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Philadelphia resident George McFadden was there bright and early. There would be 6,055 games played in the history of Shibe Park (renamed Connie Mack Stadium decades later), and no one knows how many games Mr. McFadden attended. His claim to fame is that he was the first fan to enter the sparkling new and innovative […]

Thirteen teams played in the Middle States League, an integrated minor league, in 1889. The season opened with one Negro team, the Cuban Giants, representing Trenton, New Jersey, and five white teams in Pennsylvania.1 Six more white teams and a Negro team known as the New York Gorhams joined the league in midseason, but nine […]

The 33,704 fans who packed Forbes Field for the woebegone Pittsburgh Pirates’ final game of 1947 were there, in part, to see whether slugging outfielder Ralph Kiner could hit his 52nd home run and claim the National League homer crown. They didn’t get to see that. Kiner and the Giants’ Johnny Mize were each blanked […]

12, 15, 25, 33, 37. Don’t worry. This isn’t a brainteaser where you have to guess the next number in the sequence. These figures are statistics from a wild and wacky major-league game played on August 9, 1923, between the reigning world champion New York Giants and the hometown St. Louis Cardinals. It included 12 […]

Roger Craig was settling into retirement when he agreed to become manager of the San Francisco Giants on September 18, 1985. Owner Bob Lurie and new President/General Manager Al Rosen persuaded Craig to return to baseball and help restore a winning culture in the wallowing franchise. The Giants were well on the way to the […]

Hank Sauer’s major-league career didn’t flourish until he was 31 years old in 1948, but then he proceeded to become one of the most prodigious home-run hitters (225) in the National League through 1954, second only to Hall of Famer Ralph Kiner (277). On August 28, 1950, the Chicago Cubs outfielder highlighted his propensity as […]

“There is no smarter man in baseball today than Miller Huggins.” — John McGraw1 New York Yankees co-owner Jacob Ruppert realized by mid-August 1917 that the Yankees, mired in a seven-game losing streak, were not going to contend for a championship anytime soon with easygoing manager Bill Donovan leading the team. The Yankees were not […]

Almost midway through their season, the 2005 Chicago White Sox promoted “Turn Back the Clock Night” to honor the 1959 Go-Go White Sox. That team had won the American League pennant but had then lost the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers in six games. The Go-Go Sox roster had included six future Hall […]

If it were not for bad luck, Creepy Crespi may not have had any luck at all. The infielder with one of baseball’s great alliterative nicknames played parts of five seasons in the big leagues, all with his hometown Cardinals, including the World Series title club of 1942. An ankle fracture sustained while playing baseball […]

The Philadelphia Phillies have a long history of trading away future Hall of Famers for lesser players. In 1982 they swapped a young Ryne Sandberg and veteran Larry Bowa for Ivan DeJesus. In the 1960s they sent 23-year-old Fergie Jenkins to the Chicago Cubs for two pitchers with a combined age of 72. The very […]

Like Gummo Marx, Willie Delahanty is the forgotten member of a famous brothers act. A decidedly lesser talent, the youngest Delahanty never scaled the professional heights attained by his five ball playing siblings or garnered the public attention accorded them. About the only distinction that can be claimed by Willie is the fact that he […]

On his third tryout in the spring of 1910, right-handed pitcher Frank Lange finally made the roster of the Chicago White Sox. With Lange just coming off a 29-win season for the Des Moines Boosters of the Class A Western League, White Sox management held high hopes for him. And on occasion Lange would validate […]

Controversy and contrast defined Scott Perry’s brief major-league career. In 1918, his first full season, the Boston Braves and Philadelphia Athletics battled for his services, exposing the increasing inability of Organized Baseball to govern itself in the pre-commissioner era. Philadelphia retained Perry, and he produced a memorable rookie effort, becoming one of only seven pitchers […]

How about batting third in the lineup, between eventual Hall of Famers Max Carey and Honus Wagner, in your first major-league start? Frank Edington could rake, and he gave the second-place Pittsburgh Pirates an offensive shot in the arm for three weeks during the summer of 1912. Yet as it turned out, the 20-year-old never […]

Cotton Knaupp played 1,555 games in the Southern Association, more than any other player.1 The most memorable of those games came on August 8, 1916. On that afternoon he was at second base for New Orleans as the Pelicans hosted the Chattanooga Lookouts. With the bases loaded in the sixth inning, Knaupp snagged a line […]

“I realized that this was a short-lived career, and I did something to prepare myself for what was to come later. I never spent a winter without doing something constructive.  I never played winter ball. I went to school or I took courses in advertising, radio and TV production.  I even took books on the […]

After World War II, Frank Jobe followed the proverbial American dream: college, medical school, marriage, and a family. Even though he said he never planned it that way, he pursued a career that helped make the world a better place — particularly the world of baseball, as the developer of the procedure known as Tommy […]

In 1951 The Sporting News encapsulated the career of Frank Hiller stating, “This is the human story of the man who stands outside looking in … with desperation, pathos, perseverance as its theme … [Once] one of the ‘anointed,’ a hand-picked [New York] Yankee prospect from the start … And then, as the Fates snipped […]

Francis Isaiah “Monkey” Foreman’s life began and ended in Baltimore, Maryland. In between he played virtually everywhere in the Northeast and Midwest and seemingly forever. He was one of 19 men who played in four major leagues: the Union Association, the American Association, the National League, and the inaugural seasons of the American League. His […]

“Atta-boy, Frank”1, the slick-fielding Fordham University shortstop shouted to the diminutive second baseman with every successful double play turned on the practice field at Rose Hill. The oft-repeated ritual helped propel the shortstop to a major league contract before college graduation. More than 50 years later, when the shortstop-turned-baseball-coach-turned-Fordham institution had to retire, the keystone […]

The Brattleboro, Vermont, newspaper read, “The death of Dr. O’Connor removes a capable physician…a man whose warm personality made friends of all his acquaintances, a husband who manifested a strong affection for his wife.”1 Dr. F. H. O’Connor had played briefly in the major leagues, making the comments reminiscent of Minnesota doctor Archibald “Moonlight” Graham, […]

Flamboyant, visionary, ego — or monomaniacal, tempestuous, alcoholic, and self-destructive — the words approach but do not satisfactorily explain Larry MacPhail. His innovative approach to the game brought about night baseball and baseball on the radio. He was a mover and shaker in the world of Major League baseball until in a fury he catapulted […]

Charles C. Crabtree was born on January 31, 1888, in Farmersville, Texas. His father, Jim, was a carpenter, and his mother, Susie (Burns) Crabtree, was a housewife and helped with chores on their farm.1 When Charles died on March 30, 1943, at the age of 52 in Houston, his death certificate gave his name as […]

Today we would call Sherry Magee a five-tool player: he could hit, run, field, throw, and hit with power. For more than a decade he was the Philadelphia Phillies’ clean-up hitter and greatest offensive star, setting the all-time team record in stolen bases (387) and ranking among the top ten in almost every other category. […]