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Washington Nationals fans could be forgiven if their focus was on the evening game of the doubleheader. Max Scherzer had broken his nose the day before in bunting practice, but declared himself “good to go” to pitch the night game. The day game had been scheduled for Monday night, rescheduled for Tuesday night, but both […]

Labor Day Weekend in the Bronx was greeted with little fanfare by fans of the Yankees. The 63-73 Yankees had lost the second game of a three-game series with the Texas Rangers on Saturday, returning them to fifth place in the American League East Division. As the pennant races materialized, Don Mattingly, the Yankees’ star […]

Sunday, July 20, 1947, was a sunny day in Detroit after a cool and rainy Saturday. The second-place Tigers were wrapping up a four-game set with the New York Yankees, whom they trailed by 11½ games. Good weather had been in short supply in Detroit. Tigers management was expecting a crowd of 40,000 for Friday’s […]

“They invented the All-Star Game for Willie Mays,” Ted Williams said,1 and Mays showed why in the 1963 All-Star Game. Wondrous Willie didn’t hit a home run, but the rest of his formidable tools were on display as he had a hit and a walk, stole two bases, scored two runs, knocked in two runs, […]

Detroit’s management was searching for answers to the team’s 10-18 start in 1987, which left the Tigers in sixth place in the AL East, 10 games out of first, on May 9. The Tigers’ roster featured Kirk Gibson, Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker, and Jack Morris, all familiar names from Detroit’s 1984 World Series championship club. […]

At first glance, the game played between the Chicago White Sox and Washington Senators on September 12, 1939 was an unremarkable late-season game with no real implications. The White Sox entered the game in third place with a record of 76–58, 20 games behind the first-place New York Yankees with 20 games left to play. […]

“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 […]

Fledging leagues need paying customers to survive, but sometimes owners have to give away free samples to entice potential consumers to pay for products. This kind of thinking led to Fans’ Day, when, “[f]or the first time in many years admission to a big league game was free”1 as the Federal League’s Brooklyn entry’s “gates […]

By August 1945, Jimmie Foxx was in his 20th season in the major leagues and approaching his 38th birthday. He was no longer the fearsome “Beast” who clubbed 484 home runs between 1929 and 1940 and challenged Babe Ruth’s single-season record by hitting 58 in 1932. He had actually already retired once, spending all of […]

Having won the World Series in both 1915 and 1916, the Boston Red Sox, chasing the idle first-place White Sox, needed to beat Washington to salvage a series split against the mediocre Senators. The game took place in front of only 928 fans in “wartime Washington … an apathetic baseball town”1 despite a compelling matchup […]

Herb Score was on his way to stardom in the major leagues. He burst onto the scene after being named Minor League Player of the Year by The Sporting News in 1954. The tall left-hander posted a 22-5 record for the Indianapolis Indians of the American Association. He set a league record of 330 strikeouts […]

South Bend Blue Sox manager Karl Winsch was having none of it. After his team had lost Game One of the 1952 All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) championship series in Rockford, Winsch went out and measured the distance of the recently-shortened right-field fence at Beyer Stadium.1 Sure enough, it was 21½ feet short of […]

For much of the 2005 season, the White Sox cruised in the American League Central Division race. Even with slugger Frank Thomas missing almost all of the season because of an injured left ankle, the team dominated the division with strong pitching, steady hitting, and strong defense. The White Sox had a 15-game lead over […]

When fog rolls in, anything can happen. Just imagine a film noir detective pursuing a suspect through a murky mist, or a Lovecraftian horror story in which thick clouds hide unspeakable terror. The Pittsfield (Massachusetts) Rangers and Trois-Rivieres (Quebec) Aigles1 of the Double-A Eastern League encountered their own kind of drama on June 26, 1972, […]

Red Shannon is one of the 53 players who played for both the Boston Braves and the Boston Red Sox. His career embraced five consecutive years in the American League, bookended by two disconnected years in the National, first for the Braves and later with the Cubs. Shannon’s debut was with the Braves, in the […]

Buck Schemanske had a blazing fastball when scouts saw him on the Detroit sandlots in the early 1920s. The growth of sabermetrics has altered how we view the game of baseball, but some things remain constant. A prime example is that scouts still look for speed from a pitching prospect. Talk all you want about […]

Right-handed pitcher “Wild” Bill Luhrsen spent three weeks in the major leagues, winning each of his first three games, only to lose to Christy Mathewson in his final appearance. Advancing from the low Class D Cotton States League to the majors in two months, the spitballer was a minor bright spot during the tail-end of […]

He pitched only 267⅓ innings in parts of three major league seasons, but Cletus Elwood “Boots” Poffenberger was the character in all of baseball in his day—and his day included such notable characters as Dizzy Dean and Van Lingle Mungo. While amassing a modest 16-12 career record, the right-hander holds the lifetime mark for funny […]

As the unofficial but recognized spiritual adviser to the ever-mercurial Manny Ramírez, Ino Guerrero had a distinctive role on the 2004 World Series champion Red Sox.1 Given the nature of the team’s offensive prowess, his official role as batting-practice pitcher would seem to be enough for most people, and yet his role as the attendant […]

While playing in the Western Association in 1906, Harry Cheek was reportedly “one of the best catchers in the league notwithstanding that he is one of the smallest in stature. He is always full of pepper and is fast in chasing fouls. He knows how to handle a pitcher and pegs to second with the […]

By all outward appearances, George Davies was leading the good life in the early autumn of 1906. A dozen years removed from a short but respectable stint as a major leagues pitcher – he had won 10 games for the second-half pennant winning Cleveland Spiders in 1892 — Davies was now an eminent citizen of […]

The third virtual meeting of the Larry Dierker Chapter was attended by 31 members on July 20, 2020. Chair Bob Dorrill was happy to report that our chapter continues to grow, with membership now at 144 fans of the game. SABR membership continues to expand as well, and SABR has agreed to support an initiative […]

SABR Bibliography Committee Research Guide No. 12: A Checklist of Leaves From A Fan’s Scrapbook in The Sporting News  Editor’s note: This guide was first published by the SABR Bibliography Committee in 1989. To download the original in PDF form, click here. By Bill Hugo April 1989 About six months before that marvelous series, DAGUERREOTYPES, […]

For over a century, it’s been an article of faith in baseball history that Hall of Famer Zack Wheat’s mother was a Cherokee Indian. This statement started in his early days as a professional. It was repeated in numerous newspaper and magazine reports, and subsequently in various books, including the 2004 encyclopedia Native Americans in […]