Category: August

Aug 6 in baseball history: One of the Greatest Pitching Duels of all-time

AUGUST 6, 1952 | ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI – Satchel Paige got a rare start on this date in 1952, and ended up in one of the greatest pitching duels of all-time against Virgil Trucks.

Despite the consensus among players, black and white, who played with and against him that he was the greatest pitcher of his day, Paige didn’t make the majors until after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947.

Paige had been playing professional baseball in the Negro Leagues since the mid-1920’s. He was finally invited to play for the Cleveland Indians in 1948. He was 41.

Paige pitched mostly relief. But on August 6, 1952, now with the St. Louis Browns, he got the start against Detroit Tiger right-hander . They were two cagey veterans; though Paige had 10 years on Trucks. Virgil was 35 years old. Satchel was 45.

They matched each other pitch for pitch, inning for inning. Trucks pitched 9 scoreless innings. Paige pitched 12 and won 1-0.

Satchel Paige’s long overdue major league career lasted six seasons. He went 6-1 with a 2.48 ERA in his first year, helping the Cleveland Indians win the 1948 World Series. He retired in 1953 at the age of 46, but came back to pitch in one game in 1965 at the age of 58. His career mark was 28-31, but three of those years were with the Browns who usually lost 100 games a year. He finished with a career Earned Run Average of 3.29.

CONTRIBUTING SOURCE:
August 6, 1952 Tigers vs Browns game stats

Aug 5 in baseball history: First game on the radio

August 5, 1921 | PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA – Major league baseball was heard on the radio for this first time on this date in 1921. KDKA radio studio announcer Harold Arlin became the first play-by-play man as he described the Pittsburgh Pirates‘ 8-5 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies from Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Baseball and radio – they said it wouldn’t last.

Not everyone in major league baseball welcomed the exposure on this new medium called “radio.” Many were concerned games on radio would keep fans at home rather than at the ballpark, an observation that seems shortsighted today.

Staff at KDKA looked at that first broadcast as a one-time thing; baseball would be too slow moving to become regular programming. It turned out radio’s intimacy made it and baseball an ideal match.

Radio’s portability helped too; at home, in the car, at the office, a transistor radio under the pillow. Still, it took years for many teams to recognize the marketing ability of broadcasting games. It was 1938 before major league games were regularly broadcast in New York City, the country’s largest market.

CONTRIBUTING SOURCES:
“Radio and its impact on the sports world,” by Eric C. Covil  
Baseball’s future

Aug 3 in baseball history: Let’s Play Two All-star games

AUGUST 3, 1959 | LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA • The Major League Baseball all-star game was such a hit since it was introduced in Chicago in 1933, many people thought, ‘Let’s play two all-star games.’ For four seasons that’s what was done.

A second MLB all-star game was played on this date in 1959. Dual classics were the norm for four seasons – 1959, 1960, 1961 and 1962. The American League won this contest in front of 55,105 fans at the Los Angeles Coliseum, avenging a National League victory on July 7th at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The LA Coliseum (predominantly a football stadium) was the home of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who came to the west coast in 1958, while Dodger Stadium was being built.

The pitchers of record for this second mid-summer classic were the starters. Jerry Walker of the Baltimore Orioles won it for the American League. Dodger Don Drysdale, pitching in front of his hometown fans, was the loser for the National League.

Jerry Walker was a 20-year old rising star with an 8-4 record at the time of the second all-star game. He never became the kind of star this all-star game foreshadowed. Walker never won more than eight games in any season and finished his eight year major league career with a record of 34 and 44.

The highlights of the 1959 all-star game were the introductions of superstars Stan Musial of the St. Louis Cardinals and Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox, both were reaching the ends of their careers. Both would end up in the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.

CONTRIBUTING SOURCES:
The Associated Press, August 4, 1959, Los Angeles, CA
1959 All-star games

OTHER STUFF – An excellent series of articles on Midwest Ballparks in Chicago Magazine by Jeff Ruby: “Playing the Fields”

Aug 2 in baseball history: Thurman Munson was indestructible, until this day in 1979

August 2, 1979 | AKRON, OHIO – Thurman Munson was a rock, a catcher, the face of the New York Yankees in the 1970s. Thurman Munson was indestructible, until this day in 1979.

Thursday, August 2, 1979 was a rare day off for Yankee captain. The Yankees played in Chicago against the White Sox the night before and wouldn’t play again until Friday night in New York. Chicago’s game would be Munson’s last.

He headed home to Canton, Ohio after Wednesday night’s game. Thursday afternoon Munson was practicing take-offs and landings at the Akron-Canton airport. He’d recently bought a twin engine Cessna Citation plane so he could get home to his wife and three children more easily.

At 4:02pm, while making an approach to the runway the plane crashed about 1,000 short. An investigation determined the crash was due to pilot error.

Thurman Munson played 11 years for the Yankees. He was the starting catcher for ten of those. He was a seven-time all-star who led the Yankees to three World Series – winning two of them. Munson finished his career with a .292 batting average, 113 home runs and 701 RBI. Three times he drove in over 100 runs. His leadership was immeasurable.

Thurman Munson was indestructible, until this day in 1979. Pilot error? It doesn’t compute.

Contributing Sources:
Thurman Munson Bio 

Aug 25: Minor draws a million

AUGUST 25, 1983 | LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY • A million fans can’t be wrong. The Louisville Redbirds became the first minor league baseball team to draw more than a million fans in a season on this date in 1983. Not long before that, a million was considered good for a major league team.

Louisville, the St. Louis Cardinals’ triple-A team, reached 1,006,103 in attendance with a crowd of more than 31,000. The Redbirds outdrew three major league teams that year – the Cleveland Indians (768,941), Seattle Mariners (813,537) and Minnesota Twins (858,939).

Minor league baseball experienced an attendance renaissance at the end of the 20th Century and beginning of the 21st. According milb.com, the official website of minor league baseball, minor league baseball draws more fans than the NBA or the NFL. By drawing 39.8 million in 2004 it broke the total attendance record of 39.6 million fans set in 1949.  Minor League attendance peaked in 2008 at 43.2 million.

While attendance has dropped in the last decade or so, it remains above 40 million each year.

[Minor league baseball does not include numerous independent leagues around the country that are not associated with major league teams.]

Contributing Sources:
Minor League attendance 2016
Minor League Baseball history
Major League Baseball attendance