2 outs, bottom of 9th THEN 7 runs scored to win 16-15

While going through the 1888 AA Cleveland lineups, I ran across an interesting ending to a game that I wanted to go ahead and post.

On June 2, Cleveland led 15-9 going to the bottom of the 9th (Cleveland chose to bat 1st) and was within 1 out of a 6 run victory before all heck broke loose, KC scored 7 runs and won 16-15.

Cleveland's Doc Oberlander was by no means having a smooth game in this battle of tail enders, having already given up 9 runs

This is how it went for KC against Oberlander in the fateful 9th:

1.  Barkley singles to center
2.  Davis pops to catcher Zimmer (1 out)
3  Phillips pops to shortstop Alberts (2 outs)
4  Rowe singles to right (Barkley to 2nd or 3rd)
5  Daniels singles to center (Barkley scores, Rowe to 2nd or 3rd)  10-15
6  Allen triples to left (Rowe and Daniels score) 12-15
7  Easterday walks
8  Toole doubles past shortstop (Allen and Easterday score)  14-15
9  McTamany triples over cf Hoteling's head (Toole scores)  15-15
10 Barkley singles along 3rd base line (McTamany scores)  16-15


Not sure where this stands in regards to comeback win probability (or whatever it is called), but I would think it would be up there - down 6 with 2 outs in the bottom of the 9th and winning.

As the saying goes,  "it ain't over 'til it's over".

This would be Doc Oberlander's final game (of 4 total) of his major league career.  He did pitch a couple more seasons in minors.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=oberla001doc


Will have my Cleveland review up in a few days.

1888 AA St. Louis

Next up, the AA Champion St. Louis Brown Stockings.

Primary Source: St. Louis Republic (GeneologyBank.com)

Had batter k's in about 72 of 82 games (88.2 %).   GeneologyBank.com does not have the Republic for April, so I maybe able to get a few more games once I find someone in St. Louis to help me.


92 Wins 43 Losses

Primary Lineup:

1 Arlie Latham 3b
2 Yank Robinson 2b
3 Tip O'Neill  lf
4 Charlie Comiskey 1b
5 Tommy McCarthy rf
6 Harry Lyons cf
7 Bill White ss
8 Jack Boyle/ Jocko Milligan c
9 Silver King p

This team was filled with all sorts of interesting players and a quite colorful owner. 

Owner Chris Von Der Ahe - there is a great book on him, his teams, and his eccentricities (http://www.amazon.com/Chris-Von-Ahe-Louis-Browns/dp/0810834731/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332266177&sr=8-1).   The same author, J. Thomas Hetrick, also wrote a day-by-day account of the woeful 1899 Cleveland Spiders.

Shorter bio here: http://research.sabr.org/journals/chris-von-der-ahe-baseballs-pioneering-huckster

Charlie Comiskey - In his 7th major league season at this point, the 28 year old captain/manager of the team.  It is quite interesting in reading about Comiskey the player given the perspective that many of us has of him as the owner of the 1919 Black Sox.   I have often wondered what influence/impact Von Der Ahe had on the development of Comiskey the owner.

Silver King - this year's Justin Verlander:  45-20, 1.66, 2.58, 584.1 innings pitched,  64 starts, 63 cg, 0.874 WHIP.   All of this at age 20.  Although he would have other very nice seasons, this was King's signature season.


http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/k/kingsi01.shtml


Leadoff hitter Arlie Latham, "The Freshest Man on Earth". Led the league with 109 swipes (stolen bases were ANY extra advancement as a rule, though I am discovering many/most were "legitimate" swipes), but was best known for his colorful character.  Also did 3rd base coaching for the team (a "coacher") while not in the field or at bat.


http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/e89392f6

Yank Robinson - led the league in walks by 42 WALKS! (116 to 2nd place Tom Fennelly's 72).   Let me re-emphasize,, Robinson had 116 walks in a 134 games when it took 5 balls to get a walk.   As a result, combined w/ the strong lineup behind him, Robinson ended up with more runs than hits, 111 runs to 105 hits.
His slash line was .231/.400/.314  (His OPS of .714 translated into a 120 OPS+).

http://mwww.baseball-reference.com/players/r/robinya01.shtml

Tip O'Neill - best known to baseball stat/historians as the guy who "hit" .492 in 1887 when walks were counted as hits (ONLY .435 without the walks factored in).   In 1888, he led the league with only a .335 average.  Not sure if there is another case of a player's bavg dropping by 25% and still retaining the batting title.


http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/o/o%27neiti01.shtml

Tommy McCarthy - an avg/slightly above avg outfielder at this point in his career.  He would later best be remembered as one of the 1890's Boston Beaneaters "Heavenly Twins" (along with Hugh Duffy).  Elected by the Old Timer's Committee into the Hall of Fame in 1945.

http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/2187c402


I would remiss if I didn't mention that this team also had another player with a great nickname:

Ice Box Chamberlain - he came over in September and proceeded to start 14 games and go 11-2 down the stretch.  Chamberlain is known for having pitched with both hands during a game.

http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/ac500d52

There is a Jim Devlin on this team, but not the one that was kicked out of baseball.
Devlin, ironically was the oldest regular on the staff.

