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On May 31, 1884 the Altoona Unions disbanded; club president Lucas arranged for their best players to be transferred to Kansas City. As an inducement for Kansas City to pick up Altoona’s schedule, the results of all previous Altoona games were cancelled. The new Unions started with a clean slate. A.V. McKim, the Kansas City […]
The Callaghan sisters, Helen (left) and Margaret. (British Columbia Sports Hall of Fame) The young women gathered on the grass in Chicago shagged flies and fielded grounders. They played scrub games under the watchful eyes of coaches. Even the practice games were not without incident, as Gladys “Terrie” Davis, a batting star in Toronto’s […]
The underlying aggressiveness in rivalries between baseball teams has been recorded in the annals and burned into our memories for decades. Fans hear yarns about Ty Cobb’s boiling temperament and witness bench-clearing brawls. When that explosive competitive spirit spreads from the field to the fanatics in the streets, the result can be drunken fist-fights at […]
Adrian C. Anson, who rose to national prominence as captain of the Chicago White Stockings, was the first of what is now a long list of baseball players who succumbed to the lure of the footlights. Anson made his theatrical debut in 1895 in a production called A Runaway Colt. Arguably the most famous baseball […]
WHAT’s in a name? If it’s a baseball team’s name, there’s a story in it. The story of what to call Washington, D.C., baseball teams (except “last in the American League”) began in confusion and remained that way for almost a hundred years. Professional league baseball began in Washington in 1871, with the Olympic Base […]
What’s in a name? If it’s a baseball team’s name, there’s a story in it. The story of what to call Washington, D.C., baseball teams (except “last in the American League”) began in confusion and remained that way for almost a hundred years. Professional league base ball began in Washington in 1871, with the Olympic […]
Gus Greenlee, in hat and tie, shown here with some members of his Pittsburgh Crawfords team. (SABR-Rucker Archive) The United States Negro Baseball League is mostly known for its minor role in the Jackie Robinson story. It was famously backed by Branch Rickey in 1945, possibly for use as a cover for the Brooklyn […]
There can be little doubt that compared to pitching and hitting, fielding is the most vastly under-analyzed part of the game. There is very good reason to hope that the greatest advances in our understanding of the game through statistics will come in the area of fielding measures.
Birmingham Black Barons center fielder Willie Mays was not originally who scout Ed Montague was looking at for the New York Giants.1 On Alex Pompez’s recommendation to the Giants’ director of minor league operations, Jack Schwartz, he was looking at Barons first baseman Alonzo Perry for the Sioux City (Iowa) Soos, the Giants’ Class-A affiliate […]
INTRODUCTION Pitchers are a breed apart. On average, they are taller and heavier than most players; contrary to their fielding brethren, they do not play every day; even the most resilient of relievers have to sit out half of their team’s games or risk burning out their arms, and most starters will work only every […]
This article was originally published in “St. Louis’s Favorite Sport,” the 1992 SABR convention journal. There was a time in baseball history when exhibition games meant something. There was a time when rival teams met each other on the field of play, and even though the exhibition contests did not figure in the regular […]
Pete Rose’s reputation is built on two pillars: he has more hits than any player in history and he helped his teams immeasurably with his hustle. The first is a fact; the second is a complete misimpression. Rose was not much of a hitter and only an average offensive player. He didn’t create runs, he […]
In the summer of 1972 I was a 16-year-old pitcher for my American Legion team in Las Vegas, Nevada. That summer our team traveled to Southern California to play American Legion teams in the Los Angeles area. We won a few games, and we lost a few games. But the highlight of the trip was […]
Since the formation of the National League in 1876, many cities have failed to retain their major league teams. Fifteen such cities were represented in the majors before 1900. Most cities persevered in the minor leagues, but only Troy, New York suffered longer without professional baseball than Altoona, Pennsylvania, whose sole stint in the majors […]
The 1985 Winter Meetings had showcased a then-record 62 free agents, but the 1986 free-agent class shattered that mark as 82 players filed for free agency by the deadline.1 Despite the uptick in the number of free agents, however, for the second year in a row none of them signed with a new club at […]
On the southwest side of Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky, lies a plain granite marker with a slightly misspelled inscription, the gravesite pathetically guarded by a twisted sweet-bay magnolia tree. Buried there in lot #549 is Louis Rogers “Pete” Browning, whose occupation at the time of his death on September 10, 1905, at age […]
Introduction The most important labor arbitration decision of all time involved baseball, two pitchers and one of the finest labor arbitrators of all time, a true arbitration “superstar.” His 1975 decision in baseball’s Messersmith case still reverberates throughout the multibillion-dollar sports industry. Arbitrator Seitz set the players free. Peter Seitz was a role model for […]
This essay is intended as an exploratory survey of baseball players of the 1880s, what they did in the offseason, and how — or if — they planned for their future economic security. The purpose is to examine how the individuals of this era responded to the economic opportunities offered by their baseball careers and […]
Introduction and Context In 1937, both the National and the American Leagues held their Winter Meetings in Chicago, while the National Association met a few days earlier in Milwaukee. Rumors aplenty swirled around these gatherings, but very few teams actually pulled the trigger and made significant deals. The deals that did take place, however (and […]
Who is the greatest catcher to have ever played in the major leagues? Some might say it is Yogi Berra or Johnny Bench or Roy Campanella. The answer depends on what one uses as a measure of greatness. There have been numerous measures used or proposed 1 and numerous lists 2 ranking the great backstops. […]
Not many fans are still around who remember when the Chicago Cubs compiled the best ten-year record in major league baseball history over the past century. That’s because it happened from 1903 through 1912. The Windy City Cubs—yes, those Cubs who haven’t made it to the World Series since 1945—won 980 games way back then […]
On February 20, 1859, William Cauldwell, National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP) convention delegate and secretary of the Union Base Ball Club of Morrisania, NABBP Rules Committee member, and editor/publisher of the New York Sunday Mercury, printed a notice of the Association’s impending second annual convention, scheduled to open on March 9. The notice […]
In slightly over a century of professional baseball history, seven major league clubs have attained a winning average of .750 or better for a single season. Five of those teams were relatively easy victors against little better than nominal opposition as shown by the following table. Year Club League Won Lost Pct. Games Ahead […]
SABR Online On July 19, 1995, the SABR-L listserv went public, when around 600 SABR members with email addresses were added to the SABR-L list and welcomed by John Gregory, the first chair of the Internet Committee. SABR-L was begun in order for SABR members not only to have a forum for the exchange of […]