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Few post-1960 sportscasters have enjoyed a broader national impact in the United States than Dick Enberg. During his 60-year career, Enberg was a fixture for NBC and CBS television networks, delivering his signature exclamation “Oh My!” while announcing NFL football (including eight Super Bowls), college basketball (including four Final Fours), Wimbledon tennis, and events in […]

Chief Johnson was a strong-armed pitcher who had great beginnings to his professional baseball career but met a tragic, untimely end. Johnson was known for hurricane speed and a slippery-elm-laced spitball that baffled batters at all levels of competition. He pitched a shutout in his first major-league start and became a controversial figure when he […]

The Black Sox Scandal shocked the sporting public and led to fundamental changes in the governance of professional baseball. Central to this astonishing fix were eight Chicago White Sox ballplayers, including star center-fielder Oscar “Happy” Felsch. An unpretentious Milwaukee native, the “Pride of Teutonia Avenue” only left his hometown to play ball. Felsch, one of […]

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 […]

“I never wanted to be a superstar, or the highest paid player,” Don Sutton said. “[A]ll I wanted was to be appreciated for the fact that I was consistent, dependable, and you could count on me.”1 By that measure, Sutton achieved his goal and more, as few pitchers in baseball history were as reliable, and […]

Although he answered to a variety of nicknames – Rub-Dub-Hub, Hurling Hub, the Tennessee Cyclone, the Untamed Son of Sumner County, the Gallatin Squash – his family, friends, and baseball fans simply called him Hub. Herbert Rodney Perdue was one of the most personable and exciting pitching prospects to emerge from the hills of Middle […]

Possessing Hollywood-good looks and a keen sense of humor, Jim Pagliaroni was a beloved teammate and fan favorite who knew how to work a room. “Pag is a 6-4 stack of happiness … [who] seems to have been born with a gift of laughter. He refuses to take either himself or baseball seriously … [and […]

The etymology of the term “ace” meaning the best pitcher on a team derives from the nickname of Asa Brainard, one of the top pitchers of baseball’s early years. Upon settling with the Excelsiors of Brooklyn in 1860, he was initially a second baseman and outfielder because the great James Creighton was positioned in the […]

Early Deadball Era outfielder George Barclay crammed significant achievement into a sadly abbreviated life. He first gained prominence as captain and star halfback for an 1896 national champion football team at Lafayette College. He later found success coaching college and pre-NFL professional elevens. Barclay is also generally recognized as the inventor of the football helmet. […]

In January 1983, NBC television debuted a new action series titled The A-Team. The show followed the exploits of a fictional group of former U.S. Army members with such colorful names as Face, Hannibal, and the brawling, straight-talking, ludicrously bejeweled B.A. Baracus, the fictional embodiment of the character’s actor, Mr. T. Within months of the […]

By the time he retired from the National League’s New York Mets after the 1962 season, Eugene Richard “Gene” Woodling had accumulated a number of honors, including batting over .300 five times in his seventeen seasons. Although averaging .284 lifetime, he was best known as a dangerous hitter with runners in scoring position during the […]

“There was no better teammate. … He’ll do anything to win.” – James “Cool Papa” Bell1   When legendary pitcher Satchel Paige became the first to be inducted in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1971 based on his Negro League accomplishments, he told Afro-American reporter Sam Lacy that he thought there were others […]

Pitcher Jim Hannan appeared in 276 major-league games as a starter and reliever from 1962 through 1971, winning 41 of his 89 decisions. During both his playing days and post-playing days, he participated in and had an impact on several historic baseball moments. On the field, he was a senior member of the Washington Senators […]

Shoeless Joe Jackson was a country boy from South Carolina who never learned to read or write much (“It don’t take school stuff to help a fella play ball,” he once said1) but is widely hailed as the greatest natural hitter in the history of the game. A left-handed batter and right-handed thrower, Jackson stood […]

Catcher “Oil” Smith, a bench-jockey and brawler extraordinaire, played on five World Series teams in the 1920s. Behind the plate, he perfected tactics that distracted and intimidated hitters. A potent left-hand batter himself, he finished his 12 seasons in the majors with a .303 lifetime average. “He probably was involved in as many fights as […]

Baseball history was made at Boston’s Fenway Park on Friday afternoon, September 14, 1951. In the top of the second inning, in his first major-league at-bat, Bob Nieman of the visiting St. Louis Browns hit Mickey McDermott’s low-and-away 1-2 pitch into the screen above Fenway’s Green Monster. An inning later, in his next trip to […]

Johnny Morrison had one of the deadliest, most knee-locking curveballs baseball had ever experienced. “You simply couldn’t see it,” raved contemporary Pat Duncan. “The ball came in like a fast ball and it dropped so fast that it fell completely out of your vision unless you were looking for such a hook.”1 That pitch became […]

If it were not for the San Diego Padres, this biography on the lives of Ray and Joan Kroc would never have to be written. Not that the reader would be bereft of materials on this celebrated billionaire couple. Ray and Joan Kroc were both American celebrities long before they ever became associated with baseball. […]

From 1950 to 1955, Robin Roberts was the top right-hander in the National League while pitching for the Philadelphia Phillies. For most of the remainder of his 18-year career, he was a crafty veteran who had a remarkable resurgence with the Baltimore Orioles. Either way, he would go out, take his turn on the mound […]

  “Braves Win! Braves Win! Braves Win! Braves Win! … Braves Win!!” That call still gives fans of the Atlanta Braves goosebumps.1 That’s how Skip Caray ended his description of the play that sent the 1992 Braves to their second consecutive World Series. He repeated his signature “Braves Win!” line a few times more than […]

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 […]

Dick Williams was regarded as one of baseball’s premier managers and turnaround artists. He was only the second skipper to win pennants for three different teams — Boston, Oakland, and San Diego.1 As a rookie manager in 1967, Williams led the Red Sox from ninth place the year before to the World Series. Both personally […]

As a kid growing up in Pasco across the river, being able to stand on the mound at Sanders Field was as big for me as going to Yankee Stadium. — Bruce Kison1 Sanders Field, circa 1953 (Photos courtesy of the Eastern Benton County Historical Society)   Sanders-Jacobs Memorial Field, originally known as Sanders Field, […]