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Veteran New York sportswriters were impressed with 21-year-old Sandy Koufax’s overpowering four-hitter with 11 punchouts at Wrigley Field in the Brooklyn Dodgers’ one-sided win over the Chicago Cubs on August 1, 1957. “Sandy’s strikeout record against the Cubs is remarkable,” declared New York Times scribe Roscoe McGowen.1 Dick Young of the Daily News quipped, “Koufax, […]

It was a new season, the Pirates opening against the 1952 National League champion Brooklyn Dodgers. Pittsburgh had finished last (42-112-1) in 1952, 54½ games behind Brooklyn. Fred Haney had been brought in as manager. They’d played Opening Day at Ebbets Field the day before and taken a 4-0 lead in the top of the […]

Three years after announcing his retirement, Bill Virdon returned to active service in July 1968, when injuries and military obligations left the Pittsburgh Pirates shorthanded. Though brief, Virdon’s reactivation produced one memorable moment: a game-tying two-run ninth-inning home run off star reliever Ted Abernathy in Pittsburgh’s 12-inning, 7-6 loss to the Cincinnati Reds at Forbes […]

At the end of the day on July 21, 1925, the Washington Senators stood atop the American League standings with a record of 57 wins and 31 losses, which put them a half-game ahead of the second-place Philadelphia Athletics. The Senators were near the end of a 17-game road trip as they tried to repeat […]

Early in his 16-year major-league career, Johnny Callison was labeled “the next Mickey Mantle.” His manager with the Phillies, Gene Mauch, said Callison could “run, throw, field, and hit with power. There’s nothing he can’t do well on the ball field.”1 These encomiums proved burdens that the always sensitive Callison found difficult to live up […]

A rookie in his first training camp must do something to make the manager notice him. It certainly does not hurt his cause if he can get the newspaper writers to write favorably. Bernie Neis was invited to spring training with the Dodgers in 1920. He came from Class C ball in Canada with the […]

“Pembroke Finlayson” was surely a mouthful of a name for a 5-foot-6, 140-pound lad. Known as the “Midget Twirler,” young Mr. Finlayson made two very brief appearances in major-league baseball, pitching for the Brooklyn club, before reaching the age of 22. He might have worked his way back to the bigs if he’d only made […]

Paul Snyder was the indispensable man behind the scenes of the Atlanta Braves’ success. If anyone has said a bad word about him, it has not been recorded in the hothouse world of baseball. A baseball lifer since he started his career as a Braves minor-league outfielder-first baseman in 1958, Snyder is a rarity in […]

Allan Montreuil was the true definition of a baseball “phenom.” Unlike most amateur players who acquire the label when they are in high school or college, Montreuil first got attention as a two-year-old. He went on become one of the most celebrated amateur players in New Orleans baseball history as a result of his athletic […]

In life James Donaldson Brown’s journey took him from humble beginnings in Laurel, Maryland, to a nondescript death in an Oregon logging town. In between his birth and death he completed an odyssey that entailed stops in at least 28 minor-league cities, one foreign country and two major-league cities. He crisscrossed the county playing in […]

John Clapp was a part of so many beginnings in baseball history that his middle name should have been Genesis. He was the second batter that the Cincinnati Red Stockings faced in their Eastern tour of 1869; in the opener of Al Spalding’s groundbreaking tour of the British Isles in 1874, he delivered the game-winning […]

Jim Suchecki was born in Chicago of Polish-American parents. All four of his grandparents had come to America from Poland, but his parents – Joseph Suchecki and the former Josephine Piotrowski – were both born in Illinois. James Joseph Suchecki was their first-born, arriving on August 25, 1927. About five years later, they had another […]

This infielder was the original “Sugar Bear” — several years ahead of Floyd Rayford, who bore the same nickname in the 1980s. With their pleasant, sleepy-eyed expressions, both men resembled the easygoing cartoon character in the ads for Post Super Sugar Crisp cereal. Yet contrary to popular belief, that is not how Blanks got his […]

In Homer’s Iliad, Diomedes was one of the strongest Greek warriors. He was also the youngest — unlike his namesake, Dominican pitcher Diómedes Olivo. Olivo made his big-league debut with the 1960 Pirates at the age of 41. As of 2018, he was still the second-oldest “rookie” in major-league history, behind only Satchel Paige. Like […]

John Gibbons has seen a lot of ups and down in his career. A highly touted prospect for the Mets who was expected to be their future catcher, but a lack of production and the acquisition of Gary Carter stood in the way. Gibbons became a major-league manager for the Toronto Blue Jays, but mediocre […]

During his days with the Baltimore Orioles at the end of the 1970s, Pat Kelly talked a lot with skipper Earl Weaver. While Weaver spoke about baseball strategy, Kelly – who became a born-again Christian in 1975 – persisted in talking about Jesus Christ. In one of those dialogues, Kelly proposed to Weaver, “Why don’t […]

No less an authority than Ted Williams referred to him as “the greatest young hitter I’ve ever seen.”1 His immense power drew comparisons to Hall of Famers Harmon Killebrew and Eddie Mathews, while his value was glimpsed in an unexecuted one-for-one swap with the California Angels’ future Cooperstown inductee Nolan Ryan. (The talks collapsed only […]

Born in Bellows Falls, Vermont, on December 26, 1947, Carlton Fisk embodies traditional New England values like pride, ruggedness, and individuality. Those virtues were what the late Boston Red Sox public relations director Dick Bresciani was trying to capture in 1997 when he wrote that Fisk was a “native of Vermont” on his original plaque […]

It takes a special kind of talent for a pitcher to lose 20 games in a season. The pitcher has to pitch both poorly enough to lose, but well enough that he keeps getting chances to pitch. If losing 20 games takes talent, how much more talent does it take to lose 48 games in […]

Jason Andrew Varitek (nickname: Tek) was a major-league baseball catcher who played all 15 seasons of his major-league career for the Boston Red Sox (1997-2011), a switch-hitter who threw right-handed. Varitek was a member of two World Series winners for Boston, in 2004 and 2007. After retiring as a player, he continued to work for […]

While Red Sox fans remember Dave Morehead mostly for the no-hitter he threw in 1965, Morehead played a role on the ’67 dream team by contributing five wins in the August-September stretch drive. Although he had a career major league record of only 40-64 with a 4.15 ERA, he showed flashes of brilliance, particularly early […]

Editor’s note: During our Stay Home With SABR initiative, enjoy these light-hearted Dispatches From the Mudville Bureau by Joanne Hulbert of SABR’s Boston Chapter to stay engaged with baseball until the games return. Check out what’s new and keep up with all the news in the Boston Chapter on Facebook at BostonSABR or on Instagram […]