He Threw Games for Gamblers Yet He Still Holds Record for Most Innings Pitched Without Allowing a Home Run

We present now for your amusement, the curious case of one Joe Blong.  St. Louis Brown Stockings right-handed pitcher, St. Louis native, son of Irish immigrants, and University of Notre Dame alumnus.

He holds the major league record for most innings pitched without allowing a home run in a career (320.1 innings). But it also seems he had a nasty habit of throwing games, "hippodroming" as the newspapers of the day colorfully called it, and was kicked out of baseball for it not once but twice.

When Joe and two other Browns teammates were kicked out of baseball and blacklisted from all respectable leagues in November 1877, it was curtains for repeat-offender Blong.   How do you develop a reputation for throwing games and still hold a positive record that lasts forever?  Perhaps he had so much pitching control that he was able to serve up only singles and doubles so that it did not look too obvious that he was throwing a game.?? In that case, still remarkable control for a pitcher.

The modern record is quite a ways off from Blong's mark: (269.1 Greg Minton, San Francisco Giants reliever - June 1, 1979 through May 1, 1982), symptomatic of home runs that happen about 8 times as often as they did in the eighteen seventies.  But nonetheless even if someday someone surpasses 320.1 innings, it is not likely to represent the entire career of that pitcher.  Organized baseball did not know what a favor they were doing for Joe when they expelled him in 1877:  bestowing him with an almost impossible record of pitching an entire career, consisting of more than 300 innings, without giving up a home run.

Blong is buried in Calvary Cemetery in north St. Louis.

p.s. for Notre Dame fans, one of Blong's partners in crime was the unfortunately named ballplayer Trick McSorley, his classmate at Notre Dame. 

Here is the account from This Game of Games blog:

The St. Louis Globe Democrat ... chastised the Browns for signing Blong. While it’s possible that this sense of outrage was simply a result of Blong’s disregard for a contract, the Globe Democrat’s article from October 31st, that stated that Blong was expelled from both the Reds and the Stars for “hippodroming, must be taken seriously. The contemporary sources paint Blong as a scoundrel at best and, at worst, as a man lacking honesty and character. The red flags were certainly up.

Playing mostly in the outfield, Blong had an uneventful 1876 season for the Brown Stockings while enjoying his best year statistically. In 1877, he was named team captain. Captain Blong was not having a good year at the plate that year when the Brown Stockings went to Chicago in late August to take on the White Stockings. On August 24, 1877, Chicago beat St. Louis 4-3 in just another game in the dog days of the season. However, later that month, Blong and teammate Joe Battin were named by a group of Chicago and St. Louis gamblers as “willing partners” in the fix of the August 24th game. “Crooked play has been discovered in the St. Louis nine,” said an article in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, “and a dispatch from St. Louis says that (Davey) Force, Battin, and Blong have been expelled with forfeited pay.” The scandal would lead to the blacklisting of Blong, Battin, Force, and teammate Mike McGeary in November of 1877.

Joe Blong’s big league career was over. Even though he was able to catch on with “the Springfield nine” in 1878 and was playing baseball with the Union Club of St. Louis as late as 1884, Blong would never again be allowed to play baseball in the major leagues. While the incidents with the Reds and Stars are open to interpretation, Blong was specifically named, by gamblers, in a fixing incident while with the Brown Stockings and would be persona non grata in Organized Baseball for the rest of his life.

Photo Collages of St. Louis Browns

Click below for Browns history. All of the items displayed are available for purchase. Write or call:
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St. Louis Browns Were Colorful

 Major League Baseball fans in Illinois are divided into several camps. Cardinals fans rule the south, while White Sox fans creep in farther north. The Cubs have a strong base statewide. Sixty years ago, there was another, more interesting choice.

Until 1953, St. Louis was home to two teams, the National League's Cardinals as well as the Browns of the American League. Though the Browns lost a bundle of games over the decades, they left a legacy of some of baseball’s most colorful moments.

