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Like Babe Ruth, he was a savior for the major leagues when the game was at risk of losing fans. Like Jackie Robinson, he was a courageous pioneer who blazed a trail and opened new doors of opportunity for others to follow. Like Fernando Valenzuela, he was the pride of a specific ethnic community, yet […]
Just five short years after the Pittsburgh Pirates won the 1979 World Series championship, the team had fallen to last in the National League East. They were on their way there again in 1985 – but a rebuild was under way, as the trade for Bob Kipper that August showed. The deal in which the […]
Almost every scout considered him too short (5-feet-6½) to be a major-league pitching prospect. One scout was not deterred, however, and dared to sign the left-hander, setting off Bobby Shantz on a 16-year odyssey in the major leagues. Shantz reached the heights of success early in his career by winning the American League’s Most Valuable […]
“I’m nobody’s caddy. I should be playing somewhere,” Larry Biittner insisted. “I don’t want to be stereotyped. … Once you get the label you can’t play every day, it sticks. I’ve seen too many careers ruined that way, and I don’t want it to happen to mine.”1 These frustrations were expressed in 1979 as the […]
Inspired in part by his older cousin José Uribe, who returned every winter to the Dominican Republic with tales of his life in major-league baseball, Juan Uribe from an early age aspired to play in the big leagues. That dream ultimately became a reality as Uribe crafted a 16-season major-league career that saw him playing […]
A competent but colorless right-hander, Joe Lake had the misfortune of pitching for some of the Deadball Era’s worst American League teams. In six big-league seasons, he was never once a member of a winning team, and three of Lake’s clubs finished more than 50 games behind the pennant winner. Through it all, Joe labored […]
Perhaps Joe Simpson was destined to play and describe a game of pitch and catch and hit. For one thing, the holiday baby was born December 31, 1951, at a time when baseball was the only game in town. Imagining the pastime, hearing it on radio, or watching on television, no one needed slow motion, […]
[With research assistance from John Leidy] Ray Fisher has been justly honored for his 38 seasons as head baseball coach at the University of Michigan. He was elected to Michigan’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1959, the American Association of College Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame in 1966, and the University of Michigan Hall of […]
A steady, left-handed pitcher can always find employment in baseball. Bob McClure was armed with a tremendous competitive spirit and a deceptive curveball. He turned his talent into 19 major-league seasons. “Bob Uecker told me that if I were right-handed I would have been digging ditches 10 years ago,” McClure said.1 After his playing days, […]
Prior to Edgardo Alfonzo and José Altuve, three Venezuelan second basemen stood out for their skills: Manny Trillo, Remy Hermoso, and Gustavo “Gus” Gil. Trillo was the most complete player of the trio and Hermoso was likely blessed with the most speed – but Gil was peerless with the glove. He executed split-second double plays […]
“There is no baseball off-season in Cuba,” declares Sigfredo Barros Segrera, long-time sports journalist for the Cuban Communist Party news service Granma, available in print, in Cuba, and online versions for the rest of the world. Barros was born on November 14, 1945 in the provincial capital city of Santiago de Cuba, the second largest […]
Most great players have something similar during their careers: a dominant year, a key series in which they made their name — or a signature play. Hall of Famer Enos Slaughter’s even had a nickname. His “Mad Dash” in Game Seven of the 1946 World Series took place on the brightest of stages. It’s certainly […]
The manager of the Hotel del Comercio in Caracas, Venezuela, summoned George Genovese for a phone call from the San Francisco Giants in November 1963. It sent Genovese’s hopes soaring. “Maybe I’m their new manager,” he said to his wife, June. When the call was completed, Genovese was crestfallen. His career as a manager was […]
The year 2008 was supposed to be the coming-out party for Nate McLouth, then an outfielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He made his first All-Star team, captured his first Gold Glove, and tied for the NL lead with 46 doubles. But the party was short-lived. Due to injuries, McLouth never achieved that level of success […]
In announcing the March 1921 indictments of the players and gamblers involved in the Black Sox Scandal, Cook County (Illinois) State’s Attorney Robert Crowe announced that the World Series fix originated in St. Louis, specifically with Carl Zork and Benjamin Franklin, rather than in Boston and New York by the Eastern clique of Arnold Rothstein, […]
The stage was the fifth game of the World Series, on October 15, 1970. The Baltimore Orioles had taken a three games to one Series lead over the Cincinnati Reds. Brooks Robinson had already delivered a game-winning home run in the opener, robbed Tony Perez and Johnny Bench of base hits with a pair of […]
Chicago White Sox owner Bill Veeck faced a dilemma after the 1976 season. The White Sox had finished that campaign, their fourth consecutive losing season, with a 64-97 record. Only 914,945 fans attended games at Comiskey Park. The team needed stars to improve the record and increase attendance. The start of free agency, however, boosted […]
Not even the all-powerful Kenesaw Mountain Landis could predict the future. At 11:00 A.M. on October 8, with a steady rain falling, the commissioner decided to postpone Game Four of the 1928 World Series. When the skies had cleared by 1:00 P.M., Landis looked a bit foolish and many fans were understandably upset.1 In reality, […]
When Game Seven of the American League Championship Series began, the temperature at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto was 44 degrees and rapidly dropping as a brisk wind blew across the outfield from left to right. The fading Blue Jays, in the postseason for the first time ever, handed the ball to ace Dave Stieb, the […]
The first week of a new season is supposed to be a time for optimism. But even the most diehard fans of the 1994 Florida Marlins and San Diego Padres knew to temper their expectations. The Marlins were in their second year of existence and were not expected to seriously compete in any race except […]
Thursday, September 25, 2014, was a rare day in New York. It was a day fans, players, and management of the Yankees had not felt in a long time, actually in over a decade. The previous night the Yanks had been eliminated from the playoffs for the second consecutive season. The Yankees had not missed […]
The New York Mets took a road trip to play two interleague series in June 2003.1 They won two of three games against the Texas Rangers before heading to Anaheim for a series against the reigning World Series champion Anaheim Angels. The Mets were mired in fifth place in the National League East Division with […]
The Detroit Tigers were one win from their first World Series appearance in over 20 years. After 12 straight losing seasons from 1994 through 2005, the Tigers carried a commanding three-games-to-none lead over the Oakland Athletics in the 2006 American League Championship Series into a cool Saturday evening in the Motor City. They appeared unstoppable, […]
“The pitcher has to throw a strike sooner or later, so why not hit the pitch you want to hit and not the one he wants you to hit?” — Johnny Mize1 Great baseball players often write about their craft. Tony Gwynn called hitting a baseball an art in The Art of Hitting.2 Ted Williams […]