History Shots Ep. 2 - Baseball

Here's a history shot to open up MLB's 2024 season!

Episode Transcript

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Alright, welcome back to the

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history on the rocks podcast. This is history shots and in celebration of
opening day of baseball yesterday and opening weekend as it continues. Today
we're going to do a history shots episode with some little known facts about
America's pastime and Major League Baseball. So we're going to start with a

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very upsetting fact first. We call baseball America's pastime but unfortunately
established in 1877, Labats Park in London, Ontario in Canada is the oldest
baseball field in the world. Yes, believe that or not. Secondly, Leroy
Robert Satchel Page is the oldest baseball player at 59 years and 80 days

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on September 25th 1965. 59 years old still playing professional baseball, that's
crazy. Alright, let's take a look at some statistics here. The fastest
professional baseball game only lasted for 31 minutes. Now I coach baseball and
I can tell you right now 31 minutes would be an absolute slaughterfest. The

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Winston Salem Twins defeated the Asheville tourists at 2 to 1 on August
30th 1916 in Asheville, North Carolina. While the game was originally scheduled
at 2 p.m. it ended before it was officially supposed to begin. That's
kind of crazy and only two to one. So things must have moved fast in that game.
The fastest recorded Major League game only lasted for 51 minutes. It happened

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on September 28th 1919 at the Polo Grounds very famous stadium. If you play
MLB the show the Polo Grounds is terrifying with how deep center field
is and how short the right and left field walls are. Back then the New York
Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies 6 to 1 in 51 minutes. Now the longest MLB

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game in terms of time lasted for 8 hours and 6 minutes. Between my Chicago
White Sox and the Milwaukee Brewers the game had to be completed in more than
two days. It began on May 8th of 1984 at Camiskey Park where the score was tied
at 3 to 3 after 17 innings. However the game resulted in a tie when no more
scores were hit the following day with a total of 25 innings played. Yes that

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sounds like my White Sox not being able to score as day one of the 2024 MLB
season showed against the Tigers yesterday. The longest MLB game in terms of
innings had 26 innings. On May 1st 1920 the Brooklyn Robins and Boston Braves
tied at 1 to 1. The game could have lasted longer than 3 hours and 50 minutes

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if not for the night's darkness that caused the calling of the game. And no
there were not lights back in 1920 like our stadiums have today. A little bit of
president history here as well. William Howard Taft was the first US president
to throw the ceremonial first ball. Several years prior to the historical event
on April 14th 1910 the 27th president was once a semi-pro baseball player.

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American presidents have been doing the honor of throwing out the first ball on
opening day since then. Still Jimmy Carter remains to be the only exception to
this tradition probably because he wasn't in the United States. He was
probably abroad doing all of his philanthropy. Most home runs in a game.
So far 18 players have managed to achieve this feat and the record stands at

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four home runs. The first player to do it was Bobby Lowe back in 1894 and the
latest person to do it is JD Martinez in 2017 with four home runs when he was
playing for the Arizona Diamondbacks in a game against the Los Angeles Dodgers at
Dodger Stadium. The most expensive autographed baseball sold for $191,200.

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On May 5th 2006 Heritage Auction Gallery sold it at an auction in Dallas, Texas.
Legendary player of course Joe DiMaggio and then wife film star Marilyn Monroe
signed the said baseball in 1961. So both of their signatures yeah I can see how
that's expensive. The first baseball team to ever wear numbers on their backs
were the Yankees. In the 1920s the team wore numbers in order of their batting.

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Babe Ruth always wore number three because he always hit third. The least
amount of people recorded at a baseball game is 347 and my fellow White Sox fans
it usually feels like that. However it wasn't us. Woohoo in 2011 the Florida
Marlins which might not be surprising either. We're playing against the

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Cincinnati Reds however only 347 people were able to attend due to Hurricane
Irene. Various references have different takes on who invented the game of
baseball. Some even date as far back as the 18th century. However the most direct
ancestors of the game turn out to be two different English games. One is Cricket

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while the other one is called Rounders which was a children's game that early
colonists brought to New England. There were once two versions of baseball
until the American Civil War. One was called the Massachusetts game which used
a softball. On the other hand the New York game used a hardball. Soldiers from
New York and New Jersey taught their game to others during the Civil War and
eventually obviously the New York game became predominant. Since the Civil War

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baseball has earned the tag America's National Pastime. Both Union and
Confederate soldiers played the game to boost morale and even escape
emotionally. Obviously during this tragic time in our history. Hence baseball
increased in popularity during the war between 1861 and 1865 and obviously many
years after that. World War II inspired some changes in baseball rules. Major league

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baseball declared that in the event of an enemy bombing the leading team after
five innings would automatically be the winner. So some stipulations are just in
case. Baseball has listed eight original MLB teams. They are the Philadelphia
Athletics, the St. Louis Brown Stockings, the Hartford Dark Blues, Louisville

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Graves, Mutual of New York, Boston Red Stockings which is now the Atlanta
Braves not the Red Sox, Cincinnati Red Stockings and the Chicago White
Stockings which are now the Cubs not the White Sox. So a lot of changes happened
over the decades of baseball. A lot of changes to teams and where they moved

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and what they were called. On a sadder note Ray Chapman is the only major league
baseball player to be killed by a pitched ball in history. On August 16, 1920 he
was playing for the Cleveland Indians when he received a fatal hit in the head.
Yankee pitcher Carl Mays was the one who threw the deadly ball which is honestly
that's kind of shocking because baseball is a dangerous sport especially today how

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fast and hard guys throw. I know we wear helmets now but still at the same time
like getting hit in the head that's it's kind of amazing that there's only one
person that has passed away due to that kind of injury but fortunately that's a
good thing. And lastly Joel Youngblood is the only MLB player to get hits for two

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teams on the same day. As a Metz member Youngblood played an afternoon game
against the Cubs. Then he was traded to the Expos right after the game in which
he made baseball history because he played that same night against the
Phillies in Philadelphia and recorded another hit. Just wanted to bring you a
history shots throw those back. A little fun for the weekend going into baseball

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season for you who love baseball like we do you know it's a great time of year.
Summer's coming it's about to be the time to go sit outside watch my crappy
white socks and throw back some beers which always make it feel better.
Alright well thank you for joining us for a nice short history shots episode I

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hope you all have a wonderful weekend. March Madness getting crazy as well the
sweet 16 going on so enjoy that enjoy some baseball have a great weekend
throw some drinks back relax and cheers.

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you