If you are not happy with the results below please do another search
The Jefferson Street Neighborhood in 1860. From 24th Street to where Turner’s Lane ends is the ballpark site. The Philadelphia ballparks situated at Jefferson and Master Streets, between 27th and 25th Streets, have a significant historic importance for our national pastime. Originally, this plot of land was known as the Jefferson Parade Grounds. It […]
On July 10-12, 2015, the New York Yankees visited Boston’s Fenway Park for a three-game series. Bill Nowlin sat down and talked with the umpiring crew: Ted Barrett, Chris Conroy, Angel Hernandez, and Pat Hoberg. Conversation in the Umpires Room at Fenway Park on July 11, 2015. Clockwise from top-left: Ted Barrett, Chris Conroy, Angel […]
This article was originally published in “Above the Fruited Plain,” the 2003 SABR convention journal. Since opening in April of 1995, Denver’s Coors Field has received accolades for its architectural design and downtown location. The ball park echoes the scale and materials of adjacent brick warehouses and replicates the urban accessibility found in early […]
Willie Mays batted .298 in 399 career games at the Polo Grounds and hit 98 home runs. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library) Certain ballparks complement the strengths of specific players. Yankee Stadium, which opened in 1923, was termed The House That Ruth Built. One reason for such a slogan was the short distance […]
George A. “Tuck” Turner was a member of the National League and American Association for seven seasons (1893–98) and a utility outfielder for the Phillies for the first five of those big league seasons. How Tuck Turner became a major leaguer and a member of the Philadelphia Phillies is an unusual story. Bill James observed […]
Independent minor leagues returned to the baseball landscape in the 1990s and have continued to sprout during the first decade of this century. Some leagues lasted just one season while others have been more successful. This is a return to older times. During the earliest parts of the twentieth century, minor leagues were part of […]
In the summer of 2018 Washington Post reporter Jorge Castillo penned an article about free agent Bryce Harper’s performance and his agent Scott Boras’s interpretation of why Harper was experiencing a subpar year. At the time, Harper was batting a meager .215. Boras pointed out that batting average is not necessarily a good metric, and […]
Introduction Using Statcast data, it is now possible to compare individual pitches across baseball based on characteristics like movement, velocity, and spin rate that become obvious and meaningful even in a single outing. Various research has used those physical characteristics to define optimal pitches. However, to be effective even an elite pitch must be mixed […]
Jackie laughed. “Baseball isn’t all about home runs,” he said. “It’s a team sport. You have to trust the other players as much as you trust yourself.”1 A Big Day For Baseball (2019), written by Mary Pope Osborne and illustrated by Sal Murdocca. (Courtesy of Penguin Random House) When Jackie Robinson debuted for […]
Professional athletes naturally experience hot and cold streaks. However, there’s been a debate going on for some time now as to whether professional athletes experience streaks more frequently than we would expect given the players’ season statistics. This is also known as having “the hot hand.” For example, if a player is a 75 percent […]
A list of hit sequences for players who completed a cycle during the 1920-2017 period.This is the online appendix for Herm Krabbenhoft’s “‘When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It’: Who Took the Cycle or Quasi-Cycle?” Click here to scroll down for Table A-2: Sequences for Players Who Completed a Quasi-Cycle […]
Jeff Gray1 pitched four years for collegiate baseball power Florida State University, followed by eight years of professional baseball, including parts of one season with the Cincinnati Reds and two with the Boston Red Sox. Gray’s admirable playing career was cruelly shortened at age 29 in 1991, when he suffered a stroke-like brain injury. Despite […]
A “short, stocky, active, aggressive” second baseman, Otto Knabe teamed with shortstop Mickey Doolan to provide the Phillies with one of the most notorious double-play tandems of the Deadball Era.1 After seven years in Philadelphia, Knabe jumped to the Federal League in 1914 to lead the Baltimore Terrapins. But in Baltimore and two later minor […]
In the sizzling summer heat of the 1957 National League pennant race, Fred Hutchinson turned philosophical. “Baseball doesnt have many naturals, a lot less than you might imagine,” said the Seattle-born-and-bred skipper of the St. Louis Cardinals. “The ones who work the hardest are the ones who make it, the ones who win. Sometimes that’s […]
Hans Lobert’s game was built around speed. Aside from 1912, when an injury caused him to miss more than half the season, the stocky, bowlegged third baseman stole 30 or more bases each year from 1907 to 1914. At a field day in Cincinnati on October 12, 1910, Lobert rounded the bases in 13.8 seconds, […]
It is rare for a single moment to pivot a career. Dick Stockton is an exception, not rule. Before 1975, Stockton moved from Syracuse University via KDKA Pittsburgh’s revolutionary news to pro basketball’s Boston Celtics. After 1975 he aired a Klondike of more national sports, including the Red Sox, A’s, and network baseball postseason and […]
The 1906 season opened for the Boston Beaneaters in Brooklyn on April 12. Making his major-league debut that day with Boston was outfielder Johnny Bates, a compact left-handed swinger (5-feet-7 inches and around 170 pounds). Batting fifth in the lineup, Bates strode to the plate to face Harry McIntire in the second inning. The 22-year-old […]
Soon after the 1967 World Series ended, Fleetwood Recording Co. released a long-playing phonograph record, The Impossible Dream, a reprise of the Boston Red Sox magical same-year pennant. Narrating, Sox announcer Ken Coleman hailed “an affair twixt a town and a team,” telling how the Boston American League Baseball Company used wonderwork to wave 1967’s […]
From the Class D Southeastern League to a perfect inning in the National League over a three-game five-day span, 20-year-old Harrie “Jack” Reis was a tiny bright September footnote from a lackluster 1911 St. Louis Cardinals season. It marked the beginning and end of his major league career. Harrie C. Reis was born on June […]
By the end of the 1960s, future Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax and All-Star Jim Maloney stood among the best pitchers of the decade: they were two of only seven with at least 1,500 strikeouts from 1960 to 1969; over the period, Koufax ranked seventh in victories with 137 while Maloney was eighth with 134. […]
The Chicago Tribune described the Chicago White Stockings as “disaffected, demoralized and crippled” as the club prepared to clash with the Boston Red Stockings in a match of pennant contenders on September 29, 1871.1 With third baseman Ed Pinkham sick in bed and the club suffering from a host of other injuries, Chicago had not […]
A breakdown of Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski’s 452 career home runs makes for interesting reading. The former Red Sox captain hit 237 homers at Fenway Park and 215 on the road. He hit 65 four-baggers against the Tigers, more than any against other team. He hit 266 homers before the All-Star break, 91 in […]