King - 20 yrs old
Nat Hudson - 19
Chamberlain - 20
Devlin - 22

Average age of all pitchers was 20.0 - and this was the league champions!

1888 AA Baltimore

Continuing my march through the 1888 AA.

Now working on Baltimore home games.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/BAL/1888.shtml

Main source:  Baltimore Sun (GeneologyBank.com)
Secondary source:  Baltimore American (Google News Archives)

I have hit my 1st hard spot, primarily due to no Sunday edition of the Baltimore Sun.  The Sun for the most part has the batter k's, but it does not look as if the Sun had a Sunday edition.  The Monday edition gives a brief summary of Saturday games, but no box score.  As a result, I am having to rely on the Sunday edition of the American, which for all days, does not have batter k's in the box, but in many cases mentions the batter k's, in part at least, in the game write-up.  

For Retrosheet purposes, the American also serves to get me LOB's and some DP's.

Sample lineup from June 12:

Mike Griffin cf
Oyster Burns lf
Blondie Purcell rf
Jack Farrell  ss
Tommy Tucker 1b
Billy Shindle 3b
Bill Greenwood ss
Sam Trott c
Sam Shaw p

This team's rotation included
Matt Kilroy, coming off of his historic 46-19, 589 inning pitched season.  In fact in 1886-7, Kilroy completed 132 GAMES and pitched 1172.1 innings.   Already early in the season, there are many mentions of his arm being sore.  Even in this era of 2 1/2- 3 man rotations and shorter pitching distance (among others) , Kilroy  (led in CG's in both '86 & '87).    Though he would pitch over 480 innings in 1889, he was never really the same pitcher. 
Funny thing for me about Kilroy was that when I was doing the 1898 season, I was introduced to him (well I already knew of him) as an outfielder.  He did pitch 13 games in 1898, but also played 12 games in the OF).
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/k/kilroma01.shtml

Bert Cunningham - again, I was familiar with him from later in his career, 1st as part of  the 1899 Louisville Colonel rotation (1899 was my first research season) and then as a 28 game winner for the previous Colonel team.  The papers referenced back in that season to his return to glory.  Actually, his 28-15,113 ERA+ was easily his best season in fairly poor career.  He would probably be referred to in our times as a innings eating 5th starter type - poor ERA, 200-300 innings (equiv 125-150 modern).  His measurements according to BR: 5'7", 147 lbs.  (soaking wet, I suppose).
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/c/cunnibe01.shtml

John "Phenomenal" Smith - I love the nicknames of this era - you got some Farmers, a Blondie, an Oyster, and a bunch more I can't think of at this time.  And of course, we have "Phenomenal" or "Phenom" as we also sardonically referred to.  Smith played very small parts of the season from 1884-1886 (I don't see any minor league info during those season yet).  In 1887, he "broke out" with a 25-30 record with the Orioles (491.1 innings).  He was just 21.

He hung around the majors until 1891 and then had an extended minor league career, primarily in the New England League, until 1904.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/smithph01.shtml

In fact, the ages of Kilroy, Cunningham, & Smith were 22, 22, & 23 - starting 123 of their 137 games.

As for the everyday guys, a couple of players were of immediate interest to me.

I'll start with Tommy Tucker.
Again, I was introduced to Tucker in my 1899 research.   He was the starting first baseman for the ill fated Spiders/Exiles/Wanderers franchise that won only 20 of 154.   He hit .241 for them.   In retrospect, he was a bit like one of the veteran players (Ashburn, Hodges) on the 1962 Mets - he had previous "glory", but ended up on a very terrible team.  In his case, I think I should state that he would be a "poor man's" version of that.

Anyway, that was all I really knew about Tucker until I worked on the 1897 and read up on the 1890's Beaneaters teams.   He was a steady, not spectacular 1st baseman for them for 7 years and also won the batting title in 1889 with the Orioles.   The 1899 Spiders experience apparently convinced him that his major league days were done.  He did play a couple more season in primarily the Connecticut State League.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/t/tucketo01.shtml 

Mike Griffin
When I think of Mike Griffin, I think of M101-1.   What is M101-1 you may ask?   It was a supplement premium produced by The Sporting News from 1899-1900.  One of the 1st (I have about 40 of the 60) ones I obtained was of Griffin as a Brooklyn Superba.  What was interesting about this is that he never played for the Superbas in 1899.  

