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Johannes “Joe” Blyleven, the youngest of seven Blyleven siblings,1 admitted that he didn’t have his older brother Bert’s legendary curveball. Perhaps as a result, Joe didn’t have his brother’s Hall of Fame-level professional success, either. Pitching in the lowest reaches of the California Angels’ minor-league system in 1977 and 1978, he posted a 6-8 record […]
For a certain type of twenty-first-century baseball fan – one numbed by too many pitching changes, mascot races, launch angle analyses, and Internet hot takes – a kind of mental balm can be achieved by contemplating an afternoon pitchers’ duel on a cold, windy, overcast day in South Dakota a century of Septembers ago. The […]
William Edward White’s 1879 appearance for Providence made him the first Black player to play in a major league game. He played on Brown University’s 1879 championship baseball team. White is sitting directly behind the man in the suit holding the bat. An answer commonly given to the question of who was the first […]
Throughout human history, many cultures and religions have worshipped sun deities. The ancient Greeks had Apollo and Helios; the Aztecs had Tonatiuh. In Japan, Amaterasu is the Shintō sun goddess.1 Although it’s unlikely that Art Nehf did anything to anger any of these deities, the late-afternoon sun in Boston on September 4, 1915, still cost […]
The San Francisco Giants journeyed to Los Angeles for a late-season three-game series with the Dodgers beginning on September 21, 1970. As the series began, the Dodgers, were in second place in the National League West but 12 games behind the Cincinnati Reds. The Giants, in third place, were just one game behind Los Angeles. […]
Going into the August 7, 2010, game between the Greenville Drive and the Rome Braves, six teams were locked in a battle to claim the second-half crown in the Southern Division of the South Atlantic League and earn the rights to a postseason playoff spot. Greenville (an affiliate of the Boston Red Sox) was tied […]
The game appeared to be merely the first in a meaningless, end-of-the-season doubleheader between two teams that many weeks earlier had been eliminated from the 1954 pennant race. The sixth-place Washington Senators trailed the league-leading Cleveland Indians by 39 games and the Philadelphia Athletics were even further out of contention: 51½ games back. However, as […]
A crowd of 35,093 showed up at Citi Field on September 25, 2016, for the Mets’ final regular-season home game, against the Philadelphia Phillies. The crowd brought the Mets’ home attendance to 2,789,602, their second highest since their inaugural season at Citi Field in 2009.1 The Mets and the Phillies had scored 50 runs between […]
The 1920 best-of-nine World Series opened on October 5 at Ebbets Field, where temporary bleachers were erected on the outfield. In a tight pitching duel featuring just five hits by both teams, Cleveland’s Stan Coveleski emerged victorious, 3-1, over the Brooklyn Dodgers. (Photo: Library of Congress) The Cleveland Indians were making their initial appearance […]
To say neither the Dodgers nor the Phillies had much success in the years leading up to 1939 is to say the least. The Dodgers hadn’t won a pennant since 1920 and had finished sixth or worse 12 times in the 18 years since. They had become so comically inept that they were being called […]
In spite of the previous night’s 5-3 loss in 10 innings, the Houston Astros were confident of victory as they prepared to face the Philadelphia Phillies on October 12 in the “winner-take-all” Game Five of the 1980 NLCS. In addition to being a battle-tested team that had already survived a one-game playoff with the Los […]
Born as the Seattle Pilots in 1969, they moved to Milwaukee the following season and became the Brewers. In the first 12 years of their existence, the team never reached the postseason. That was about to change. The 1981 Brewers were a team that had been on the rise for the three prior seasons, but […]
Relocated, renamed, and piloted by two generations of Black baseball royalty, the Columbus Buckeyes opened the 1921 Negro National League season to fanfare, hosting the Chicago Giants on April 30. But Chicago’s John Taylor struck out 12 Buckeye batters and the Giants capitalized on shaky Columbus defense for a 5-3 win at Neil Park. The […]
Once again, a “7” figured in an American League Championship Series game in 2007. The Boston Red Sox had won Game One by a seven-run margin, 10-3. In Game Two, the Cleveland Indians won by seven, thanks to seven runs scored in the top of the 11th inning. In Game Four, the decisive inning was […]
With 2½ weeks left in the 1988 season, the Boston Red Sox were in a good position to capture their second American League East crown in three years. Surging out of fourth place by winning 12 in a row and 18 of 19 after Joe Morgan replaced John McNamara as manager at the All-Star break, […]
It was expected to be a glittering night of firsts. The 1968 All-Star Game was to be the first played on artificial turf, the first played indoors, and, if not the first played at night (the wartime games of 1943 and 1944 had been played under the lights), it was to be the first played […]
Between April 21 and June 19, 1951, the city of Detroit was mired in a transit strike. Downtown businesses suffered. The work stoppage may have been part of the reason only 2,723 fans showed up at Briggs Stadium for the Tigers’ game against the visiting Philadelphia Athletics.1 The A’s came into Detroit to begin a […]
Right-hander Joel Finch had an excellent minor-league career, building toward a major-league debut the year after the Red Sox were eliminated by the New York Yankees in the 1978 single-game playoff that closed Boston’s season that year. During the 15 games in which he worked in the majors — all for the Red Sox and […]
When young Jim Owens first came up with the Philadelphia Phillies in the mid-1950s, the predictions were that he would be Philadelphia’s “next Robin Roberts.”1 He had dominated hitters in the minor leagues, was voted the best pitcher in the International League for 1954, and possessed what Phillies general manager Roy Hamey called, “the best […]
In 1897 Mark Twain wrote a quick note to say, “The report of my death was an exaggeration.” Twenty years later pitcher Louis Schettler found out exactly how Twain felt. The August 24, 1917, Dayton Daily News declared that “Outfielder Spencer and Pitcher Schettler were fatally injured” in a train wreck.1The article went on to […]
It was as much a psychological move as a baseball one. Game Five of the 2004 American League Championship Series at Fenway Park was tied, 4-4, heading into the bottom of the ninth. Red Sox pitchers Curt Schilling, Derek Lowe, and Tim Wakefield, gloves in hand, began walking from the team’s first-base dugout out to […]
If You Are There had done an episode on nineteenth century baseball, Edward “Eddie” Kennedy could have been the lead character. He would play in the first World’s Series, and both the first professional game and the first American Association game in New York City. His career would also mirror the experience of many of […]
The 1901 Cleveland Blues were mired in seventh place as July came to a close. Dissatisfied with their pitching staff, club management replaced the older arms – Bill Hart (35), Bill Hoffer (30), and Ed Scott (30) – with Harley McNeal (23), Jack Bracken (20), and Bill Cristall (25). McNeal debuted on August 5 with […]
The name John Lickert flickered momentarily at baseball’s top level. On September 19, 1981, the catcher appeared in half an inning for the Boston Red Sox. The game ended before he stepped into the batter’s box, and though he played on in the minors through 1985, he was never seen again in a big-league box […]