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This Day in Baseball History
October 9th

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27 Fact(s) Found
1894 At Chicago's Lake Front Park, Quaker (Phillies) fly chaser Jack Manning hits three home runs in an 11-7 loss to the White Stockings. The Philadelphia outfielder is the first player in franchise history to accomplish the feat.
1905 At Columbia Park, Christy Mathewson blanks the A's in Game 1 of the World Series, 3-0. En route to throwing 27 consecutive scoreless frames, the Giants right-hander will also shut out Philadelphia in the third and the fifth contests of the Fall Classic, which New York wins in five games.
1906 In a snowy West Side Park, the first one-city World Series opens in Chicago. Nick Altrock outduels Three-Finger Brown, giving the White Sox a 2-1 victory over the heavily favored Cubs.
1907 In Game 2 of the World Series played at Chicago's West Side Grounds, Tigers third baseman Bill Coughlin tags out Jimmy Slagle, leading off the base, using the hidden ball trick. The Cubs center fielder is the first victim deceived about a ball's location during the Fall Classic.
1909 Ty Cobb's steal of home highlights the Tigers' 7-2 victory over the Pirates, tying the World Series at one game apiece. The 'Georgia Peach' swipes home plate 54 times during his career, a major league record.
1910 Sitting out the last two games of the season, Tigers outfielder Ty Cobb wins the third of his nine consecutive batting titles by edging Nap Lajoie by less than a percentage point. The player-manager of the Cleveland Naps, who had six bogus hits on the last day thanks to the Browns' attempt to dethrone the Georgia Peach with their defensive indifference, still loses the race .3849 to .3840.
1913 In Game 3 of the World Series, rookie right-hander Joe Bush throws a complete game, limiting the Giants to five hits in the A's 8-2 victory at the Polo Grounds. At 20 years and 316 days, 'Bullet Joe' is the youngest pitcher to start a game in the Fall Classic, 40 days sooner than Fernando Valenzuela (1981) and Jim Palmer (1966), tied for second on the list.
1915 Woodrow Wilson became the first president to watch a World Series game when he attended Game 2 of the Fall Classic at the Baker Bowl in Philadelphia. In addition to hitting the go-ahead single in the ninth inning, Red Sox right-hander Rube Foster limits the Phillies to just three hits en route to a 2-1 victory, evening the series at one game apiece.


President Woodrow Wilson at the Baker Bowl (1915)
Library of Congress - George Grantham Bain Collection

1919 With rumors spreading about a fix, the White Sox, after an ineffective start by Lefty Williams, are defeated 10-5 at Comiskey Park and drop the World Series to the underdog Reds, five games to 3. Before next season begins, eight Chicago players, including Shoeless Joe Jackson, will be accused of purposely accepting bribes to throw the games.
1928 At Sportsman's Park in St. Louis, the Yankees beat the Cardinals, 7-3, completing their second consecutive sweep of the World Series. The Bronx Bombers, winning their third World Championship in franchise history, live up to their name when they slugged five homers in the game, three by Babe Ruth, a feat not equaled until 1989 when Oakland did it against San Francisco.
1934 At Detroit's Navin Field, Commissioner Landis makes Joe Medwick leave Game 7 of the World Series for 'his own safety.' The Tiger fans, upset with his aggressive slide into third baseman Marv Owen, respond by hurling fruit at the outfielder during the Cardinals' 11-0 series-clinching victory.
1938 Sweeping the Cubs in four games, the Bronx Bombers become the first team in major league history to win three consecutive World Series. Red Ruffing goes the distance, beating Chicago, 8-3, at Yankee Stadium.
1948 At Cleveland Stadium in front of 81,897 fans, the solid pitching of Steve Gromek helps the Indians win pivotal Game 4 of the Fall Classic, edging the Braves, 2-1, to take a 3-1 series lead. Larry Doby's third-inning solo home run, the first by a black player in World Series history, proves to be the difference in the Tribe's victory.