The BioProject bio of Griffin gives a nice summary of the situation:


http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/45f87fcd

The Brooklyn franchise was floundering, posting a 54-91 record in 1898 and drawing the third worst attendance in the National League. So Charles Ebbets merged the team with Baltimore's club. Baltimore's manager was future Hall of Famer Ned Hanlon, who was retained to manage the new combined team.
Mike Griffin was offered a salary of $2,800 to be only a player instead of a player-manager. He refused the offer, saying he had a valid contract for $3,500 and expected it to be honored. It is likely he realized the "new" Brooklyn team was considerably better than the 1898 version, and he had looked forward to managing what promised to be a successful team. In none of his previous twelve major league seasons had he played for a pennant-winning ballclub.
The dispute dragged on with neither side willing to give in. Players had very few rights in this era, so owners were used to holding the upper hand. On March 11, 1899, Ebbets sent Griffin the following telegram: "You have been released to the Cleveland club. They wish you to report to Cleveland on Monday, to go with team to Hot Springs. Personally I wish you the best of luck in your new position." Griffin also received a telegram from Cleveland manager Patsy Tebeau that said, in part, "Mr Robinson has purchased your release from Brooklyn."
Griffin refused to report to Cleveland until his contract dispute with Brooklyn was resolved, because it appeared unlikely that Cleveland was going to pay the $3,500 salary that Griffin felt he was entitled to. For two weeks, letters and telegrams were exchanged between Griffin (at home in Utica), Cleveland, and Brooklyn. Cleveland finally had enough and released Griffin to St. Louis. This mattered little to Griffin as his beef was still with Brooklyn. He didn't report to St. Louis-he never played professional baseball again. In mid-April he announced his retirement from baseball.
Griffin filed suit against Brooklyn for breach of contract. Judge William Scripture of the New York State Supreme Court ruled in Griffin's favor and awarded him $2,266. Brooklyn appealed, with John M. Ward arguing their case. Ward was a former ballplayer who was one of the founders of the Players League that had challenged, unsuccessfully, the supremacy of the "Lords of Baseball," the owners.
The justices on the appeals court sided with Griffin. In fact, they said that Brooklyn not only didn't have grounds to win an appeal, they were fortunate with the initial ruling because the judge should have awarded Griffin several hundred dollars more in damages.

Back to M101-1 for a second - during my collecting of the set, came upon a second variation of the Griffin issue, this one with his team as St. Louis.  There are a number of variations in the M101-1 set, but that is for another blog time.  2 "cards" of a player in which he played for neither in the season of issue.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/g/griffmi01.shtml


Another player on this team that has his place in baseball history is George Bradley.  He only played in one game, as a shortstop, for the Orioles, but 12 years earlier he had pitched the National League's 1st no hitter.


http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/b/bradlge01.shtml

1888 AA

Well, I finally decided to dive into the missing AA stirkeouts.   Most of these seasons have ICI sheets, but I like to work from the primary sources (ICI is not a primary and I am not sure where specifically it sourced its data).

As part of this phase of my batter k research, I agreed to pull (and format) as much of the pertinent retrosheet data as I could - that includes linescores, double plays, umpires, attendance, lob.  

I am working team by team, entering their home games from their home town paper.

So far, I have done
Kansas City Cowboys - Kansas City Times
Philadelphia Athletic(s) - Philadelphia Inquirer, Record
Cincinnati Red Stockings - Cincinnati Commercial Gazette

Having a subscription to GeneologyBank.com has really paid off.

Most of the scans are good, however many of the Commercial Gazette scans are a bit more adventurous and I have been using a secondary source like the Cleveland Plain Dealer to verify some of the blurry stuff.  However, what is nice about the Gazette is is that they have pretty good play-by-play for a number of the games which allows me to get better k info (and verify the box info).  


Interesting to see the home and away splits as far as games played.  Kansas City had only like 55 home games, while Cincinnati had about 81.  In fact, I saw a note in either the Gazette or Cleveland Plain Dealer mentioning the Cincinnati owner offering KC $1000 to transfer a set of games from KC to Cincy.

The real fun for me in doing the AA is going back more the 10 years prior to my previous earliest season that I had researched and pulled lineups for (1897).   It is interesting to see some of "my veterans" as young players - Lave Cross as a 22 year old catcher, Wilbert Robinson, not as a grisly veteran;  Bid McPhee in his prime; Elmer Smith as a young pitcher for the Red Stockings, and others.

Also, I get a chance to read up on some players that I have only known in bios or mentions, both famous and lesser - Toad Ramsey, Elton Chamberlain, Tony Mullane, Bob Caruthers and Dave Foutz - both pitching and playing the field, Pete Browning (who was in and out of the lineup battling his demons).

One other quick observation in regards to home/away game splits - I am finishing up Cincinnati's home schedule - Baltimore played in Cincinnati 3 TIMES on the same road trip - Aug 7-9, Aug 13-15, & Aug 25-26.   I haven't checked, but I wonder if this is another of those transferred games.

Favorite players so far (name-wise): McTamany of KC, Jersey Bakley of Cleveland (he started/completed 61 games for them, 2nd to St. Louis's Silver King (btw, all comtemporary references refer to him as Bakely (e & l flipped), and Long John Reilly.

