t know is that they have […]

Although obscured by the exploits of his Hall of Fame brother Orator Jim, John O’Rourke had a respectable, if short, major-league playing career. As a 30-year-old rookie for the 1879 Boston Red Caps, John batted .341, with a National League-leading 62 RBIs. But age, injuries, and the security of employment by the railroad cut short […]

Self-effacing and relentlessly confident, Joe McCarthy was a relatively silent yet authoritative force behind the success of the New York Yankees during 1930s and most of the 1940s. McCarthy’s Yankee teams regularly dominated the American League, and in many seasons New York faced little competition for the pennant. Although he was once famously scorned by […]

Indians fans in Cleveland awoke the morning of May 23, 1957, to the musings of columnist James E. Doyle of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Doyle often wrote a small poem at the beginning of his column, and this spring day was no exception. Soxcess with Cal “That stuff served up by Cal McLish,” The Red […]

A onetime budding prospect in the Milwaukee Braves’ organization, Al Spangler drew favorable comparisons to Hall of Famer Richie Ashburn for his speed and pesky hitting throughout much of his early career. Seemingly in spite of the table-setting success of an Ashburn-like talent, Spangler often found himself on teams in search of a power-hitting slugger, […]

It is hard to reconcile Henry Chadwick’s world of gentleman baseball players with the portrayal of New York City in Martin Scorcese’s film The Gangs of New York. One link between these two worlds was John Morrissey; immigrant, “wharf rat”, heavyweight champion, gambler, businessman, congressman and state senator. Morrissey is tied to baseball through accounts […]

It sounds like a parody of Popeye, but the doctor was deadly serious when he told Oscar Melillo in 1926 that if he wanted to live he could eat nothing but spinach. Facing a potentially fatal kidney problem (Bright’s Disease), the 27-year-old Melillo wisely followed the doctor’s remedy and recovered from the disease, enabling him […]

Gambling posed a serious threat to baseball in 1919. Rumors of a “fixed” World Series were widespread. Owners of major- and minor-league teams were anxious to get control of the situation and restore the public’s confidence in the sport. “The very life of baseball depends upon keeping it above suspicion of any sort,” said Dr. […]

The Boston Red Sox certainly had momentum on their side as they headed into the 2004 World Series. They also had an unfortunate history of failing to close the deal when it came to winning world championships; it had been 86 years since the team had last won it all and they had lost in […]

As the 1978 Los Angeles Dodgers prepared to host the Atlanta Braves in the third game of a four-game series on July 5, the Dodgers were on their way to a third National League pennant in the decade while the Braves were struggling to avoid the fate of another 100-loss season as had befallen them […]

The Chicago Inter Ocean described it as the “greatest pitchers’ battle that has been seen” in the Polo Grounds.1 The Chicago Colts’ Bob Wicker emerged victorious, 1-0, in a grueling 12-inning battle with the New York Giants and Joe McGinnity. Sportswriters across the country praised Wicker’s performance and his string of 9⅓ hitless innings, apparently […]

In 2007, the Washington Nationals and Florida Marlins could only be considered “contenders” in the sense that they were contending for last and next-to-last place in the NL East Division. However, those few hardy fans among the original 19,278 who remained to the end of this game were treated to a memorable ending. Rookie Matt […]

Surely, preparation would not be an issue for Pittsburgh’s 1891 National League campaign. The club spent two months training in the South, getting in shape for the new season. The new manager was also familiar to the squad. Still an active player, Ned Hanlon was in the nascent stages of a managerial career that would […]