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Left-hander Bill Walker overcame two life-threatening heart attacks by the age of 15 to become a big-league pitcher. He debuted with the New York Giants in 1927 after a mentally taxing seven-year journey in the minor leagues. With two National League ERA titles in three years (1929 and 1931), it appeared that Walker was headed […]

Jackie Jensen, the blond rugged Californian who attained great heights on both the football gridiron and baseball diamond, also waged a complex struggle with anxiety that he seemed to have conquered only at the very end of his life, a life that ended too early. A member of the College Football Hall of Fame and […]

One of the best pitchers of the 1970s, Dock Ellis feared success nearly as much as he feared failure. He both angered and amused. His antics cut across racial and cultural lines, as he challenged old prejudices and “normal” ways of doing things. Ellis pitched a no-hitter in 1970 and the next year led the […]

Lore Verne “King” Bader was a lesser member of the 1918 Boston Red Sox. A right-handed hurler, he pitched in just five games, starting four and compiling an unexceptional 1-3 record. All told, Bader appeared in a modest 22 games over three major league campaigns, in 1912 (with the New York Giants) and 1917-18 (with […]

One of the premier “bonus babies” of the 1950s, Frank Matt Baumann was born on July 1, 1933, in St. Louis, Missouri. He lived with his parents and younger sister, Rose Ann, on the north side of the city within walking distance of Sportsman’s Park, home field for both the Cardinals and the Browns. Frank’s […]

Although most current reference works assign Oliver Hazard Perry Caylor the nickname of Ollie and omit Hazard as one of his middle names, Caylor made it known that his full name included Hazard and he loathed the nickname Ollie, preferring to sign his correspondence either Opie or O.P. Caylor, depending on his spirits at the […]

When San Francisco Giants skipper Wes Westrum signaled for Johnnie LeMaster to get into the game, the 21-year-old rookie couldn’t find his glove. He had joined the team only a few hours before the afternoon contest on September 2, 1975, in Candlestick Park against the Dodgers. “A couple of veteran players hid my glove on […]

When Garrett Atkins made his major-league debut with the Colorado Rockies on August 3, 2003, the sky appeared to be the limit. The young corner infielder had progressed through the Rockies’ minor-league system in three years and appeared to be Colorado’s heir-apparent to third baseman and fan favorite Vinny Castilla. The unassuming Atkins rose to […]

Jackie Tobin’s older brother, Jim Tobin, pitched in the major leagues from 1937 through 1945, first for the Pirates, mostly for the Boston Braves, and then for the last several weeks of his career for the Detroit Tigers. Though Jackie, an infielder, was a little more than eight years younger, the two played in Boston […]

In many situations, an injury or a trade can end up being a setback to a player’s career. Hal McRae turned both of them into an opportunity. After being traded to the Kansas City Royals when an injury reduced his defensive skills, he became one of the best designated hitters of all time. Harold Abraham […]

William Henry Wright, better known to the baseball community as “Harry” Wright, today strikes historians as, in the words of Bruce Markusen, an “especially underrated Hall of Famer.”1 Popularly regarded in his time as “The Father of Professional Baseball,” Wright’s modern legacy pales in comparison, though many of his innovations characterize the game that we […]

Some people called him Smiler. His daughter said he was known as the Clark Gable of Dallas. Because he came from North Carolina, some called him Tarheel.i George King Murray was a right-handed pitcher from Charlotte and his father, William, was a railwayman. The Murrays – William and Mary Lee – lived in Charlotte, and […]

Dante Bichette is one of the most important figures in Rockies history. Though his major-league career began with the Angels, and included stints with the Brewers, Reds, and Red Sox, it was in Colorado that Bichette made a name for himself as one of the game’s great sluggers in the mid-1990s.   Bichette holds a unique […]

Late in the evening of May 15, 1973, Amos Otis lifted a Nolan Ryan fastball to Royals Stadium’s spacious right-center-field gap. Angels right fielder Ken Berry “pulled it down,” Otis told the Kansas City Star. “Right there on the warning track. If Bob Oliver (whom Berry had replaced for defensive purposes) had been out there, […]

Brother against brother? The brothers united as batterymates? Les freres Gaston faced both scenarios. They played against each other in 1926 when Alex Gaston was a catcher with the Red Sox and brother Milt was a pitcher for the St. Louis Browns, and they were batterymates after Milt was acquired by Boston and brother Alex […]

Jennings Poindexter was a lefty, and an Okie, who was apparently also something of a character. He pitched in three games for the 1936 Boston Red Sox, 11 games for the 1939 Philadelphia Phillies, and 11 seasons in the minors. Chester Jennings Poindexter was born in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma, less than three years after the […]

Most high-school or college pitchers with dreams of a major-league career think about pitching in the World Series, an All-Star Game, hurling a no-hitter, or getting a strikeout to end a big game. Besides these, Mark Wohlers had something else on his mind while growing up — throwing a pitch 100 miles an hour in […]

Major leaguers have been blessed (or cursed) with colorful nicknames, such as “Pudge,” “Prince Hal,” “Pops,” “Pie,” “Pee Wee,” “Putt Putt,” and those are just some of the ones starting with the letter “P.” To that list, add Tomás “Planchardón” Quiñones, a Puerto Rican right-handed pitcher whose four games in 1947 with the Cincinnati-Indianapolis Clowns […]

Nobody wrote a song about Vince DiMaggio. It was his lot in life to be outshone by his kid brothers. He’s the DiMaggio who set the single-season record for strikeouts by a batter. Vince and strikeouts go together like Joe and Marilyn. He led the National League six times. He didn’t deliver the home runs […]

Hall of Famer Ty Cobb said, “Baseball is a red-blooded sport for red-blooded men. It’s no pink tea, and mollycoddles had better stay out. It’s a struggle for supremacy, a survival of the fittest.”1 Observers could see that he meant it by the way he played. One fan of Cobb’s opined, “Few names have left […]

On Monday night, May 19, 1986, the Boston Red Sox hosted the Minnesota Twins at Fenway Park. The first-place Red Sox had defeated the Texas Rangers on Sunday in a stunning 10-inning finish. As Yogi Berra once said, it was déjà vu all over again on Monday, as Boston again rallied and won in walk-off […]

The 92-70 Anaheim Angels finished atop the American League West in 2004, one game ahead of the Oakland Athletics. On the morning of September 28, with only six games remaining, the Angels were in second place. They hadn’t been in first place since early June. They were tied for first on September 30. For the […]

The Boston Red Sox had not won a World Series since 1918, almost 30 years. As all the teams reassembled their full rosters in the wake of World War II, the Red Sox found themselves with a superb team and jumped out to a very strong start. They were 21-3 by May 10. They clinched […]

The 2000 National League Division Series against the NL West champion San Francisco Giants and the wild-card New York Mets was the first postseason series played at Pacific Bell Park. The Bayfront stadium was opened in April of that year. The Giants finished with a 97-65 regular-season record, 11 games ahead of the Los Angeles […]