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“Running! turning! leaping! like little Al Gionfriddo — a baseball player, Doctor, who once did a very great thing.” The great thing novelist Philip Roth described took place on October 5, 1947. It was Game Six of the World Series. Outfielder Al Gionfriddo, a little-used reserve, made a racing, twisting catch in deep left-center at […]

The 21st-century epithet “ump show,” coined to describe umpires who make themselves the center of attention, could have been created 100 years earlier to describe Charles Van Sickle. Brawls, riots, ejections, and suspensions followed Van Sickle throughout his 20-year career, which included 67 games in the 1914 Federal League and stints in more than a […]

A 6-foot-3, 220-pound right-hander with a prominent chaw of tobacco in his right cheek, Al Severinsen pitched parts of three major league seasons. In 1969 he relieved in a dozen games for the Orioles and earned one of Baltimore’s franchise-record 109 victories. Severinsen finished his career with the San Diego Padres, making a total of […]

In November 1970 Boston Red Sox slugger Carl Yastrzemski was in Florida working with the organization’s young hitters when a hard-throwing right-handed hurler commanded his attention. “[Lynn McGlothen] is going to be a winning pitcher in the major leagues,” predicted the future Hall of Fame outfielder. “I don’t just mean a pitcher. I mean a […]

“We wouldn’t have won the World Series without him.” – Kevin Millar1 Mark Bellhorn is quite possibly the most underrated player on the 2004 Red Sox team. While other players like David Ortiz, Curt Schilling, or Dave Roberts rightfully garner much praise for the success of the Red Sox’ 2004 championship run, Bellhorn and his […]

On September 22, 1914, Shoeless Joe Jackson sat on the Cleveland Naps dugout bench watching his newest teammate, 19-year-old Frank LeMoyne Mills, make his major-league debut. Seconds later, Shoeless Joe applauded Mills as he stood on first base after hitting a single. At 19 years old, with a batting average of 1.000, the baseball future […]

When Johnny Cash sang the Shel Silverstein song “A Boy Named Sue,” he was telling the fictional story of a boy given a girl’s name by a father who was about to leave him, so that the boy would grow up tougher and able to weather what life might throw at him. In researching Johnny […]

During his five full seasons with the Boston Red Sox, Babe Ruth established himself as one of the premier left-handed pitchers in the game, began his historic transformation from moundsman to slugging outfielder, and was part of three World Series championship teams. After he was sold to the New York Yankees in December 1919, his […]

Typically stocked with ballplayers past their prime or otherwise below average, major-league expansion teams have had little prospect of participating in pennant races during their inaugural seasons. As a result, their fans celebrated lesser triumphs – like their first win, their first win at home, and their first walk-off win. The Kansas City Royals collected […]

Hank Aaron quietly and unassumingly approached another significant career milestone. Eighteen seasons into his major-league career in April 1971, the 37-year-old Aaron was one home run shy of joining two fellow sluggers, Babe Ruth and Willie Mays, as the only players in baseball history with at least 600 career homers. Ruth topped the leaderboard with […]

As the 1992 National League Championship Series opened, the Pittsburgh Pirates found themselves facing a familiar foe. In 1991, the Bucs had taken the NL’s best record into its NLCS matchup with the upstart Atlanta Braves, but despite a 3-2 lead in games and home field in Games Six and Seven, they ultimately fell short […]

“How good a hitter was Mize? He was Lou Gehrig good. He was Stan Musial good. He was Mel Ott good, Frank Robinson good, Joe DiMaggio good, Albert Pujols good.” — Joe Posnanski1   Johnny Mize loved to hit a baseball, and he wrote about it in his 1953 book, How to Hit, published primarily […]

For the second season in a row, the Chicago Cubs claimed the World Series title in 1908 by besting the Detroit Tigers in five games. Cubs pitcher Orval Overall dominated the Tigers, allowing three hits in a complete-game, 2-0 victory. Overall became just the second post-1900 pitcher to strike out four batters in an inning, […]

In a battle for the 1924 American League pennant, the defending World Series champion New York Yankees faced the Washington Senators in late August in the first game of a critical four-game series, played at Yankee Stadium. New York (70-52) was a half-game ahead of Washington (71-54) in the standings, attempting to reach the postseason […]

In 2020, SABR’s Baseball Cards Committee established the Jefferson Burdick Award, honoring individuals who have made significant contributions to the baseball card hobby. Eligible candidates include anyone who has made significant contributions to the hobby in such areas as baseball card research/scholarship; baseball card creation/production/innovation; developing/maintaining resources (e.g., publications, websites, communities, events) for collectors; and […]

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in 2021 as part of the SABR Century 1921 Project. Eddie Collins, left, and manager Kid Gleason were left to pick up the pieces after the Chicago White Sox lost most of their championship core following the Black Sox Scandal. (LIBRARY OF CONGRESS)   The 1921 Chicago White […]