Rube Foster Wins the Cup

Rube Foster Wins the Cup (1906)

On Labor Day at Columbia Park, the Philadelphia Giants and Cuban X-Giants played for the title of a one-season league that put white, Cuban, and Black clubs on the same schedule. Foster loaded the bases twice, escaped twice, and Philadelphia took the Freihofer Cup, 3 to 2, before the largest crowd black baseball had ever drawn. The Cuban X-Giants never played another season.

The Yankees Beat the Clock and Lose Anyway (1939)

Massachusetts law barred any inning starting after 6:15 on a Sunday, and any play at all after 6:30. New York scored twice in the top of the eighth at Fenway to lead 7 to 5, then had to make outs fast enough for those runs to survive. George Selkirk and Joe Gordon each jogged home from third into a tag. Boston fans answered with straw hats and bottles until the field was unplayable, and umpire Cal Hubbard forfeited to New York. Five days later, league president Will Harridge threw the forfeit out, called it a 5 to 5 tie, and fined three Yankees $100 each.

Billy Williams Calls It (1970)

He had not missed a game since September 1963. In 1970 he led the majors in hits, runs, and total bases and finished second in the MVP voting, and he was worn down enough to ask Leo Durocher at Wrigley for the afternoon off. The streak stopped at 1,117, a National League record until Steve Garvey passed it in 1983. Most great streaks end with an injury or a manager's decision. This one ended because the man inside it decided he had had enough.

The Glove Throw (1986)

Terry Mulholland was a rookie left-hander when Keith Hernandez opened the third with a chopper to the mound. He backhanded it, and the ball wedged into the webbing so tightly he could not pry it out. So he trotted toward first and threw the whole glove to Bob Brenly, who caught the thing and got the out. Hernandez has said he would have forgotten a routine out. Nobody has let him forget this one.