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For baseball, 1857 had been a momentous year in its development into an organized sport for adults. The meetings of 14 Greater New York clubs in January and February introduced standardized rules that still form the game’s backbone: nine innings, nine players, 90 feet between bases. Furthermore, the list of rules was extensively modified: What […]

In the old days of professional baseball, players fistfighting on and off the field was not uncommon. Players would scream at each other. Some would tease. Many others were just downright mean. One player in particular earned a nickname that perfectly described his slick dugout demeanor. The handle followed him throughout his days in the […]

The yardstick for enshrinement in Cooperstown is generally determined by a player’s ability to dominate a decade. Dale Murphy more than met that standard. Crippled by recurring knee problems that required mid-career surgery, Murphy retired with 398 home runs—one fewer than first-ballot inductee Al Kaline and 16 more than 2009 inductee Jim Rice. When he […]

“The greatest pitcher I have ever seen,” whispered John McGraw as he shoved his way through a jostling home­ bound crowd after watching “Cannonball” Jackman strike out eighteen batters in nine innings. That whisper spread from ear to ear and finally developed into a roar, for certainly the famed former New York Giants pilot should […]

It could be compared, in a way, to a romance novel — first they hate each other, then they start to learn more about each other to where they like each other, and finally they fall in love and get married. Unlike the two protagonists in this popular style of fiction, though, the National and […]

Introduction and Context The 2002 Winter Meetings were held from December 13 to December 16 at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee. This was the fourth time they were held at this venue. Economic conditions in some markets had made contraction — eliminating two or more teams — a concern during the 2001 Winter Meetings. […]

1920 Baltimore Orioles, International League champions. (BALTIMORE SUN)   In 1920, the Baltimore Orioles were champions of the International League (IL) for the second straight year. Baltimore would win seven consecutive pennants (1919–25), and six of the championship teams are ranked in the top 20 of the 100 best minor league teams of the twentieth […]

The 1977 major-league baseball season witnessed two new teams — the Seattle Mariners and Toronto Blue Jays — join the American League. George Foster hit 52 home runs for Cincinnati. The Twins’ Rod Carew flirted with hitting .400 and Yankees outfielder Reggie Jackson’s bat returned the World Series championship to New York City. The 1977 […]

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in the SABR Deadball Era Committee’s February 2018 newsletter. The accessibility of the Deadball Era derives, in part, from the many existing images of players from the period. It is worthwhile to recall that some of the most vivid and enduring player portrayals are on contemporary baseball cards. […]

When it came to his involvement in the corruption of the 1919 World Series, Shoeless Joe Jackson rarely told the same story twice. When the fix first came to light in late September 1920, Jackson, along with teammates Eddie Cicotte and Lefty Williams, abjectly admitted that he had agreed to join the conspiracy to throw […]

Hitting three triples in s game has become a rare batting feat.   Maybe it should be described as a rare base-running feat as well, because speed on the base paths is also very helpful.   In fact, the last two times it has been accomplished it took two very fast runners.   Bert Campaneris hit three triples […]

On September 12, 1992, in the fifth inning of a game between the Dodgers and the Giants at Dodger Stadium, Michael Joseph Piazza hit his first major league home run and his road to the catcher career home-run record began.[fn]All game details obtained from Retrosheet and the author’s own databases.[/fn] This first four-bagger was a […]

In his excellent biography of Bill Veeck, author Paul Dickson tackles the controversy over whether National League president Ford Frick and/or Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis blocked Veeck’s attempt to buy the Phillies in 1942 and field a team of players from the Negro Leagues, as Veeck alleges in his 1962 book, Veeck — as in […]

It has become almost as rare as the major-league Triple Crown, and even more so than its statistical opposite of a pitcher winning 20 games in a single season. Since 1980, there has been only one pitcher who lost 20 games in a single season—21 to be exact—and there is no reason to think baseball […]

Ty Cobb is usually thought of as the very embodiment of the Deadball Era hitter; the “Punch and Judy” counterpoint to the post-1920 Ruthian power game.1 This common misconception is underscored in a number of ways. First, it is supported by the types of players who have surpassed Cobb’s career records. Lou Brock bested his […]

When the lively ball era was launched in 1920 there were few players who displayed the combined ability of speed and power. If a player were to accumulate a lot of extra bases it would be with his bat and not his feet. Thus it was automatic that when we thought of extra bases it […]

Introduction and Context The 2009 Winter Meetings were held in Indianapolis – representing a Northern host city for just the fifth time in 43 years; in fact, this was the farthest-north host city associated with a minor-league team since the 1966 meetings were held in Columbus, Ohio. While Indianapolis provided amiable temperatures, player movement was […]

On November 11, 1918, minor-league owners from 40 teams, representing seven leagues, were preparing for a somber discussion about whether baseball would even be played in the 1919 season1 when word came down that the World War had ended. The “war to end all wars” had caused an existential crisis throughout the baseball world. The […]

During the first years of the twentieth century many of the most celebrated—and marketable— major leaguers supplemented their incomes by headlining in vaudeville or touring in legitimate plays during the off-season. A few even appeared in motion pictures: a new medium that was revolutionizing the way in which Americans passed their leisure hours. And so, […]

Few individuals saw more Astros history than Alan Ashby. An Astro for 20 of their first 50 seasons, he spent eleven on the Astrodome carpet, coordinating one of the more challenging pitching staffs of his time. After one year as their bullpen coach Ashby moved to the broadcast booth for another eight, culminating with Houston’s […]

We all know that the first All-Star Game wasn’t played until 1933 at Chicago’s Comiskey Park. But calls for an annual All-Star Game as early as 1914 in Baseball Magazine. So it might have happened. And with the help of some modern-day innovations, we did make it “happen,” using a combination of the most comprehensive […]

The intentional base on balls was a part of professional baseball long before it became a part of baseball’s official statistics. The Sporting News’s Baseball Record Book lists Napoleon Lajoie of the Philadelphia Athletics of the American League as the first player to receive an intentional walk with the bases full, in the ninth inning […]

2000 AAABA Champion Maryland Orioles with General Manager Walter Youse (center) and Manager Dean Albany (standing far left second row). (GREG PAUL)   Emergence of Summer College Baseball For more than a century, summertime baseball has been a significant part of the lives of young Marylanders. Over the decades, this has evolved from pickup games […]

All batters think it’s great to hit a home run. They think it’s even better to hit one as a pinch hitter. And when the bases are loaded and you’re called off the bench to deliver — and you do! There’s hardly anything to match the emotional impact of a pinch grand slam! Here’s a […]