Philadelphia Baseball History

When you look back at Connie Mack's time in Philadelphia, you see a lot of elephants.  There were elephant on the Athletics' uniforms.  There were elephants on the hats.  Connie Mack had elephant statues.  There was an elephant in the Athletics' logo.  The A's Christmas cards even had an elephant.  Now, most fans of Philadelphia baseball history can tell you that the elephant originated from a comment by John McGraw, the famous manager of the New York Giants.  He called the Philadelphia Athletics a white elephant.  Connie Mack was so amused by the comment, that he adopted the white elephant as the team's mascot.  But, what exactly does all of this mean? White elephants were revered in southeast Asian culture.  They were seen as a sign of wealth and opulence.  Rulers kept white elephants as a symbol of their power.  Because white elephants were revered, they were protected from performing labor.  But this meant that a g...

In 1954, the Athletics were the only baseball team in Philadelphia that had brought a World Championship to the city.  In fact, the team won five!  Arguably, the team was more popular than the Phillies.   But 1954 was the last season that the American League had a team in Philadelphia.  In the off season, the A's stunned the City of Philadelphia by announcing that they had found a new buyer for the team, and that they were moving to Kansas City.   While the A’s fortunes hand dwindled in the past two decades, the Athletics still had a loyal following.   Indeed, to this day, some Philadelphia baseball fans say the wrong team left. So what happened?   How did Philadelphia lose the A’s? Cornelius McGillicuddy, known as Connie Mack for short, guided the Philadelphia Athletics since the inception of the American League as a rival major league in 1901. Charles Somers, who had made his money in the coal industry, invested the money to help seed five ...

Baseball, having evolved from the game of rounders, is at its heart a child’s game. Growing up in the city, it was easy to start a baseball game. All you needed was a stick in a rubber ball for equipment. Gather a few friends. Find an open space such as an empty lot, or even a quiet city street where a car’s bumper would serve as a base. Boom! You have a ball game. It should be of no surprise, therefore, that this children’s game has attracted many children at heart to play professionally. The childish exploits of the great babe Ruth, and his soft spot for children fans, are well known in the baseball world. But child-like exploits as an adult often go hand-in-hand with child-like irresponsibility. And this could be a problem when a grown man cannot control his behavior, or curb child-like excesses. It often takes great patience to see the potential in such a player. Such was the case of George Edward “Rube” Waddell.  Waddell’s child-like exploits are well-known. Waddell ...

The 1929 Philadelphia Athletics boasted four future Hall of Famers: Jimmie Foxx, Robert “Lefty” Grove, Al Simmons and Mickey Cochrane. But the most unexpected hero of that season was a thirty-five year old right-handed pitcher with a submarine-style motion, Howard Ehmke.  Born in Silver Creek, New York, Ehmke moved to Los Angeles in 1913. The Los Angeles Angles of the Pacific Coast League signed him to a contract, and then sold his rights to the Washington Senators. Ehmke spurned the Senators in favor of signing with the Buffalo Blues of the upstart Federal League.  But Ehmke’s year with the Blues was disappointing. After the Federal League folded, Ehmke played with the Syracuse Stars, and was sold to the Detroit Tigers. However, the Senators claimed that they still owned the rights to Ehmke. AL President Ban Johnson agreed. The Senators then sold their rights to the Tigers.  Ehmke played six seasons with the Tigers, until he was traded to the Red Sox befor...

It may seem weird that a guy in his mid 40s is nostalgic about the Philadelphia Athletics. After all, the team had left Philadelphia a good decade and a half before I was even born. I had known about the A’s from the plaques that the Phillies put up at Veteran Stadium every year. Each season the Phillies honored both a Phillie and an Athletic on their Wall of Fame.  The practice of honoring a member of the A’s ended in 2004, and the A’s Wall of Fame inductees we’re relegated to a plaque on a statue of Connie Mack in the parking lot of Citizens Bank Park.  Still, as a child, I knew who Connie Mack was. I knew he had an impact on the city. But I had never seen a game Connie Mack managed. I had never seen Bobby Shantz throw a single pitch. I had never even seen Jimmy Foxx hit a home run. There were something romantic about the Athletics. Perhaps it was growing up in the 1970s as a Phillies fan. To this date, I can recite starting lineup of the 1977 Phillies.  I tu...

            In the business of baseball, Colonel John Rogers and Benjamin Shibe were not allies.   To the contrary, Shibe was the largest owner of the Philadelphia Athletics who played in the upstart American League.   The A’s had signed away one of the stars of Rogers’ Philadelphia Phillies, Nap Lajoie, in the premier season of 1901.   Many of Lajoie’s teammates also jumped leagues, which prompted Rogers to seek an injunction preventing former Phillies from playing in American League games in the state of Pennsylvania.             But on the gridiron, Rogers and Shibe became unlikely compatriots.   In 1902, football was becoming more popular in the United States.   Rogers and Shibe saw an opportunity to benefit from the rising popularity of the sport, and formed the first professional football league: the National Football League.   The league...