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It was a Saturday afternoon game at Cleveland Stadium. The Cleveland Indians (37-29) were in first place in the American League, one game ahead of the Baltimore Orioles and two games ahead of both the Chicago White Sox and New York Yankees. The 30-37 Boston Red Sox were just a half-game above the last-place Kansas […]

After wins in Games Six and Seven in Cincinnati by scores of 5-4 and 4-1, respectively, it was clear the Chicago White Sox were no longer playing to lose. Dickey Kerr wasn’t as brilliant in Game Six as he was in Game Three, but he went the distance in a 10-inning affair that saw the […]

Detroit’s Briggs Stadium, renamed after 1935 for new owner Walter Briggs, was a roomy ballpark by 1939 standards. Taking over 23,000-seat Navin Field, which had opened in 1912, Briggs had expanded capacity to over 50,000 in 1938. In response, the Tigers drew 10,121 per game, second in the American League, as the country climbed out […]

Several themes were evident for All-Star games played in the 1960s. First was the National League’s crushing superiority during the midsummer classics. Of the 13 games played (two games were played from 1960 through 1962) the National League took 11; the American League won only once (the second game in 1962 was a tie). Toward […]

(Photograph by Duane Rieder) After winning three straight games at home, including Nelson Briles’ masterful two-hit, 4-0 shutout in Game Five, the Pirates returned to Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium with the hope of clinching their fourth World Series championship in Game Six. A win in Baltimore was a tall order, 6-feet-3 to be exact, which was […]

Under the leadership of manager George Stallings, the Buffalo Bisons won the Eastern League championship in 1904 but fell to fifth place in the eight-team league in 1905. Entering the 1906 season, fans were enthused about the Bisons’ chances after Stallings procured new talent for the team. Among his acquisitions were William Thomas, a pitcher […]

The Potomac Nationals and Lynchburg Hillcats met on Saturday, August 25, 2018, occupying first and second place respectively in the High-A Carolina League’s Northern Division. On the mound for the Nationals was Matthew Crownover, a 25-year-old left-hander in his fourth professional season. The Georgia native had won 2015 Atlantic Coast Conference Pitcher of the Year […]

Residents of Wampum, Pennsylvania, and neighboring towns cheered hometown hero Dick Allen at Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field during his 1964 National League Rookie of the Year season with the Philadelphia Phillies, even honoring him in on-field ceremonies before three games against the host Pittsburgh Pirates. But Allen scuffled in Pittsburgh in ’64, batting .182 in nine […]

Pitcher Vicente Romo won well over 400 games as a professional player from 1961 through 1986.1 Just 32 of those wins came in the majors, where he played during eight seasons (1968-74; 1982) for five teams. Yet many experts in his homeland consider this man the finest right-handed pitcher that Mexico has ever produced — […]

“That was the most exciting thing I ever accomplished in baseball, and to do it with those guys was great.” — Pokey Reese, on being a member of the 2004 Boston Red Sox.1   Pokey Reese didn’t have many things when he was a kid, including a baseball glove. He chucked a tennis ball against […]

From 1953 through 1956, Jim Woods was Mel Allen’s and Red Barber’s partner on New York Yankees radio/TV. One day, eying Woods’ slight overbite and gray buzz cut, Enos Slaughter jibed, “I’ve seen better heads on a possum.” In 1958 Jim moved to Pittsburgh, where announcer Bob Prince’s wife called Woods’ spouse “Mrs. Possum.” In […]

Literally a son of Fate, Bert Edgar Chapman changed his name to Ed Chaplin because he got caught cheating in 1919, the same year that the Chicago “Black Sox” consorted with gamblers during the World Series. He was player-manager for the Sanford Celery Feds in the Florida State League. (Sanford was known at the time […]

Fate: “The supposed force, principle, or power that predetermines events.”[1] Some people believe in it, some do not, though no one can be certain of its existence. But Fred Clarke was a believer in fate. In an interview with a reporter from the New York Herald in 1911, Clarke admitted, “I attribute my success to […]

When John Joseph O’Brien took the field for the Brooklyn Bridegrooms on July 25, 1891, he was “unheralded and unknown,”1 described as “a little pale-faced chap who looked as meek as a country youth fresh from the mourners’ bench.”2 He hit the first pitch he saw for a line single to right, then added another […]

“Billy Williams,” said his manager Leo Durocher, “never gets excited. Never gets mad. Never throws a bat. You write his name down, in the same spot every day, and you forget it. He will play left, he will bat third. Billy Williams is a machine.”i This was not wholly hyperbole—at the time Durocher made this […]

There’s a saying that if you play a game in the major leagues, you can live on that fame for the rest of your life. To some extent, Regis Leheny may have done just that. He appeared in two major-league ballgames, with the 1932 Boston Red Sox, and played – apparently – but a handful […]

Fausto Miranda was the dean of Cuban sportswriters. Miranda’s writing showed just how elegant the Spanish language can be. Yale University professor Roberto González Echevarría, author of the Cuban baseball history The Pride of Havana, said, “He was a journalist who wrote with vigor, grace and agility.”1 Baseball, as Cuba’s national sport, naturally accounted for […]

Eddie Mathews, the only man to play for the Braves in Boston, Milwaukee, and Atlanta, burst into stardom in 1953, the team’s first season in Milwaukee, when he belted 47 home runs at the age of 21. He hit 370 homers before his 30th birthday, and many believed that if anyone could top Babe Ruth […]

A two-out, seventh inning single by New York Mets’ right fielder Ron Swoboda was the margin between a 21-year-old left-hander and a no-hitter – a feat that would otherwise have capped the youngster’s fine, 16-win, 1965 season. Possessing one of the greatest curveballs of his time, his immediate splash in the major leagues had the […]

Jackie Tobin’s older brother, Jim Tobin, pitched in the major leagues from 1937 through 1945, first for the Pirates, mostly for the Boston Braves, and then for the last several weeks of his career for the Detroit Tigers. Though Jackie, an infielder, was a little more than eight years younger, the two played in Boston […]

In a nine-year career spent with three teams, outfielder Tito Landrum never received more than 205 official at-bats in a season. Yet he earned two World Series rings and was a League Championship Series hero for both the 1983 Orioles and 1985 Cardinals. Terry Lee Landrum was born on October 25, 1954 in Joplin. Missouri. […]

On March 9, 1914, youthful pitching prospect Harry Juul1 took two giant strides toward adulthood. Within hours, he signed a major-league playing contract with the Brooklyn Tip-Tops of the Federal League, and he married former high school classmate Hilda Marie Johnson. Shortly thereafter, Harry informed his doubtful father, “Yes, Pop. It’s true. Hilda and I […]

Who’d have thought that almost a decade after Pete Henning’s final major-league game he could run afoul of none other than Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis? What’s more, he was connected to an obscure aftereffect of the momentous 1919 Black Sox Scandal. Yet Henning didn’t even have American or National League experience; he peaked as […]

The Toronto Blue Jays have played at the Rogers Centre, previously known as SkyDome, since 1989. (Creative Commons 2.0 image by Oliver Mallich)   Quest for a Franchise Canadian sports conjure up images of ice hockey, curling and three-down football. However, baseball has a long and somewhat overlooked place in the Canadian sports scene. Prior […]