The Browns opened play in St. Louis in 1902, a year after the founding of the American League, when the last-place Milwaukee franchise moved to the Gateway City after only one season. They were named for the color of their uniforms, which were replete with brown trim. The name also had been an early moniker of the other team in town, the Cardinals, before the turn of the century.

The Browns finished second at 78-58 in that inaugural season, which was not a sign of things to come. In their 52 years in St. Louis, the Browns finished first once, second twice and sixth or worse 33 times. Their ineptitude gave rise to the saying, “St. Louis. First in shoes, first in booze and last in the American League.”

Despite their struggles, the Browns never lacked for color. The team gave rise to the brilliant career

Branch Rickey

of Branch Rickey, who came to St. Louis in 1913 from a successful stint as head baseball coach at the

University of Michigan. Rickey later moved across town and built the first minor-league farm system, which helped the Cardinals win four World Series titles before he left in 1942 for Brooklyn. There, he introduced Jackie Robinson, the first African-American to play in the major leagues.

“The owner of the Browns at the time did not recognize Rickey’s value,” said Bill Rogers, of St. Louis, who has researched the Browns extensively. “Had Rickey stayed on, I think things would have turned out much differently.”

Rickey also is responsible for the player that many believe was the greatest in Browns history. First baseman George Sisler was a former Michigan star who batted .420 with 51 stolen bases and 105 RBIs in 1922 to lead the Browns to a 93-61 record, their best ever. Sisler batted .340 in a 15-year major league career, 12 with the Browns. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1939.

Poor attendance was a recurring theme in Browns history. The 1935 team drew 80,922 fans for the entire season, and the Great Depression was not entirely to blame. St. Louis never won more than 67 games in a 154-game season at any point in the 1930s and was a miserable 43-111 in 1939.

Finally, the Browns broke through in 1942, finishing third at 82-69 under manager Luke Sewell. 

With a strong pitching staff and a formidable infield, St. Louis was primed for a run. In 1944, they

remained in contention for most of the season and swept a season-ending, four-game series against the Yankees at home to capture the pennant with an 89-65 mark.

Ironically, their World Series opponents were their crosstown rivals, the Cardinals. Since the early 1920s, the Browns actually had been the Cardinals’ landlords as the owners of Sportsmans’ Park. Unfortunately for the Browns, they had to suffer as the Cardinals rose to the top of the National League and routinely outdrew their counterparts at the box office.

The Browns jumped to a 2-1 Series lead, but the Cardinals won the last three to clinch in six games. “The Series appearance was a tremendous shot in the arm for the Browns,” said Rogers. “But in St. Louis, the fans of one team did not like the other team. Even Stan Musial remarked about that once.”

The Browns nearly repeated in 1945, but were eliminated from the pennant race on the last day of the season. That year, the star attraction for the Browns was Pete Gray, a one-armed outfielder who batted .218 in 77 games in his sole major league season.

For most of their existence, the Browns were financially strapped, and often had to sell off star players simply to keep afloat. After their glorious run of the mid-1940s, many top players were sold for needed cash, and the team fell into steep decline.

“I hate to say it, but I think the Browns were often mismanaged,” remarked Rogers. “That put them in a financial bind often, and they had to trade or sell their best players to cover expenses.”

However, there were plenty of memorable episodes. Many were courtesy of the flamboyant Bill Veeck, who bought the team in 1951 from an ownership tandem including Bill DeWitt, whose son is a current Cardinals’ team owner. Veeck challenged the Cardinals head on with a series of wacky promotions.

Soon after buying the team, Veeck signed Eddie Gaedel, a three-foot-seven-inch midget to a one-day contract and sent him up to bat in the second game of an Aug. 19, 1951, doubleheader against Detroit. Wearing the number “1/8" and creating a strike zone of a mere inch-and-a-half, Gaedel walked on four pitches.