1902 HBP's & Online Newspaper Resources

As I wrapped up my batter strikeout research, Pete Palmer asked me if I might be able to help him on some stuff he had been working on  - filling in the hit batters in the early 1900's.   His records had cases where the pitcher was identified (via ICI), but no batter had been identified.   He had filled in a bunch already through his own research as well as help from others such as the late John Schwartz, Walt Wilson, Lyle Spatz, Bob Tiemann.

So, I started helping him fill in a few that were still missing - so far, I have helped him with 1907 NL, 1906 AL, and I am currently finishing up 1902 AL.

Due to my scanning of many of the era's papers for my batter k research, I had access to papers that are not yet online, plus I went through some "newer" online resources (e.g. NY Evening World had scans in the LofC site for the 1901-1910 timeframe that were new as of the past year or two).   For 1907 NL, I was able to assist Pete in getting above 95%.



I was able to find some of the "missing" batters hit through couple methods:

1.  Of course, an explicit mention in the game account, play-by-play, or box score.
Recently, while working on 1906 AL, I discovered that the Detroit Free Press have explicit mentions of the batter hit in their home game boxes - though it looks like they started doing this midway through the season.

2.  Process of elimination - looking at the boxscore, I listed each batter's at-bats.  Then I looked in the box for mentions of sac hits and base on balls.   Most of the time, the batter specific walks were not there, but I would make note of the opposing pitcher's walk total.   Then, in the latter case, I would go through the game write-up and make note of any mentions of walks.  After I gathered all of this info, I added up all of the plate appearances for each player, taking into account the listed at-bats, sac hits, any documented walks, and any other documented hit by pitchers.  Then it was a matter of looking for the missing plate appearances.  In a number of cases, I was only able to narrow down the potential batter hit to 2 or 3 players, but I relayed that info onto Pete anyways.



This leads me to the main crux of my post, online newspaper resources.   Many of these are known by researchers, but I am always running across new ones as they are added.  Sometimes they are documented, other times they are not (or I don't know it!).

Anyway, here are the main sites of newspapers w/ lists of papers that I have used for my batter k & hbp research:

L of Congress Chronicling America - http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/newspapers/
1.  NY Evening World
2.  St. Louis Republic (1901-06)
3.  Washington Times/Evening Times
4.  Washington Herald

GeneologyBank.com (subscription):  http://www.genealogybank.com/gbnk/keyword.html


1.  Cleveland Plain Dealer
2.  Cleveland Leader (this is a very new add & a great complement to the PD)
3.  Boston Herald
4.  St. Louis Republic (before 1901)
5.  Rockford Morning Star (I used in some games for 1911 that the Chi Trib had inadequate coverage)
6.  Baltimore Sun


Google Newspaper Archives (not adding any new content): http://news.google.com/newspapers#M


1. Baltimore American
2. Baltimore Morning Herald
3. Milwaukee Journal
4. Philadelphia Record
5. Pittsburgh Commercial/Gazette/Commercial Gazette
6. Pittsburgh Press
7. Reading Eagle (Philly play-by-play on certain Sundays)


FultonHistory.com (search tool is poor):  http://www.fultonhistory.com/my%20photo%20albums/all%20newspapers/Page3.html

1. New York Evening Telegram (great play-by-play)
2. Brooklyn Eagle (Eagle has its own site too, but that site ends its coverage at 1902, this one is more extensive)
3.  Bunch of other good resources (Spirit of the Times) that I did not use.

Next post I will add info on the scans that I have stored in at my Google docs site. 

Posts from my previous blog

Going through some old bookmarks and I found the blog I started in 2008 as a first attempt at chronicling my research adventure.  Here is the copy/paste of the entries (in reverse date order):

1907 Update - Boston
06/18/2009

Received copies of boxscores from the Boston Herald from Lee Panas (thanks Lee).

As a result, here are my completion percentages for 1907 AL and NL:

1907 NL: 82.8%
1907 AL: 71.3%

St. Louis and, to a lesser extent, Chicago, are my NL trouble spots.

Detroit and St. Louis are my AL trouble spots.

Leaders (based on data so far):

1907 AL:

Most projected K's:

1.  Bill Hinchman -     108   (83 k's in 117 of 152 games - 77.0%)
2.  Danny Hoffman -  104  (91 k's in 120 of 137 games - 87.6%)

BK+:  

1.  Kid Elberfeld -  591 (7 k's in 105 of 120 games, 87.5%)
2.  Willie Keeler -  458 (8 k's in 93 of 107 games, 86.9%)



1907 NL:

Most projected K's:

1.  Bill Maloney -  100   (96 k's in 138 of 144 games - 95.8%)
2.  MIke Mitchell -  81  (71 k's in 130 of 148 games - 87.8%)

BK+:  

1.  Larry McLean -  306 (11 k's in 96 of 113 games, 85.0%)
2.  Johnny Evers -  250 (15 k's in 107 of 149 games, 71.8%)

June 09 update
06/08/2009

Well, it has been quite awhile since I have submitted an update.

Work and life have taken me away from my research for some time.

