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The Chicago Cubs swept all seven games against the New York Mets during the 2015 season but were swept by the Mets, four wins to none, in the National League Championship series. A season later, on June 30, 2016, the Cubs and Mets began their first series of the season, a four-game set at Citi […]

The social calendars for many a Louisvillian in the mid-1880s were anchored by two annual marquee events: the Kentucky Derby and the Southern Exposition. The Derby, which grew to become the signature event in American horse racing, was held on the first Friday in May at Churchill Downs.1 The Southern Exposition was a regional fair […]

As Dodgers fans streamed through Ebbets Field’s turnstiles on October 9, 1949, their mood matched the day’s weather: warm and sunny. “You could not have a finer day for a baseball game,” broadcaster Red Barber said as World Series Game Five began.1 Brooklynites were optimistic that their team of young sluggers, led by Jackie Robinson, […]

More than nine years before Pumpsie Green first played for the Boston Red Sox – the last team in baseball to desegregate – Sam Jethroe played for Boston’s first major-league team, the Boston Braves. Jethroe’s first two games were on the road, against the Giants at the Polo Grounds, on April 18 and 19, 1950. […]

In an outstanding final season at Auburn University,1 which resulted in a 50-17 record and a trip to the 1997 College World Series, Tim Hudson compiled a record of 15-2 with a 2.97 ERA and 165 strikeouts in 118⅓ innings2 and batted .396 with 18 homers, 21 doubles, and 95 RBIs3 – breaking the school […]

On June 17, 1952, in front of 6,914 fans,1 the University of Missouri, coached by John “Hi” Simmons,2 and the College of the Holy Cross, coached by Jack Barry, a five-time World Series champion as a player with the Philadelphia Athletics and Boston Red Sox,3 faced off in the winner-take-all game of the College World […]

“As I grew up, I knew that as a building (Fenway Park) was on the level of Mount Olympus, the Pyramid at Giza, the nation’s capitol, the czar’s Winter Palace, and the Louvre — except, of course, that is better than all those inconsequential places” — Bart Giamatti1   Saturday afternoon at Fenway Park with […]

  Baseball only decrees 90 feet between bases and 60 feet 6 inches from home plate to the mound. Elsewhere, look backward, angel.“Thanks to Alexander Cartwright,” said former Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, “the outfield distance, fence height, and space between the seats and lines vary. Parks could do as they liked.”1 Some have been liked better. […]

Left-hander Kevin Morton’s time in the big leagues was brief but showed considerable promise. A first-round pick of the Boston Red Sox in June 1989, he debuted in the majors just over two years later with a complete-game 10-1 five-hitter at Fenway Park against the Detroit Tigers. He won six games in the four months […]

Myles Thomas was the winning pitcher in seven of the New York Yankees’ 110 victories in 1927. He also has the distinction of owning the fifth-highest batting average (.333) on a team known as Murderers’ Row. But there’s more. In real life, Myles Thomas was a Pennsylvania farmer’s son, a baseball star for Penn State, […]

During the 1920s and 1930s the New York Giants captured seven National League championships. While they had great outfielders like Mel Ott and Ross Youngs as well as solid pitching, most prominently Carl Hubbell, it was their infield that anchored the team in its success. George Kelly, Fred Lindstrom, and Bill Terry each had a […]

“If somebody came up and hit .450, stole 100 bases, and performed a miracle in the field every day, I’d still look you right in the eye and tell you that Willie was better. He could do the five things you have to do to be a superstar: hit, hit with power, run, throw and […]

In September 1976 Hall of Fame inductees Yogi Berra and Warren Spahn were only the two most prominent names among a large field of managerial candidates available to the expansion Toronto Blue Jays. But the Jays startled the baseball world by selecting the hardly-household-name Roy Hartsfield as the franchise’s first skipper. But the surprise may […]

The first of three Grillis to play major-league baseball, Guido John Grilli had the briefest career of the three. In 1966 he was 0-1 for the Boston Red Sox and 0-1 for the Kansas City Athletics.    Grilli put in his time in the minor leagues. He was first signed by Red Sox scout George […]

Brian Barkley’s career path has taken him from pitching major-league baseball to becoming a practicing pediatrician. When he began in pro ball, there had been the possibility of confusion with another pitcher of a nearly identical name. In the summer of 1995, the Boston Red Sox gave brief duty (2 1/3 innings over three games) […]

As of 2021, lefty pitcher John Cerutti is the last man from Amherst College to have played in the majors. Over seven major league seasons from 1985 to 1991, Cerutti posted a winning record in nearly an equal number of starts and relief appearances. Other than his final season with the Detroit Tigers, he spent […]

Shortstop Lewis Everett “Deacon” Scott was the steady infield leader of championship Red Sox and Yankee teams of the 1910s and 1920s. Beginning June 20, 1916, and ending May 6, 1925, he played in 1,307 consecutive games, which was the major league record until Lou Gehrig and then Cal Ripken broke it. Not only was Scott an […]

Hank Behrman was a minor contributor to the golden age of baseball in Brooklyn. His career was all promise and little delivery. Yet the five-feet-eleven, 174-pound right-hander did have one sterling season for the Dodgers. In 1946, his rookie campaign, he appeared in forty-seven games and posted an 11-5 record with a sparkling 2.93 ERA. […]

Craig Lefferts battled all his life to make it to the major leagues. Once he did, he stayed there for a decade, and became famous for running from the bullpen to the mound, showing his lifelong enthusiasm for the game. Craig Lindsay Lefferts was born on September 29, 1957, in Munich, West Germany.1 His father, […]

A prominent third baseman of the 1890s, Bill Joyce hit for average and power, and drew a lot of walks; his .435 career on-base percentage ranks seventh all-time.1 He was a smart and magnetic leader who inspired his teams with his aggressive style of play, though his disputes with umpires were excessive. The oft-quoted Joyce […]

Pitcher Chet Kehn (pronounced keen) appeared in just three games for the Brooklyn Dodgers in April and May 1942. He got no decisions and posted a 7.04 ERA. Yet he holds a distinctive position in baseball annals, being one of just 10 big leaguers to hit 1.000 in a career of more than one at-bat.1 […]

“He’s worth a bonus,” Cleveland Indians scout Jimmy Gruzdis told farm director Walter Arthur “Hoot” Evers.1 “He” was Tyrone Alexander Cline, a 1960 first-team All-American outfielder for the Clemson University Tigers who batted .335 in two varsity seasons, including a career-best .348 for the 1959 Atlantic Coast Conference champions. He also won five of six […]

Born on October 17, 1859, in Hoagland, Ohio, a small town about 53 miles east of Cincinnati, William Ewing was the uncle of twentieth-century major league pitcher Bob Ewing and the older brother of major league pitcher John Ewing, with whom he formed a formidable battery for two years (1890-91) before John left the game […]

Although he helped the Cincinnati Reds win a National League pennant, Lee Grissom is remembered (if at all) for things unrelated to his exploits on the mound. Baseball fans remember him vaguely as the brother of Marv Grissom. Newspaper readers of a certain age may remember a photograph of two ballplayers in a rowboat. Comic […]