Six days later, the Browns hosted “Grandstand Manager’s Night,” in which fans were allowed to


Bill Veeck

make on-field decisions. Manager Zack Taylor held up signs such as “Should the Browns Bunt?,” “Take Out the Pitcher?” and “Steal?,” while spectators held signs replying “Yes” or “No.” The Browns knocked off the Philadelphia A’s 5-3 that night, a highlight for a squad that went 52-102.

Still, many of the players preferred playing for the Browns than the other team in town. Though the Cardinals never finished lower than second from 1941-49, many Browns were happier with their cellar-dwelling franchise. In an interview for a 2000 book, Don Gutteridge, a former Cardinal who was the Browns’ second baseman through their 1940s heyday, said that “the Cardinals were always pinching pennies. The Browns were a better club to play for than the Cardinals.”

Some of the later Browns are among the franchise’s most recognizable names. They include the legendary Satchel Paige, who won 12 games at age 46 in 1952, as well as righthander Ned Garver, who won 20 games in 1951. Garver is one of 23 surviving Browns players today, a list that includes Ottawa native Ed Mickelson, who saw action in seven games for the Browns in 1953 and is said to have driven in the final run in Browns history.

Mickelson, now 88, played in a total of 18 Major League games over three seasons with the Browns, White Sox and Cardinals and later wrote a memoir of his 11 seasons in pro ball, mostly in the minors.

Another surviving ex-Brown is Don Larsen, a St. Louis rookie in 1953. Three years later, he tossed a perfect game for New York in the 1956 World Series.

When the Cardinals were sold to Anheuser-Busch in December 1952, Veeck realized he could no longer survive against a larger-budget rival. His tumultuous run as Browns’ owner came to an end when he sold the team after the 1953 season. The franchise moved to Baltimore and became the Orioles.

Sixty years later, the Browns are hardly forgotten. In 1984, the St. Louis Browns Fan Club was founded and now numbers 370 members. The club holds an annual banquet, publishes an in-house magazine and offers a line of collectibles.

“Interest in the Browns is extremely high,” said Rogers, the president of the club. “Even though only 23 Browns survive, there are tens of thousands of fans left. Even younger people have experienced the Browns through the memories of their parents and grandparents. Like one person said to me, 'we can’t bring back the Browns, but we can at least keep their memory alive.’ ”

Don Lenhardt, 91, former outfielder for the St. Louis Browns

Don Lenhardt, who spent five seasons in the major leagues as an outfielder with the St. Louis Browns, Chicago White Sox, Boston Red Sox, Detroit Tigers and Baltimore Orioles, passed away June 9, 2014 in Chesterfield, Missouri. He was 91.

Don Lenhardt

A native of Alton, Illinois, Lenhardt was a standout multi-sport athlete, earning a scholarship to the University of Illinois to play both baseball and basketball. His collegiate career was cut short in 1942 when he joined the Navy. He served in World War II until his 1945 discharge, never playing during his military service.

“I missed about five summers of playing after I went into the service,” Lenhardt told Lou Hernandez in his book, “Memories of Winter Ball.” “I cannot say it was bad, because you never know. It probably did not hurt me at all, because I probably matured some. I did not play ball in the service. I tried out when I was leaving, and they wanted me to stay and play, but I said no, I am going home.”
With the help of Yankees scout Lou Magualo, Lenhardt signed with the St. Louis Browns in 1946.

As he progressed in the Browns minor league organization, Lenhardt grew into a feared power hitter, smashing 22 and 26 home runs respectively for Springfield in 1948 and San Antonio in 1949. His outburst in Double A with San Antonio attracted the attention of Mike Gonzalez, who managed the Habana team in the Cuban Winter League.

“Mike Gonzalez saw me play in San Antonio and he invited me to play in Havana,” he said to Hernandez. “I wanted to go, because I knew it would help me get to the big leagues. I had a great year down there and I had a great first year in the big leagues.”

