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The Philadelphia Athletics hosted the Cleveland Indians to complete their four-game series on a warm Tuesday afternoon. The third-place Indians (59-53) were percentage points ahead of the Boston Red Sox and 15 games behind the AL-leading Detroit Tigers. The seventh-place Athletics (47-63) were a half-game behind the St. Louis Browns and 26 games behind Detroit. […]

Luis Tiant1 befuddled major-league hitters for 19 seasons with an assortment of pitches delivered from various angles. Signed at age 18 by the Mexico City Tigers of the Double-A Mexican League in 1959,2 Tiant toiled three years in Mexico before his contract was acquired by the Cleveland Indians. After two seasons in the Cleveland farm […]

Left-hander Jon Lester had enjoyed one of the best careers of any major-league pitcher in the twenty-first century when he signed a $5 million, one-year contract with the Washington Nationals not long before spring training 2021.1 In 15 seasons with the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs, Lester had won 193 games, played on three […]

Brilliant pitching by Dizzy Dean, Carl Hubbell, and Lon Warneke led the National League to its first All-Star win. The 4-3 triumph was played in 89-degree weather, Boston’s hottest July 7 since 1883. However, while thousands of Bostonians chose to spend the day at nearby beaches, it was not the weather that was responsible for […]

In 1969 the Minnesota Twins ran away with the first American League West Division pennant by winning 97 games. In 1970 they showed no signs of slowing down. A month and a half into the season, the red-hot Twins sported a record of 24-10 and sought a sweep of a three-game series against the Kansas […]

Acrowd of just over 25,000 filed into Ebbets Field in Brooklyn for Game Three of the 1920 World Series. Others piled onto the rooftops of nearby houses along Bedford Avenue and Montgomery Street.1 “The fans turned out in droves,” wrote the New York Times, “and long after the game started thousands were left outside the […]

In front of a May 5, 1933, Ladies Day crowd of approximately 3,000 at the Baker Bowl, St. Louis Cardinals leadoff hitter Pepper Martin had a field day against the Philadelphia Phillies. In five at-bats, he contributed “Four Dashes of Pepper”1 – a home run, triple, double, and single – as he hit for the […]

Both the Milwaukee Brewers and the Chicago Cubs had lost five straight games heading into a three-game series in Chicago starting on August 2, 2010. The Brewers had scored just eight runs in their five.1 Cubs manager Lou Piniella was in the midst of a four-game suspension for kicking dirt on an umpire, with bench […]

The Atlanta Braves had their back to the wall. After losing the first two games of the best-of-five National League Championship Series to the New York Mets at home, they had to win the final three games at Shea Stadium in order to advance to the World Series. The Mets started Gary Gentry, one of […]

There are fewer third basemen in the Hall of Fame than players from any other position. One who hasn’t made it is Stan Hack, who held down the post for 16 years with the Chicago Cubs, from 1932 through 1947. Yet Bill James ranks him the ninth best all time at the position, well ahead […]

He was a very good ballplayer. Certainly good enough that he posted some outstanding numbers during a long and distinguished minor-league career. Probably good enough that he could have had a substantial major-league life. But Carlos Bernier managed to play only one season in “The Show.” As Steve Treder wrote, “The baseball career of Carlos […]

Jerry Priddy’s life went from pinstripes to prison stripes. When second baseman Priddy and shortstop Phil Rizzuto came up to the Yankees together in 1941, Priddy “was the hotshot of the pair,” sportswriter Milton Richman wrote. “He was smart in the sense that the chances were good he would succeed in anything he undertook.”1 But […]

Baseball lore is filled with stories of players who distinguished themselves on the diamond despite physical limitations. Examples include Dummy Hoy, Three-Finger Brown, One-Armed Pete Gray, Monty Stratton, and more recently, pitcher Jim Abbott. But Washington Senators left-handed pitcher Bert Shepard remains the only player to have ever played in the major leagues on an […]

June 19, 1911, was Trace Baker’s debut in professional baseball, and the last day of his playing career. So it would appear. And he didn’t really do anything wrong, but he wasn’t invited back to play again. Baker played for the Boston Red Sox that day, for manager Patsy Donovan. The Red Sox were in […]

As the center fielder for the St. Louis Cardinals from 1926 to 1930, Taylor Douthit was one of the game’s top defensive players. His career range factor ranks first among all outfielders,1 and his 547 putouts in 1928 remain the major-league record for outfielders.2 An effective leadoff hitter,3 Douthit averaged .302 over that five-year span […]

“There is a lot of talk in the Cardinal clubhouse of togetherness … ’a family affair.’ Indeed, after each Cardinal victory, there blares a rendition of “We Are Family,” recorded by Sister Sledge … on the recommendation from reserve outfielder Jerry Mumphrey.”1 — The Sporting News Unknown to many, Jerry Mumphrey’s name emerged to debunk […]

Harvey Hiller was the son of a steam railroad engineer from East Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania, the youngest of seven children of George and Elizabeth (Bayson) Hiller. Both parents were Pennsylvania natives, of German and Irish parents, respectively. Harvey Max Hiller was born in Carbon County on May 12, 1893. After his baseball career, he himself […]

In what may be a unique event in the annals of baseball history, Al “Zeke” Zarilla had to buy a ticket to his major-league debut. He didn’t have to buy a plane ticket or a train ticket but the brand-new baseball recruit had to buy a game ticket to the game in which he was […]

Howard Johnson was a solid major-league player for several years. He was probably best known for a combination of power and speed that made him the darling of fantasy baseball owners as that variant of the national pastime took off in the 1980s. He was a member of two World Series championship teams, the 1984 […]

George Rooks led the 1888 Tri-State League in home runs playing for Lima, Ohio. His hitting was no surprise because he came to the team with the nickname “Home Run.” Lanigan’s Baseball Cyclopedia credits him with three home runs on June 16, 1886, for Oshkosh. However the June 16 game was a 7-2 Oshkosh win […]

Duke Maas pitched in the American League during seven seasons from 1955 to 1961, most notably with the New York Yankees. He appeared in relief in the 1958 and 1960 World Series. Maas won the game that clinched the 1958 pennant for New York. In 1959 he started 21 games, fashioning a 14-8 won-loss record […]

Joe Schultz, a catcher in his playing days, spent over 40 years in professional baseball. His career included five full seasons and parts of four others as a fringe reserve in the majors. That paved the way for 13 years as a minor-league manager and another 14 as a big-league coach. He was there for […]

Index for Bill James’s Baseball Analyst Nos. 1-40, 1982-1989 Read Rob Neyer’s introduction of the Baseball Analyst archives “Baseball Analyst,” a Bill James creation that he self-published from 1982 to 1989, was one of the first publications to feature articles devoted to sabermetrics — a phrase he coined in part to honor SABR. “Baseball Analyst” […]

Fort Wayne, Indiana, has hosted only 12 major-league games in its long association with professional baseball, including the final game of a ten-game postseason series between Chicago and Providence of the National League in 1882. However, one of those 12 contests was the very first major-league game, played in 1871 at the Kekionga Ball Grounds.1 […]