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Pitcher Omar Daal’s career statistics, the accepted baseline for snap judgments about a player’s effectiveness, were, perhaps, misleading. A pitcher with a lifetime major-league record of 68-78 and a 4.55 earned-run average, one who relied far more on a deceptive delivery than a blazing fastball to retire hitters, might be considered something of a failure. […]

These days, a man coming from Gayville might be taunted in some circles, feted in others. There appear to be two Gayvilles in South Dakota, one an unincorporated place on the western edge of the state and the other a town in Yankton County in southeastern South Dakota. In 2010, the population was 407. In […]

“You look out and you’re in a big-league park, you’re on a big-league field, you’re going to pitch. It’s a hundred emotions going through you.” – Abe Alvarez, on his major-league debut with the 2004 Boston Red Sox1 Abe Alvarez pitched four games in the major leagues, including his debut for the 2004 Boston Red […]

A scrappy outfielder, Nemo Leibold had a 13-year major-league career and played on four World Series teams, winning a championship with the Chicago White Sox in 1917 and another with the Washington Senators in 1924. Later a distinguished manager in the minor leagues from 1928 to 1948, Leibold is best known for passing through the […]

Saves became an official major-league statistic in 1969. By the mid-1970s, closers had become firmly entrenched on big-league rosters. Pitchers such as Rollie Fingers, Bruce Sutter, Sparky Lyle, and Rich “Goose” Gossage were helping to define the role, often pitching multiple innings at the end of games. In 1976, the antacid maker Rolaids, whose motto […]

Two weeks after being shelled in his debut, Steve Ellsworth was credited with his first big-league win. The 27-year-old right-hander was on the mound for the Boston Red Sox, and the team he bested was the same one that had sent him to the showers after just two-plus innings. Going seven strong at Tiger Stadium, […]

For almost all his high-school career, and in his early minor-league years in the Chicago White Sox organization, Nyls Nyman was stamped as a surefire star. In 1974 when Nyman was in spring training with Double-A Knoxville, manager Jim Napier had nothing but praise for the 20-year-old Californian. “Nyls has everything it takes to make […]

“I guess if you can’t win ballgames, you gotta try to win fights,” Yankees owner George Steinbrenner jokingly taunted after witnessing one of the uglier brawls in baseball history. “If I hadn’t been upstairs, I would’ve tried to get [Armando Benitez], too.”1 Despite having baseball’s biggest payroll, the 20-23 Baltimore Orioles came into Yankee Stadium […]

Seventh place in the eight-club National League in 1946 and 1947, the Pittsburgh Pirates challenged for the pennant in 1948. The team’s success – and left fielder Ralph Kiner’s league-best home-run stroke – pushed total home attendance toward 39-year-old Forbes Field’s all-time high with a month left in the season. On August 31, before a […]

Tommy Brown first gained notoriety as a 16-year-old for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1944. His unique opportunity to reach the big leagues at such a young age came about because most of baseball’s regular players were serving in the military during World War II. He would be a part-time player during his entire nine-year major-league […]

Rookie knuckleballer Tim Wakefield boosted the Pittsburgh Pirates to their third consecutive National League East Division crown in 1992 after getting called up in July to fortify a shorthanded starting rotation. With the Pirates trailing the Atlanta Braves two games to none in the NL Championship Series, Wakefield continued his late-season infusion, tossing a five-hit […]

Larry Bowa and Joe Hoerner crossed paths for the first time as teammates on the 1970 Philadelphia Phillies. Bowa, signed and developed by the Phillies’ organization, was a 24-year-old rookie shortstop batting leadoff for a mainly veteran team. Hoerner, a 33-year-old lefty reliever, was acquired in an offseason trade with the St. Louis Cardinals to […]

The Philadelphia Phillies captured the 1983 National League pennant with hitting and pitching metrics above league average. The team’s major weakness was defense; it was tied for the third most errors in the NL. Despite a major turnover in personnel in the offseason, the 1984 Phillies team had some similarities with their 1983 counterparts. Both […]

Less than a week before the 1944 midsummer classic, Boston’s “All-Star squad quartet”1 of second baseman Bobby Doerr, right fielder Pete Fox, pitcher Tex Hughson, and left fielder Bob Johnson paced the Red Sox to a 13-3 thrashing of the Detroit Tigers. A crowd of 5,146 at Fenway Park saw all nine of Boston’s starters […]

The Philadelphia Phillies surged to 10 games over .500 with their 4-3 win over the Cincinnati Reds at Riverfront Stadium on July 17, 1984. With six wins in seven games, the Phillies were 2½ games behind the National League East-leading New York Mets. Philadelphia, which had won five division titles, two NL pennants, and one […]

Not even the oppressive St. Louis heat could break Bob Sykes on the Fourth of July in 1980. With the Busch Stadium on-field temperature a reported 140 degrees,1 the Cardinals left-handed pitcher spun a 10-inning shutout against the Philadelphia Phillies. Center fielder George Hendrick hit a walk-off home run with one out in the bottom […]

Fans at Ebbets Field cheered when Babe Ruth — decked out in Dodger blue — trotted to the third-base coach’s box on Sunday, June 19, 1938, in the first game of a doubleheader. Baseball’s home-run king had agreed the previous day to join the Brooklyn staff. Dodgers general manager Larry MacPhail signed him to a […]

“I know it’s happening, but I can’t believe it,” said a fan in the stands in a hushed voice, trying to suspend disbelief.1 “Thirty-nine years and here we are at last,” marveled longtime Chicago columnist Mike Royko.2 It was the opening game of the best-of-five National League Championship Series, and the first postseason game at […]

Hank Aaron was tired and a bit on edge as he made his way to Crosley Field for the Atlanta Braves’ Sunday afternoon twin bill with the Cincinnati Reds to conclude a four-game series. He had fielded phone calls until 3 A.M. and had an upset stomach, too. “I didn’t eat much,” said Aaron. “I’m […]

Not even the all-powerful Kenesaw Mountain Landis could predict the future. At 11:00 A.M. on October 8, with a steady rain falling, the commissioner decided to postpone Game Four of the 1928 World Series. When the skies had cleared by 1:00 P.M., Landis looked a bit foolish and many fans were understandably upset.1 In reality, […]

Walter “Red” Barber was one of the pioneers of radio and television broadcasting in baseball. Among the firsts in his career was serving as the announcer for the first Brooklyn Dodgers radio broadcast, on April 18, 1939, when the Dodgers hosted the New York Giants at Ebbets Field to open the 1939 season. By 1938, […]

Surely, preparation would not be an issue for Pittsburgh’s 1891 National League campaign. The club spent two months training in the South, getting in shape for the new season. The new manager was also familiar to the squad. Still an active player, Ned Hanlon was in the nascent stages of a managerial career that would […]

In the aftermath of the 1967 Detroit riots, Detroiters desperately needed something positive to take their minds off their torn city. Many sought solace in the Detroit Tigers, who emerged that summer as bona-fide pennant contenders. An entire generation of Tigers fans had witnessed mostly mediocre baseball since the team last won the pennant in […]

The reigning World Series champion Brooklyn Dodgers finally made a push to the National League pennant late in the 1956 season. After being 1½ games out of first place following a doubleheader split September 7, the Dodgers charged forward and held a one-game lead on September 30. Brooklyn had swept the Pirates in a doubleheader […]