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The annals of baseball prose include several memoirs and biographies from and about major-, minor-, and amateur-league umpires, well stocked with entertaining war stories from the diamond front, as well as numerous how-to-manuals for those pondering careers in this noble and unappreciated profession; and books inviting fans to offer their own interpretation of baseball’s knottier […]

If Bob Sheppard, longtime public address announcer for the New York Yankees, was class personified, Tex Rickards, who held a similar slot with Dem Bums, reflected the spirit of the “woiking” class Brooklynite.1 And while Robert Merrill, the classy Metropolitan Opera baritone, often sang “The Star Spangled Banner” at Yankee Stadium, at Ebbets Field the […]

1. THE INTERNATIONAL RETURNS In the case of Ottawa’s return to the International (née Eastern) League, as has so often been the case in Organized Ball, one town’s misfortune proved to be another city’s gain, however briefly. The New York Giants’ Triple-A club in Jersey City, affectionately or derisively known as the Little Giants, struggled […]

As a baseball executive, Lou Gorman worked for more than a third of a century with scouts. He’d been a farm director for the Orioles and Royals, director of player development with Kansas City, and GM or assistant GM with the Mariners, Mets, and Red Sox. The Providence, Rhode Island, native was once a minor […]

Driving along the oft-congested Chicago expressways in 2005, one might occasionally pass a wayside billboard that featured a White Sox player in full uniform with a random-seeming catchphrase. If you drove the same route, you saw it every day and during those rush-hour traffic jams, the image lasted longer, leaving a lingering impression. The seeds […]

Clyde Sukeforth as Dodgers manager, 1947. (NATIONAL BASEBALL HALL OF FAME LIBRARY)   I met Clyde Sukeforth three times altogether. On the first occasion, Howard V. Doyle, an old Mainer, friend, and former boss who knew I’d be interested, invited me to join him on a trip to Waldoboro, Maine, specifically to meet Clyde, with […]

Kenichi Zenimura (right) with his cousin Tasumi Zenimura (left) in 1928. (Rob Fitts Collection)   Few baseball fans know the story of early twentieth-century Nikkei (Japanese American) baseball. Despite this lack of awareness, the Nikkei impact is still visible in today’s game. It’s subtle, though, visible only to the well-informed. The legacy is not a […]

  Long before Aaron Judge broke the single-season American League home-run records formerly held by fellow New York Yankees Babe Ruth and Roger Maris, a young man from a small farm on the Maryland Eastern Shore was on pace to hit more dingers than any of them.1 His name was Jimmie Foxx, nicknamed “the Beast” […]

Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth on July 4, 1939 on Lou Gehrig’s last day at Yankee Stadium. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library.)   Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig weren’t exactly best friends or worst enemies, weren’t exactly master and pupil, weren’t exactly equals on or off the field. Half a generation apart in age1 […]

Willie Mays and Willie McCovey played together for 14 seasons, including in McCovey’s 1969 MVP campaign. (SABR-Rucker Archive)   Willie Mays and Willie McCovey formed one of the greatest one-two power combinations in baseball history. The pair were teammates on the San Francisco Giants from 1959 to 1972. During that stretch, they won the 1962 National […]

The date was October 14, 1972. Families across North America gathered around their wood-paneled television sets to watch Game One of the World Series that Saturday afternoon.  Many fans in the televised audience had not seen the Oakland A’s or the Cincinnati Reds in a regular-season contest.  There stood the Reds along the first-base line […]

In the 1970s, the very time when players and umpires gained wealth and power, baseball’s field managers’ status declined as they became wretched scapegoats to be sacrificed to the bloodlust of victory-starved fans. True, sacking the manager was a time-honored ploy; whenever rumblings of fan discontent erupted, a manager was bumped off as virgins in […]

Back in the mid-1990s, I published Great Baseball Films (Citadel Press), which charts the manner in which the sport has been depicted onscreen from the late 1890s to early 1990s. Twenty years ago as today, even the most obscure films with obvious baseball themes were readily accessible to researchers. However, seeking out films in which […]

In December 1936, the San Diego Padres of the Pacific Coast League purchased a catcher from the Albany Senators. Bill Starr would leave his mark on San Diego baseball history: As a player, he had the honor of pinch-hitting for Ted Williams. As an owner, he signed the player who broke the Pacific Coast League […]

Washington, D.C., is primarily known today as the home of our nation’s central government and for its wealth of great museums. Very few people are aware that the city helped give the game of baseball its rich national identity over 150 years ago. A thorough review of the recent “find” of baseball materials, known simply […]

Toronto hosted the 1979 winter meetings at the Sheraton Centre, marking the fourth time the winter meetings were held outside the United States (Montreal in 1930 and 1936 and Mexico City in 1967).1 The owners’ discussions, both formal and informal, focused on the game’s economics and the coming labor negotiations with the players — only […]

The 1954 major league baseball season ended leaving a lot of questions about the 1955 campaign unanswered — especially for the Baltimore Orioles and the New York Yankees. In 1954 the Yankees, led by 64-year-old Casey Stengel, won 103 games (the only time in Casey’s career that he would win 100 games) yet finished eight […]

Former Washington Senators pitcher and pitching coach Sidney Charles “Sid” Hudson dedicated 19 seasons as a player and coach to the national pastime in the nation’s capital. Unsung and scarcely remembered in the city in which he lived and worked all those years, Hudson nevertheless holds an exalted place in the hearts of the people […]

Much has been said about the Chicago Nationals’ “stonewall infield” of the 1880’s, both fact and fantasy. With Cap Anson at first base, Fred Pfeffer at second, Tommy Burns at short, and Ed Williamson at third, it was the most celebrated quartet of its day and an unbeatable combination for the Chicago champions of 1885 […]