Lenhardt had a breakout rookie season in 1950 with the Browns, cracking 22 home runs, driving in 81 runs while posting a .273 batting average; however, his powerful start was not enough to cement his position in St. Louis. The cash strapped Browns traded Lenhardt to the Chicago White Sox less than halfway through the 1951 season for two players and cash. It was a welcome acquisition for the White Sox.

“I’m glad to have him with us,” White Sox manager Paul Richards said to the United Press in 1951, “and I’ll probably use him most against left-handed pitching.”

The White Sox used him as Richards directed and in 199 at-bats, he hit 10 home runs. Still, despite his power hitting, the winds of change continued to blow Lenhardt throughout the American League.
He played for three different teams in 1952, starting with the Boston Red Sox after an off-season trade. He was then traded twice in the span of two months, going from Boston to Detroit in a blockbuster deal that sent Walt Dropo and Johnny Pesky to Detroit in exchange for future Hall of Famer George Kell and Dizzy Trout. In August, Detroit sent Lenhardt back to St. Louis for 20-game winner Ned Garver.

Lenhardt stayed with St. Louis through the 1953 season, their last in St. Louis. He followed the organization in their move to Baltimore in 1954 and finished out his major league career that year with the Boston Red Sox after being sold to the team in May
.
He played two more seasons in the minor leagues with the Boston organization and hung up his spikes for good at the end of the 1956 campaign.

He finished his major league career with a .271 average and 61 home runs in 481 games.
After his playing days, he worked over four decades in the Red Sox organization as a scout and coach, serving as the Red Sox' first base coach under manager Eddie Kasko from 1970-73. He retired from scouting in 2002 and lived in Chesterfield attending St. Louis Browns reunions and meetings of the 1-2-3 club, an exclusive group of St. Louis retired athletes and sports writers.

His passing leaves only 22 living former members of the St. Louis Browns.

Browns Original Jersey For Sale

While there are a number of sources in the market for replica jerseys for the Browns and other teams, the Browns jersey shown below is reported to be an original jersey from the 1952-53 season. Price is negotiable. Call Jay Turek during evening hours in Pennsylvania at 215-855-4006.

Click on photo to enlarge

This is a New One on Me ...

Athletic and competitive, Cohen was an avid baseball fan, partial to the St. Louis Cardinals, as he made it past the team’s first cuts in his youth when the Cardinals were then known as the St. Louis Browns.

I am afraid that the Cardinals were not the St. Louis Browns.  At least not since 1898.  The Browns were a different team.  But condolences to the family.  Another one for the "Grand daddy played for the Browns" annals.

By Guest Contributor on November 06th, 2014

Gerald Allen Cohen

Gerald Allen Cohen

Gerald Allen Cohen, 83, passed away Oct. 1, 2014, at his home in Laguna Beach.

Cohen was born March 5, 1931, in St. Louis, Mo., to Benjamin and Leah Cohen.

He was a remarkable mathematician and a very talented engineer who contributed greatly to the U.S. space program and several other engineering projects.

His academic pursuits began in 1948 at Purdue University. A full scholarship brought him to the California Institute of Technology for post-graduate work and he returned to Purdue to receive his Ph.D in mechanical engineering by the age of 25. Interest in post-Ph.D math studies brought him to Brown University and later he was a professor of mathematics at Virginia Tech University.

After working for Ford Aeronutronics, Cohen started his own company, Structures Research Associates. There he developed the software program FASOR (Field Analysis of Shells of Revolution) which he contracted to NASA, Ball Corporation, and others. He was known by his colleagues as the best in his field and by his sons and their peers as a math and physics homework tutor.

Athletic and competitive, Cohen was an avid baseball fan, partial to the St. Louis Cardinals, as he made it past the team’s first cuts in his youth when the Cardinals were then known as the St. Louis Browns. The highlight of his every year was his Alaskan/Canadian fishing trip with his son, Gerald.

