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On the night of August 25, 1980, an armed man described as “screaming” and “ranting and raving” entered Miami Stadium in Miami, Florida, between games of a Class A minor-league doubleheader. He shot one fan in the neck, causing a minor wound, then turned to leave. When two other fans chased him, he shot them […]

On July 13, 1962, more than halfway through the regular season, all but one of the 10 teams in the American League standings were separated by only 8½ games. Sitting in eighth and ninth places respectively were the Boston Red Sox and the Kansas City Athletics. The two teams were in the midst of a […]

David Ortiz addresses the crowd at Fenway Park on April 20, 2013. (MICHAEL IVINS / BOSTON RED SOX)   Monday, April 15, 2013, was Patriots Day in Massachusetts, a state holiday commemorating the Battles of Lexington and Concord. Patriots Day is famous for two sporting events — the Boston Marathon, and the morning Boston Red […]

Kevin McReynolds and Rich “Goose” Gossage were teammates for three years with the San Diego Padres and were major contributors to a Padres team that played in the 1984 World Series. After McReynolds was traded to the New York Mets during the 1986-87 offseason, Gossage had some unkind words for his former teammate. The outspoken […]

Black baseball pioneer and 2022 Hall of Famer Bud Fowler played for at least 15 minor-league teams from 1878 to 1895, and he’s considered the first acknowledged African American professional baseball player.1 One stop on his journey was with the Montpelier Capital Citys of the 1887 Northeastern League. Throughout his historic career, Fowler was the […]

The New York Mets came into existence in 1962 and were one of the worst teams in baseball history, losing 120 games. The 1963 season was much of the same for Casey Stengel’s Mets. They lost 111 games and finished last for the second straight year. The Mets of that era were lovable losers, with […]

What happens when the worst team in the American League meets the worst team in the Class B Interstate League for a late-season offday exhibition game? Only 956 people could have told you firsthand, because that was the paltry reported crowd on the night of September 7, 1943, when the Philadelphia Athletics (44-84, 35½ games […]

Reggie Jackson had not returned in years, but it made no difference. Decades after being one of the few Black minor leaguers on the 1967 Birmingham A’s, he could still recall how segregationists would point and refuse him service. He could still recite the taunts: “The n****r can’t stay here”; “The n****r can’t eat here.”1 […]

A switch-hitting reserve catcher (.228 career batting average) who came up in the Red Sox farm system, Tim Blackwell had his best season at the plate as a Chicago Cub, hitting .272 and catching full-time in 1980. Blackwell grew up in San Diego and participated in Little League baseball. A star in two sports at […]

Ron Luciano was a football All-American, baseball umpire, TV broadcaster, and best-selling author. He barged through the world like a gnu amid a herd of Shetland ponies, entertaining many, offending a few, and hiding behind a cheerful and outrageous persona until life somehow proved unbearable. Everyone knew him, but nobody did. He was born June […]

Former major league player and scout Lenny Yochim once said in a New Orleans Times-Picayune interview, “I had a good life doing something I love.”1 From his teenage days in the Crescent City in the 1940s until his retirement in 2002, Yochim spent practically every summer participating in some aspect of the sport to which […]

On Monday evening, September 22, 1947, the “sizzling steaks [were] on the house . . . [and] free gravy down the shirt front” was de rigueur at 600 Flatbush Avenue.1 Pitcher Hugh Casey, proprietor of Hugh Casey’s Steak and Chop House, was optimistically throwing a victory dinner party for his Dodgers teammates. Brooklyn’s beloved “Bums” […]

Darrell Dean Johnson worked in baseball as a catcher, a coach, a manager best known for taking the 1975 Red Sox to Game Seven of the World Series, and as a scout. He was born in the small community of Horace, Nebraska, on August 25, 1928, but grew up on the West Coast, so much […]

America loves an underdog. It favors stories of players who weren’t given a chance because they were too small or didn’t have a traditional background, but they pushed and persevered and in the end made the team. Wayne LaMaster’s baseball career isn’t widely remembered today, but it is the classic underdog story of a player […]

Despite winning three professional batting titles, outfielder Luis Mercedes played only 70 major-league games over parts of three seasons (1991-1993) for the Baltimore Orioles and San Francisco Giants. After retiring, he became a renowned hitting instructor in his native Dominican Republic. Luis Roberto Mercedes Santana was born on February 15, 1968, in San Pedro de […]

At times, it looked like José “Coco” Laboy would never get a shot in the majors. When he finally did, ten years after his professional career began, his rookie year made many wonder why it took so long. On his way up, no one would have ever accused Coco Laboy of having it easy. He […]

Bob Friend was one of baseball’s more consistent starting pitchers during his era and a workhorse for the 1960 Pittsburgh Pirates. That year the right-hander led the team in games started and innings pitched while posting an 18-12 record and 3.00 earned-run average in a major comeback from a disappointing 1959 campaign. Durable at 6-feet […]

With a career batting average of .264 and the second-highest home run total of any Iowan who ever played major league baseball (after Hal Trosky), it goes without saying that Casey Blake could hit. He also was a good fielder, whether he was playing his natural position of third base or filling in at first […]

In three different seasons — 1939, 1941, and 1944 — Frank McCormick hit home runs more often than he struck out. In his entire 13-year career, encompassing 5,723 at-bats and more than 6,200 plate appearances, the slugging first baseman had just 189 strikeouts — 10 fewer whiffs than Ryan Howard achieved in only 529 at-bats […]

Right-handed pitcher J.B. Young celebrated his 35th birthday in unique fashion — by appearing in his first, last, and only major league game.1 Unhappily for Young, his outing on behalf of the 1892 St. Louis Browns was a nightmare: two innings-plus, 13 runs surrendered. He never appeared in another Browns game and was back home […]

What Tommy Davis accomplished as a major leaguer on one good leg, most players would be proud to do on two. Not that this sums up his athletic career, but it is an important backdrop to his improbable baseball odyssey. Davis seemed ready to have his ticket punched for Cooperstown as he entered his ball-playing […]

First baseman Gus Suhr is best known for playing in a then-record 822 consecutive National League games (1931-37). Yet he also achieved recognition for his extensive offensive and defensive contributions in a commendable big-league career of 11 years, 10 of which were spent with the Pittsburgh Pirates. August Richard Suhr was born on January 3, […]

In the 1940s Red Barber was solidly entrenched as the Brooklyn Dodgers’ lead broadcaster. But he was not the team’s lone play-by-play man. The “Old Redhead” was ably assisted by Connie Desmond, whose delivery befitted the era in that it was unhurried, calming, and wholly agreeable. Decades after Desmond last described a game in Brooklyn, […]

Everyone has his baseball dream when growing up, but few get the opportunity to realize that one special moment. On October 12, 1956, the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers played the seventh game of the World Series. The Yankees had lost the first two games but had come back to win the next […]