The Flying Dutchman was a German

     Johannes Peter Wagner was born on February 24, 1874 in suburban Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to German parents. As a young boy he dropped out of school and worked in the local coal mines. In his off time he and his brothers enjoyed playing baseball. Johannes frequently went by the nickname of "Honus". Honus was described as barrel chested, massive shoulders, muscular armed, bow legged 5'11", 200 lbs with huge hands.

    After several stops in the minor leagues, he made his major league debut on July 19, 1897 with the Louisville Colonels. The Colonels won the game against the Washington Nationals by the score of 6-2. At the end of the 1899 seasons both clubs folded and Wagner moved on to the Pittsburgh Pirates. He had all the tools required for success, a great hitter (3,418 hits and 8 batting titles) a great baserunner (722 stolen bases, thus the nickname "The Flying Dutchman" from the word for a german Deutsch)  A long career with the Pirates included many highlights including two World Series.

   Wagner retired with many records to his credit. One of his proudest moments was the 1936 announcement that he was one of the first 5 players to elected the newly created Baseball Hall of Fame. Many of his contempories called him the greatest shortstop to ever play the game.

     In answering yesterdays trivia question about the four Canadian cities that have had teams in both Baseball's International League and the American Hockey League, the first two should have been really easy guesses, those cities being Montreal and Toronto. The other two cities should have difficult for all but the most hardcore of sports fans to simply guess, those cities are Hamilton, Ontario and Winnipeg, Manitoba. If you guessed those two correctly, you are either a Canadian who is a big long time fan of both leagues or you have been spending time reading my league histories.

   Todays trivia question is how many teams played in the 1987-88 season of the Continental Basketball Association? Bonus question, which one of those teams played in the league the longest? The answers will be posted as part of tomorrows daily blog about Cassius Clay meets Sonny Liston.