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On June 4, 1951, a meager crowd of 2,343 came to Shibe Park to witness the third and final game of a series between Pennsylvania’s cross-state rivals. A month and a half into the season, the Philadelphia Phillies and Pittsburgh Pirates were occupying the bottom two spots in the National League standings. The visiting Pirates […]

It seemed that every time St. Louis Cardinals fans clicked on the television or flipped open a newspaper in the first six weeks of the 1997 season, they learned that another player was headed to the disabled list. By the time the Cardinals took the field on May 14 to conclude a two-game series at […]

Just getting to the World Series is never a walk in the park, but for the talented Chicago Cubs of 1907, it was the next thing to a summer stroll. The defending National League champions were dominant in earning 107 victories and besting the runner-up Pittsburgh Pirates by 17 games. The Cubs clinched the pennant […]

Sudden Sam McDowell’s search for his 17th victory of the season appeared easier than it otherwise would have been on a mid-September afternoon in Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium. The Orioles had clinched the American League East Division crown the day before against McDowell’s Indians, and manager Earl Weaver was resting his entire starting infield of Brooks […]

The walk-off home run is the most dramatic and exhilarating of all baseball plays. As in any written account of such a conclusion, the writer need not worry about spoiling the ending. On this day, the Mets beat the Montreal Expos in 11 innings on Bernard Gilkey’s pinch-hit two-out home run. The New York Times reporter, […]

With the National League Championship Series tied at three wins apiece, on October 21, 2004, the St. Louis Cardinals and Houston Astros played a final game to determine who would play Boston in the World Series. Houston was looking to advance to the World Series for the first time, while the Cardinals were looking to […]

In his second at-bat of the second All-Star Game in 1960, Willie Mays made history by completing the All-Star Game cycle. In the span of just two days, Mays had collected the four necessary hits to hit for the cycle: a single, double, triple, and home run. No major leaguer has ever hit for the cycle […]

After finishing July 1991 in second place in the National League East Division, the New York Mets went 8-21 in August and fell to fourth. Things didn’t improve in September, as they lost five in a row from September 4 to 9, including the opener of a two-game home series with the last-place Montreal Expos. […]

“When I lost Frank I lost one of my best friends. Baseball lost one of its best managers. He was one of the best catchers we ever saw.” — Buck O’Neil1 Frank Duncan’s legendary Negro League career lasted 27 years and his unquenchable zest for life was etched across each and every one of them. […]

“Pinch hit hero mobbed by rabid Red Sox enthusiasts” was a sub-headline of the October 17, 1912, edition of the Boston Globe reporting on young Olaf Henriksen’s game-tying base hit in the eighth and deciding game of the 1912 World Series, against a dominant Christy Mathewson. It was a crucial blow off the great Mathewson, […]

Buddy Gilbert is rarely, if ever, mentioned among baseball’s greatest hitters. Yet he holds a claim to baseball fame: His 10 percent ratio of home runs to at-bats is technically the highest in major league history (given a cutoff of 20 at-bats). The outfielder played in just seven big league games with the Cincinnati Reds […]

Should the National League permanently adopt the designated hitter, Puerto Rican infielder Mario Ramirez’s big league career from 1980 through 1985 will serve as a time capsule of forgotten strategy. A lifetime .192 hitter in just 184 games, known primarily for his glove, he was nevertheless used as a pinch hitter on 39 occasions and […]

What if? Are there any more tragic words in the English language? Helen of Troy’s face is reputed to have launched a thousand ships. Miguel Fuentes’ story may have launched fewer conversations, but the former is a myth while the latter is reality. Or in Shakespearean terms, a tragedy. For the Seattle Pilots’ fans, whose […]

Steve Crawford was a pitcher who spent most of his 10 major-league seasons fighting for a job on a major-league roster, the majority of them with the Boston Red Sox. He was a once-promising prospect, but became almost a forgotten man by 1986. He would have been left off the Red Sox’ postseason roster that […]

Sometime during the 1967 baseball season, Houston Chronicle sportswriter John Wilson first referred to Houston Astros’ center fielder Wynn as the “Toy Cannon.” Wynn did not like the nickname at first, believing, justifiably, that it was yet another reference to his small (5-feet-9, and a muscular 165 pounds) stature. But the name hardly poked fun […]

Thousands of baseball players have been labeled with a nickname. Some depicted the player’s size like “Rabbit” or “Jumbo”. Others were based on where they came from: “The Hoosier Thunderbolt”, “Vinegar Bend”, “Dominican Dandy”. Some became iconic like “The Babe”, “Joltin’ Joe”, “Hammerin’ Hank”. Some nicknames were so obvious that a player could not help […]

Any conversation about the greatest hitter in baseball history must include Rogers Hornsby in the opening gambit.1 His .358 lifetime batting average in 23 big-league seasons is second all-time to Ty Cobb’s .367 and well ahead of such all-time greats as Tris Speaker (.345), Ted Williams (.344), Babe Ruth (.342), Lou Gehrig (.340), and Stan […]

If you page through the annals of Black baseball, you will come across watershed moments – the “First Colored World Series,” Yankee Stadium’s first game between Black ball clubs, Satchel Paige’s first professional no-hitter – and you will find a single face peering across the ages. Historic moments seemed to cling to Clint “The Hawk” […]

Chicago Cubs fans who are old enough will remember Walt Moryn as the blond, 6-foot-2, 205­-pound Minnesota native who roamed the Cubs outfield from 1956 to 1960. The burly, left-handed-hitting slugger, known affectionately as “Moose,” averaged 20 home runs a season for a team that never won as many games as it lost. For most […]

Sportswriters treated pitcher Monte Weaver as a curiosity during his nine seasons with the Washington Senators and Boston Red Sox. He was a college professor, a mathematician, a hypochondriac and – most radically – a vegetarian, according to the sports pages. Montie Morton Weaver was born on June 15, 1906, in Helton, North Carolina, a […]

Shortstop Humberto “Chico” Fernández played the game with flair. It was a flair that endeared him to fans and fellow players, but often saw him at odds with his many managers. He was a daring, some would say reckless, baserunner. Playing for the Detroit Tigers, he showed that special flair in the second game of […]

The first owner of the St. Louis Browns, Robert Hedges was a visionary leader, years ahead of his time. He was also a shrewd businessman who maximized the value of his baseball franchise, in spite of its mostly losing ways. Hedges’ innovations and financial success in baseball contrasted vividly with his teams’ lack of success […]

Super Scout: Thirty-five Years of Scouting was the name of Jim Russo’s 1992 memoir. The title was simple and apt. Russo worked full-time for the Baltimore Orioles franchise from 1951, when it was still the St. Louis Browns, until 1986. As the club rose to prominence in the ’60s, he gained acclaim as one of […]

Even the most casual baseball fan is familiar with Eight Men Out, the book (and the movie) that tells the story of the eight members of the Chicago White Sox who were forever banished from organized baseball for fixing the 1919 World Series. Joe Gedeon was the “ninth man out.” The regular second baseman of […]