Baseball History

July 12th, 1921: Babe Ruth becomes baseball's all time leading home run hitter. He clears the fence twice off Dixie Davis to pass previous record-holder Roger Connor's total of 136, in the Yankees 6-4 win over the Browns at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. By the time he retired in 1935, the Babe's total would become the iconic number of 714 -- a record that would stand for 39 years until broken by Henry Aaron.
As an aside, if you follow the Yankees to Baltimore for a couple or three games, be sure to visit the Babe Ruth Birthplace Museum, just a few blocks from Camden Yards.

The rest of this date belongs to pitchers:

July 12th, 1975: Steve Carlton's 2000th strikeout victim is Wilbur Howard as the Phillies clobber the Astros 14-2 in Houston. Lefty would eventually more than double that total: his 4136 k's are the most ever among southpaws.

Speaking of pitchers and milestones timestamped 7/12:

1901: Cy Young won his 300th game, as the Boston Americans beat the Philadelphia A's 5-3. Today, it's the point for almost certain Hall of Fame induction... For the pitcher for whom the game's annual award for excellence is named, it's just another day a the office, as Young is barely more than halfway towards his eventual career total of 511 wins!

1951: Allie Reynolds throws the first of his two no-hitters that season, as the Yankee righthander stops the Indians bats cold in a 1-0 victory at Municipal Stadium. Opposed by Bob Feller, who also brought his "A-game," the difference was Gene Woodling's solo homer in the top of the 7th. It's the first of his two no-hitters that season for Reynolds.  The other comes on September 28th against the Red Sox at Yankee Stadium.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rare Remnant of a Lost Ballpark

Image
When the subject of baseball in Brooklyn comes up, the discussion centers around Ebbets Field, the Flatbush venue most famously home to The Boys of Summer.  Those legendary 1940s and '50s teams that featured such historic and beloved players as Jackie Robinson, Duke Snider, Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges. Ebbets Field hosted its last major league game in 1957 and was torn down during the winter of 1960. But decades earlier, just before World War One, the Dodgers were based in the Park Slope area and played at Washington Park.  Once they moved out, the land was occupied by another stadium, which housed a different franchise.  The upstart Federal League, which played in the 1914 and '15 seasons, had a Brooklyn team called the TipTops.  Owned by a local baking magnate Robert Ward, whose company produced TipTop bread, the club took over the abandoned lot along 3rd Street and built a new brick and steel venue. The only no-hitter in the Federal League's two-year r
Read more

Another Yankee Trade

Image
Yankee fans: here's a last look at shortstop Trey Sweeney .  The 2021 first round draft choice was part of the three player trade with the Dodgers that brings reliever Victor Gonzalez and infield prospect Jorbit Vivas to New York. Now seeking to rebuild their pitching depth after dealing for Juan Soto and Alex Verdugo, the Yanks deemed Sweeney expendable.  While the Louisville native showed promising power in his three seasons with the organization -- he batted only .248 to go with his 36 career homers -- Brian Cashman has committed to Anthony Volpe and Oswald Peraza as his young middle infielders.  So Sweeney became a trade chip. ( My images of Trey Sweeney are from the Somerset/Binghamton AA games on July 15th and September 19th, 2023. )
Read more

Will He Wear Zero in the Bronx?

Image
The Yankees bolstered their starting rotation with Thursday's signing of Marcus Stroman .  The Long Island native, who spent 2019 and '21 with the Mets before moving onto the Cubs, brings a 77-76 career record to the Bronx, along with a recent loyalty to uniform number (?) zero.  If he requests that, he'd become the third Yank to wear it, following the path of Adam Ottavino and Domingo German.  Of course, neither of their Yankee tenures ended all that well -- Ottavino struggled badly in 2020, before reviving his career with the Red Sox and Mets; German's alcohol and domestic violence issues sabotaged such Yankee highlights as last year's perfect game. Can a number truly be lucky? You can understand kids in little league or high school ball wanting to wear 2 in honor of Derek Jeter or 7 for Mickey Mantle.  But is there an heroic ballplayer associated with 0?  The closest I recall comes from pro football, where the Oakland Raiders Hall of Fame center Jim Otto wore 00
Read more