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In the first minutes of Tuesday, July 13, 1976, police in the central New York State village of Newark responded to a report of a fight. They found the body of a teenage boy, shot dead, on the village’s Norton Street. The victim, 17-year-old1 Daniel Monzon,2 had come to the small town from Puerto Rico […]

Dick Allen joined the Chicago White Sox in a December 2, 1971, trade with the Los Angeles Dodgers.1 It was Allen’s third trade in three years.2 Despite telling the press that he was weary of moving to new teams, Allen joined the White Sox after encouragement from his mother, Era Allen. She knew Chicago manager […]

Fans at Ebbets Field cheered when Babe Ruth — decked out in Dodger blue — trotted to the third-base coach’s box on Sunday, June 19, 1938, in the first game of a doubleheader. Baseball’s home-run king had agreed the previous day to join the Brooklyn staff. Dodgers general manager Larry MacPhail signed him to a […]

Rick Reuschel had followed in his older brother Paul’s footsteps at every level of Organized Baseball until Rick reached the majors first with the Chicago Cubs in 1972. Ever since then, Rick had rooted for Paul, also in the Cubs system, to join him on the big-league club. Paul got the call from the Cubs […]

When first-place Chicago hosted second-place Boston on September 4, 1891, the Colts’ lead over the Beaneaters was six games. Colts manager Cap Anson was so confident of winning the pennant that he entertained the crowd by wearing a white flowing beard throughout the game. The Colts’ 5–3 victory increased the lead to seven games. Ten […]

The most coveted player in the September 1907 minor league player draft was 23-year-old Bill Lattimore. All 16 National and American League clubs placed the name of the Toledo Mud Hens lefthander on the player wish lists submitted to the National Commission. The winner of the Lattimore lottery was the AL Cleveland Naps, a stroke […]

More than a few contemporary baseball insiders viewed John Clarkson as the finest pitcher of the 19th century. He won 30 or more games in a season six times, including two of the top four all-time totals, 53 in 1885 and 49 in ’89. In the 10-year period between August 1884 and July 1894, he […]

Why didn’t Jeremy Giambi slide? Hindsight is always crystal clear, much to the chagrin of involved parties. The Yankees mystique built upon a century of dominance over major-league baseball. The ill-advised enthusiastic wave by third-base coach Ron Washington, perhaps blind to actions outside his tunnel of vision. The cruel spectacle of a slow runner attempting […]

Twenty-year-old Newton Halliday’s only major-league game came on August 19, 1916. He replaced injured star Honus Wagner and struck out in his only career at-bat for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Halliday, however, is better known for, less than two years later, being the first and youngest big-league baseball player to die while enlisted in military service […]

Infielder Albert Roberge played portions of three seasons with the Boston Braves during the 1940s. He appeared in 177 games and compiled a lifetime .220 batting average. Three years of military service during World War II interrupted his baseball career. After playing a brief period in the majors on his return from the war, Roberge […]

“Big Bill” Brennan was a large man, weighing 235 pounds and standing 6-foot-2½. He had a loud voice and could be heard all over the ball field. Brennan’s voice served him well not only as an umpire, but also as a football coach at the University of Tennessee Medical College. Brennan was born on October […]

George Woodrow Dockins was a soft-tossing, perpetually sore-armed left-handed pitcher. He was born in Clyde, Kansas, to Joseph and Ida Moffatt Dockins on May 5, 1917. One of four children, he attended Joines School, just north of Clyde, until the eighth grade. As a youth Dockins loved baseball and played in the Ban Johnson League […]

None other than noted baseball statistics guru Bill James observed and commented, “At the age of 21, Tuck Turner hit .416 and scored 91 runs in 80 games; he also drove in 82 runs.” His career degenerated quickly after that. “I can’t remember that I ever read anything about him, and I have no idea […]

Roy Cullenbine’s greatest skill was unappreciated in his time. Cullenbine walked in 17.8 percent of his plate appearances, the seventh-highest rate in history.1 He set a record by drawing walks in 22 consecutive games. But his extraordinary ability to get on base didn’t impress the people who signed his paychecks. One general manager said he […]

John Dopson pitched in 144 major-league games over eight seasons from 1985 to 1994. He had a career-high 12 wins with the 1989 Boston Red Sox (against eight losses) – but arguably his best year came with the Montreal Expos in 1988, when he was 3-11. He started 26 games and had a 3.04 earned […]

“Oh, Gertrude, when sorrows come they come not as single spies but in battalions.” – Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5, a favorite quote of Ned Martin when the Red Sox were having a particularly bad day   “With this back and these knees? Mercy,” Ned Martin asked rhetorically, using his trademark exclamation when asked if […]

Bob Will hit .333 during six minor-league seasons despite being advised in 1953 to stop playing sports because of “an irregular curvature of the spine.”1 However, the bespectacled outfielder never batted over .257 in three full seasons and parts of three others for the Chicago Cubs (1957-58; 1960-63). He was a regular in just one […]

Lázaro Salazar was a great two-way player and manager in Cuban professional baseball and the American Negro Leagues, as well as in Venezuela, the Dominican Republic, and Mexico, from 1930 until 1957. In addition to winning two MVP awards in the Cuban Winter League, he won four batting championships in three countries, won more than […]

Bob Smith was a shortstop with a strong arm and a weak bat who made himself into a pitcher when he was 30 years old and lasted 15 seasons in the majors. He was stuck on losing teams for most of his career, so naturally the highlight was a defeat. In 1927 Smith pitched and […]

Versatility can be both a blessing and a curse. Larry Kimbrough came to the Negro Leagues with the reputation of being both a switch-hitter and a switch-pitcher. Early in his career he faced the Harrisburg (Pennsylvania) Stars in an exhibition game and held them to two hits until the fourth inning, when they exploded for […]

Bill Killefer began his 48-year career in Organized Baseball in 1907 as an unlikely professional, weighing only 125 pounds when he played with Jackson of the Southern Michigan League. According to his brother Wade, “the bats he used were almost as big as he was.” It would be years before he grew to be 5’10 […]

In Jim Bouton’s revelatory 1970 book Ball Four, he describes a late September 1969 scene at San Francisco’s Candlestick Park. “A group of terrorized pitchers stood around the batting cage watching Willie McCovey belt some tremendous line drives over the right-field fence. Every time a ball bounced into the seats we’d make little whimpering animal […]

Coors Field opened for baseball on April 26, 1995. The Colorado Rockies had joined the National League two years earlier. They played their first two seasons in Mile High Stadium while Coors was being built. When the National League got the OK in 1985 to expand by two teams, several cities, including Buffalo, Denver, Miami, […]

The Washington Senators line up on the field for Opening Day festivities, April 5, 1971, at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington, D.C. (Library of Congress, U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection.)   Related link: Click here to read Part I of the Washington Senators team ownership history, on the original team from […]