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A Sunday crowd of 19,950 — overflowing into fair territory in left field — flocked to Cleveland’s League Park on May 11, 1913, for the first of four games between the Cleveland Naps and the New York Yankees. The game was promoted as “Frank Chance Day,” to honor New York’s popular player-manager. Chance — in […]

Superstitious? Not me. Although there was a time in my life when I thought I could alter fate merely by avoiding black cats, knocking on wood, or even by talking to baseball bats. The latter practice occurred in the spring of 1968, when I was 12 years old and batboy for the Minnesota Gophers baseball team. Saturday, […]

Fingernail care was part of the Niekro family business. Forty-two-year-old Joe was in his 21st season as a major-league pitcher, and 48-year-old brother Phil was in his 24th. They both owed their longevity to the knuckleball, an erratic pitch that requires less velocity and is less taxing on the arm. They had their father to […]

Wilbur Wehde was born on November 23, 1906, in the hamlet of Holstein, Iowa. The town, roughly 45 miles east of Sioux City, was at the time home to fewer than 1,000 residents, mostly first- or second-generation German immigrants. Wehde’s father, Gustave, managed a creamery and brokered other farmers’ produce, while his mother, Frieda, managed […]

In Philadelphia early in 1938, manager Joe Cronin of the Boston Red Sox threw four rookie pitchers into an April 24 game against the Philadelphia Athletics. Emerson Dickman started, and was relieved by Charlie Wagner, Dick Midkiff, and Byron William Humphrey. Dickman took the loss. The 6-foot, right-handed Humphrey closed the game, taking over after […]

Since 1931, Earl Webb has held the major-league record for the most doubles hit in a single season – 67. It is one of the longest-lasting records in baseball, despite the fact that when it was set, the season was eight games shorter than today’s 162-game schedule. As it happens, Earl’s team that year – […]

On October 20, 1988, the Los Angeles Dodgers were on the verge of winning it all. They held a comfortable lead over the Oakland Athletics in the World Series, three games to one. LA was in a good spot for sure as its ace, Orel Hershiser, was the starting pitcher. After Kirk Gibson’s dramatic pinch-hit […]

By the time Carl Scheib pitched his final major-league game in 1954, the big righthander from Gratz, Pennsylvania, had risen from the youngest player in American League history in 1943 to a solid performer who won 45 times and fashioned a lifetime 4.88 ERA. During his 11 major league seasons, he played all but two […]

Puerto Rico has long been a baseball hotbed. The sport has also thrived in Hawaii, thanks largely to Americans and Japanese. Yet unless one is very familiar with Hawaiian culture, one might not realize that Puerto Rican immigrants embraced the game there too. John Matias, who played 58 games for the Chicago White Sox in […]

“For a man who wants to stay in baseball, being a utilityman is the best training he can get. Much better than being a regular. The fellow who’s on the bench, if he applies himself, has an opportunity to study every facet of the game, and to learn more about it than the regular.”1 That […]

In the spring of 1947, “uncertain” may have been the word that best described the New York Yankees’ prospects. The team that had dominated the American League throughout the late 1930s and the early 1940s was coming off an ignoble third-place finish in 1946, seventeen games behind— and seemingly light years removed from—the champion Boston […]

Infielder Bill Ripken attacked the game of baseball with reckless abandon and paid the price, sustaining an inordinate number of injuries during his career. He never changed his all-out, hustling style of play, earning the reputation of a player who left it all on the field. The Ripkens were a baseball family. Bill’s father, Cal Ripken […]

He threw a ball as fast as Amos “The Hoosier Thunderbolt” Rusie, hit the ball as “hard as any man in the league,” and was versatile enough to play every position except catcher.1 His name was Jack Stivetts. In an 11-year major-league career that began with the St. Louis Browns of the American Association in […]

Frankie Frisch may have been playing possum, or just being coy. But after the St. Louis Cardinals won Game Six of the 1934 World Series, the big question was which pitcher manager Frisch would send to the hill for the seventh and deciding game. His star pitcher, Dizzy Dean, was coming off a loss in […]

Few players in the history of our national pastime could match the versatility of the man Sporting Life magazine once referred to as “The finest all around player in the business besides Lajoie.” Lewis “Sport” McAllister was the ultimate utility man, making appearances at every position on the diamond during his 22-year tenure in professional […]

The Red Sox party boarded the train in Boston on February 28, 1927, bound for spring training in New Orleans. During a four-hour layover in Cincinnati, eight more players got on. Among them was a prospect, F. A. Bennett. He didn’t make the team, but was “loaned” to Portland, Maine.1 About 3,000 people turned out […]

On September 16, 1975, the Pittsburgh Pirates were wrapping up a three-game series with the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field. They held a six-game lead over Philadelphia in the National League East Division and the season was growing old. With only 12 games remaining on the Pirates’ schedule, time was indeed running out on the […]

The minds and memories of casual baseball fans often recall the names and exploits of pitchers who have performed brilliantly during a career peak or even a single shining season. Hall of Fame careers have been built around a few great years in succession and the awards and buzz that accompany these successes. At the […]

Jack Brickhouse, a broadcaster best known for covering Chicago Cubs baseball, also covered many other sports and teams and did a significant amount of non-sports broadcasting, including coverage of several national political party conventions, and interviews with four U.S. Presidents and Pope Paul VI. “My father ran the gamut of the entertainment world,” wrote Jack […]

Billy Hamilton was the greatest base stealer and most prolific run scorer of nineteenth-century baseball, but few recognized his name when he gained admittance to the Hall of Fame long after his death. Bill James, who ranks Hamilton as the ninth-best center fielder of all time in his book, The New Historical Baseball Abstract (1999 ed.), remarked […]

Entertaining and irritating by turns, outfielder Chuck Carr was known for his speed and cocky personality. Carr’s running ability was what made him fun to watch. He made many circus catches and stole a lot of bases. That made him a fan favorite in Miami, where he enjoyed his best year in 1993 for the […]

“Big Bill” Brennan was a large man, weighing 235 pounds and standing 6-foot-2½. He had a loud voice and could be heard all over the ball field. Brennan’s voice served him well not only as an umpire, but also as a football coach at the University of Tennessee Medical College. Brennan was born on October […]

Ken Suarez, one of the “can’t-miss” catching prospects of the 1960s and a member of the Rangers’ inaugural squad in 1972, took a roundabout trip to arrive at his Arlington destination. Kenneth Raymond Suarez was born on April 12, 1943, in Tampa, Florida, the son of Joseph R. and Gladys M. (Wadsworth) Suarez, who married […]