I have started creating 1904 and 1905 lineup databases.  Once these are done, I will fill-in what I have so far.

Ed Morton, Philly, has been able to start sending me philly k's again.  He is pulling some 2ndary source info for 1905 Phil and A games.

More to come...

Quick 2/4 update
02/04/2009

2/6:  Updated leader pages on Website w/ revised 1902 info and 1903 info,

1907 Pittsburg boxscores came in! 

1907 NL is now up to 67.5% complete

1903 Boston NL and AL boxscores came in (Thanks to Lee Panas!)

1903 AL is up to 81%.  Still inputting the Bos NL info - will be well north of 80% though.

1903 Roadblocks:  St. Louis and Washington!!

January 09 update
01/28/2009

Latest update:
St. Louis - got more play by play copies from the St. Louis Chronicle.  Unfortunately, most of the games are fairly incomplete (better than nothing).  I also requested sample dates for 1903 and 1907 from the Globe Democrat, World, Star (and Star-Chronicle), and Post Dispatch.  Alas, no luck.  Hopefully, I am missing a St. Louis newspaper somewhere or there is some St. Louis pbp hiding somewhere.  :(
Cincinnati - got all of 1907 home game scans from the Cincinnati Public Library - so these games are complete.

Pittsburg(h) - awaiting copied of 1907 home games from the Carnegie Library from the Pittsburg Press.

Boston - A good friend and fellow SABR'ite has graciously photocopied 1903 Boston Herald boxscores for me.  He is through June so far.  I have the 1907 Herald on ILL request.

NYA/NYN/Brooklyn - got play-by-play accounts from the NY Evening Telegram for 1904, 1905, 1906 from Dave Smith of RetroSheet.  I am using these, along w/ the LofC's Chronicling America scans of the NY Evening World to start to document the NY teams' k's for these seasons.  Coverage is really good - home AND away.

Chicago - working my way through the Tribune 1904-06 getting the home games.  Sent an ILL request for the Inter-Ocean to hope fill in missing 1907 home games.  Also got some RetroSheet pbp from the Daily News to fill in blanks for 1903 and 1907.

Cleveland - got Leader for 1907 and documented k's.  Made ILL request for 1904 Leader

Detroit - Checked 1907 Free Press and found that after the 1st game of the year, batter k's were not documented in the boxscore.  Checked Times, News, and Today(?) without any success there either.  Put ILL request in for 1904-06 Free Press.

12/17 Update
12/17/2008

1903 - Started receiving St. Louis Chronicle print-outs from the St. Louis Public Library.  So far games through May 4.
So far (guardedly written) the play-by-play is more complete than 01 or 02.  Hoping this continues.

Finished doing scannings for Retrosheet of various NY and StL sources.

1907 - got AL database up and going.  Entered in Wash, Chicago (what I had), and NYA.  Hope to get to Lib of Mich next week to pull the Det stuff.  Have ILL request in for Cleveland Leader.   Ed Morton is compiling the Philly stuff.  Boston - who knows. 

Recording Brook and NYN batter k's from NYET retrosheet info and NYEW online.  Once done, I will setup the database and send my requests out to Cincy and Pitt for copies/scans.

1903 NY update
12/05/2008

Received the NY Evening Telegram copies from Cliff Blau.  Thanks to Cliff again for his tremendous help.
I was able to fill in a big chunk of the AL and NL NY games.

I got the 1903 Boston Post finally.  Unfortunately, the Post only had batter k's in April.
I am hoping that I can have someone in Boston check in the Herald to see if it has the data (it had it in 1901) .

Also compiling my missing St. L games (AL & NL) list and send it off to a fellow SABRite or to the St. Louis PL.


1903 percent complete #'s.
NL - 73.9%
AL - 68.6% 

Temporarily on to 1907
11/24/2008

While waiting on some NY 1903 stuff, I decided to jump ahead to 1907.  Why 1907?  Because, this is the year that the Washington Post decided to start listing batter strikeouts again.  Unfortunately, the Chicago Tribune had a weird setup that year (at least that year, that is).  The boxscores associated with the games that the reporter known as "Sy" covered had batter strikeouts, no matter whether "he" was home or away.  Conversely, boxscores associated with "Charles Dryden" do not.  Between the two of them, they covered the Cubs and White Sox interspersedly (I know, not a word). 
On a good note, I am currently going through the NY Evening World and the online scans are of the "Final Results Edition"  - which has most (through May so far) of the complete play by play.  Not sure if this was a new Edition version by 1907 or the earlier years just didn't have that edition scanned.

Still looking for help in Boston...

Quick Update
11/11/2008

Mark O'Hara in Washington generously took the time to check the 1901 Washington Times for me and found a few more games for me - about 12 new bk games.  The Times, unfortunately, stopped doing batter k's after July 1 (they were scattered/inconsistent prior to that date).  Regardless, a nice find and greatly appreciated.  This moved the 1901 AL total documented games up to 71%.  If I could find a decent Milwaukee source, I would be in much better shape.
In the meantime, Clif Blau is copying 1903 NY Evening Telegram PBP for NYG, Broo, and NYH.  Hope to have that in a few weeks (a good deal of copies).

