Baseball’s Best Runners-Up: 1885-86 National League

This is the first of several articles on teams through baseball history who had tremendous years, only to be overshadowed by an even better team in the same season.

1885 New York Giants

85-27, .760 winning percentage; 2 ^nd place to Chicago White Stockings (87-25)

Rarely have two teams dominated a regular season the way the Chicago White Stockings and New York Giants dominated the National League in 1885. The two clubs finished 1-2 in nearly every single important statistical category, including runs scored, runs against, hits, batting average, OPS plus and ERA plus. Chicago outscored its opponents by a ridiculous 364 runs in 112 games, the Giants by 321. The only other team in the National League with a positive run differential was Philadelphia, who checked in at +2 on the year. Predictably, there was a gap of 28 games between second and third place. The pennant race went down to the final week of October and a frenzied four game series in Chicago. Unfortunately, if second place is indeed the first loser, the New York Giants just might be the best loser in baseball history.

The Giants had a star-studded group in 1885 that put a special emphasis on defense and pitching. Star hurlers ‘Smiling Tim’ Keefe and ‘Smiling Mickey’ Welch were both in the prime of their careers, and coming off of 37 and 39 win seasons, respectively. On the offensive side, they were supported by catcher Buck Ewing and 1B Roger Connor, who had combined for an OPS plus of 141 the year before. Connor had been obliged to move to first base after the 1884, when regular first baseman Alex McKinnon signed with the St. Louis Maroons. Roaming in the outfield was Jim O’Rourke, still effective at 34 years of age. Offensively, the infield was the team’s weak link, but they compensated for their light hitting with outstanding defensive play. Shortstop John Ward, third baseman Dude Esterbrook and second baseman Joe Gerhardt all recorded fielding percentages and Range Factors above league average. Overall, the Giants committed 331 errors in 1885; six of the other seven teams in the National League committed 440 or more. With two future Hall of Famers on the mound and four behind them on the field, any team coming to play in the Polo Grounds was bound to find runs hard to come by.

In any other year, New York would likely have been the runaway favorite for the pennant. It was their misfortune, however, to be matched against an equally imposing Chicago squad. The Sox had finished in fifth place in 1884, but returned a lineup of frightening potency, led by Cap Anson, King Kelly, George Gore and Abner Dalrymple. Along with slugging second baseman Fred Pfeffer, the foursome had all posted OPS+ scores over 150 the year before, and six of the eight starters were between 25 and 28 years old. On the mound was young gun John Clarkson, taking over for Larry Corcoran as the team’s ace. If any team had the sheer muscle to defeat the stingy Giants, it was Chicago. As it turned out, their offense would not be enough—New York beat Chicago 10-6 in the 1885 season series. Amazingly, the White Stockings won the pennant anyway.

In the season opener, Mickey Welch tossed a one-hitter against Boston to get the year off with a bang, and Keefe replicated the feat a week later against Providence. After the first month of the 1886 season, the Giants had a 2.5 game lead on Chicago. They had scored 10 or more runs in 8 of their 21 games, including a 24-0 pasting of Buffalo on May 27. They had also helped their cause by taking three out of four head-to-head matchups with the White Stockings. New York continued to win regularly in June, but scored only 107 runs in the month, compared to 160 in May. The Sox, meanwhile, celebrated the opening of West Side Park with a wild winning streak that lasted nearly the entire month of June, and moved into first place on June 10. After beating Philadelphia 12-2 on June 24 for their eighteenth straight victory, they held a 2.5 game lead on New York, but losses in their next two games chopped the lead back to half a game.

The two teams had not met during Chicago’s streak, and when they did face each other again at the beginning of July, the Giants again took three of four. Chicago responded, however, by winning 14 of 15, while New York lost 7 games in July, more than in any other month. Back to back defeats at the hands of the Maroons on July 8-9 represented the first time all season long that the Giants had lost games consecutively. The team made a valiant push in August, going 18-3 and and yet again topping Chicago three times out of four. Meanwhile, the Sox bent but did not break. After seeing their lead dwindle to half a game on the last day of August, they went on an explosive six-game run in which they outscored their opponents 64-27. When New York lost a pair in Philadelphia on August 5 and 7, Chicago was able to boost its margin back to three games.

As the teams sparred down the stretch, it became apparent that their four-game stand in the second-to-last week of the season would prove crucial. Although the games were to take place in Chicago, the challengers must have liked their chances, having taken nine of twelve in the season series thus far. As it turned out, the Sox had learned their lesson well, and were able to protect their home field and their lead by taking the first three contests, ballooning their lead to five games with only five to play. New York won the finale, but Chicago clinched the pennant by pummeling the Quakers on October 6. The teams ended with final records of 87-25 and 85-27. As mentioned above, no other team in the league had even approached either of them the entire season long. To illustrate the point—New York had taken the season series from Buffalo 15-1, outscoring them 150-38; Chicago, meanwhile, had beaten the lowly Bisons all 16 times by a cumulative count of 138-59.

Looking back at their 1885 campaign, the Giants had displayed a rare combination of superior pitching and hitting. On the mound, Keefe and Welch both pitched 400 innings, combining for 76 wins, 485 strikeouts and a 1.62 ERA. The offense featured four players with an OPS+ over 140, led by Roger Connor at 198. Connor topped the league with a .371 average, Jim O’Rourke scored 119 runs, and the defense again allowed fewer runs than any other team.

