Before the 1903 season, C Ossee Schreckengost asked for an unusual clause to be inserted not in his own contract with the Philadelphia Athletics but in the contract of P Rube Waddell.

• Schreck had been one of Connie Mack's best acquisitions during the 1902 season in which the A's won the pennant in the second season of the American League. An outstanding C, Schreck had become friends with Wild Child Waddell when the two were batterymates at Louisville. Ossee not only helped Rube focus during games but also kept him in line off the field.
• Mack assigned Schreck to room with Rube on the road. In those days, it was standard practice in baseball for roommates to share not only a hotel room but also the bed. That experience led the C to ask Connie to insert a provision in Rube's contract prohibiting him from eating animal crackers in bed.
• Ossee explained: "This big bum has got to where he eats these little animal crackers every night. I didn't mind the flat crackers so much. But for a whole week last year, I woke up with elephants' tusks and cowhorns stickin' 'tween my ribs."
• Since Mack knew he couldn't get anyone else to room with Rube, he acceded to Schreck's request. Surprisingly, Rube did not protest and signed his contract.

However, Waddell gained some revenge on Mack a few days later.

• While with the team in Florida for spring training, Rube knocked on Mack's door late one night. Mack yelled that he was in bed but invited Rube in.
• Rube spoke to Connie about some inconsequential matter. While doing so, he ate a sandwich containing raw onions and limburger cheese. The mischievous southpaw made sure to drop crumbs and other morsels on Mack's bed while they spoke.

On July 27, 1947, in the first game of a DH between the Red Sox and the St. Louis Browns at Fenway Park, Boston 1B Jake Jones hit a 60-foot triple that never reached fair territory. Here's what happened. With two out and none on in the sixth inning, Jones hit a roller outside the 3B line. After the ball traveled 60 feet, P Fred Sanford threw his glove and struck the ball to keep it from going fair. Umpire Cal Hubbard awarded Jones a triple on the basis of Rule 7.05(c) which, as worded at that time, gave a runner "three bases if a fielder deliberately throws his glove at and touches a ball." NL umpires followed an unwritten agreement to ignore the violation in the case of foul balls. However, AL umpires had no such understanding. In 1954, the rules committee finally amended the rule to apply only to fair balls.

Cal Hubbard

Reference: The Rules and Lore of Baseball, Rich Marazzi
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Former Commissioner Faye Vincent's book The Only Game in Town includes transcriptions of his interviews with former major leaguers. Dom DiMaggio, Boston Red Sox CF from 1940-53, relates several interesting stories related to his brother Joe's 56-game hitting streak in 1941.

• Dom, of course, followed the streak quite closely.

  We were aware of Joe's streak. ... playing at Fenway Park, we had the scoreboard in LF, and Teddy [Williams] always talked to the scoreboard keeper and would get the news ... "Dommie, Dommie," he would call over to me, "Joe got a base hit in the second inning ..." and he'd keep me posted.

Dom DiMaggio, Ted Williams, and Joe DiMaggio

• Dom played against his older brother during the streak. One game in particular stands out in his mind.

  Joe was out on the first trip [to the plate] and then a second trip. He hit a shot to left center field ... so many things ran through my mind, and the bases were loaded, I believe, at the time, and he was fighting for the runs batted in title. And I went out and I caught this ball in the tip of my web and as soon as I caught it, I got a sick feeling to my stomach. I said, "Oh, my God." You know, this is his third time at bat.

  On the way in, after I caught the ball – and this was the third out of the inning – he was coming out to his place in CF and I've got to pass this guy and, gee, I'm feeling so sorry and then I turn to give him an apologetic look and ... he just turned at the same time and he looked at me – believe me, if looks could kill, I would have dropped right there, and I said, "Oh my God. I made an enemy."

  The next at bat, he hit the ball into the seats so that nobody could catch it.

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Connie Mack and Lefty Grove

From the beginning, baseball teams have used their home ballparks to their advantage. Hall of Fame manager Connie Mack certainly used every trick in the book.

• Early in his managerial career, Mack kept some baseballs in a refrigerator in his office to put into play at crucial moments when the visiting team was at bat. In 1896, the rules were changed to require the home team to supply the umpire with 12 balls before the game.
• While managing the Philadelphia Athletics, Mack was accused of stationing a coach in the CF scoreboard to steal signs from the opponent.
• Mack had his groundskeepers build a 20" mound for ace P Lefty Grove, George Earnshaw, Chief Bender, and Eddie Plank. This occurred despite the fact that the rules mandated that the mound be at most 15" above the baselines.

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"Row on a Ball Field. A Lively Time in the Game Between Philadelphia and Boston"

That was the headline over the article in the July 18, 1894, New York Times concerning the National League game the previous day between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Boston Beaneaters. Here's what caused a riot.

• Boston led 2-1 going into the bottom of the eighth with rain in the offing.
• The Phillies scored seven runs, which caused the visitors to delay the game in every way they could think of, "positively refusing to make an effort at a put out."
• "Finally Delahanty went out for cutting second base" to end the inning.
• "The Bostons then refused to bat."
• Umpire Dan Campbell, a local substituted for the ill Billy Stage (only one arbiter assigned to a game in those days), gave the game to Philadelphia.
• The crowd, apparently sick of Boston's antics, "surged on the field" and began punching the visiting players. "Tucker, who had made himself particularly objectionable, was struck and had a bone in his cheek broken." Tucker is 1B Tommy Tucker who probably made no effort at fielding throws to put runners out at first.
• A squad of 25 policemen and some of the Phillies had to escort the Boston players from the grounds and for several blocks.

