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The fifth All-Star Game is remembered chiefly for effectively ending Dizzy Dean’s career as a dominating pitcher, thanks to Earl Averill’s third inning line drive off ole Diz’s toe.  It was, however, also the first All-Star Game held in the US capital and the first attended by the sitting president, in this case Franklin Delano […]

On June 15, 2016, the Cleveland Indians were tied for first place in the American League’s Central Division with the Kansas City Royals. By July 2, Cleveland had a franchise-record 14-game winning streak and a seven-game lead over the Royals.1 The streak had begun at home, with sweeps of the Chicago White Sox and Tampa […]

As August 1933 began, the race for the American League pennant was down to two teams, the Washington Senators (61-35) and the New York Yankees (60-36). The Philadelphia Athletics (47-49) were holding down third place in the standings, but, as they were 14 games behind the top spot, the task of winning the title seemed […]

A major-league record eight batters hit for the cycle in 1933.1 Four of those occurred in the month of August, and every one of the August contests involved the Philadelphia Athletics. In the span of four games, Athletics teammates Mickey Cochrane (August 2 against the New York Yankees) and Pinky Higgins (August 6 against the […]

By September 30, the next-to-last day of the regular season in 1933, the teams playing in that season’s World Series, the Washington Senators and New York Giants, had already clinched their respective league pennants.1 However, there were still tight races for second and third places in the National League. The Pittsburgh Pirates held a one-game […]

A regular in the New York Giants outfield from 1910 to 1915, Fred Snodgrass was the “meteor” of the 1910 season, leading the National League in batting average for most of the year before tailing off to finish at .321. The next season Snodgrass batted third in the lineup and ranked second on the club […]

Hennery Peck, more popularly known as Peck’s Bad Boy, was a fictional character created by George W. Peck, a newspaperman, in the 19th century. Hennery was a mischievous child whose doings became a popular term for any incorrigible rule-breaker. Hennery had a real-life counterpart in Russ Meyer, a right-handed pitcher for six major-league teams from […]

A practicing dentist in the offseason, pitcher Ed Lafitte was a lanky, square-jawed journeyman in the American and Federal Leagues during the Deadball Era. No one knew just what to expect when righty Doc Lafitte took the mound. His hurling was often wild and occasionally brilliant, sometimes both in the same game. His historic contributions […]

“Timber Like Mapel What Browns Need” — The Sporting News, September 4, 1919 In his major league debut on August 31, 1919, St. Louis Browns left-hander Rolla Mapel held Ty Cobb hitless in five plate appearances. That turned out to be the highlight of his 12-day, four-game MLB career. But “Rollie” Mapel will forever be […]

Sherry Smith was a laconic Georgian who narrowly lost a World Series game to the young Bambino, fashioned a long mound career despite missing a season as a doughboy during World War I, and later nabbed small-town scofflaws as efficiently as he had baserunners who’d strayed too far off the first sack. Sherrod Malone Smith […]

In his first three professional seasons, James “Wickey” McAvoy played for a World Series champion, an American League champion, and a team that lost 109 games. This dramatic shift of fortune required no action on McAvoy’s part: The catcher joined Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics in 1913 and lingered there as Mack traded some of his […]

The fractured skull Philadelphia Athletics shortstop Skeeter Newsome suffered on April 9, 1938 left a gaping hole in the club’s defense. Ten players, including Newsome after he recovered, attempted to fill the void through the 1939 season. One was Al Brancato, a 20-year-old September call-up from Class-A ball who had never played shortstop professionally. Enticed […]

For more than 70 years, pitcher Joe Cleary was the last native of Ireland to play in the major leagues. Appearing in just one game in 1945, Cleary had the misfortune to post a lifetime 189.00 earned run average, the highest on record for pitchers who retired at least one batter, when he yielded seven […]

New York’s Penn Station was all hustle and bustle on the sunny afternoon of June 12, 1941. The Brooklyn Dodgers were gathering to board a train bound for Pittsburgh. The trip would then continue west to St. Louis, where a crucial series with the Cardinals awaited the two early rivals in the National League pennant […]

Right-handed pitcher Bill Evans had a very brief major-league career, with a total of one decision (sadly, for him, a loss) in the 13 games he pitched over two seasons of big-league baseball. He worked in four games in 1949 for the White Sox, and in nine games in 1951 for the Red Sox. He […]

Eduardo Green (1920-1980) never played in the majors. In fact, he played only 11 games in Organized Baseball at the Class B level. Yet under different circumstances, he almost certainly could have been a big-leaguer. La Gacela Negra — The Black Gazelle — still stands as one of the greatest players in the history of […]

A star athlete in high school and at the University of Michigan, Elmer Gedeon played a handful of games for the Washington Senators in 1939. He died while flying a bombing mission over France in 1944, less than a week after his 27th birthday. James T. Taaffe, a fellow officer in the U.S. Army Air […]

Ten years a backup catcher for five major league teams, Matt Batts was born and raised in San Antonio, Texas. He lived in the north part of the city at the time, but San Antonio has grown so much since he was born on October 16, 1921, that where he lived would be nearer the […]

Lefty Sullivan had everything a pitcher could want: a blazing fastball, a knee-buckling curve, a disappearing spitball, and pinpoint control. The one thing he couldn’t do was field. Because he felt dizzy every time he picked up a bunt – a lifelong heart condition cut off the flow of oxygen to his brain when he […]

“Me a pop-off? Aw, that’s bunk.” — Mickey Harris, Boston Post, May 20, 1941 Mickey Harris is well known for an impressive amount of self-confidence and for posting a 17-9 record as one of the key components of the starting staff that carried the 1946 Boston Red Sox to their World Series showdown with the […]

World War II ended when the Axis powers surrendered to the Allied powers in 1945. Men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces returned to an America deeply affected by years of war, and they sought to resume a simple, more pedestrian way of life. They looked to an America which embraced enterprise and entertainment, […]

Mike McNally emerged from the gritty Lackawanna Valley before World War I to fashion a half-century career in baseball. A deft, light-hitting utility infielder, he played 10 seasons in the big leagues, twice scored spectacularly in the World Series, and went on to become a popular manager, scout, and front-office executive. Along the way, irrepressible […]

John (Jack) Burwell Reed played the outfield in the regular and post-season for the fabled 1961 New York Yankees, and contributed to their pennant-winning efforts in 1962 and 1963. He was Mickey Mantle’s defensive replacement for most of these three seasons.  Jack was a terrific high school/college athlete in Mississippi, winning the state quarter-mile run […]

Joe Burt Scott’s professional baseball career intersected with the emerging opportunities in the sport following Jackie Robinson’s 1947 debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers and the waning years of the Negro Leagues. This left-handed first baseman and outfielder was 26 years old in 1947, when he hit .400 for the Memphis Red Sox of the Negro […]