Cohen is survived by his wife, Eivor; four sons, Ben, Ron, Gerald and Steve; grandson, Jaden; brothers Ray and Stan; and many friends.

A private memorial service at sea was held Oct. 11, 2014, off the coast of San Pedro, Calif.

Very Contempo: A St. Louis Browns Hoodie

I spotted this St. Louis Browns hoodie at the Cardinal Authentics store in ballpark Village next to Busch Stadium in St. Louis.  It is the store that is right on the ground floor next to where the St. Louis baseball Museum is (containing some great Browns exhibits, natch!).

Happy Halloween, Browns Fans, from Blackie Schwamb

Happy Halloween from the Browns Fan Club!

Halloween greetings brought to you by Blackie Schwamb, from Manager Zack Taylor's '48 squad. As a kid in depression-era Los Angeles, Ralph Schwamb earned his nickname "Blackie" because he dressed in all black to emulate the bad guys he rooted for in western movies.

Honorable Halloween mention from Spook Jacobs, who although not a Brownie, played for two defunct teams: the Philadelphia and Kansas City A's.

Is This Bobo Holloman's Daughter??

"Maggie grew up in St. Louis watching the Cardinals with her grandfather, who once threw a no-hitter as a member of the Triple-A St. Louis Browns." 

Assuming they mean the American League Browns (and not the AAA Browns), "Maggie" would have to be Bobo Holloman's granddaughter. A granddaughter of Bob Groom or Ernie Koob, would be much older than this young lady.

See http://espn.go.com/espnw/athletes-life/article/11779356/sports-dating-sites-help-fans-meet-their-matches-online

ATHLETE'S LIFE

LOVE AND BASEBALL: SPORTS DATING SITES HELP FANS MEET THEIR MATCHES ONLINE

• 1

By Sarah Spain | Oct 28, 2014
espnW.com

Dilip Vishwanat/Getty Images

A Cardinals fanatic finally found her match on MLB Singles, one of many dating sites that are helping pair up sports fans.

When you think about it, a baseball game is a perfect first date.

There's enough action on the field to give you something to talk about or fill the awkward silences, but it's not too loud or frenetic, so conversation can flow. You've got the sun above you, beer and hot dogs in hand, and a couple of hours to kill, usually enough time to determine if you'd like to play tonsil hockey with this person sometime down the road.

Of course, you've gotta like baseball. Or at the very least, tolerate it.

In five years living in L.A., die-hard St. Louis Cardinals fan Maggie* was dying for that perfect first date, but she was having a heck of a time trying to track down a guy willing to watch an entire baseball game.

"They're all into their clothes and Hollywood," the 29-year-old says of the guys she'd encountered in SoCal. "I'm like, 'Can we just eat hot dogs and watch baseball?' It's kind of a big hang-up, because it's hard, especially in L.A., to meet guys who like sports as much as I do.

"A lot of guys find it intimidating when a girl is rattling off statistics and they're clueless, so I've learned from past experience that that doesn't always work out that well."

Courtesy of Maggie

Maggie met Dan's parents at a game at AT&T Park earlier this season.

Maggie grew up in St. Louis watching the Cardinals with her grandfather, who once threw a no-hitter as a member of the Triple-A St. Louis Browns. "I spent every summer with my grandfather on the lake," she says. "Watching baseball, fishing and barbecuing. I was just raised on it, it's in my blood."

So when a banner ad reading, "Meet other singles in your area who like baseball" popped up on her MLB.TV app in April, she figured she'd give it a shot. She clicked on it and ended up on the "MLB Singles, powered by Match.com" landing page.

"I've tried a few other dating sites before and wasn't impressed," Maggie says. "This was the first time I ever paid for a dating service. I made 'N1StlCardsFan' my user name as a way to find people who were truly baseball fans and help break the ice. A lot of the messages I got, they used the Cardinals fan thing as a great way to start a conversation."

