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“The Boston nine are just scooping things their own way, and as a consequence are tiptilting their athletic nasals to the surrounding ether.” — Daily Inter Ocean (Chicago), June 7, 1874   In addition to regular-season games (called “championship” games at the time), the Boston Red Stockings played well over 100 exhibition games between 1871 […]

Stan the Man remains a legend in St. Louis and throughout Cardinal nation. (Photograph by Glen Sparks.)   Almost exactly five years after Stan Musial made his major-league debut, St. Louis Post-Dispatch sportswriter Bob Broeg wrote an article that forever transformed Musial into Stan the Man. Published on September 20, 1946, the article referred to […]

1930 University of Chicago team in Japan. (Rob Fitts Collection)   On the fourth day of spring in the 20th year of the Imperial Heisei era, just as the cherry blossoms were starting to bloom, another chapter in one of the most significant stories in US-Japan sports history was about to be written. It was […]

In the heart of Venezuela, where passion runs as deep as the Orinoco River, baseball is more than just a sport; it’s a cultural phenomenon that unites a diverse nation. With a history dating back over a century, baseball has transcended its status as a game, becoming a powerful force that bridges divides and reinforces […]

Back in the mid-1990s, I published Great Baseball Films (Citadel Press), which charts the manner in which the sport has been depicted onscreen from the late 1890s to early 1990s. Twenty years ago as today, even the most obscure films with obvious baseball themes were readily accessible to researchers. However, seeking out films in which […]

Havana served for many years as something of a playground for the idle wealthy of the United States, as often as not those of New York, particularly during the Prohibition years (1920-1933), when alcohol was banned in by an amendment to the US Constitution. It was a major tourist mecca and attracted a large number […]

Introduction In September 2005 the confirmation hearings of John Roberts as the nominee for chief justice of the United States included an unexpected but telling nod to the national pastime when Roberts observed, “Judges and justices are servants of the law, not the other way around. Judges are like umpires. Umpires don’t make the rules; […]

“If there’s a greater day in the history of Tampa Bay, I don’t know what it is,” proclaimed Tampa Bay Devil Rays principal owner Vince Naimoli on March 20, 1995, the day the American League awarded a franchise to the group he headed.1 After many years of city leaders striving to bring a team to […]

Very little has been written about Deadball Era umpires who established the foundations of the modern umpiring profession — the implementation of umpire signals, the two-umpire system, and more support from league authorities for umpires. And yet this group of men who umpired during the Deadball Era established the traditions, rules, and procedures by which […]

Editor’s note: This article was selected as a recipient of the 2025 McFarland-SABR Baseball Research Award.   On July 25, 1966, Casey Stengel and Ted Williams were inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. Although most observers likely assumed that Casey would steal the show, as he usually did, it was Williams […]

Mickey Mantle is carried off on a stretcher after injuring his knee during the 1951 World Series at Yankee Stadium. (NATIONAL BASEBALL HALL OF FAME LIBRARY)   A batter takes a fastball to the ribs. An outfielder crashes into the wall trying to make a circus catch. A baserunner steps on the side of first […]

This article was selected as a winner of the 2016 McFarland-SABR Baseball Research Award.   This well-known Chicago Tribune photo of Black Sox defendants, attorneys, jurors, and supporters shows them celebrating the not guilty verdicts on the steps of the Cook County Courthouse on August 2, 1921. A number of the celebrants have numbers inscribed […]

Jim Bouton (right) and John Thorn, Major League Baseball’s Official Historian, sharing the stage at SABR’s 47th annual convention in New York City in 2017. (Photo: Jacob Pomrenke)   In the fall of 1976, CBS Television premiered the television series Ball Four, based upon the 1970 book by former major-league pitcher Jim Bouton, a best-seller […]

On the afternoon of Sunday, June 20, 1965, New York Mets announcer Ralph Kiner described for listeners on WHN Radio in New York one of the more awesome sights in major-league baseball in the mid-1960s: “Sandy Koufax, one of the top left-handers in the history of baseball …”1 Baseball Hall of Fame writer Roger Angell […]

Nelson Rockefeller stands with Jackie Robinson, who served as a special assistant on community affairs for the New York Governor in the 1960s.   Between 1960 and 1968, Jackie Robinson was widely regarded as the most famous Black Republican in the country. Following his announced retirement from baseball in January 1957, and in remarkably short […]

Once a very sparsely settled farming community, Holyoke, Massachusetts’s geographic location on the banks of the Connecticut River was ideal for development, utilizing its ample source of hydroelectric power.1 A group of four wealthy executives from Boston, about 90 miles to the east, believed the South Hadley Falls of the river was large and powerful […]

Ticket purchase receipt to Game Five of the 2004 World Series — had it been played at Yankee Stadium. (Photo by Jeb Stewart)   Even for a confident Yankees fan (are there any other kind?), the 2003 offseason began with troubling signs. True, Brian Cashman found a way to obtain Alex Rodriguez, who had seemed […]

Tecumseh Park hosts an International Association match between Guelph and London, 1877. (C.J. Dryer, Canadian Illustrated News. Photo courtesy of Library and Archives Canada)   There resides in London, Ontario, across Queen’s Avenue from the old early nineteenth century courthouse located above the confluence of the north and south branches of the Thames River (locally […]

“Has anybody else told you about Dobie Moore? Well, I’ll tell you something about him. That Moore was one of the best shortstops that will ever live! That fella could stand up to the plate and hit right-handed, he could hit line drives out there just as far as you want to see.” — Casey […]

Forbes Field was one of the very first classic era ballparks (only Philadelphia’s Shibe Park preced­ed it) to be built in America. It was the home of the Pittsburgh Pirates for 62 seasons after it opened June 30, 1909. Forbes Field has been regarded as a spacious park and a poor park for hitters. Only […]

This is the appendix for “Quasi-Cycles — Better Than Cycles?” by Herm Krabbenhoft.Editor’s note: This is the appendix for “Quasi-Cycles — Better Than Cycles?” by Herm Krabbenhoft.   DISCREPANCIES Comparison of Joseph Donner’s “Full List of Players with Five and Four Long Hits in a Game” [The Baseball Research Journal (1993)] with Joseph L. Reichler’s […]

On Larry Tye’s 2009 biography of Paige and Timothy M. Gay’s 2010 book on the barnstorming tours of Paige, Dizzy Dean and Bob Feller.

When Negro National League officials agreed to close operations for 1932 due to the hard realities of the Great Depression, the usually minor Negro Southern League and the newly created East-West Colored League became black baseball’s “major leagues.” Low attendance figures, disillusionment with the National League collapse, doubts about the ability of the leagues to […]