On June 26, 1975, professional gambler Barney Curley pulled off one of the most famous betting coups in all of sports. With careful planning and skillful execution, Curley and his compatriots won just over IR£300,000 (or about $2.6 million today) on the “slow but steady” mostly unknown horse named Yellow Sam. Curley’s father, Charlie, had been a grocer before sinking […]

Mitchell asks: Why is home plate shaped different than other bases? Oftentimes the most exciting part of a baseball game is the competition between the pitcher and the batter. The pitcher stares down the batter as he adjusts his grip on the ball and prepares for the most perfect pitch his arm can throw; the batter returns the pitcher’s glare […]

Bert Trautmann was born October 22, 1923 in Bremen, Germany. Blue-eyed and blond haired, Trautmann was the product of a tumultuous political climate within the post-World War I country. He grew up surrounded by Nazi-ideology, including blaming the Jews for the country’s economic problems and believing certain Germans, such as himself, were members of the “master race.” So it’s not […]

Birds chirping, Sun shining, temperatures warming, and the smacking of a baseball hitting a glove – ah, the sights and sounds of spring. Okay, maybe up north and on the east coast, they are still digging out from the latest snowstorm, but those signs of the changing season aren’t far away. On the west coast and down south, the annual […]

On a field about fifty miles from Boston, Strawberry Hill, on the evening of September 3, 1880, history was made. It is unlikely the department store employees who were tossing around a ball knew that this game would still be talked about 135 years later. As the crowd took their seats, the ball players took their positions; the Sun dipped […]

Denny G. asks: Why do baseball managers wear the team’s uniform instead of a suit or something like that like you see in other sports? It especially seems weird because managers in baseball seem to universally let themselves go after their playing days are over and tubby old men do not look good in sports uniforms! Football coaches wear clothes […]

On April 15, 1947 in Brooklyn, New York, the great Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier and became the first African-American in 67 years to play in the Major Leagues. (Yes, Robinson was not the first, as is often stated.) Less than three months later, on July 5, 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio, Larry Doby became the second African-American ball player […]

Kevin A. asks: I was just wondering how Felix Hernandez became known as “King”? The religious Abraham was commanded by God to leave his homeland and travel to a distant, already occupied, place in which Abraham would eventually rule with the aid of divine blessing. Maybe it was fate that Felix Abraham Hernandez, born in Venezuela, would come to baseball’s […]