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Bobby Malkmus was a small, light-hitting, versatile middle infielder who made his major-league debut for the Milwaukee Braves in 1957 during their frantic midseason search for a second baseman. Poor hitting (2-for 22) and the club’s acquisition of All-Star Red Schoendienst marked the end of the Malkmus experiment after less than four weeks. Malkmus returned […]

Babe Ruth is considered by many, if not most, baseball fans, as the greatest player ever. The Great Bambino is noted for his magnificent clouts and overwhelmingly charismatic personality. Before he became baseball’s home run king, he was a tremendous pitcher, winning 94 games in his career. His enormous appetite for everything that life had […]

Joe Black helped lead the Brooklyn Dodgers to the 1952 pennant, going 15-4 with 15 saves, and a 2.15 ERA. He won the NL’s Rookie of the Year Award and became the first African American pitcher to win a World Series game. “Let’s put it this way,” Dodgers manager Chuck Dressen told reporters, “Where would […]

Although the 1970s Reds were famous for their great offense, a pitcher holds one of the team’s – and baseball’s – most impressive records. Jack Billingham has the lowest earned-run average in World Series play, 0.36. He allowed just one earned run in 25⅓ innings spread over three different World Series for the Reds. In […]

A baseball lifer, Al Widmar spent almost six decades playing, managing, coaching, and developing players in the major and minor leagues. Widmar, who was the pitching coach for the 1964 Phillies, pitched for the Boston Red Sox, St. Louis Browns, and Chicago White Sox with a 13-30 career record and 5.21 ERA in parts of […]

Frank Quilici must have been a milliner in a previous life because he wore so many hats with the Minnesota Twins. From player to coach to manager to broadcaster, Quilici came up from working-class roots in Chicago to become a baseball lifer with the Twins’ logo tattooed on his heart. He was also the only […]

Tom Angley was a ballplayer born 50 years too soon. Born in an era nearly 70 years before the designated hitter, he was a short but powerfully built player who hit for average and power. However, defensively, he was a catcher more because of his physical size than prowess behind the plate. The Sporting News […]

Though contemporary newspaper reports typically referred to Hall of Fame outfielder Hazen Cuyler by his given name, the right-hander is more easily recognized by one of the most unique, yet most often mispronounced nicknames in baseball history: Kiki.  “It came from shortening my name,” Cuyler explained about acquiring the moniker (which rhymes with “eye-eye”) as […]

Some baseball players have the luck of being in the right place at the right time. Many others never do. A few, however, momentarily have this kind of good fortune in their grasp, then see it taken away. Shortstop Rey Quiñones was a May call-up for the 1986 Boston Red Sox, a team destined to […]

Brandon Knight is on the list of major-league pitchers who have just one career win, but his life and career go far beyond that unique distinction. In addition to being a major leaguer, he was an Olympic athlete who represented the United States, and he also enjoyed a successful baseball career overseas in both Japan […]

Andy Seminick was a rock-solid catcher who had a career year in 1950 and had a lot to do with the Phillies winning their first pennant in 35 years. He was the antithesis of bonus babies like Curt Simmons, Robin Roberts, Richie Ashburn, and Stan Lopata because he was anything but highly sought after. He […]

This lanky pitcher was the first Mexican player to win a World Series ring. El Ejote – The Stringbean — was a member of the Oakland A’s bullpen in 1973. His motion was quirky and memorable: Whipping the ball from a low side-arm/submarine angle, Piña then swung wide and landed hard with his trailing right foot. NBC’s […]

Donald Wayne Hankins, a tall, lanky right-hander who suffered a broken elbow as a teenager, enjoyed an 11-year professional baseball career — including ten seasons in the minors — during the 1920s. Hankins finished with a lifetime minor league record of 75-87. But during the four seasons he hurled in the Double-A (the highest classification […]

For decades, Emil Verban was remembered as an obscure minor-league infielder who made the majors because of depleted wartime rosters, then played for losing teams and hit one home run in 2,911 times at bat. But more than 20 years after his retirement, Verban won a measure of fame as the namesake of the Emil […]

The picture is familiar. From a very young age, a father and son throw a ball back and forth in the backyard or the playground or the street. A bond is formed and with it, the dream emerges. “I was hoping just to get to the Show and stayed 14 years.” So it was that […]

It is an oft-told story that legendary manager John McGraw, who led the New York Giants for 30 eventful years, had photographs of only two former players on his office wall: Christy Mathewson and Ross Youngs, today an almost forgotten Hall of Fame outfielder.1 Youngs personified the type of all-out hustle and will-to-win ballplayer that […]

During the 1980s, Harold Reynolds stood out as one of the best second basemen in the American League. A three-time Gold Glove Award winner, Reynolds showed tremendous range and a strong throwing arm at the keystone position for the Seattle Mariners. He was also an adequate hitter and a threat to steal bases. Reynolds led […]

Mark Baldwin could burn the ball in there. He terrorized opposing batters with his nervous tics on the mound, which were usually followed by one of the swiftest fastballs of the 19th century, if not the swiftest. His catcher at Columbus of the American Association, Jack O’Connor, certainly thought he was the fastest. O’Connor said […]

You could say that John Candelaria’s story is a tale of heartbreak, or a tale of unfulfilled promise, or a tale of self-destruction, and you might be right every time. On the other hand, how unlucky can a person be if he managed to pitch in the major leagues for 19 seasons? The Candy Man […]

On August 29, 1977, Gene Richards was nearing the end of what was one of the finest rookie seasons in baseball history. His 56 stolen bases during that season were an all-time rookie record. However, on this particular evening, he stood silent at first base at San Diego Stadium, next to a man who had […]

Prospects who don’t fulfill their promise are a dime a dozen throughout baseball history. Boze Berger could be the epitome of that kind of prospect. While his major-league service was not exemplary, Berger had a flexible glove in the field, giving him some value to a few American League teams. After spending three seasons with […]

Fred “Bones” Ely did not become an everyday starter in the major leagues until he was 30 years old, but then he spent nearly a decade as one of the game’s top defensive shortstops. He gained lasting fame, however, for losing his job with the Pittsburgh Pirates to one of the greatest players in baseball […]

“Interleague competition would give the game a big lift and, what’s more important, it would give the fan, the average citizen, a lift, too.” – Walter O’Malley, president, Brooklyn Dodgers, in 1954.1 “Interleague play would be the fastest possible way to ruin baseball.” – George Selkirk, general manager, Washington Senators, in 1964.2   Regular-season play […]

On April 22, 1886, construction wrapped up on New York’s home for America’s quintessential icon. The final granite capstone was “laid in silver mortar,” on the Bedloe’s Island pedestal for the Statue of Liberty, Auguste Bartholdi’s homage to American independence.1  That same day, on nearby Staten Island, the brainchild of another foreign-born visionary opened its […]