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Overcoming potentially career-ending shoulder injuries in the early 1950s to develop into one of the most feared sluggers of his era, Roy Sievers became just the 18th player to hit 300 home runs. With a powerful and graceful swing that Casey Stengel called “one of the sweetest,” 1 Sievers, known as Mr. Clutch for his […]

It may have been happenstance that made Ron Blomberg own a piece of history as baseball’s first designated hitter. After he overcame anti-Semitism in his hometown of Atlanta to become the number one overall pick by the New York Yankees in the free agent draft in 1967, his dream of playing in New York City, […]

In a widely circulated national profile of the Brooklyn Dodgers’ Billy Loes in the Saturday Evening Post in 1953, journalist Jimmy Breslin described the young hurler as a “Dizzy Dean from the sidewalks of New York.”1 That reference would not have been lost on readers at the time. The former 30-game winner Dean parlayed his […]

It was one of the most famous trades in baseball history. On December 11, 1959, the Kansas City Athletics sent Joe DeMaestri, Kent Hadley, and Roger Maris to the New York Yankees for Hank Bauer, Don Larsen, Norm Siebern, and Marv Throneberry. For Hadley, the trade effectively ended his major-league career. Kent William Hadley was […]

Don Lock was a strong defensive center fielder who twice placed in the top 10 in homers in the American League. He played in 921 major-league games from 1962 to 1969. Lock was originally signed in March 1958 by New York Yankees scout Tom Greenwade, the same scout who signed Mickey Mantle. Greenwade signed Lock […]

Ed Roebuck has a safe-deposit box with two World Series championship rings in it. One ring represents the Brooklyn Dodgers’ only title, won in 1955. The other was earned as a scout for the 2004 Boston Red Sox, the first Red Sox team to win it all in 86 years … a bounty that would […]

Kenneth Jerry Adair was born to Kinnie and Ola Adair on December 17, 1936, at Lake Station, an unincorporated area named for a station on a trolley car line between the northeastern Oklahoma cities of Sand Springs and Tulsa. Jerry claimed Sand Springs as his hometown. He was a fair-skinned, blond-haired descendant of mixed-blood Cherokee […]

Right-hander Truman Eugene Clevenger was born and raised in Visalia, California, went to California State University at Fresno, and signed with the Boston Red Sox to play professional baseball. At no point in his minor-league career did he work for a team that played in Texas. But he still picked up the nickname “Tex” and […]

With his trademark dark glasses and red socks, Bob Addie, the son of a New York City butcher, was a respected and popular fixture on the Washington sports and social scene for almost 40 years. A columnist and Senators beat writer for the Washington Times-Herald and the Washington Post, Addie served as president of the […]

Although the vaunted starting duo of John Sain and Warren Spahn is usually credited with leading the Braves to the 1948 National League pennant, stellar relief pitching from several sources also helped Boston to the World Series that fall. One of the men providing this spark was rookie right-hander Bobby Hogue, who baffled NL batters […]

Right-handed pitcher Bennett Flowers worked in 76 major-league games, starting 13 of them, for four different teams over four seasons. He compiled a record of 3-7 with a 4.49 earned run average, earning one win per season in the years 1953, 1955, and 1956. In a lengthy 13-year minor-league career, he was 121-118 (3.51). Flowers […]

“The next Olympic Games must not have the same character. They must be kept more purely athletic, they must be more dignified, more discreet and more in accordance with the classic artistic requirements. The Games must be more intimate, and, above all, the Games must be less expensive.”1 — Baron Pierre de Coubertin   As […]

A baseball lifer, Mel Stottlemyre burst on the scene as a midseason call-up for the New York Yankees in 1964, helping the club win its fifth consecutive pennant and starting three games in the World Series. One of the most underrated and overlooked pitchers of his generation, Stottlemyre won 149 games and averaged 272 innings […]

A superb college basketball player, Charles Nash became the University of Kentucky’s career scoring leader in the early ’60s. Yet baseball was his first love. “Cotton” — as he was known for his bright blond hair — was also a slugging first baseman/outfielder. He juggled the two sports as a pro, and though his time […]

A glorious, romantic, and competitive era of Cuban amateur baseball was the early 1940s.1 During that time, there was a quartet of star pitchers: Conrado Marrero, Julio Moreno, Rogelio Martínez, and Sandalio Consuegra. All four entered the big leagues in 1950 with the Washington Senators. Consuegra – often known as Sandy in the U.S. – […]

A generation after Johnny Bench’s last game, he remains the gold standard for baseball catchers of any era. By the age of 20 he had redefined how to play the position, and by 22 he was the biggest star, at any position, in all of baseball. Catching eventually took its toll, moving him to the […]

It was Game Six of the 1964 World Series. The Mayor and the town Treasurer of Alba, Missouri were relaxing in box seats behind the St. Louis Cardinal’s dugout at Busch Stadium. Both His Honor and the Treasurer enjoyed a singular advantage over all of the other spectators in the ballpark on this autumn day. […]

Those fans who don’t remember Bob Johnson as a member of the 1969 Mets can certainly be excused. Johnson, 26, pitched in all of two September games that season—notching one save in the team’s 100th win of the year and allowing no runs—before being rendered ineligible for postseason play. Still, those brief Mets appearances represented […]

With a passion for problem solving fueled by an unyielding streak of empathy for his constituents, Mario Cuomo garnered allegiance from Democrats and respect from Republicans — most notably for his 1984 keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention. Whether on the stump or in Albany, the 52nd Governor of New York exemplified politicians being […]

Infielder Ted Schreiber was #10 in the long list of New York Mets third basemen. He played just 39 games as a utilityman for Casey Stengel in 1963. Of his 55 plate appearances, the most significant was his next to last — the final regular-season out made in the Polo Grounds. Second base was his best […]

Years after Ken Szotkiewicz played in his final major-league game, his name still surfaces in baseball trivia. It is not often due to his on-field exploits; rather, it tends to appear on lists of big leaguers born in Delaware (of whom there are relatively few), or on lists of big leaguers with the most peculiar […]

Over his 16 major league seasons, Stan Bahnsen was a regular rotation starter, a workhorse in a three-man rotation, a closer for a while, and finally an all-purpose reliever and spot starter. Fans at the University of Nebraska named him “The Bahnsen Burner” for his blazing fastball; later in his career he would be “Stanley […]

Note: On Wednesday morning, April 23, 2014, Conrado Marrero passed away quietly in his native Havana, Cuba, marking the end to one of the most celebrated and tenacious baseball lives on record. The sad news comes less than two days before the seemingly ageless Cuban legend would have reached his 103rd birthday, extending a remarkable […]

“The greatest thrill in the world is to end the game with a home run and watch everybody else walk off the field while you’re running the bases on air” Al Rosen1   Known as walk-offs since the late 1980s,2 game-ending home runs are unforgettable for those ballplayers fortunate enough to have hit one. To […]