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The boy loved baseball. As a teenager he was the best baseball player in his hometown. But Charlie Gould probably never dreamed of playing baseball for a living. His future career was more likely as a clerk or perhaps as a bookkeeper. At that time, there were no openly all-professional baseball clubs, where a young […]
No matter how you measure it, Tony Conigliaro’s career got off to a terrific start, but tragedy repeatedly intervened and the great promise of his early years remained unfulfilled. A local boy made good, Tony was born and raised in the Boston area, signed with the hometown team, and made his major-league debut in 1964 […]
There were two major-league ballplayers named Joe Harris, and both played for Boston’s American League team. They had very different records. One had two middle names – the pitcher named Joseph Lionel White Harris, who pitched only for Boston (1905-07) and racked up the astonishing record of 3-30, despite a 3.35 earned-run average. This biography […]
He was one of baseball’s freer spirits, whose flakiness could drive management crazy. But Bernie Carbo’s biggest legacy is hitting one of the all-time clutch home runs in World Series history, setting the stage for Carlton Fisk’s more memorable blast that ended Game Six of the 1975 World Series. Bernardo Carbo was born on August […]
A strong, quiet leader. Steady and determined. One of the best minds in baseball. All apt descriptions of the often-overlooked player, coach, and manager Bob Lillis. In 1928, Perry Reed Lillis, born in Michigan, married Lillian Pearl Porterfield, from Oklahoma. The couple had two sons: Jack Howard Lillis, born in 1928, and Robert Perry “Bob” […]
Right-hander Joel Finch had an excellent minor-league career, building toward a major-league debut the year after the Red Sox were eliminated by the New York Yankees in the 1978 single-game playoff that closed Boston’s season that year. During the 15 games in which he worked in the majors — all for the Red Sox and […]
Hall of Fame catcher Roger Bresnahan claimed that Slim Sallee “had the best control of any southpaw that ever curved a ball over the plate.” Pitcher Dutch Ruether said, “He [Sallee] is a wonderful pitcher. If I ever begin to learn all he knows about baseball I shall be satisfied.” Baseball Magazine attributed Sallee’s success […]
In June 1970 Ted Williams, then managing the Washington Senators, reminisced for a reporter about the first time Williams had ever seen Dick Hall pitch. Hall, Williams recalled, “was taking his warmup throws, having come in to relieve somebody. I was kneeling in the on-deck circle and I thought to myself, ‘Oh, boy, he’ll be […]
Billy Jurges, a star shortstop for the Chicago Cubs (1931-1938, 1946-1947) and the New York Giants (1939-1945), played a part in Babe Ruth’s called home run during the 1932 World Series, and perhaps provided some of the inspiration behind Bernard Malamud’s novel The Natural and the movie by the same name. He helped prompt the […]
The Oakland Athletics reached the postseason in 2000 and 2001, but their October prospects for 2002 were in jeopardy after they lost 2-1 to the Toronto Blue Jays at home on August 12. The ’02 A’s had demonstrated potential for greatness – including a stretch of 16 wins in 17 games in June – but […]
Tucked in among Connie Mack’s many major-league managerial records – most wins, most losses, most games managed – is an oddball distinction. As of the spring of 2023, “The Tall Tactician” also had more ties than any other big-league manager, 76. (Only three other managers have had more than 50.1) While the smart fan never […]
Thirty games into the 2022 season, the Cincinnati Reds were already written off for the season. On May 11, sitting 13½ games out of first place in the National League Central, the Reds came into the Wednesday afternoon finale of a three-game series against the Milwaukee Brewers with a major-league-worst 6-24 record. From April 12 […]
Shortly before the start of Game Six of the 1921 World Series, with the New York Yankees leading the New York Giants three games to two in the best-of eight series, Babe Ruth arrived at the Polo Grounds with his arm in a sling and wearing civilian clothes. Ruth had lacerated his elbow in Game […]
The 1890 Louisville Colonels – dubbed the “Cyclones” in newspapers in Louisville and other American Association cities1 – had already doubled their 1889 win total when the Syracuse Stars came to town for a three-game series on August 9. Baseball’s first-ever 100-game losers at 27-111-2 in 1889, a season that included the majors’ first players […]
On May 30, 1938, some 81,000 people crammed into Yankee Stadium for a Yankees-Red Sox doubleheader, possibly the biggest crowd in baseball history up to then. The home fans got what they wanted, a Bronx Bombers sweep, powered by four hits and four RBIs from Lou Gehrig, who was climbing out of a disconcerting early-season […]
On May 6, 1915, New York Yankees pitcher Jack Warhop threw a pitch that gave him an unwanted place in baseball history. In the third inning of a game against the Boston Red Sox, Warhop surrendered a home run to rookie pitcher Babe Ruth. It was the first of Ruth’s 714 career round-trippers, a big-league […]
Ted Williams ended his 1941 season, the one in which he was the last American or National League batter (as of 2020) ever to hit over .400, with a career total of 91 home runs. As May 1942 approached its end, he already had a dozen more. The Red Sox, though, were in fourth place […]
The Philadelphia Phillies returned home on September 21, 1964, holding first place in the National League after winning six games on a three-city road trip. With 12 games to play, Philadelphia’s lead was 6½ games over the second-place Cincinnati Reds and St. Louis Cardinals. The city and team were looking forward to the World Series. […]
The New York Mets won the franchise’s fifth pennant in 2015 but lost that year’s fall classic to the Kansas City Royals. A season later, they fell in the National League wild-card game to the San Francisco Giants. After this came consecutive losing seasons. By 2019, the Mets had almost completely overhauled their depth chart. […]
By the time the Cubs scheduled their first home night game, they were, by four decades, the last holdout against baseball under the lights. The first major-league team to host a night game, the Cincinnati Reds, had done so in 1935, with the other teams following suit until 1948 when the Detroit Tigers played their […]
After splitting the first two contests of the 1935 World Series in Detroit, the Tigers and Cubs trekked westward to Wrigley Field for Game Three. With no travel day scheduled, the players struggled to catch up on their rest, with a few of them dozing off as their trains caromed around the southern shore of […]
In reviewing the previous day’s game at Ebbets Field against the Brooklyn Dodgers, Bob Broeg had much to say of the St. Louis Cardinals’ skipper in the July 19, 1957, edition of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Red-necked Fred Hutchinson lost the National League lead and his temper. Whether he’ll regain either soon is a question […]
Major-league baseball came to Jersey City, New Jersey, for the 1956 and 1957 seasons. The ongoing saga of the mid-1950s determining the future of baseball in Brooklyn now included New Jersey. Over these two seasons, the Dodgers played 15 home games at Roosevelt Stadium, one against each National League team each season, and two against […]
In a matchup of first-place clubs at Fenway Park as the 2013 season began its final month, the American League East Division-leading Red Sox were having a hard time scoring runs against the AL Central-best Detroit Tigers. On September 2, Labor Day, Doug Fister threw seven scoreless innings, and the Tigers shut out the Red […]