The rules of the day helped precipitate the riot. Under today's regulations, if the umpire had called the game because of rain in the bottom of the eighth after Philly took the lead, the entire eighth inning would have counted. However, in 1894, the game reverted to the previous inning if the home team did not complete the following inning. There were many other instances similar to the one just described where it was to the visitors' advantage to delay the end of the inning in hopes that the weather would cancel the rest of the game.

Ed Delahanty (Photo obviously
colorized much later)

Boston Beaneaters Infield from
Turn of 20th Century

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In June 10, 1974, Mike Schmidt of the Philadelphia Phillies hit what is probably the longest single in MLB history.

The setting was the Houston Astrodome. Lefty Claude Osteen was the Astros' P when Schmidt clobbered a pitch so high that it struck a loudspeaker 329' from home and 117' above the playing field. The ball would undoubtedly have been a 500+ foot HR if it hadn't hit the speaker and dropped into CF. Instead, under the ground rules in effect, it was ruled a single.

Another Astrodome ground rule stated that, if a ball hit a speaker in foul territory and a fielder caught it, the batter was out.

You would think that, as an indoor stadium, the Astrodome never suffered a rainout. However, you would be wrong. On June 15, 1976, the scheduled game between the Astros and the Pittsburgh Pirates was cancelled when massive flooding in the Houston area prevented the umpires from reaching the stadium. Both teams had arrived early for practice but, with no umps, the game was called off. Tables were brought onto the field. and both teams shared their clubhouse meal with the few fans who braved the flood.

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Joe Medwick was an All-Star for the St. Louis Cardinals from 1933 through 1939, playing at least 146 games each season. He won the Triple Crown and NL MVP in 1937 (the last an NL player won the Triple Crown). Ducky (as Medwick was called because someone thought he waddled rather than walked) got a reputation as a combative, selfish player. He once knocked out teammate Tex Carleton because he walked in front of the camera during a photo session. And several other Cardinals got knuckle sandwiches from him for various infractions. So on June 12, 1940, Cardinals' GM Branch Rickey traded Medwick and P Curt Davis to the Brooklyn Dodgers for Ernie Koy, Carl Doyle, Sam Nahem, Bert Haas, and $125,000.

Facing his former teammates just six days later, Medwick was beaned in the head by Cardinals' pitcher Bob Bowman. The umpires stopped several Dodgers from charging the mound. In the home team dugout, Dodgers GM Larry MacPhail was restrained from going onto the field by coach Chuck Dressen and player Babe Phelps. After Medwick regained consciousness and was removed from the field on a stretcher, Cardinal manager Billy Southworth, in only his sixth game since taking over from Mike Gonzalez, removed Bowman from the game to avoid repercussions from the fans. Two detectives appeared on the Cardinal bench. MacPhail crossed the field and exchanged heated words with the visitors. A later account says that Bowman had to be escorted from Ebbets Field to his hotel by police. Other reports say that, as Bowman was led through the Dodger dugout to the locker room, MacPhail, from his box seat, swung and knocked Bowman's cap off. However, the New York Times story the day after the game does not mention these latter incidents.

The Times account also says that "prior to yesterday's game Bowman and Leo Durocher, the Brooklyn pilot, exchanged words, by way of widening the breach." The writer (Louis Effrat) was referring to "a certain amount of ill feeling between the Dodgers and Cardinals for a year now." He added, "Last season Bowman and Hugh Casey opposed each other in a game at St. Louis in which both pitchers were accused of throwing dusters." It is also stated on some Internet sites that, on the morning of the beaning, Medwick, Durocher, and Bowman had supposedly exchanged words in the elevator of the New Yorker Hotel. According to Durocher, Bowman shouted, "I'll take care of both of you guys! Wait and see!"

Bob Bowman (26) stands over Joe Medwick after beaning.

Medwick spent several days in the hospital with a concussion. At first expected to be out three weeks, he pinch hit on June 21, only two days after the beaning. MacPhail called – unsuccessfully – for Bowman to be punished by NL Commissioner Ford Frick and also asked the Brooklyn DA to investigate the incident. However, on the same day Joe left the hospital, the DA announced that his office had uncovered no "evidence of any criminal intent on the part of Bowman." Medwick himself said that he knew of no threats of bodily injury. Frick did not suspend or fine Bowman.

Medwick hit .300 the rest of the season for the Dodgers, then in 1941 hit .318 to help Brooklyn to their first pennant in 21 years. Rickey, who replaced MacPhail as Dodgers GM in 1943, traded Medwick again that year, this time to the New York Giants. Joe returned to the Cardinals in 1947 and retired in 1948 after an injury-plagued season.

Ducky never produced the numbers after the beaning that he did before it. But that is easily explained by the fact that (a) he was past his peak in age and (b) the success he had the first part of his career was Hall of Fame level – difficult for anyone to duplicate at any age.

Joe Medwick

Larry MacPhail and Branch Rickey

Billy Southworth

Leo Durocher

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