MLB Singles launched earlier this year and, according to Match.com, since then more than 550,000 members have added an MLB badge to their profile to identify themselves as baseball fans and acknowledge their favorite teams. (And, surprise, surprise, the New York Yankees badge is the most popular one on the site.)

Right around the same time the MLB Singles page hit the web, so did Packers Backers, a site that aims to pair up Cheeseheads looking for love. According to the home page, about 2,600 Packers fans have signed up, but the site didn't respond to requests for updated statistics or potential success stories.

SportsPassions.com, GolfMates.com, MVPDate.com and FanSingles.com are some of the other dating sites that look to aim Cupid's arrow at sporty singles. NFL Network broadcaster Rich Eisen is even getting in on the action -- he partnered with Nike Football to create the Free Agent app for sports-loving singles.

I like that we get to cheer for each other. I feel like it expands my team interests a bit. I'm dedicated to my Cardinals, but it's nice to have someone help cheer for my team, and then I can rally for his team, as well.

Maggie

Using a shared interest in sports to bring singles together not only works well for dating sites like Match.com, which earned a new paying customer in Maggie, but also for MLB, which launched the partnership hoping to get baseball fans paired up and buying tickets to games.

"The idea is to put like people together with similar interest and passion," Noah Garden, Major League Baseball Advanced Media's executive vice president of revenue, told The Associated Press. "There's still always room for more butts in the seats."

Of course, helping two baseball fans find lasting love is a nice bonus, right? Maggie certainly thinks so.

She went on a lot of first dates with guys she met on the site, but only one or two second dates. No one impressed her much, until about six weeks in, when a message appeared from a handsome, smart guy who not only liked baseball, but made a living off the game, too.

"My mom and my sister were in town when he first messaged me and he mentioned that he worked for the Dodgers," Maggie says. "I have lower expectations when I'm on those sites, so I kind of joked with my family, 'He's from the Dodgers, maybe he can at least get me some free tickets when the Cardinals come in town next month.' ... Little did I know that he was going to end up being this amazing guy."

(*The amazing guy, a 33-year-old who works in the Dodgers' front office, is a little wary of admitting to the guys that he went on Match.com, so for the sake of the story, he's "Dan" and she's "Maggie.")

"He doesn't really want people at work knowing he was on the site," Maggie says, laughing. "Some people in the office already give him a little grief for dating a Cardinals fan, but I think his friends are just happy he's with another baseball fan."

Even though Dan works for the Dodgers, he's actually an A's and Giants fan, owing to his Bay Area roots. The couple has a visit to Oakland, California, on the agenda, as Maggie has never been to O.co Coliseum. They already made the trek up north to AT&T Park, where she met his parents at a game.

"One of my goals is to see the Cardinals play in every stadium," Maggie says. "I'm the kind of person who wants to book a last-minute trip to go see my team play and he's really understanding of that and supportive. He actually hooked me up with tickets to a Padres game, so I drove down to San Diego to go with my sister."

Maggie says the best parts about dating a fellow baseball fan are the shared interest in the game and having a friendly rivalry to bond over.

"I like that we get to cheer for each other," she says. "I feel like it expands my team interests a bit. I'm dedicated to my Cardinals, but it's nice to have someone help cheer for my team, and then I can rally for his team, as well."

Maggie is finishing up her Ph.D. at USC and plans to do management consulting in the health-care field, so it was also important for her to find a sports lover with an intellectual side and a lot of ambition.

"'You're smart and you're into baseball?'" she says about meeting Dan. "Oh, my god. I'm always pinching myself. I'm like 'Am I dreaming? Is this baseball heaven?'"

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Contributor, espnW.com

Sarah Spain

Sarah Spain is a SportsCenter Anchor for Chicago's ESPN1000 and a reporter for ESPNChicago.com. She's a proud Cornell alum and a huge Chicago sports fan. You can follow her on Twitter @SarahSpain.

