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Brooklyn Dodgers skipper Walter “Smoky” Alston was on edge. Though his club (80-45) was in first place, leading the Milwaukee Braves by 10 games, they had been playing terribly and had lost 12 of their last 18 contests. To shake up his team, he tabbed 19-year-old Sandy Koufax to start the final contest of a […]

The band played Tessie as the penultimate game of the 1904 season moved into the ninth inning. For the first time the AL pennant had come down to the final day in a doubleheader pitting the defending champion Boston team versus the upstart New Yorkers. Jimmy Collins’s Champions1 had broken swiftly from the gate and […]

Hartford, Connecticut, is among the baseball markets that has found new life in the flashy, merchandise- and promotion-driven minor-league climate of the twenty-first century. Since 2016 the city has hosted the Hartford Yard Goats, a Colorado Rockies affiliate in the Double-A Eastern League.1 The Yard Goats touch all the bases of modern minor-league ball — […]

“This may be the worst game I’ve ever seen … the best worst game I’ve ever seen.” – Tim McCarver, in the top of the seventh inning.1 The Boston Red Sox had dropped a close 8-7 game to New York the night before, despite Kevin Millar’s three homers. This was more or less the same […]

The Boston Red Sox played only 126 games in 1918, a season abbreviated by World War I. The last games of the regular season were played on September 2. The World Series began three days later, and the Red Sox triumphed over the Chicago Cubs in six games, winning their fifth championship in the first […]

Negro League historian James A. Riley wrote about Satchel Paige, “A mixture of fact and embellishment, Satchel’s stories are legion and form a rich array of often-repeated folklore.”1 There is truth in the assertion that a lot of myth-making has been involved in constructing Paige’s life story: however, as Riley also noted, “The stories are […]

Del Wilber’s game on August 27, 1951, could easily rank among the most memorable of his life. After bringing his newborn daughter, Cynthia, home from the hospital earlier in the day, he smacked three solo home runs to account for all of the Phillies’ runs in a 3-0 victory over Cincinnati. Batting eighth in the […]

The New York Mets were trying to return to relevance in the National League East after finishing no higher than third in their division over the previous three years. Willie Randolph had been hired as their manager in the offseason in the hopes that he would bring some energy to the club. After finishing the […]

The St. Louis Cardinals were back in Busch Stadium, back home after losing the first two games of the 2004 World Series to the Boston Red Sox. They were hoping that the proverbial “home cooking” might help even things up. Their home and away splits hadn’t been appreciably different; they’d won 53 regular-season games at […]

With rain falling and the clock approaching 1:00 A.M., Yankees coach Don Zimmer wasn’t even sure of the situation any more. He turned to Roger Clemens on the bench and asked, “If Giambi hits it out, do we win?”1 Such was the setting on a soggy Friday night-cum-Saturday morning in a back-and-forth game at Yankee […]

The Philadelphia Phillies were mired in the NL East cellar when they arrived at Shea Stadium for a three-game series against the New York Mets. They were hoping to turn things around after losing their previous five games. The Mets were 38-32 and 4½ games behind division leader Pittsburgh. They had won four of their […]

It was a crazy week for Orioles fans in mid-May of 2012. The Sunday series finale in Boston on May 6 had them trying to complete a three-game sweep in Fenway Park after a three-game series win at Yankee Stadium. The Orioles had not won consecutive series in New York and Boston in 20 years.1 […]

As a young and hopeful Art Kusnyer (pronounced KUSH-ner) started his professional baseball career in 1966, he made a contingency plan: “If I didn’t make it in baseball, I wanted to be a highway patrolman,” he told the author.1 He never got to work for the highway patrol. Instead, the solidly built 6-foot-2, 197-pound Kusnyer, […]

Phil McCullough remembered sitting in sleet and freezing rain in the Washington Senators’ bullpen in Griffith Stadium on April 22, 1942. “It was just a terrible day. We tore up chairs and benches and furniture to make a fire in the bullpen to keep warm. It was so cold.”1 The sturdy (six-foot-four, 204 pounds), curly-haired […]

Right-handed pitcher Bob Spade had one notable season in the majors (17-12 with 2.74 ERA) with the 1908 Cincinnati Reds but it almost never happened. An ill-advised trade attempt and paperwork nightmare necessitated the Reds ownership formulating a deal for Spade even while he was still in uniform with them. Spade had two more lackluster […]

The tallest player in American League history from his 1939 debut until well after he retired, 6-feet-8-inch “Big Mike” Naymick came to the Cleveland Indians organization with a mountain of potential.1 Delivering his pitches with a high leg kick that disoriented many batters, Naymick was said to throw faster than celebrated teammate Bob Feller, but […]

Many baseball players from the New Orleans area signed professional contracts in the 1930s and 1940s. Ray Yochim rode the wave, along with other signees from his high school that included future major-leaguers Lou Klein, Mel Parnell, George Strickland, and Jack Kramer. Yochim missed three formative years of his professional development as a pitcher owing […]

“The biggest thrill was being able to step on the field,” Harry Danning said.1 His 10-year big-league career, all with the New York Giants, gave him plenty of thrills: three World Series, four All-Star Games, and a memorable nickname, “Harry the Horse.” Danning was the answer to the Giants’ prayer for a Jewish star, but […]

Dave Shean was the epitome of the Deadball baseball player on the field—he sacrificed runners to the next base, played a steady second base, and collected his share of singles. Off the field, Shean was the opposite of a hard-charging deadballer – he didn’t smoke, drink, chew tobacco, or swear, and regularly attended Sunday Mass. […]

When the Baltimore Orioles announced their 2015 Hall of Fame class, it seemed fitting that Gary Roenicke and John Lowenstein would be inducted together. The two previously shared left field duties for the Orioles in the late 1970s and early 1980s, not an ideal situation for Roenicke – a former first-round pick still in the […]

A light-hitting, rifle-armed shortstop who played a key role in baseball’s biggest scandal, Swede Risberg was a rising young player in the American League when he was banned from the game at age 25. The youngest member of the Black Sox, he always found his home state of California and the Pacific Coast League preferable […]

Considered one of the hardest throwers of his era, two-time National League strikeout king Wild Bill Hallahan lived up to his name by leading the league in walks and wild pitches three times each in the early 1930s. The left-hander, who had a reputation as a big-game pitcher during his best years with the St. […]

On athletic fields – both baseball and football – John Clifford Happenny was eclipsed by Hall of Famers. Only after his retirement from sports did his light fully shine, as the former Chicago White Sox infielder (32 games in 1923) became a senior executive at utility companies in Oklahoma and Illinois, and a leader in […]

Three-time All-Star and 1959 Rookie of the Year Bob Allison was a feared slugger, an aggressive, daring baserunner, a versatile outfielder and first baseman with a powerful arm, and, above all, a competitive team player. He played his entire 13-year career (1958-1970) with the Washington Senators/Minnesota Twins, helping transform a moribund franchise into a consistent […]