9/29/08 Update
09/29/2008

I received and reviewed the following microfilm last week:

1903 Cleveland Leader
1903 NY Herald
1901 Chicago Daily News

I was able to get  almost all of the 1903 Cleveland home games documented - 2 missing, 1 was played in Canton and the other in Columbus.  May  need to check local papers there for additional data.

I requested the NY Herald on a tip that they might have BK's, but in 1903 they did not.  I have re-requested the NY Evening Telegram as well as the NY Evening World from the NY State Library (the online World is not the "Late Extra" edition).  Hopefully I will see them in the next month or two. :O
The Daily News (a heads up from Walt Wilson) has partial play-by-play, allowing me to fill in a few more blanks in my missing games (particularly Washington, Milwaukee, and St. Louis).

Also, got more scans from the Cincy PL of 1902 and 1903 box scores.  Coming along nicely in groups of 5-6.

Got photocopies of selected games from 1897, 1901, and 1902 from the St. Louis Chronicle - I discovered that the Chronicle was an Afternoon/Evening paper and had play-by-play, mostly partial games.  Considering the lack of data in the other 4 St. Louis newspapers I had search (1901-2), this is a great revelation.  I still will have some big gaps there, but slowly I will be able to get some of those numbers up.  I have sent a photocopy request to the St. Louis PL for the 1901 St. Louis box scores from the Chronicle. 

 Current percentage completions (main home games missing):

1897 - 88.8  (St. Louis, Louisville)
1898 - 86.4 (Louisville, Cincinnati, St. Louis)
1899 - 88.3 (Louisville, Cincinnati)
1900 - 98.9
1901 NL - 86.4 (St. Louis)
1901 AL - 69.1 (Milwaukee, Washington, Baltimore)
1902 NL - 86.4 (St. Louis)
1902 AL - 62.2 (St. Louis, Baltimore, Washington)
1903 NL -42.9 (Boston, NY, Brooklyn, St. Louis, Cincinnati)
1903 AL - 56.2 (Boston, NY, St. Louis, Washington)

I have sent out requests for the Louisville Dispatch and the Evening Wisconsin to see if I can fill in some more gaps in Louisville and Milwaukee.  Both are evening papers and hopefully have play-by-play  (partial) - the Dispatch does for sure, though it is "touch and go" in the pbp coverage details.

Brief 1902/03 Update
09/18/2008

I have contacted the Cincinnati Public Library and they have generously agreed to run scans of all the (needed) 1902 and 1903 home boxscores from the Cincinnati Commercial-Tribune.  They are emailing them to me every day or two in batches of 5 games.  And for FREE!  Have about 2/3 of 1902 so far.   1902 NL at 84.5% currently.
My library just received the 1903 Cleveland Leader and NY Herald.  I will begin to glean the Cleveland stuff Friday and see if the Herald has any BK info.

1901 Update
08/20/2008

Finished updating 1901 information w/ Pitt, NY, Brook, and Chicago info.

Got Chicago info from Walt Wilson this morning.

Pct complete jumped from 68 to 85%.  St. Louis is still the problem child.

Updated the BK+, Misc, and Most tabs w/ the new info.

Will go back and update 1897, 1900, 1901 AL, and 1902 NL in the next couple of days.

Update 8/19/08
08/19/2008

It's been awhile since I have posted anything.  Been on vacation in DC w/ the family (which was a blast, but a TON of walking - but that is another story) as well as waiting on microfilm and photocopies.

Upon my arrival home, I had mail from the Carnegie Library with box scores for missing Pitt games from 1897, 1901, and 1902 (mostly).  The 1897 (and 2 1900) games were from the Post for the ones that the Press did not have BK's for.  1901 & 1902 were from the Press.

I also received a mailing from the St. Louis Public Library with my "survey" of the St. Louis papers for 1897, 1901, and 1902.  I had them copy various games from those years from the Republic, Star, Globe-Democrat, and Post Dispatch.
Upon quick review, none of the papers have explicit batter strikeout information, unfortunately.  The best from a game summary looks like it was the Republic, but I need to go back through again.   Still wonder if there is another paper (or source) that might have the info.

In the meantime, I have contracted Walt Wilson, in Chicago, to pull the missing Chicago games for 1901 and 1902 from whatever paper he can.  He has sent me some of the stuff.  Apparently, the Chicago Daily News has play-by-play (or at least partial PBP).  He was able to pull BK info from that paper as well as the Chronicle and Herald.

Cliff Blau mailed me copies of the NY Evening Telegram from the 1st part of 1901 as well as a few scattered games in the 2nd half.  This should help fill in more of the Brook and NY gaps in this year.

Once I have completed reviewing and updating the various databases, I will uupdate the various pages here with updated information.