Next Eddie Gaedel

The Next Eddie Gaedel

1951 Autographs

Click on graphic to enlarge
 

Press Release on Elimination of Orioles

ST LOUIS- October 16, 2014  

The St. Louis Browns Fan club is disappointed that there will not be a reenactment  of the 1944  World Series,  in its 70th anniversary year, but wishes to congratulate the Baltimore Orioles on a fabulous 2014 season.  Many of our fan club members are Orioles rooters,  and the  O's  (the former Browns) have given them a thrilling ride.

In 2015, the Orioles will be entering their 32nd year without an AL pennant.  The Browns would encourage Orioles fans to take heart: the Browns went 41 years without a pennant! All things come to those who persevere and  look for their opportunities.   Best of success!

Browns Pitcher Al LaMacchia Elected to San Antonio Sports Hall Of Fame; Was Young 'Benchwarmer' for 1944 American League Champs

St. Louis Browns right-handed pitcher Al LaMacchia was elected to the San Antonio Sports Hall of Fame.  LaMacchia, a native St. Louisan, pitched for the Browns farm club, the San Antonio Missions, in the 1940s as well as stints with the Browns and the Washington Senators.  He went on to become a very successful pro scout, working for several MLB teams.

LaMacchia did service with the Browns club for parts of four seasons (1943-46). In 1944, the year the Browns won their only American League championship, he was with the club through May, and later in the fall, but was never called upon to play in an official game. While on the roster, he served as batting practice pitcher for the wartime/arm-weary team until he injured his thumb during the "Streetcar" World Series versus the Cardinals.   

In between call-ups to the Browns roster, LaMacchia went 12-3 in '44 as a starter for the Toledo Mud Hens, leading the American Association in winning percentage with an .800 mark. 

He was a successful scout for many teams, most notably the Toronto Blue Jays (whom he joined as an expansion team and helped lead to back to back World Series titles) and the Los Angeles Dodgers. Active for the latter club up until the mid 2000's, LaMacchia scouted outfielder Andre Ethier, who is still with the Dodger ballclub as of 2014.

LaMacchia, with fellow ex-Brown Bud Thomas at the '09 BFC

In 2009 he was a guest speaker at the St. Louis Browns Fan Club (BFC) annual luncheon at the Missouri Athletic Club West.

Other inductees in this Hall Of Fame class include former San Antonio Spurs head coach Doug Moe.

Alfred Anthony LaMacchia died in his adopted hometown of San Antonio in 2010. 

For further information on Al LaMacchia, see the Society of American Baseball Research Bio Project.

UPDATED DAILY: Oddsmakers Rate Chances of a Cardinals-Orioles World Series

According to fangraphs, the current chances of an Orioles-Cardinals World Series, 70-years after the Browns-Cardinals "Streetcar" World Series of 1944  is...

2.1 8.87 8.67 13.2 19.1 12.6 4.5 6.2 1.2%

http://www.fangraphs.com/coolstandings.aspx

Browns Players/Fan Reunion Luncheon 2014

If you didn't make it to the Browns Fan Club annual luncheon, here are some of the people and activities you missed.

Bud Thomas (L), Bill Rogers

J.W. Porter (L), Ed Mickelson (R)

Bud Thomas

Roy Sievers

Club Member, Denise Rivlin (L), Zee Porter (R)

J.W. Porter

Emmett McAuliffe

Ed Mickelson (L), Bud Thomas (R)

J.W. Porter

(L-R) Fan Club Directors,  Emmett McAuliffe & Bill Borst; Harmony Lineback, Member;
Vicki Martin, Director; Bill Rogers, President

Dave Heller, Author, "As Good As It Got"

Emmett McAuliffe (L), Bill Rogers (R)

Player Panel Discussion, Mickelson, Thomas, Porter, Sievers

Emmett McAuliffe (L), Bud Thomas (R)

Bud and Janet Thomas

Mary and Ed Mickelson