The Lone Homer

Some leagues were known as hitters leagues, where a pitcher with a 4.00 ERA might end up winning the ERA title. Some leagues are known as pitchers leagues, where a hitter hitting .299 could win the batting title. Some leagues start out on one side and several years later they will be the other.

The 1952 Georgia-Florida League was most certainly a pitchers league. How can you tell? On July 3, the Cordele A's traveled to Brunswick, Georgia to play the Brunswick Pirates. In the fourth inning, they sent Ralph "Froggy" Betcher to the plate with the bases loaded. A wild pitch and 2 of the Pirates 6 errors on the day emptied the bases, before Betcher homered. It was his first home run of the season. The blast gave him the team lead by himself. Betcher won the team home run title with the one home run. Thats right, the A's hit 1 home run in 139 games.

Perhaps the A's had a power shortage in their lineup? After all the Valdosta Dodgers and the Waycross Bears had 15 home runs each. Three clubs with a combined 31 home runs? How about 4 clubs combining for 56 home runs. The entire league had 186 home runs and batted .242. The Thomasville Tomcats lead the league with 42 home runs. only 12 hitters in the whole league cleared .300 with their batting average. If you were a hitter this was not the league that you wanted to play in.

Tomorrow we will look at a Fourth of July bonfire or two.

Another long game

A hundred years ago, one of the leading outlaw leagues was the California State League. The league had clubs around the San Francisco Bay Area and the surrounding areas. In 1905 the league had 6 clubs, two from San Francisco and one each from Fresno, Lodi, Stockton and San Jose. On July 2, 1905, the Stockton Poppies hosted the Lodi Melon Rollers at Oak Park in Stockton. The Poppies sent Frank Ferguson to the mound to face Frank Ingalls of the Melon Rollers. The game took 3:26 and 23 innings before the Poppies won the game by a score of 1-0. Both pitchers went all the way.

Tomorrow we look at a team that hit one home run in a 140 game season.

Womens League History

Major League Baseball played their first All-Star game in 1933. Many leagues quickly followed suit. The All-American Girls Softball League was no exception. They played their first all-game on July 1, 1943 at Wrigley Field in Chicago, Illinois. The game featured players on the Kenosha Comets and the Racine Belles against the Rockford Peaches and the South Bend Blue Sox. The Wisconsin squad won the game by a score of 16-0.

Exactly 49 years to the day later, the film "A League of Their Own" came out in theatres. The 1992 movie starred Tom Hanks, Geena Davis and Madonna. I am not a fan of Madonna. I have however, spoken with several of the AAGBL players, who coached the cast in how to look like a ballplayer. They all agreed that in the beginning Madonna did not look like a player in the beginning. They said she worked very hard before filming and came out very well in this film. I agree, good job!!

Tomorrow we will look at a 23 inning game.

Follow along please

Usually when a sports team moves from one city to another in midseason, its a fairly easy thing. A team either has poor attendance or their home burns down or even their owner goes broke, then the team finds a new team, gets league permision and starts playing home games in a new city.

Whatever you do, do not tell William Buckley of the Watertown-Massena Club of the Canadian-American League. Buckley was the clubs Business Manager. The team began the season in Watertown, New York. On June 24, 1936 the club began playing their home games in Massena, New York. On June 30, Buckley announced that the club was being transferred to Massena for the remainer of the season. Now keep your eye on the team, where it stops nobody knows. On July 12, the club played a home game, where else?? Watertown, of course. On July 16, Buckley announced that the club would remain in Watertown for the remainer of the season. The biggest thing was that Buckley had never submitted the proper paperwork to the National Association for them to approve the move in the first place. Perhaps he should have paid more attention to how the team was doing on the field as they finished the season with a 35-52 record.

Tomorrow we look at events making history in the All-American Girls League.

One for the books

Baseball games have been postponed for many reasons over the years. Games have been postponed by rain, snow, high winds, excessive cold, fog, invasions and even games postponed by the events of 9-11.

In 1943 the Class E Twin Ports League was struggling to get its four clubs on the playing field despite a very wet spring. By June 29, only 19 of 36 scheduled league games were played. with the wet spring make up games had to be scheduled. The Superior Bayfronters were scheduled to play a game against the Duluth Heralds, one of three clubs in the league from Duluth, Minnesota. The game was forced into the postponement column because league officials failed to consult with the softball league that had the rights to the field before they scheduled the game. when the softball league refused to give the field up, the teams were forced to postpone. League officials were careful after this as only one more league game had to postponed. Unfortunately, it was a little too by then. Three weeks later the league failed. Its place in history as the only Class E to hit the playing field was assured.

Tomorrow we look at a strange franchise shift.

How many records were set?

Professional Baseball was still in its first season of league play when the Philadelphia Athletics Club went to Haymakers Grounds in Troy, New York to play the Troy Haymakers on June 28, 1871. To set the may have set a few records is an understatement, a rather large understatement. Some of the records set that day, stand to this day in the annuals of all of professional baseball history.

So lets get started, first the Athletic Club scored 49 runs, that record stood for almost 31 years. They are still second all-time for runs scored in a single game. The Haymakers scored 33 runs, that record for a losing club still stands. The Athletics out hit the Haymakers 42-32. Both clubs committed 10 errors. Both clubs scored in every inning. The stats for this game were staggering, especially for a game with only 19 players. Sometime during the game, the Athletics chnaged rightfielders. Although he gave 49 runs, Haymaker pitcher John F. McMullen continued in the game, batting sixth and going 3 for 6 with 3 runs scored and 2 RBIs. Athletic pitcher Dick McBride batted second and went 4 for 8 with 7 runs scored and 2 RBIs. 18 players in the haad at least one hit, one run scored and one RBI, only the Athletics replaced rightfielder failed to get an RBI. Only one inning saw a team score in double figures as the Haymakers fourth inning when they scored 10 runs. That must of been a make up for the one run first inning, the only such inning in the game when the Athletics outscored them 2-1.

A game like this today, would take alot longer then 3 hours and 55 minutes to play. The game sure has changed over the years. My gracious thanks to folks at Retrosheet for this one. Tomorrow we look at a weird postponement.

Boxing meets Baseball

Gentleman James Corbett was a great boxer at the end of the 19th century. He was a man who knew how to promote himself. His brother Joe played baseball. In 1895 the two brothers, though 9 years apart in age, they played in a couple of minor leagues together. Over the next few years Gentleman James played one or two games for as many as 29 teams in nine different leagues. On June 27, 1900 he played for the Binghamton Crickets in a game against the Oswego Pirates in a 2-1 win for the Crickets. It is not yet known for sure exactly how many games that he played as the teams for which he played for have not yet fully documented. What better way for a boxer to promote himself was to convince baseball fans, to be boxing fans then to play a few games of ball himself. He must of knew what he was doing.

Tomorrow we look at a very high scoring Baseball game.