Below is an excerpt from the 1907 OSA Eastern League Guide. Brooklyn Whales – LBL No significant changes have occurred to the major league roster with the off-season focused on talentacquisition for the farm system. The plan appears to be to continue to feature strong infield defensebehind the gloves of Tinker Taylor, Clovis Juby and…
Author: Brendan H
Grading the 1906 St. Louis Reds’ Season
Hello! Harry Musgrave with you again. The Reds finished the 1906 campaign at 60-60. In third place and a mile behind Cleveland. Today I am going to grade each position based on the season. Catcher – CHunter Vigors was solid offensively but pretty terrible defensively. Despite hitting .274 the team was disappointed since it was a big drop…
1906: Brooklyn Whales’ Season Recap
Overview of the 1906 Brooklyn Whales The 1906 Whales were a team hoping to professionalize. Rooters for the Whales had gladly cheered on the band of weirdos and misfits that characterized the team’s success in the early part of the decade. However, now under League ownership, word was that Madigan’s Hall had been hoping Brooklyn…
The Taxonomy of a Whale
An excerpt from the personal diary of Brooklyn Whales’ scout Malcolm Franklin. June 18, 1906 Heading into the draft, Skip [ed note: Whales’ GM/Manager Marques Williams] had made clear his wishes. Top-to-bottom throughout the organization, he wanted to emphasize players with strong fundamentals with the glove and to be opportunistic with any pitchers with projectable…
Cherry Picked
In the concrete bunker in Brooklyn doubling as GM/Manager Marques Williams’ office beneath the Field of the Whales, two men with an uneasy history sat across from another. Like two boxers, they were sizing up their adversary for any sign of weakness. Williams, the legendary baseball man and profane giant charged with running the Brooklyn baseball operations…
Inside Baseball
Below is an excerpt from the seminal account of the tenure, trials, and tribulations of the second Commissioner of the Legacy Baseball League, Jacob Parker, from esteemed baseball historian Richard Abbott. This excerpt is published with the permission of the author in connection with the release of a new edition with an all new foreword….
The Doctor is… Out
April 7, 1904 Home Locker Room Field of the Whales Young southpaw Ocie Stibbs, who pieced together a reasonably successful 1903 campaign under the tutelage of backup catcher James ‘Doc’ Talmadge, has looked shaky in preseason workouts. Nevertheless, Whales manager Marques Williams has scheduled the youthful pitcher to start the fourth game of the opening…
Rich Whales’ Rookie Impresses, Inspires, Rests
By Anthony Harrison Baseball has a new richest man. A humble 26 year old leftfielder, Hyman Rickward, has signed with the Brooklyn Whales for a less-than-humble $52,000. Rickward is reported to be a complete player with a strong bat, strong glove, and speed on the bases. The star rookie was much sought after an off-season…
Whale of a Scandal: Foreward
Published in the Summer of 1960, this bestselling recounting of one of the most famous scandals in baseball history is part memoir, part collection of interviews and essays, and part attempt to exorcise the past while rewriting many of its most basic assumptions. FOREWARD It’s a peculiar feeling, although perhaps not an uncommon one, to…
Bloodletting After Baltimore
July 4, 1903 Field of the Whales The Whales’ young lefthanded hurler sat despondent in the home locker room alone on a wet morning in Brooklyn. The trip back from Baltimore was long—not so much in terms of the distance, but rather in the Sisyphus-ian mental reliving of his pitching performance that such a journey…