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In early 1925, the New York Yankees offered to trade Lou Gehrig to the Boston Red Sox for first baseman Phil Todt to repay Boston for the blockbuster Babe Ruth trade a few years earlier. The Red Sox turned the Yankees down. So says the official Gehrig site (www.lougehrig.com). But was it true? Both debuted […]

Juan Francisco Herrera Villavicencio played three years for the Philadelphia Phillies (1958; 1960-61). Yet that accomplishment just scratches the surface of Herrera as a ballplayer and a man. “Pancho” – or, as he was typically known in Cuba, “Panchón” – was a childhood idol to many who grew up in his homeland. He also played […]

A quintessential sportsman and promoter, Michael J. Finn was a newspaper writer, trainer of champion foot racers, dog racing promoter, boxing manager, and circus man before he ever got into professional baseball in 1897. Then, over the next 25 years, he served as a minor league manager, owner and scout, sending dozens of players to […]

A diminutive lefty who was one of baseball’s biggest stars of the rollicking 1890s, Wee Willie Keeler continued to “hit ’em where they ain’t” through the first decade of the Deadball Era. The tiny (5-feet-4½-inches, 140 pounds) right fielder’s career covered 19 big-league campaigns, and in 13 of them – every year from 1894 to 1906 […]

Though he was an outstanding catcher for the Baltimore Orioles during the 1890s, Wilbert Robinson is remembered today primarily as the jovial, rotund “Uncle Robbie” who managed the Brooklyn Robins to two National League pennants and a 1,399-1,398 record from 1914 to 1931. His congenial nature and happy-go-lucky attitude made him one of the most […]

Floyd “Jelly” Gardner was a prototypical leadoff hitter who played 13 seasons in the Negro Leagues, from 1919 to 1931, most notably for Rube Foster’s Chicago American Giants. The speedy Gardner stood just 5-feet-6½ and weighed 160 pounds, and his base stealing prowess created constant pressure on opposing defenses. He was a left-handed hitter, threw […]

Burly, 6-foot-7 reliever Tim Stoddard remains (as of 2023) the only man to win an NCAA Division I basketball title and a World Series ring. Before he grew his big walrus mustache and began to lose his hair, he was the starting power forward for the 1973-74 North Carolina State Wolfpack. Although baseball’s January 1975 […]

Mel McGaha’s life was part Frank Merriwell, part Greek tragedy. Like Merriwell, the fictional athlete popularized in dime novels, McGaha (pronounced mŭ-GAY-hay) was a clean-cut, handsome figure who excelled in multiple sports as a collegian. A University of Arkansas graduate, he was a basketballer drafted by the New York Knickerbockers, a two-way football player signed […]

Frank Mulroney came from Mallard, Iowa, a right-hander. He was born 12 days before the Boston Americans opened the 1903 season, on their way to winning the first World Series ever played. On April 8, 1903, John P. Mulroney, a retail merchant of groceries, and his wife Alice (Cullen) welcomed their second child to the […]

Matt “The Scat” Alexander holds an odd distinction: He is the foremost pinch-running specialist in major-league history. Over parts of nine seasons (1973-81), he played in 374 games — yet amassed only 195 plate appearances. A favorite of manager Chuck Tanner, Alexander won a World Series ring with the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates. Along with his […]

Charlie Hautz was a man of modest baseball talent but much baseball enthusiasm. He parlayed his limited abilities into a long career as a first baseman and outfielder during the pioneering years of nineteenth-century baseball in St. Louis and other Western locales. While he spent only parts of two seasons with major-league clubs, he always […]

On June 23, 1931, sportswriter Walter W. Smith encountered George Watkins, the St. Louis Cardinals right fielder, in the lobby of Philadelphia’s Franklin Hotel, where the team was staying for a series against the Phillies. Both men were relatively new to their jobs; Smith had begun covering the team for the St. Louis Star the […]

In his first three professional seasons, James “Wickey” McAvoy played for a World Series champion, an American League champion, and a team that lost 109 games. This dramatic shift of fortune required no action on McAvoy’s part: The catcher joined Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics in 1913 and lingered there as Mack traded some of his […]

On ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball, a national cable audience watched the Baltimore Orioles set a few records as they pounded the Texas Rangers, 15-6. A crowd of 40,516 packed Oriole Park at Camden Yards to celebrate a promotion called Texas Barbecue Night, and they were treated to Baltimore batters “grilling a couple of Texas pitchers.”1 […]

Philadelphia is not known the to be coolest place to summer in, and the summer of 1926 was no exception. Temperatures had been rising steadily after a rainy fourth of July and reached 94 degrees on July 9 with a forecast for even warmer weather on July 10.1 The weather was having a tragic effect […]

Urban “Red” Faber’s Hall of Fame pitching career took off in 1915. After posting a 10-9 record as a rookie the previous season, the Chicago White Sox spitballer went 24-14 with a 2.55 ERA in 1915, tying for second place in the American League in wins and ranking first in games pitched with 50.1 He […]

The Cincinnati Redlegs were mired in seventh place during late July 1955, more than 20 games behind the NL-leading Brooklyn Dodgers. The team struggled during a 5-15 road trip that lasted from July 8 to 24. Although the Redlegs endured seven- and four-game losing streaks during July’s travels, their misery was mitigated by a 19-1 […]

An estimated 350,000 fans greeted the Expos as they paraded through downtown Montreal in open-air vehicles on a chilly Thursday afternoon on the eve of their 1977 home opener.1 Baseball had captured the imagination of Montrealers even though the NHL’s Canadiens had just begun a playoff run for their second consecutive Stanley Cup. Buried under […]

During the first six seasons of his stellar 17-year career with the St. Louis Cardinals, Bob Gibson won 71 games, achieved All-Star status, and pitched on a World Series winner. Early in Gibson’s seventh season, 1965, the 20-year-old Steve Carlton joined Gibson on the Cardinals’ pitching staff.1 The two were teammates for seven years, and […]

“If a showman had arranged it,” opined the AP’s Paul Mickelson, “he couldn’t have staged a more dramatic finish than that of today.”1 The pennant hopes of the St. Louis Cardinals hinged on the last day of the season. A victory over the lowly Cincinnati Reds guaranteed the Redbirds the pennant; their loss and a […]

On a clear and cool day, the Cincinnati Redlegs and Chicago Cubs prepared for an early May finale of a five-game series at Wrigley Field. A Cubs vice president estimated that the team lost at least 100,000 fans to unstable Chicagoland weather during this 10-game homestand.1 Another small crowd (5,936) entered the turnstiles at Clark […]

The Detroit Tigers were baseball’s biggest surprise of 2006. On a streak of 12 consecutive losing seasons, and three years removed from the most losses in American League history, Detroit surged to the head of the AL Central behind a new manager and an emerging rookie ace. Jim Leyland, in a major-league dugout for the […]

At close of play on September 20, 1886, the St. Louis Browns (82-41) had a 12-game lead over the second-place Pittsburgh Alleghenys in the American Association, with the Philadelphia Athletics (54-63-3) in sixth place, 25 games off the pace. The next day, the Browns came to Philadelphia for a three-game series. St. Louis, as expected, […]

“In other years, the cynics expected the Red Sox to go nowhere. This year the experts say they’ll go halfway to somewhere.” — Editorial, Boston Globe, April 11, 1967   “I don’t care where people say we’re going to finish,” grunted new Red Sox manager Dick Williams. “Let them pick us for 10th. But I […]