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Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in the SABR Deadball Era committee’s April 2016 newsletter. The announcement of the winner of the 2016 Larry Ritter Book Award, Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty by Charles Leerhsen, provides an excellent opportunity to discuss the origins and history of the award. Now in its 15th year, the Ritter […]

Some teams today don’t even play a single game on a holiday, providing a stark contrast to the many years when the holiday doubleheader was a staple of the major league baseball schedule. From the 1890s through the 1950s, most major league teams were scheduled to play two games on each of the three national […]

In December 1936, the San Diego Padres of the Pacific Coast League purchased a catcher from the Albany Senators. Bill Starr would leave his mark on San Diego baseball history: As a player, he had the honor of pinch-hitting for Ted Williams. As an owner, he signed the player who broke the Pacific Coast League […]

The Asahi in Osaka, Japan, during their 1925 tour. From left, back row: Kichitaro Okagaki, Nobukichi Ishikawa, Jay Nishida, Morio Sera, Harry Hashimoto, Jimmy Araki, Earl Tanbara, Mr. Takeshita, Fred Koba, and two Japanese officials. Front row: Tom Sakamoto, Sai Towata, Jimmie Yoshida, Jiggs Yamada, Frank Ito, Russell Hinaga, Ed Higashi. (Kanemoto Collection, Kifune Family […]

Interview with Dave Mellor by Bill Nowlin on August 16, 2015.   I started here in the 2001 season. I grew up a Red Sox fanatic. Previously I worked for the Milwaukee Brewers for 16 years, from 1985. I also interned with the Angels and the Giants. The Green Bay Packers played half their home […]

All managers think about strategy, but one can argue that no manager this side of John McGraw changed our prevailing understanding of baseball strategy as much as Earl Weaver. In his seminal work, Weaver on Strategy, and in various quotations uttered while holding court, Weaver presented insights that may have long been implicitly understood by […]

Minor-League Winter Meeting The 1949 Winter Meetings saw several firsts for the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues: the first time a meeting was held in Baltimore, the first time a player draft was held during a meeting, and the first time an incumbent Association president missed a meeting. The meeting itself was held at […]

In his four appearances at Yankee Stadium with the 1952 St. Louis Browns, Satchel Paige had a 2.55 ERA in 17 2/3 innings. (SABR-Rucker Archive)   Yankee Stadium is considered baseball’s biggest stage, a modern marvel of concrete and steel. The fashionable frieze that encircled the top of the exterior walls added regality and panache […]

A large mural of Roberto Clemente adorns Parque Luis Alfonso Velasquez Flores in Managua, Nicaragua. (Courtesy of Steven A. Melnick, Ph.D.)   New Year’s Day, 1973: As the world awoke to the awful news and details emerged about the accident that claimed Roberto Clemente’s life, fans could only ask why. Why Clemente? Why was such […]

Mickey Mantle is carried off on a stretcher after injuring his knee during the 1951 World Series at Yankee Stadium. (NATIONAL BASEBALL HALL OF FAME LIBRARY)   A batter takes a fastball to the ribs. An outfielder crashes into the wall trying to make a circus catch. A baserunner steps on the side of first […]

Nelson Rockefeller stands with Jackie Robinson, who served as a special assistant on community affairs for the New York Governor in the 1960s.   Between 1960 and 1968, Jackie Robinson was widely regarded as the most famous Black Republican in the country. Following his announced retirement from baseball in January 1957, and in remarkably short […]

I wish that someone had told me when I was 15 years old that Willie Stargell was starting a five-year tear that would transform him from a good home run hitter to one of baseball’s superstars. If they had, I would have taken more mental snapshots of the man who was not yet  “Pops.” While […]

“The disturbed state of the country and the fact that the baseball players are the most largely represented fraternity in the ranks of our volunteers, and to this may be attributed the small number of represented, there being sixty-one answering the roll call,” wrote the Brooklyn Daily Eagle,1 referring to the annual meeting of the […]

You can’t hit it if you can’t see it. Success in baseball requires good visual skills, including being able to see clearly. Many people need glasses or contact lenses. The most common reason for using them before age 40 is myopia (nearsightedness), which affects 20 to 30 percent of young adults in the United States.1,2 […]

Cover of the Arizona Diamondbacks expansion draft program on November 18, 1998. (Photo courtesy of Joel Zolondek)   In the first two decades since major-league baseball granted an expansion bid to Arizona Baseball, Inc., the Arizona Diamondbacks franchise has been characterized by the stability of its leadership. The franchise has had two managing general partners, […]

Urban Shocker, the legendary pitcher who perfected his signature spitball while playing for the Ottawa Senators. (Ottawa Journal, September 10, 1914: 4.)   On a hot afternoon in mid-July 1920, Ottawa-trained spitball pitcher Urban Shocker of the St. Louis Browns found himself at New York City’s Polo Grounds in a showdown with Babe Ruth. At the […]

The Players’ National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs, or Players’ League, completed only one season of competition, 1890, but was the culmination of labor disputes that arose between 1879 and 1889. Professional baseball players were willing to risk future employment — their livelihood — to pry agency from the fists of club owners. The […]

“Hardly anything in America symbolizes a large city more than its National or American League baseball team. To take the Pittsburgh baseball team out of Pittsburgh would be to deprive its people of the opportunity for a spontaneous outburst of civic pride, for which there is no substitute. In fact, it is practically impossible to […]

The first of back-to-back NFL Championships for Baltimore Colts coach Weeb Ewbank (center, suit) and players (left to right) Raymond Berry, Lenny Moore, and John Unitas came at Yankee Stadium in 1958. (Courtesy of the Babe Ruth Museum.)   As the crowd of 64,185 streamed into Yankee Stadium for the 2:00 kickoff on the afternoon […]

Lou Gehrig Played First and Last Games of Consecutive Streak at Yankee Stadium In the July 12, 1999, edition of Sports Illustrated, the magazine listed some memorable dates in the history of Tiger Stadium in Detroit. The item for May 1, 1939, read,”Lou Gehrig played his 2,130th consecutive game—the last of his major league career.” […]