Lifetime St. Louis Browns

Jeter. Rivera. Mantle. Robinson. Palmer. Ripken. Yaz. Williams. Rice. Musial. Yount. Brett. Schmidt. Bench. Larkin. Banks. Clemente. Feller. Puckett. Gwynn. Over the years, a handful of players have become associated with a ballclub because that was the only team they played for in their career. These are the players who would be held in special […]

Steve Gerkin’s Pickle of a Career

You never know what can happen to a player when he’s called up to the majors. He could go on a hot streak, like Bob “Hurricane” Hazle, who hit .403 for the Milwaukee Braves in 155 plate appearances in 1957, or Duster Mails, called up to Cleveland in 1920 and proceeded to go 7-0 with […]

The Improbable Career of Adolph “Otto” Rettig

The St. Louis Browns had never seen the Philadelphia Athletics starter previously, someone who was listed as “Rettiz” in the scorecard. There was some of the usual razzing of the unknown rookie, but that soon stopped as batter after batter was fooled by the newcomer’s “slow ball.” It was July 19, 1922, and Adolph “Otto” […]

Earl Pruess: The Browns’ “Moonlight” Graham

“Moonlight” Graham is a name which came to the forefront due to the book “Shoeless Joe” and subsequent movie “Field of Dreams.”  Graham, as most know, was a baseball player who got into one game for the New York Giants back in 1905 and never played in the majors again. Graham was not the only […]

John L. Sullivan: Base-Ball Player

John L. Sullivan was largely considered the first heavyweight champion of the bare-knuckle variety and a greatly popular boxer of his era. But Sullivan also played some semi-pro baseball growing up in Boston and had, according to the New York Times, “always been identified with base-ball, and at one time was a promising player.” On […]

2013 Yankees Fall Just Short of 1990 Reds

The New York Yankees opened the 2013 season having won 19 straight games in which they scored first. That streak ended May 21 when the Yankees fell to the Baltimore Orioles in 10 innings. Only two teams had done as well in that regard as New York—the 1990 Reds (20-0) and 1902 Pirates (19-0). That […]

Closers Who Rose And Fell

If John Axford never regains his role as Brewers closer, it would hardly be the first time a reliever amassed a lot of saves (in Axford’s case, a franchise-record 46 in 2011) and then drifted off into the sunset. In fact, the baseball landscape is littered with members of the “rise and fall of the […]

Touring the Bases With…Jim Northrup (May He Rest in Peace)

In 1968, Jim Northrup hit two grand slams in one game and became the first person in history to hit three grand slams in a week (and only the second to hit three in a month). He hit four grand slams that season, plus one more in the World Series. In Game 7 of the […]

It Could Have Been Worse, Milwaukee

Opening day 2011 saw the Milwaukee Brewers suffer an improbable defeat, allowing four runs in the ninth inning – punctuated by a two-out, three-run game-winning home run by Ramon Hernandez – in a 7-6 loss to the Cincinnati Reds. A deflating loss? Yes. Crushing? No doubt. Frustrating? Of course. The worst loss in opening day […]

Shouldn’t 1987 Raise Eyebrows Too?

There has been an increased raising of eyebrows when looking at or comparing statistics of players in the “steroid era,” which began in the early 1990s. Look no further than Mark McGwire to see how these allegations have hurt one’s Hall of Fame chances. We’ll get another example of this in the upcoming election as […]

The Tragic Death of “Big Ed” Morris

If ever a last-place team could have a “stopper” in its pitching staff, then “Big Ed” Morris would qualify. Morris, who earned his nickname by being 6-foot-2 and roughly 185 pounds, was 19-15 with a 3.53 ERA in 1928 for the cellar-dwelling Boston Red Sox (57-96). He appeared in 47 games with 29 starts. Of […]

Steroids and Kids: Trying to Answer the Unanswerable Question

It started with an innocent question, as are all questions which come out of the mouth of an 8-year-old. Except this question cut at the heart of Major League Baseball – past, present and future. I was at Miller Park, attending a Brewers-Cardinals game with my wife and two sons. Up to the plate stepped […]

Touring The Bases With…John Castino

John Castino was selected co-rookie of the year (with Toronto’s Alfredo Griffin) in the American League for 1979 after batting .285 with eight triples. Due to the tie, the voting process (and point system) was changed in 1980. Castino hit .302 in 1980 and led the American League in triples in 1981, but back problems […]

The Day “Sunny Jim” Made History

One of the great things about going to a baseball game is you’ll never know what you will see. Perhaps you might witness a no-hitter or a triple play. Or, as was the case for roughly 8,000 fans in Brooklyn on Sept. 16, 1924, a record which has yet to be broken. Certainly there were […]

Touring the Bases With…George Culver

George Culver pitched for the Cleveland Indians (1966-67), Cincinnati Reds (1968-69), St. Louis Cardinals (1970), Houston Astros (1970-72), Los Angeles Dodgers (1973), Philadelphia Phillies (1973-74), and Nippon Ham Fighters (1975), and tossed a no-hitter in 1968.  He only led the league in one category once in his career – hit batters (1968). In nine seasons, […]

The Life and Death of Carl Weilman

Carl Weilman had about as unlikely a major-league career as one could expect.

Lou Gehrig, St. Louis Brown (Almost)

Following up on a previous post on how Ty Cobb was nearly a Brown, here’s another involving Lou Gehrig.

Ty Cobb and the St. Louis Browns

After the 1926 season, both Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker were involved in a gambling scandal – alleged by Dutch Leonard that they, along with Joe Wood, bet on and fixed the Sept. 25, 1919 game between the Tigers and Indians.

The Fate of 100-Loss Managers

As I watch my Orioles every day creep closer to an inevitable 100 losses (and the probable sayanora to Dave Trembley) I began to wonder about the fates of the other managers over time who lost 100 games in a season.

Fritz Peterson Discusses Infamous Family Swap

For a book I was trying to get published, I wrote to a number of players who had done something interesting in their careers (i.e. threw a no-hitter, led the league in homers, etc.), but weren’t Hall of Famers. I wrote to Fritz Peterson about his 20-win season and one All-Star game appearance (in which […]

Whatever Happened to the 1944 St. Louis Browns?

This is the second of a two-part series in which the author shares material that was meant to appear in his book, As Good As It Got: The 1944 St. Louis Browns, published by Arcadia in 2003, but was left out due to space constraints.  Part one, “Gray Times for the Browns,” can be found […]

Gray Times for the Browns

In 1944, the St. Louis Browns became the last of the 16 major league teams to make their first World Series appearance. The Browns, who made it to the World Series by sweeping the Yankees on the final weekend of the season, lost to the cross-town Cardinals four games to two.