 Also, I have sent out ILL requests for 1899 Louisville Dispatch, which has partial play-by-play and 3 1901 Milwaukee papers - with the intent of trying to fill in as many blanks as possible, even if only partially.

I have started 1903 NL - entering in Chicago info.  I think I will hold off on any further entry until I can make more headway on the other seasons I am working on.
On a sidenote, I have decided to consolidate my blog entries to the "General" blog instead of maintaining one for each year.

1897 Update - 7/27/2008
07/27/2008

I have updated my 1897 database with the Pittsburg and New York strikeout info.
Now up to 87.5%.

Need to get missing Pitt games from Pittsburg Post and hope to get the missing NY games from a microfilm version that has "Night Extra" of either the NY Evening Telegram or Evening World.

Tommy Corcoran dropped out of the lead, so Willie Keeler looks like he is the leader for 1897 as well.

1897 Update - 7/24/08
07/24/2008

I went to the library yesterday and went through the 1897 Pittsburg Press and New York Evening World that came in from Kent State (via Commerce Library).

The results:
Got most of the Pitt games from the Press except about a dozen early season games.  I got only a couple of games prior to 5/27/1897.  I will have someone in Pitt check the Post for the missing games.
Also, it should be noted, that each Monday, the Press published the Pirate stats, including batter walks and Strikeouts!
Made a copy of the final one, on the Monday after the final Pirate game. Press has 341 total k's for the Pirates (Davis leads w/ 43 - real close to the projection).  In essence, I have 100% of the Pirate k's, just have to figure out how to override my DB table to take the totals. :)

Got most of the NY games (home and partial away) after 5/22/1897.  This is when the microfilm started using the "Night Extra".  The "Eveninig" edition was not late enough in the day to publish any pbp.  Slowly reviewing the pbp, gleaning the k's and entering them into the db.

Update:  Got through copying the play-by-play in  the NY Evening World (including the Temple Cup).  Now the "fun" has begun, going through each pbp and trying to decipher what is a strikeouts.  Descriptions tended to be quite flowerful and obtuse at times.

7/21 Update
07/21/2008

Pittsburg Press copies have been made by the Carnegie Library and will be mailed to me today.  Hopefully, the Press continued their coverage.

Just got copies from St. Louis Globe-Democrat for the 1st 3 months of home games - no luck, no batter strikeouts.  I have already requested copies for the same home dates from the Post Dispatch.  Keep our fingers crossed.

1901 NL Update
07/20/2008

Presently I stand at 67.8% of the team-games completed.

Here are the Home games (mostly) by team completed by source:
Cincinnati - Commercial-Tribune
Boston - Globe, Morning Journal, Post, and Herald (thanks, Bill Nowlin)
Philadelphia - Inquirer, Press, and Ledger (thanks, Ed Morton)
Chicago - Tribune (missing 16 home games)
Brooklyn & New York - New York Evening World and Evening Telegram (still need apr-june games)

Missing:
Pittsburg - just requested photocopies of Pitt home game boxscores from the Pitt Press from the Carnegie Library.  Expecting fairly quick turnaround time.

St. Louis - St. Louis Public Library continues running copies of Globe-Democrat (continuing from the copies they did for me of 1900).  Based on the 1st couple of dates for 1901, I asked for copies of the Post Dispatch as well.

Chicago - Need a secondary source - maybe the Inter-Ocean.  Need to find someone or somewhere that will check on this for me.

Brooklyn/New York - thought I was getting Apr-June on microfilm from NY State Library, but ILL problems (a constant theme lately) have caused the microfilm not be sent yet.  May have to resort to someone running copies remotely.

New Headings
07/19/2008

Today, I added 2 new headings:  BK+ leaders and most BKs by Year.

These will be updated as I get more data in.

I also will be adding some misc. categories, including pct of k's by pitcher by team.

1897 Notes - 7/18/08
07/18/2008

So far, I have been able to document the following teams (w/ their source):

Home games:

Baltimore - Baltimore Sun
Brooklyn - Brooklyn Eagle
Boston - Boston Globe
Chicago - Chicago Tribune (home and away!)
Cincinnati - Cincinnati Commercial Tribune
Cleveland - Cleveland Plain Dealer
Philadelphia - Sporting Life and Philadelphia Inquirer
Washington - Washington Post

Still to search:

Pittsburg - ILL of Pittburg Press is on its way from Kent State U.
New York - ILL of New York Evening World is on its way from Kent State U.

Louisville - Louisville Times will probably be my best bet for anything, but based on my 1899 experience (see 1899 eventually), I need to find the "Extra" edition which had rough play by play of the same day's game.

St. Louis - not sure what I am going to do here. The Globe Democrat in 1898 didn't start covering bk's until August. Not sure what to expect in 1897. Republic (from checking via Geneology.com) is not a source. Don't expect the Post Dispatch or Star to be, but will get copies made by the St. Louis Public Library to check.

