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The Cincinnati Reds started the 1912 season in a new venue, one that didn’t yet have a name, when they defeated the Chicago Cubs on Opening Day, April 11, before the largest crowd to witness a baseball game to date in the Queen City. The new ballpark was designed for 23,000 spectators, but 26,336 occupied […]

The San Francisco Giants journeyed to Los Angeles for a late-season three-game series with the Dodgers beginning on September 21, 1970. As the series began, the Dodgers, were in second place in the National League West but 12 games behind the Cincinnati Reds. The Giants, in third place, were just one game behind Los Angeles. […]

August 2 was celebrated as Bobby Doerr Day at Fenway Park. For the “silent captain” of the Red Sox, it was like Midsummer Christmas. He received both a one-ton Chevrolet truck and a tractor to be delivered to his ranch in Oregon, a Cadillac, a radio, a clock, a barometer, a red leather chair with […]

Steve Rogers was preparing for a showdown against the Pittsburgh Pirates in the heat of the 1979 National League East Division pennant race when a reporter told him that manager Dick Williams had just said he would have preferred to start one of his good pitchers but that he had to go with Rogers. This […]

Time and time again over the decades, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox have met in high-stakes, high-intensity games with a direct bearing on the American League pennant race. Their game played on Tuesday night, May 18, 1965, was not one of those epochal battles. Both teams were struggling, showing early signs of […]

“You know what they say about Chicago. If you don’t like the weather, wait fifteen minutes.”1 As Warren Corbett noted in his SABR biography of Hall of Famer Ralph Kiner, the longtime New York Mets broadcaster became famous for his “verbal strikeouts.”2 Although this one of the many Ralph Kiner quotes3 was uttered after the […]

Yankees President Gabe Paul told reporters on November 18, 1976, that the Bronx Bombers considered newly signed southpaw ace Don Gullett “a modern Whitey Ford.”1 At the time of his free-agent signing, Gullett’s .684 winning percentage led all active major-league pitchers who had 100 or more decisions. Ford, like Gullett a left-handed hurler, owned a […]

“Outside a miracle, you’ll never pitch again.” Dave Dravecky, one of the aces of the San Francisco Giants’ pitching staff, had suffered an injury-ridden 1988, in which he pitched in only seven games. But nothing prepared him for the shocking diagnosis he received in September of that year. He had felt a lump on his […]

After the 2003 season, which saw the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees take the fight for the pennant to Game Seven of the American League Championship Series, with New York winning and the Red Sox once again out in the cold, both teams had made moves to bolster their rotations. At Thanksgiving, the […]

For the third time in seven years, the gut-wrenching thud of a baseball hitting a skull reverberated from the batter’s box at Fenway Park, silencing 7,395 fans and leaving Boston Red Sox and California Angels players in a state of shock. As Boston second baseman Doug Griffin squared to bunt in the first inning on […]

As the sun came up on September 16, the Red Sox enjoyed a 4½-game lead over the Baltimore Orioles with 12 games to play, a lead that might ordinarily have led to optimism. But really, the race seemed much tighter than that. The Orioles had won the AL East five of the past six years, […]

Throughout his colorful career, the often braggadocious Dizzy Dean had few problems backing up controversial predictions regarding his or his team’s performance. It didn’t matter if the game was a late-season yawner against the last-place team or a crucial outing in the World Series; he never lacked confidence in his ability to pitch and win […]

A five-year veteran of the Negro Leagues, Ernesto Vibert Clarke was a one-hit wonder who followed the adage If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. The phrase may be a cliché, but in Clarke’s case it’s an accurate one.  The native of Panama recorded his first and only hit in the major leagues […]

The Newark Eagles’ May 5, 1946, season-opening game against the Philadelphia Stars, a 2-0 no-hit victory for Eagles pitcher Leon Day, soon spelled opportunity for a multi-talented college player named Oscar Givens. Shortstop Benny Felder made two errors in the game,1 and when the two teams moved from Ruppert Stadium to Delaware’s Wilmington Park the […]

Any list of the greatest sluggers ever to wear a Detroit Tigers uniform has to include Hank Greenberg. Despite losing four years of his physical prime to World War II, he still put together a 13-year career (all but one with the Tigers) that included 331 home runs with 1,276 RBIs. A .313 hitter, he […]

Outfielder Willie Tasby was one of the many major leaguers who graduated from Oakland’s McClymonds High School after playing for legendary coach George Powles. Robbie Henderson of probaseballscouting.com wrote, “Seventeen of Powles’ protégés made the major leagues. He coached and mentored so many athletes. I doubt any one scout coached/mentored the likes of Curt Roberts, Willie Tasby, […]

“Now, if I can just get the chance…” an optimistic Pat Dodson remarked during spring training with the Red Sox in 1988.1 Dodson excelled at the Triple-A level, becoming the International League MVP, and was a top prospect in the Red Sox farm system. However, his chances were limited, and success didn’t translate to the […]

Scrap Iron: the punchy, evocative nickname fit Phil Garner well in the 1970s and ’80s — but it fit catcher Clint Courtney even better a generation before. The punchy part was one reason. Journalist Bob Addie wrote in 1959, “Clint put his aggressive temperament to work several times and was involved in some notable fisticuffs […]

Right-handed pitcher Sam Dodge (0-0 in his career) appeared for the Boston Red Sox in 1921 and 1922, but never took part in anything but losing efforts. The Red Sox themselves didn’t do too well in those years, finishing fifth in 1921 (23½ games out of first) and dead last in 1922.  The “crack pitcher” […]

Burleigh Arland Grimes, who pitched in four games for the St. Louis Cardinals at the beginning of the 1934 season, was born on August 18, 1893, on his parents’ dairy farm about halfway between the towns of Emerald and Clear Lake in northwestern Wisconsin. (Wisconsin records indicate he was born in Emerald, but he always […]

Just five short years after the Pittsburgh Pirates won the 1979 World Series championship, the team had fallen to last in the National League East. They were on their way there again in 1985 – but a rebuild was under way, as the trade for Bob Kipper that August showed. The deal in which the […]

For someone who participated in only 855 major-league games spread over nine seasons, Ed Abbaticchio has had more questions raised about his life than most baseball fans might expect. Was he the first Italian American big leaguer? Was he the first professional dual-sport athlete? Was he the creator of the spiral punt? Why did he […]

On September 30, 1880, in his only appearance in a professional base ball game, a 24-year-old Chicagoan whose previous athletic accomplishments occurred in performances in local amateur base ball contests took the mound for the professional Chicago White Stockings in a game that had little relevance to anyone or anything beyond delivering a favor to […]

Baseball is a great family sport and father/son duos have been in the game since baseball’s early days, from George Sisler and sons Dave Sisler and Dick Sisler, to Yogi Berra and his son Dale Berra right up through the times of Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr., as well as Cal Ripken Sr. […]