Search Results

The Brooklyn Dodgers’ relocation to Los Angeles was not yet official on September 22, 1957, but the writing was on the wall. A week earlier, the Los Angeles City Council had voted to make 300 acres in Chavez Ravine available to Dodgers President Walter O’Malley for construction of a privately funded ballpark. The Los Angeles […]

Bill Mazeroski’s Baseball yearbook gave a blunt assessment of the Montreal Expos’ chances for the 1987 season: “If they think they can win with these imposters, they’ve got another think coming.”1 Sports Illustrated had more tact in its season preview, although it predicted that the Expos would lose 98 games and finish dead last in […]

It was a recipe for disaster. Houston’s Mike Cuellar, a native of Cuba, was a fiery, intensely competitive pitcher. The Phillies skipper, Gene Mauch, was known for his abrasive and combative personality. Factor in a tight game in the ninth inning, underachieving teams needing to prove something, and a good dose of bench jockeying, and […]

“We’re just a couple of natural born pitchers from down Texas way,” bantered Paul “Daffy” Dean about himself and his famous brother Dizzy. “Two good natured ordinary fellers who God gave perfect pitchin’ bodies.”1 After Dizzy worked on a no-hitter for 7⅓ innings in the first game of a doubleheader, Daffy upstaged his loquacious older […]

The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis became the home for the Minnesota Twins in 1982. The multipurpose stadium, whose main professional tenants were the Twins and the National Football League’s Minnesota Vikings, replaced Metropolitan Stadium in suburban Bloomington, where both teams had played since 1961. The first Metrodome event was an exhibition game […]

For the second time in 18 days, a sellout crowd of over 55,000 came to Yankee Stadium hoping to witness right-handed starter Roger Clemens’ 300th career win.1 Clemens, who had begun his career with the Red Sox and won three Cy Young Awards there, had won number 299 in Boston on May 21, beating Red […]

“One of the toughest losses I’ve had to deal with in a while.” – Joe Torre, August 18, 20001 “I haven’t been around that long, but to me, that was the biggest comeback we’ve ever had.” – Darin Erstad, August 18, 20002   Not too many fans in the announced crowd of 37,053 were still […]

Twenty-four-year-old Ernie Banks exploded on the national baseball scene with the Chicago Cubs in 1955, his second full major-league season. Not only did his 44 home runs shatter the single-season record for homers by a shortstop, but his five grand slams set a new major-league record.1 A lighter 31-ounce bat that added as much as […]

The postgame talk after the St. Louis Cardinals defeated the Atlanta Braves, 11-2, on August 28, 1980, focused on Cardinals outfielder Dane Iorg—and with good reason. A day after going 4-for-5 against the Houston Astros, the veteran left-handed batter collected a career-high seven RBIs with two doubles and a single. But the following day, all […]

Tom Lasorda is lucky Dodgers fans were willing to give him a second chance. Lasorda built a Hall of Fame career as manager of the Dodgers from 1976 to ’96, but his first stint with the franchise came as a minor leaguer in 1949. By the mid-’50s, he was a young pitcher trying to break […]

Not even the oppressive St. Louis heat could break Bob Sykes on the Fourth of July in 1980. With the Busch Stadium on-field temperature a reported 140 degrees,1 the Cardinals left-handed pitcher spun a 10-inning shutout against the Philadelphia Phillies. Center fielder George Hendrick hit a walk-off home run with one out in the bottom […]

It was April 1964. The top five songs on the Billboard Hot 100 were by the Beatles. The Ford Mustang was introduced to consumers.1 The New York Yankees were the Kings of American League Baseball. A perennial power throughout the ’50s and beyond, the Yankees were the only American League champions thus far in the […]

Refreshed from a day off, the Indianapolis Hoosiers of the Federal League hosted the Brooklyn team, owned by brothers Robert and George Ward. Robert had ascribed the team its name after the Ward Bakery Company’s best-selling product, Tip-Top Bread. The Indianapolis club was owned by Harry Sinclair, a millionaire by age 30, at the time […]

“Good field, no hit” is an assessment of an athlete with lopsided skills on the baseball diamond. In essence, his contributions are far greater on defense than offense. Many of these men were catchers. In fact, of the ten major-league players with the worst career batting averages (minimum 1,000 at-bats), six were backstops. Barney Gilligan […]

Clarence “Cito” Gaston was a National League outfielder from 1967 to 1978. At his best, he was an All-Star in 1970. He also made a vivid impression on the fans in Venezuela, where he won two batting titles in winter ball. However, Gaston attained much greater fame and respect as a manager. He became the […]

Catcher Jack Warner worked ten years in the National League and five years in the American League, ranging from 1895 to 1908. He caught more than 1,000 games, hitting a solid .249, with a .303 on-base percentage. One of the most noted moments of his career came when he assaulted his own manager under the […]

The proclaimed best recruit to ever come out of the Central Association, albeit one that was unsuccessful in eight at bats for the St. Louis Cardinals of 1912, “Doc” Shanley later became a successful dentist before passing away at too young an age. Harry Root Shanley was born on January 30, 1889 (the 1900 census […]

Don Richard “Richie” Ashburn, a Hall of Fame outfielder, who made the most putouts of any outfielder in major-league baseball during the 1950s, started out as a catcher, which should not be surprising because throughout his long career in baseball, Richie Ashburn had always been his own man. His independent quality even emerged during his […]

Shortstop Humberto “Chico” Fernández played the game with flair. It was a flair that endeared him to fans and fellow players, but often saw him at odds with his many managers. He was a daring, some would say reckless, baserunner. Playing for the Detroit Tigers, he showed that special flair in the second game of […]

Chris Carpenter spent 15 seasons in major-league baseball, first with the Toronto Blue Jays and then with the St. Louis Cardinals .His won-lost record was 144-94 with an earned-run average of 3.76, and in 2005, his 21-5 season and 2.83 ERA won him the National League’s Cy Young Award. But statistics alone don’t tell the […]

Relentless desire and unshakable determination define Carmen Hill’s 17 years in Organized Baseball. In 1915, the 19-year-old bespectacled hurler jumped from a Class B league to debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates, becoming the just the second major-league pitcher to wear glasses on the diamond in more than a quarter-century. For 12 years, Hill endured a […]

While Red Sox fans remember Dave Morehead mostly for the no-hitter he threw in 1965, Morehead played a role on the ’67 dream team by contributing five wins in the August-September stretch drive. Although he had a career major league record of only 40-64 with a 4.15 ERA, he showed flashes of brilliance, particularly early […]

One of the first things one notices about short-term Boston Red Sox leftfielder/pinch-hitter Gene Rye is that he used another surname while playing professional baseball, apparently Anglicized from Mercantelli. He was also sometimes known by the nickname “Half Pint” – he was 5-feet-6 and weighed 165 pounds. He batted left-handed, but threw right-handed. Rye, as […]

Here are the SABR Bookshelf listings for Winter 2016. To get your NEW book listed on The SABR Bookshelf, make sure a review copy is sent to: The SABR Bookshelf, Cronkite School at ASU, 555 N. Central Ave. #416, Phoenix, AZ 85004. An e-book file will also suffice; please send the e-book in PDF, EPUB […]