1949 During the ninth inning of the Dodgers' 10-8 loss to the Yankees in Game 5, officials turned on the Ebbets Field lights, making it the first time a World Series game occurs under artificial lights. The first scheduled Fall Classic night game happens when the Pirates host Baltimore for Game 4 at Three Rivers Stadium in 1971.
1951 In the Yankees' 13-1 rout of the Giants in Game 5 of the Fall Classic victory at the Polo Grounds, Gil McDougald, joining Elmer Smith (1920) and Tony Lazzeri (1936), becomes the third player in World Series history to hit a grand slam. The 23-year-old Yankees infielder is the first rookie to accomplish the feat.
1958 In Game 7, the Yankees beat the defending World champion Braves in Milwaukee's County Stadium, 6-2, for their eighteenth title, the club's seventh in the past decade. The Bronx Bombers become only the second team, the first being the 1925 Pirates, to come back from a 3-1 deficit to win a best-of-seven Fall Classic.
1961 With the help of a pair of five-run innings at Crosley Field, the Yankees win the World Series, beating the Reds in Game 5, 13-5. Johnny Blanchard, a reserve player who will collect ten hits in 29 at-bats in five Fall Classics, hits two home runs and bats .400 en route to the Bronx Bombers' 19th World Championship.
1966 For the second consecutive day, the Orioles win a World Series game, 1-0, in a contest decided by a home run when Frank Robinson takes a Don Drysdale pitch deep over the left-field fence in the fourth inning. With the lone run scored on a homer, for only the fifth time in the history of the Fall Classic, and the complete-game shutout thrown by Dave McNally, Baltimore completes a four-game sweep over the Dodgers.
1968 The Tigers score ten runs in the third inning en route to a 13-1 victory over the Cardinals in Game 6 of the Fall Classic. Detroit's big frame, which equals the World Series mark set by the 1929 A's, sees 15 batters come to the plate, who collect seven hits, one hit-by-pitch, and four walks against four Redbird hurlers in the Busch Stadium contest.
1969 A few days after agreeing to be on the Angels' coaching staff, Sparky Anderson accepts an offer to replace Dave Bristol as the Reds' manager. During his nine-year tenure, in which Cincinnati averaged 96 victories a season, the club won five divisional titles, four National League pennants, and consecutive World Series in 1975 and 1976.
1976 En route to a party at a golf course owned by former teammate Bill Mazeroski, 29-year-old Pirates reliever Bob Moose dies in a two-car crash on Route 7 in Martin's Ferry (OH) on his birthday. The right-hander spent his nine-year career with Pittsburgh, compiling a 76-71 record with an ERA of 3.50 and no-hit the Mets in 1969.
1980 In Game 2 of the ALCS, with the Yankees trailing 3-2 with two outs in the top of the eighth, George Steinbrenner is caught on live national television shouting what appears to be profanities when Willie Randolph is tagged out at home on a relay throw by George Brett. The Yankees' owner wants manager Dick Howser to fire third base coach Mike Ferraro on the spot, who refuses and will lose his job when the team is swept in three games by the Royals, despite a first-place finish in the American League East, compiling a 103-59 record.

1989 Televising the deciding Game 5 of the NLCS, a 3-2 Giants victory over the Cubs from Candlestick Park, NBC broadcasts its final edition of the network's Game of the Week. Next season, CBS's sporadic and less frequent coverage of a regular-season weekly game led many to believe the organization was only interested in airing the All-Star Game and postseason contests.
1996 Derek Jeter, with the Yankees down 4-3 in the eighth inning, ties the game with a fly ball to right field ruled a home run by umpire Rich Garcia, despite the protest of spectator interference that prevented the ball from being caught by outfielder Tony Tarasco and the Orioles manager Davey Johnson. Video replay clearly shows 12-year-old Jeffrey Maier reaching over the fence and bringing the catchable live ball into the stands, forever changing the outcome of Game 1 of the ALCS and, many believe, of the series.

2005 At Minute Maid Park, Chris Burke's 18th-inning homer ends the longest postseason game in baseball history as the Astros defeat the Braves, 7-6, to advance into the National League Championship Series. Atlanta's five-run late lead in the contest vanishes with an eighth-inning grand slam by Lance Berkman and a two-out ninth-inning solo shot by Brad Ausmus, which barely clears Gold Glove center fielder Andruw Jones' outstretched hand.
2010 At Yankee Stadium, the Twins drop Game 3 of the ALCS, 6-2, giving New York a series sweep. After being the first team to clinch a playoff berth, Minnesota exits the postseason without winning a game in the first round for the second straight year.
2019 After posting a historic opening frame, the Cardinals cruise to a 13-1 victory over the Braves in the decisive Game 5 of the NLDS at SunTrust Park. St. Louis tallies ten times before Atlanta bats, scoring the most runs in the first inning of a postseason game.
27 Fact(s) Found