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Thanks to sterling pitching, no clutch hitting, and two umpiring controversies, the Braves and the Reds settled for a memorable tie featuring a bizarre 2-3-5 double play concluding at home plate that extended the contest so that it ended as the longest scoreless duel in major-league history to date. Cincinnati’s Fred Toney yielded only two […]

It was quite a game at Fenway Park on July 18, 1980. Both starting pitchers worked into the 10th inning, and the game was won by a rookie’s walk-off home run. Neither of the teams was in contention in midseason 1980. The hosting Boston Red Sox were fifth in the seven-team American League East Division, […]

Oh, pass the biscuits, Mirandy, I’m a-gonna load up my gun. I’ll use your biscuits for bullets, I’ll put them varmints on the run. —  from the song “Pass the Biscuits, Mirandy,” by Spike Jones and His City Slickers, 1942   The Brooklyn Dodgers won the 1941 National League pennant by a 2½-game margin over […]

The Pittsburgh Pirates were leading the National League East Division in June 1975 when they promoted 21-year-old John Candelaria to patch up their injury-eroded rotation. In Candelaria’s third big-league start, against the New York Mets at Shea Stadium, the Brooklyn native dazzled his hometown and outdueled superstar Tom Seaver by taking a no-hitter into the […]

For a while, Boston National League fans who saw Brooklyn play at Braves Field had a decent chance of seeing a lot of extra baseball. On May 1, 1920, the teams played 26 innings to a 1-1 tie – still the longest game in major-league history as of spring 2022. Two days later they played […]

The same two cities squared off in the 1915 World Series as had in 1914, but the teams were different. In 1914 Boston’s National League team — the Braves (the so-called “Miracle Braves”) — had swept the Series in four games from the Philadelphia Athletics of the American League.1 In 1915 the Boston Red Sox […]

Each baseball season’s early summer games take on a mystical quality in cities that endure longer, darker winters. Near June solstice, night patiently awaits dusk’s extended loitering, humidity is tolerable, and the schedule is still young enough to keep fans of even the most dismal teams buoyant for revelation. Such was the setting on a […]

Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Gavvy Cravath and pitcher Tom Seaton enjoyed their finest seasons in 1913. Cravath led the National League in hits, home runs (19), and slugging percentage, while setting a league record for runs batted in (128) that was not surpassed until 1922. He placed second in batting average at .341 (behind only Jake […]

Rookie superstar Fred Lynn stole second base in the ninth inning to score the game’s only run and then made a phenomenal catch of a Graig Nettles gap shot in the bottom of the frame to preserve Bill Lee’s six-hit shutout of the fading Yankees in the opener of a doubleheader in Queens. The loss, […]

On the morning of August 11, 1921, the New York Giants were in second place, 2½ games behind the Pittsburgh Pirates. If the National League pennant race remained close, any one of a number of factors could be the difference between success and failure. Doubtless with some satisfaction, the Standard Union (Brooklyn) claimed, “[s]hould the […]

On September 22, 1911, three rookies made their major league debuts for the St. Louis Cardinals, including 21-year-old third baseman Ed “Irish” Conwell, who took over the hot corner in the top of the eighth inning with his team trailing Red Ames and the first-place New York Giants, 3-0. The game was of consequence to […]

In 1940 baseball was truly America’s national game. But it was played at the major-league level by 16 teams in only 11 cities, none west of St. Louis or south of Cincinnati.1 Minor-league baseball proliferated over the rest of the country, with 39 leagues in six classifications, designated Class AA through Class D. For a […]

The New York Mets entered the 1969 National League playoffs with their hopes riding on the arms of their young and talented pitching staff. But they won the first game of the series with their bats. After the Braves tagged Mets ace Tom Seaver for eight hits, including two home runs, Seaver’s teammates saved his […]

“Pinch hit hero mobbed by rabid Red Sox enthusiasts” was a sub-headline of the October 17, 1912, edition of the Boston Globe reporting on young Olaf Henriksen’s game-tying base hit in the eighth and deciding game of the 1912 World Series, against a dominant Christy Mathewson. It was a crucial blow off the great Mathewson, […]

As a 25-year-old Chicago Cubs outfielder and pinch-hitter Babe Twombly hit .377, a figure that usually warrants further employment at the major league level. Instead, it was the last season in the big leagues for the young man, who was shipped out west to the Pacific Coast League and didn’t look back. Clarence Edward Twombly […]

As pitching coach for the White Sox in the 1950s and ’60s, Ray Berres was noted for two things: developing quality pitching staffs year after year, and not wanting to draw attention to himself. Quiet and unassuming, he once said, “I stayed away from writers. … I didn’t care for publicity.” But Ray Berres couldn’t […]

“If you can’t get fundamentals down for Hal Lanier, you cannot play for Hal Lanier,” declared the native Floridian about his managerial philosophy, nearly a half-century since his professional baseball début in 1961.1 Lanier’s emphasis on the foundations of baseball characterized his longevity as a helmsman and, for 10 seasons, a major league ballplayer. To […]

Lou Finney was a tough man to strike out. A fast, feisty left-handed hitter with line-drive power, Finney made contact often enough and was versatile enough in the field to play an important role first for Connie Mack’s Depression-era Philadelphia Athletics and later for Joe Cronin’s World War II-era Boston Red Sox. A scrappy, curly-haired Alabaman […]

Donning the uniforms of the Chicago Cubs and Brooklyn Dodgers for the better part of his career, along with playing short stints for the Reds, Giants, and Athletics, Augie Galan (pronounced “guh-LANN”) put together a lifetime .287 batting average in 16 major-league seasons. He reached the .300 plateau six times, played in three World Series, […]

Richard John McAuliffe was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on November 29, 1939. He grew up in the tiny town of Unionville, a burg “not exactly a breeding spot for major league athletes,” according to Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray, another Connecticut native. “Chickens are more along its line. … Unionville has about nine months […]

From the hot corner, Milt Stock made vital contributions towards the Philadelphia Phillies’ first two pennants. As a second-year player in 1915, he took over third base responsibilities when Bobby Byrne suffered a serious injury during the home stretch, and helped the Phillies capture their first NL flag. For another decade, with several teams, he […]

Seventeen members and guests of the Bob Broeg St. Louis Chapter gathered at The Original Crusoe’s Restaurant in South St. Louis on Monday, June 22, 2015. Chapter president Brian Flaspohler called the meeting to order and reminded everyone of the upcoming Research Conference on Saturday, August 22, and hoped that anyone that would like to participate as presenters, […]

“People don’t know how good the Pacific Coast League is,” a onetime miner named H.V. “Hardrock Bill” Lane said in 1935. “There’s Oakland, or San Francisco.”1 A year later he moved the then-Double-A Hollywood Stars to San Diego, renamed them Padres for a nearby mission, opened single-tier 9,100-seat Lane Field, and began to fill a […]

The exterior of the Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana, is pictured in 2021. (Photo: Infrogmation of New Orleans, licensed under Creative Commons 4.0)   When most people think of the Louisiana Superdome,[1] they don’t associate it with baseball. More likely, they relate the domed stadium in downtown New Orleans with football: the New Orleans Saints […]