Out west, Chicago had fully lived up to its preseason expectations. Dalrymple, Gore and Kelly all had monster years, with OPS+ marks of 136, 161 and 140, respectively. Captain Anson led the league in RBIs with 108, easily outpacing second place finisher Kelly (75), and three other teammates in the top six. Pitcher Clarkson, meanwhile, put together a season that was astounding even by contemporary standards. In his first full big league campaign, he threw 624 innings in 70 starts, 68 of which he completed. By way of comparison, New York’s Welch came in second in all three of these categories with 492 IP and 55 complete games in 55 starts. Clarkson also led the NL with 10 shutouts and 53 wins and spun a no-hitter on July 27. It was Chicago’s fourth pennant in six years. After the regular season, they matched up with the St. Louis Browns, champions of the American Association, for a seven-game challenge. Game 1 was called due to darkness after eight innings with the score tied. The teams would split the next six, leading to an tie and a sharing of the championship. It was an unpleasant result for Chicago, but Anson was returning his squad intact the following season, and hoped to make amends.

1886 Detroit Wolverines

87-36, .700 winning percentage; 2 ^nd place to the Chicago White Stockings (90-34)

The first big moment of the Detroit Wolverines’ 1886 season actually came on September 17, 1885, when owner Josiah Jewett sold his hapless Buffalo Bisons to Detroit for $7,000. In fact, the Bisons weren’t all that bad- until several weeks previous, they’d had Pud Galvin pitching, before he was sold to Pittsburgh in July. The Bisons still had one of the greatest hitting infields of all time: Hall of Fame first baseman Dan Brouthers (.359 BA in 1885), second baseman Hardy Richardson (.319) third baseman Deacon White (.292) and shortstop Jack Rowe (.290). The unexpected offensive infusion was warmly welcomed in Detroit, where the home team had suffered through a 41-67 record, 44 games behind the juggernaut Chicago White Stockings. Between the new additions and the remaining Wolverines, the 1886 Detroit squad was formidable to say the least:

Handling the pitching duties were Charles ‘Lady’ Baldwin and Charlie Getzien, who’d taken his lumps the year before, throwing 330 innings at the age of 21.

The Wolverines’ new acquisitions immediately established them as a threat to win the 1886 pennant. The champs from Chicago, however, had kept their team intact, and had to be considered the favorites. Returning were Anson, Dalrymple, Kelly, and Gore in the field, and McCormick and Clarkson on the mound. New York also had most of its team back, but did not have the offensive firepower to compete with Detroit and Chicago. Furthermore, their pitchers did not remain at the stratospheric levels of 1885. After having won the season series against Chicago in 1885, they were bested in 1886 by the White Stockings as well as the Wolverines.

It was crucial for Detroit to start the year off right, and that’s exactly what they did. Over the first 43 games of the season (out of 123), from April 29 to June 28, they posted a record of 36-7. Included was a 15-game winning streak in the month of May. However, when they finally lost on May 31 ^st to end the run, their lead over Chicago stood at only one game! Over the same 43 game stretch, the White Stockings had gone 32-10. The teams had split their six head-to-head contests, each winning twice at home and once on the road.

At the halfway mark of the season, the Wolverines were 48-13, putting them three games on top of the Sox. This lead, however, would not last the month of August, which saw Detroit lose 13 out of 23, including two at home to Chicago. Their opponents seized the opportunity with a 17-6 mark in the same month. On the first day of September, Chicago was two games up and in the midst of a 14-game winning streak. Detroit responded with several inspired stretches of their own, and on October 7, with two days left in the season, they closed the gap to a single game by beating the Philadelphia Quakers 11-0 in the opener of a three-game series. The White Stockings were in Boston, playing the Beaneaters. Both teams lost on the 8 ^th , setting the stage for the final day of the year. Detroit had a double-header but Chicago was only playing one. A Wolverines sweep and a White Stockings loss would have lifted Detroit back into first. Alas, it was not to be- Chicago handled the Beaneaters 12-3, while Detroit was beaten twice, 5-1 and 6-1.

Detroit finished the year 87-36, a .707 winning percentage that translates to 113 wins in a 162-game season. Baldwin had emerged as the staff ace, winning 42 ball games against only 13 losses with a 2.24 ERA. At the plate, Brouthers somehow managed to top his 1885 season by batting .370 and posting a 206 OPS plus. He thus became the first player to record an OPS plus over 200 in consecutive seasons. Only six other players have done so since: Rogers Hornsby, Babe Ruth, Jimmie Foxx, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle and Barry Bonds. Mid-season pick-up Fred Dunlap had provided excellent play at 2B and allowed Richardson to move to the outfield, while Bennett, Hanlon and Thompson had fine years as well. The team’s downfall had been their head-to-head record against their stiffest competition; they lost 11 out of 18 against Chicago, including a July sweep.

On the other side of Lake Michigan, the Sox had again been led by Captain Anson, who knocked in 52 more runs than the next nearest finisher, teammate Fred Pfeffer. Anson, Gore and Kelly appeared near the top of the leaderboard in most major offensive categories, while Clarkson, McCormick and Jocko Flynn combined for all 90 of the team’s wins and a 2.49 ERA. Flynn, a promising young right hander, unfortunately blew out his arm and never pitched again. He holds the record for most victories (23) by a pitcher in his only season.

Ironically, Chicago would again fail to win the post-season matchup with the American Association champion, losing a 4-2 series to the St. Louis Browns. This was likely little consolation to Dan Brouthers’ Wolverines. Chicago’s post-season struggles notwithstanding, the 1886 Wolverines, like the 1885 Giants, have ever since been hidden in the shadow cast by Cap Anson’s dominant club.

Sources: baseball-reference.com, baseballlibrary.com/chronology.