Babe Ruth hit the first home run in All-Star Game history during the first All-Star Game in 1933.
Since its inception in 1933, the Major League Baseball All-Star Game has provided fans an annual opportunity to see most of the great stars of the game on the same field. While the game is an exhibition and has withstood periods of indifference by some players, management and fans, it remains a special mid-season moment.
Because of COVID-19, there will not be an All-Star Game played in 2020, marking only the second season without a game (the first was in 1945 during World War II) since the start of the annual contest in 1933.
Though there will not be any new memories this year, there have been many memorable games and moments in the 90 meetings between the top players of the American and National Leagues.
This is the first of a three-part series where we will relive some of the great moments and games in the history of this special series.
July 6, 1933 – Comiskey Park, Chicago The idea of bringing the top players from both the American and National Leagues together in the middle of the season for one “All-Star” game was initiated by Arch Ward, a sports editor for the Chicago Tribune. The first game was played at Comiskey Park to coincide with Chicago’s Century of Progress Exposition.
In a fitting testimonial to his legendary career, Babe Ruth hit the first home run in All-Star history when he lifted a pitch from Bill Hallahan into the right-field stands in the third inning.
The American League went on to win the game 4-2 with Lefty Gomez earning the victory.
Salaries in baseball, as in all sports, has exploded over the last 30 years.
Baseball as with other major sports in the US, has seen a huge rise in salaries over the last 100 years. This may come as no surprise to most, as you would expect salaries to rise with inflation, but sports stars’ salaries has risen far beyond this.
One man has conducted a study into these salaries over the years, with interesting conclusions. Professor Michael Haupert, who is the professor of economics at Wisconsin La Crosse, found some interesting patterns and trends, but the most surprising thing seems to be the lack of full data available to great a comprehensive report.
Despite financial information being more freely and readily available, there still seems to be a lack of recorded salaries on file for a lot of major league players. Hauperts study takes into account only 50% of players who have played at least one major league baseball game since 1874.
The study only takes into account actual salary details, excluding any bonuses. Even without taking any additional bonus earnings into account, it’s clear to see from Haupert’s study that earnings have increased exponentially since 1874.
The highest salary recorded for a player at time was $2,000. Of course this was still a large salary almost 150 years ago, but when compared with inflation, it works out as an annual salary of just over $41,000. This is a fairly modest earning for anyone, never mind top players today, like Alex Rodriguez who earned a whopping $29 million in 2013. Alex Rodriguez’ last annual salary would have been worth over $1 million in 1874 – a far cry from Fergus Malone’s salary at the time. In essence, Alex Rodriguez earned more per plate – $56,000 this year – than Malone did all year in 1874 (with calculated inflation).
Even Joe Dimaggio’s huge 1949 earnings of $100,000 is still worth under $1 million in today’s money. This means that even in the last 60 years, the salaries of major league baseball players has multiplied by over 300%. This is a huge rise not seen in any other profession outside of major league sports. Read the rest of this entry →
We all know the saying, “records are meant to be broken.” However, that may not be the case for some of the greatest records set in the world of sports. No matter if it is in baseball, football, hockey, basketball or any other sport, some achievements propel individuals or teams into legends. And while time will continue and records are never safe, certain incredible records have a chance to never be broken. Here are some of the feats throughout the sports world that may stand as all the others continue to fall.
It’s amazing to think about a pitcher winning over 500 baseball games as a pitcher, yet that’s exactly what Young was able to accomplish. It is certainly a different game now with pitchers taking more time off in between starts, making Young’s record seem untouchable. 300 wins may never be reached again by any pitcher, so Young’s 511 mark is surely one of the greatest records in sports. Read the rest of this entry →
No major leaguer has come close to matching Joe DiMaggio's record hitting streak of 56 straight games.
The Major League Baseball players of today are capable of accomplishing amazing feats, but I am going to go out on a limb and predict that no major leaguer of today will ever hit in 56 consecutive regular season games.
It was 70 years ago today that one of the most amazing individual streaks in sports history ended following an unbelievable two month performance by future Hall of Famer Joe DiMaggio.
After knocking out a hit in every game from May 15th through July 16th, the luck finally ran out for DiMaggio in a game against the Cleveland Indians. As he had done throughout most of the streak, DiMaggio hit the ball hard, but unlike in previous days, there was always someone there to make the play.
His best chance to extend the streak came in his first at bat when DiMaggio laced the ball down the third base line. Unfortunately, third baseman Ken Keltner was playing deep and was able to grab the ball and throw DiMaggio out at first.
After walking in the fourth inning, DiMaggio hit another drive toward third in the seventh inning, but Keltner made another play to throw out the Yankee Clipper.
With the bases loaded and one out in the eighth inning, DiMaggio managed not to hit the ball to Keltner, but instead grounded to shortstop Lou Boudreau who turned it into an inning ending double play.
During the streak, DiMaggio hit .408 with 15 home runs and 55 runs batted in. He had multiple hits 22 times, including four games with four hits. Read the rest of this entry →
No major leaguer has come close to matching Joe DiMaggio's record hitting streak of 56 straight games.
The Major League Baseball players of today are capable of accomplishing amazing feats, but I am going to go out on a limb and predict that no major leaguer of today will ever hit in 56 consecutive regular season games.
It was 69 years ago today that one of the most amazing individual streaks in sports history ended following an amazing two month performance by future Hall of Famer Joe DiMaggio.
After knocking out a hit in every game from May 15th through July 16th, the luck finally ran out for DiMaggio in a game against the Cleveland Indians. As he had done throughout most of the streak, DiMaggio hit the ball hard, but unlike in previous days, there was always someone there to make the play.
His best chance to extend the streak came in his first at bat when DiMaggio laced the ball down the third base line. Unfortunately, third baseman Ken Keltner was playing deep and was able to grab the ball and throw DiMaggio out at first.
After walking in the fourth inning, DiMaggio hit another drive toward third in the seventh inning, but Keltner made another play to throw out the Yankee Clipper.
With the bases loaded and one out in the eighth inning, DiMaggio managed not to hit the ball to Keltner, but instead grounded to shortstop Lou Boudreau who turned it into an inning ending double play.
During the streak, DiMaggio hit .408 with 15 home runs and 55 runs batted in. He had multiple hits 22 times, including four games with four hits. Read the rest of this entry →
Base Ruth hit the first home run in All-Star Game history.
Since its inception in 1933, the Major League Baseball All-Star Gamehas provided fans an annual opportunity to see most of the great stars of the game on the same field. While the game is an exhibition and has withstood periods of indifference by some players, management and fans, it remains a special mid-season moment.
There have been many memorable games and moments in the first 80 incarnations of the annual meeting between the top players of the American and National Leagues.
This is the first of a three-part series where we will relive some of the great moments and games in the history of this special series.
The Sports Then and Now Vintage Athlete of the Month is a former major league baseball player who came into the game as a teenager and stayed until he was in his 40s. In between, Rusty Staub put up a solid career that was primarily spent on expansion or rebuilding teams.
Originally signed by the Colt .45s at age 17, he made his major league debut as a 19-year old rookie and became only the second player in the modern era to play in more than 150 games as a teenager.
Though he hit only .224 splitting time between first base and rightfield, Staub did start building a foundation that would turn him into an All-Star by 1967 when he finished fifth in the league with a .333 batting average.
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