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“Long ago when the team was known as the Beaneaters.”  On Wednesday afternoon, June 17, 1953, at Milwaukee’s County Stadium, Warren Spahn, one of baseball’s greatest left-handed pitchers, was on the mound for the Milwaukee Braves to take on the visiting Philadelphia Phillies. While the veteran Spahn already had a celebrated career with four 20-plus-win […]

The 1955 crop of baseball “bonus babies” included Massachusetts native Tom Gastall, born on June 13, 1932, in Fall River, to Thomas and Concetta Gastall. (A “bonus baby” rule was first implemented by the major leagues in 1947, intended to restrict the inflated offers made by wealthy club owners seeking to monopolize the best young […]

Introduction and Context The 1987 winter meetings were held at the Loew’s Anatole Hotel in Dallas, Texas, in the middle of the “collusion era.”1 Collusion is a complex tale and, as such, only a brief summary is presented here. Peter Ueberroth became commissioner of baseball in 1984, after concluding his successful management of the 1984 […]

This article was originally published in SABR’s The National Pastime, Vol. 4, No. 1, in Spring 1985.   THE COURT HOUSE This is that theater the muse loves best. All dramas ever dreamed are acted here. The roles are done in earnest, none in jest. Hero and dupe and villain all appear. Here falsehood skulks […]

The 2014 baseball season’s adoption of expanded instant replay review not only introduced another wrinkle into our national pastime, it opened the door into a brand new arena of statistical analysis over 50 years in the making. Thanks to the adoption of a manager’s challenge system—which MLB has confirmed will remain in place for the […]

This is an excerpt of an article that appeared in the April 1983 issue of Baseball Gold.   If it hadn’t been for “the big gamble,” the 1993 National League baseball season wouldn’t be going on in San Diego. It all goes back to 1935. San Diego wanted to get a franchise in the Pacific […]

During a professional baseball career of 18 seasons spread out over a span of 23 years, Guy Terrell Bush only spent one full season and part of another in Pittsburgh. But with bloody fists and a heart filled with frustration, he left a few marks in the baseball history books while wearing Pirates flannel. In […]

Dodger Stadium has been home to the Los Angeles Dodgers since 1962 (Courtesy of the Los Angeles Dodgers)   Baseball is at one and the same time an idyllic game for children and a gravely serious business for adults. A sport that can be played on a pastoral commons requires, in the world of commerce, […]

Pete Rose provided the nation’s baseball fans with sustained thrills during the summer of 1978 when he made the most serious challenge yet mounted to Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak record with the New York Yankees in 1941. Rose surpassed the modern National League record of 37 consecutive games, set by Tommy Holmes of the […]

The Havana Sugar Kings played in the International League between 1954 and 1960. It was a short existence, but a memorable one. The Sugar Kings began with hopes of a major league franchise, experienced a shooting during a home game and a political revolution, won the International League’s Governor’s Cup and the Junior World Series, […]

If you had asked fans prior to the 1969 baseball season which scenario was more likely—man landing on the moon or the New York Mets wining the world championship—they would probably have been hard-pressed to choose, both being equally improbable. Casey Stengel, original Mets manager and overseer of the ugliest launching of a franchise in […]

The band struck up “Hail the Conquering Heroes Come,” and cheering Philadelphia fans opened a gauntlet at the depot October 24, 1910, to let their victorious Athletics pass through. The A’s had just arrived from Chicago, where they had whipped the Cubs four games to one to win the baseball championship of the world. At […]

“I don’t give a damn about O’Malley.” Hank Greenberg was furious. The 6-foot-4 Hall of Famer towered over Commissioner Ford Frick, who had just told him what he did not want to hear: Before Greenberg could put an American League expansion team in Los Angeles, he would have to pay tribute to Dodgers owner Walter […]

I think that no players in the majors today could conceive of going through what Negro Leaguers did for a chance at a baseball career. At the same time, however, most of the veterans of baseball’s black leagues will say that, if given the chance, they would do it all over again. A statement like […]

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 […]

Willie Mays with the Minneapolis Millers in 1951. (SABR-Rucker Archive)   The New York Giants purchased the Minneapolis Millers in 1946. It took five years for Minneapolis fans to fully process the impact. A charter member of the American Association in 1902, the Millers had a rich history that extended to the final decades of […]

Silas Kenneth Johnson was born in Danway, Illinois on Friday, October 5, 1906. He shared his strong Norwegian heritage with older brother Alvin. Their parents, Nels and Tillie Johnson, added two more male siblings—Jesse and Tilman—to the family roster soon after Si was born. The clan soon migrated to the small town of Marseilles, Illinois, […]

ESPN Radio Chicago Sports Anchor and Talk Show Host Tom Shaer and Hall of Famer Carlton Fisk after Shaer MC’d the August 7, 2005 unveiling of the White Sox’ statue of Fisk at then-U.S. Cellular Field. (Courtesy of Tom Shaer)   In 2005 I was a sports anchor and talk show host at ESPN Radio […]

“If there’s a greater day in the history of Tampa Bay, I don’t know what it is,” proclaimed Tampa Bay Devil Rays principal owner Vince Naimoli on March 20, 1995, the day the American League awarded a franchise to the group he headed.1 After many years of city leaders striving to bring a team to […]

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 […]

Roland Hemond has worked in Organized Baseball since 1951, when he was hired by the Hartford Chiefs, the Boston Braves’ farm club (Class A-Eastern League) for a $28.00-a-week entry-level job. Along the way, Hemond has worked as an executive in the front offices of the Boston/Milwaukee Braves, Los Angeles/California Angels, Chicago White Sox (twice), in […]

Whenever a Negro Leagues veteran is asked about James “Red” Moore, the response is almost automatically: “He could pick it!” Then the player adds anything else that he has to say. Such is the reputation that the Atlanta-born former baseball star earned during his career in the Negro Leagues. Described by Atlanta Daily World sports […]

In the nearly 120-year history of the New York and San Francisco Giants, several of the club’s pitchers have distinguished themselves on Opening Days. “Smiling” Mickey Welch won the franchise opener in 1883, followed by three more first day victories. In 1902, Christy Mathewson’s shutout of Philadelphia snapped the Giants’ losing streak of nine consecutive […]

From the mid-1970s until the Angels won the World Series in 2002, frequent stories of an Angels “curse” or “jinx” appeared in the local and national media. Typically blamed on a rumor that Anaheim Stadium was built on a Native American burial ground, the curse persists to the present day despite the fact that several […]