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Delos Daniel “Del” Drake was born on December 3, 1886, in Girard, Ohio, to William H. Drake, a dentist, and Mary E. (Schuck) Drake. A younger brother, William, died in infancy. Dr. Drake was credited for his son’s athletic prowess, and one article discovered by the author makes the claim, which the author has been […]
Perhaps Joe Simpson was destined to play and describe a game of pitch and catch and hit. For one thing, the holiday baby was born December 31, 1951, at a time when baseball was the only game in town. Imagining the pastime, hearing it on radio, or watching on television, no one needed slow motion, […]
Terry Hughes was a ballyhooed prospect. “I wanted to sign Hughes more than any boy I’ve ever seen,” said Boston Red Sox scout Mace Brown. “He’s got all the equipment.”1 After the Chicago Cubs made Hughes the second overall pick in the June 1967 draft, their manager, Leo Durocher, said, “All I know is that […]
Jacob “Jake” Wood Jr., an African American from Elizabeth, New Jersey, starred at shortstop for the baseball team at Thomas Jefferson High, played one season at Delaware State University, and signed with the Detroit Tigers in 1957. Jake was a natural, one of two outstanding athletes in the family. Youngest brother Richard enjoyed a 10-year […]
Right-hander Elmer Singleton pitched professionally for 23 seasons — more than half of them in the Pacific Coast League, where he won 146 games and once carried a no-hitter into the 13th inning. Over parts of eight major league campaigns with the Boston Braves (1945-1946), Pittsburgh Pirates (1947-1948), Washington Senators (1950), and Chicago Cubs (1957-1959), […]
A fill-in catcher in a rookie-loaded lineup for Connie Mack and the World Series-bound Philadelphia Athletics on September 30, 1913, Navy man and “one-hit wonder” Joe Giebel’s only major league appearance would fortuitously occur right in his hometown of Washington, DC. Joseph Henry Giebel was born in Washington, District of Columbia, on November 30, 1891, […]
This book is to be neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure to those who stared face to face with it. It will simply tell of a generation of men who even though they may have avoided the shells were destroyed by the war. –Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on […]
Played out before the empty seats of Washington’s Griffith and D.C. Stadiums in the early 1960s, the “breath-takingly impressive”1 launch of Ken Retzer’s career was nearly “invisible to the [national sports]writers … [to the point that he was] mistakenly identified as Dick Retzer” in a Sporting News article about the rich crop class of rookie […]
As of 2016, 14 men from the U.S. Virgin Islands had played in the major leagues.i Calvin Pickering was the tenth, and the third of seven from the island of St. Thomas. He was an intriguing talent, with power to match his enormous size. “Picko” stood 6’5” and weighed 260 pounds at his fittest. As […]
When John Joseph O’Brien took the field for the Brooklyn Bridegrooms on July 25, 1891, he was “unheralded and unknown,”1 described as “a little pale-faced chap who looked as meek as a country youth fresh from the mourners’ bench.”2 He hit the first pitch he saw for a line single to right, then added another […]
Often referred to as the Pittsburgh Crawfords’ “normal fall back man” to Satchel Paige,1 Bertrum Hunter was among the many supporting stars who helped make the 1935 Crawfords the greatest Negro League baseball team of all time. For five years, from 1932 to 1936, the Crawfords were considered the “Yankees of the Negro Leagues” as […]
Catcher Billy Colgan appeared in 48 big-league games in the summer of 1884 for the Pittsburgh Alleghenys of the American Association before moving to the Pacific Northwest. Later, after his tragic death, he became the first former major leaguer buried in the state of Montana. According to baseball historian Jim Price, William H. Colgan was […]
“You Called That a What . . . ?”The Newsletter of the Official Scoring Committee Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) November 2018, Volume 4, Number 1 Past newsletters Editor: Stew Thornley From the Chair Conundrum of the Month (or Quarter or Whatever) Meet Sven Muencheberg Profile: Pat Thompson 9.17 From 1944 Conundrum Solution […]
“You Called That a What . . . ?”The Newsletter of the Official Scoring Committee Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) November 2018, Volume 4, Number 1 Past newsletters Editor: Stew Thornley From the Chair Conundrum of the Month (or Quarter or Whatever) Meet Sven Muencheberg Profile: Pat Thompson 9.17 From 1944 Conundrum Solution […]
It has been said that one of the great things about baseball is that in any given game you’ll see something that has never happened before. That may not be literally true, but it was true for the 7,922 fans who came to Sportsman’s Park to watch the fifth-place Detroit Tigers and the eighth-place St. […]
Game Five of the 1982 American League Championship Series on Sunday, October 10, 1982, was the most important contest fans at Milwaukee County Stadium had been treated to since its former occupants, the Braves, fell to the New York Yankees, 6-2, in Game Seven of the 1958 World Series. While the Brewers had made the […]
The bankrupt St. Louis Browns were acquired in March 1899 by Frank Robison,1 who already owned the Cleveland Spiders. To maximize his profits and his chance of winning the 1899 pennant, he moved the best players on the Spiders to his new team, which he dubbed the St. Louis Perfectos. The result was a strong […]
After they were thumped 10-2 by the New York Giants on June 1, 1903, it seemed unlikely that the Pittsburgh Pirates would go on to win their third consecutive National League pennant. Since May 1, Pittsburgh hurlers had surrendered an uncharacteristic 5.2 runs per game, dropping the Pirates into third place, 4½ games behind the […]
The Pittsburgh Pirates surged into the National League’s crowded pennant race in August 1965 but faced stiffer resistance once the calendar flipped to September: twin aces Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale in a doubleheader with the first-place Los Angeles Dodgers at Forbes Field. In the twin bill’s opener, Koufax broke his own post-1900 NL season […]
New York Yankees right fielder Giancarlo Stanton didn’t hit any home runs during his brief rehabilitation stint with the Somerset (New Jersey) Patriots of the Double-A Eastern League in August 2022. In fact, the former National League Most Valuable Player and five-time All-Star went hitless in seven at-bats. But Stanton, the possessor of 347 major-league […]
“Torture” was the theme for the 2010 San Francisco Giants. In April 2010, after disappointing back-to-back losses to the San Diego Padres, Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper started the craze during the next day’s broadcast, saying: “Giants baseball … [pause] … torture!”1 Torture was thoroughly embraced by Giants fans. The slogan was used to describe heartbreaking […]
The Philadelphia Athletics arrived in Louisville for a four-game series on September 26 with a 3½-game lead over the second-place St. Louis Brown Stockings. To win the American Association pennant, either Philadelphia needed to win at least one game against the Eclipse or St. Louis needed to lose one game against the lowly Pittsburgh Alleghenys. […]
Sunday, July 13, 1924, was a typical hot, humid midsummer day in Washington.1 As the mercury climbed to 88 degrees, hot bats and hot tempers marked a surprising and memorable 15-11 slugfest between the Washington Senators and the visiting Cleveland Indians, who had won seven of the first nine meetings between the two teams. Washington […]
What a week in Boston! Baseball beginning to end! The Boston Chapter held its annual Hot Stove/MLK Day meeting on January 20, 2014, at The Baseball Tavern. If we have a a bigger, wilder more memorable meeting than this one, well, we’ve forgotten about it. We were very fortunate this year to have all the […]