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Who is the real Sammy Sosa? Is he the charismatic slugger whose home-run race with Mark McGwire brought baseball’s fandom back from the ruins of the 1994 strike? Is he the Dominican shoeshine boy from a poverty-stricken family who became a hero in his country and the United States? Is he a steroid cheater who […]

There have been two big leaguers named Joe Morgan — and it’s not hard to tell them apart. Joseph Michael Morgan played fractions of four seasons in “The Show,” finishing with three games for the 1964 Cardinals. He is white. Joe Leonard Morgan’s Hall of Fame career ran from 1963 to 1984. He is black. […]

Hundreds of ballplayers, from Jack Graney to Alex Rodriguez, have traded their gloves for microphones. Joe Garagiola, the second-best catcher from Elizabeth Street in St. Louis, was the most successful. Branching out from his roots as a baseball announcer, he filled in for Johnny Carson as host of the Tonight Show, served two terms as […]

A talented African-American athlete and a fleet-footed outfielder who raced through the minor leagues with flattering comparisons to Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson, Ted Savage had the unique distinction of having to seek legal assistance in confronting one major-league team in order to stay with the franchise that ultimately promoted him to the big leagues […]

Ted Strong Jr. thrilled baseball fans with a hard-hitting swing that he displayed over his 10 seasons in the Negro Leagues and in Mexico. The tall, muscular Strong played in seven All-Star games as a member of the Kansas City Monarchs and other teams. This two-sport superstar also toured the country as a member of […]

Guy Hecker has been regarded as the best combination of hitter and pitcher during the nineteenth century.1 In a major-league career that lasted from 1882 to 1890 he won 175 games and compiled a .282 batting average. But when one looks at his year-by-year record, two seasons stand out. Fittingly, one was as a hitter […]

Joe Cunningham was a left-handed first baseman and converted outfielder who played parts of 12 major-league seasons with the Cardinals (1954, 1956-61), Chicago White Sox (1962-64), and Washington Senators (1964-66). In his All-Star season of 1959, he hit .345 to finish second for the batting title. Known for his excellent batting eye, Cunningham’s lifetime on-base […]

He delivered big hits on occasion but is still asked most often about a thrown ball that struck him in the wrist while he was running to first base in the 1969 World Series. “I kid around with the fans and show them how I swelled up. I just stick my arms out. I don’t […]

As one of six rookies on the Philadelphia Phillies’ 1964 Opening Day roster, John Herrnstein experienced his finest season in a major-league career that would end two years later. The left-handed native of Chillicothe, Ohio, seemed to be a favorite of Phillies manager Gene Mauch, who moved him about his baseball chessboard frequently during the […]

Often compared to his teammate Rod Carew, Lyman Bostock was second only to Carew as a hitter in the eyes of his Minnesota Twins manager Gene Mauch. Mauch once said he had no doubt that Bostock would eventually win batting titles. With Bostock having hit .323 and .336 during his first two full big league […]

In one of the Bill James books, contributor Jim Baker has some fun at the expense of an obscure late-19th-century pitcher named Carlton Molesworth. Combing his faintly humorous name with historically dubious statistical entries that list Molesworth as 5-feet-6 and 200 pounds, Baker presents a vignette that casts Molesworth as the portly butler of a […]

Bob “Bucky” Oldis wasn’t an All-Star, or even a journeyman major leaguer, but he had much more than just a “cup of coffee.” He was a true lover of the game who liked to have fun. Along the way, he played in 135 games, hit a major-league home run, got three hits in one game, […]

Tom Veryzer got into 996 big-league games from 1973 through 1984, mainly as a shortstop. He didn’t provide much offense, hitting just .241 with 14 homers, but in those days, one could still hold down a starting job at short at the top level on the strength of sound fielding. Veryzer was solid enough to […]

The bottom of the first inning of the game between the Cleveland Indians and Baltimore Orioles on September 5, 1989, showed the athleticism of Brad Komminsk that had excited scouts and executives for over a decade. With two outs, Cal Ripken, Jr. took John Farrell’s first pitch to deep left-center field. Chasing the ball, Komminsk […]

Standing only 5 feet 11 inches tall, Billy Wagner did not look the part of an intimidating closer and yet he was often mentioned in the same circles as the Yankees all-time closer Mariano Rivera. In fact, both closers entered games to the same song, Metallica’s “Enter Sandman,” letting home fans know the game was […]

Though Thomas Austin Brewer Jr. was a lifelong resident of Cheraw, South Carolina, he was born in North Carolina on September 3, 1931.1 Cheraw lies in the northern part of South Carolina and was a town of a few thousand inhabitants in 1931 so it happens that the nearest hospital was in Wadesboro, North Carolina, […]

In the twentieth century only two pitchers recorded 40 or more wins in a season. Jack Chesbro accomplished the feat for the 1904 New York Highlanders, finishing the year 41-12. Ed Walsh joined him on that plateau by tallying 40 wins for the Chicago White Sox in 1908. His 40th win was a 6-1 triumph […]

It was widely believed that Cole Hamels’ start on Saturday, July 25, 2015, against the Chicago Cubs in Wrigley Field could be his last in a Philadelphia Phillies uniform. If so, it would end his memorable 9½-year run with the team, capped by his 2008 World Series MVP Award. The Phillies were limping along sporting […]

Ninth-inning home runs by Pedro Alvarez and Starling Marte rallied the struggling Pittsburgh Pirates to a 6-5 win over the Toronto Blue Jays, overcoming a night of missed connections and providing the first ripple of Pittsburgh’s surge toward a repeat postseason appearance. Rising up from two dismal decades,1 the 2013 Pirates notched the franchise’s first […]

Probably the greatest rivalry in the history of baseball was the Brooklyn Dodgers versus the New York Giants, especially in the late 1940s and 1950s.1 During this period the rivalry escalated as a result of Jackie Robinson becoming a major leaguer in 1947 and Leo Durocher joining the Giants as manager. Durocher had been manager […]

Baseball fans in the small-town New York-Penn League discovered an extra reason to go to games in the summer of 1975. On certain nights, there was a chance that beloved Hall of Famer Yogi Berra might join them in the stands at one of the short-season Class A loop’s modest ballparks. Yogi and his wife, […]

On Sunday evening, April 4, the Boston Red Sox and Baltimore Orioles opened their 2004 seasons at Baltimore’s Oriole Park at Camden Yards. The game-time temperature was 43 degrees.1 The two teams had had very different seasons in 2003. The Orioles had finished in fourth place in the American League East, 30 games behind the […]

SABR Bibliography Committee Research Guide No. 7: Overview and Pre-1948 Subject Player Index of “Who’s Who in Baseball Editor’s note: This guide was first published by the SABR Bibliography Committee in 1987. To download the original in PDF form, click here. By Frank Phelps July 1987 Baseball Magazine published this collection of players’ career records […]