Interesting notes on Brooklyn and Cincinnati -
The Eagle does not have bk's in 1898 forward, so I was pleasantly surprised when I found them in 1897 via their website.
Same with the Commercial-Tribune. I had Jim Farmer copy and scan each Cincy game for me, hoping to at least glean a few k's, but imagine my surprise when I found out that they had bk's! Amazingly, the C-T stopped bk's for 1898 and 1899 and then restarted the stat in 1900.

1897 Leaders at the 75% mark
07/18/2008

Just a quick note on who I have as the "leaders in the clubhouse" at 75% complete:

Fewest projected K's (pct complete):
Tommy Corcoran 2 (83%)
Willie Keeler 5 (85%)
Mike Griffin 9 (87%)
Hughie Jennings 10 (84%)
Ed McKean 10 (82%)

Most K's:
Tommy McCreery 64 (34%)
Tom Brown 63 (84%)
Billy Clingman 53 (49%)
Barry McCormick 50 (100%)

Corcoran is an interesting entry - every other year I have done (or worked on) had Keeler as the leader (97, 98, 99, 00, 01 NL). His previous year was not necessarily low.
McCreery's entry may be troublesome depending on my ability to get Lou. bk's from the Time and/or Courier Journal (and maybe the Dispatch and Evening Post). He doesn't play a full complement of games in any subsequent season, but in 1897, he played 140 between Lou and NY.

BK+ leaders (BK/game above/below BK/game league avg - kind of like OPS+)
Corcoran 1042
Keeler 630
Griffin 332
McKean 292
Jennings 280

Worst BK+:
McCormick 42
T Brown 42
Clingman 49
McCreery 50
Everitt 57

1901 AL - quick update
07/18/2008

Well, kind of starting in the middle here, but....

So far, I have been able to pull bk's from:

Chicago - Tribune (partial home)
Detroit - Detroit Free Press
Philadelphia - Press and Record
Baltimore - Sun had them for first part of year and then basically stopped doing it (not in 1902 either it appears).
Boston - Journal (primarily)
Cleveland - Plain Dealer, Chicago Tribune (a few games), and  Leader.  

Ones that do not look very promising:

Washington - no bk's in Post, Herald, or News.
Milwaukee - no bk's in Sentinel or Journal

On Baltimore, I just got photocopies of the American and News from 1901 with no addtional success.
I discovered that the Cleveland Leader was/is a great source for bk's.  I plan on going back and using it to fill in a few games in 1897 as well.
1901 AL is not looking very promising. :(

1900 Update - 7/19/08
07/18/2008

As I mention in the General section, I have been able to get 98% of the team-games documented.
Eliminating Louisville and the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune beginning bk coverage again helped make it possible.
Still waiting on a few copies from the St Louis Public Library of the Post Dispatch to see if I can fill in 3 early season games that the Globe Democrat did not have bk's of.

Here is the city-by-city coverage:

Brooklyn - NY Evening Telegram and NY Evening World (home and away)
New York - same as Brooklyn
Cincinnati - Commercial Tribune (original hardcopies at the Ohio Historical Society in Columbus!)
St. Louis - Globe Democrat (copies courtesy of the St. Louis Public Library)

Chicago - Tribune
Philadelphia - Inquirer, Sporting Life, and Ledger (I believe)
Pittsburg - Pittsburg Press (from Kent State U)
Boston - Globe
In the next post, I will list the leaders

My new Web Page!
07/13/2008

Well, I have finally decided to join the 21st century - I am creating my own web page.
This will definitely be a WIP (work in progress), but my ongoing work on Batter Strikeouts has spurred me to "publish" some of my ongoing work.
I did have my 1899 strikeout research published in the recent SABR Baseball Research Journal, which was really cool. Since that has happened, I have really started to get more into the research - in fact, I now am calling it a "project" (sounds more important, official).

Anyways, just finished getting all of the current information on 1897 into an Access Db and currently have 75% of the team-games (2 team games per game played).

The big recent news, which I will document in its own blog entry, is that I currently have 98%(!!) of the 1900 NL team-games documented. Kind of a perfect storm - no Louisville and the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune decided to include batter strikeouts(bk) in their home boxscores after a 2 year hiatus. In fact, I didn't realize the the Comm-Trib had bk's in 1897 until Jim Farmer provided scans of all of the boxscores for the year. A very pleasant surprise!

Anyway, I plan on having multiple posts on each year I am working on to start off with.

Besides 1897 (75%), I currently have and working on 1898 (86.5%), 1899 (88.9%), 1900 (98%), 1901 NL (67.8%), 1901 AL (65.6%), 1902 NL (70.8%), and 1902 AL (62.2%). I am going to try to fil-in as much on these years as I can before proceeding onto 1903 on up.

Hope you enjoy and feel free to comment.

 

Links to my data

My source and summary data resoides in a Google Docs folder.


Here is the link for those interested in examining the information:


https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B4NEDe8uYbdlNjgwMDViYTgtYTlhMS00OGU2LTg4NTUtODFiMGMxNmNhNGU0