In October 1911, as the Philadelphia Athletics were playing the New York Giants in the World Series. Edward J. Walsh, a founding owner and director of  Washington’s American League team, met with Cincinnati Manager Clark Griffith at Philadelphia's 30th Street Station. That meeting helped determine the fate of Major League Baseball in Washington for nearly … Continue reading Ed Walsh, an original Nats owner, recruited Clark Griffith →

Leon "Goose" Goslin and Joe Judge, who helped Washington win the World Series in 1924 and an American League pennant in '25, became the first two players under today's rules to hit back-to-back homers twice in the same game. It happened on the afternoon of May 26, 1930, at Yankee Stadium. The Senators were looking … Continue reading Goslin, Judge hit back-to-back homers twice in the same game →

Three former expansion Senators – Chuck Hinton, Jim Hannan and Fred Valentine – helped found the  Major League Baseball Players Alumni Association in February 1982, recruiting more than a dozen other former players. The organization today has more than 8,600 members. Brooks Robinson is the group’s current president and several other Hall of Famers serve … Continue reading Former Nats founded the players alumni association →

Charles Everd “Gabby” Street played in the majors for seven seasons as a catcher with the Cincinnati Reds, Boston Braves, New York Highlanders, St. Louis Cardinals and the Washington Senators, where he spent four years as Walter Johnson’s personal catcher. In the midst of his playing career, he survived the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and … Continue reading Gabby Street’s Monumental catch →

Relief pitcher Ed Roebuck, who spent two months of the 1963 season and another one in ’64 with the Senators, was one of the game’s greatest fungo hitters. As a child, according to Paul Hirsch’s SABR bio essay, Roebuck liked to pass time hitting stones with a stick. The pitcher became so good at making … Continue reading Ed Roebuck: Fungo hitter extraordinaire →

One of the nation’s best baseball writers, Tyler Kepner of the New York Times, has a knack for shedding new light on his subjects, which is precisely what he did in a 2021 column about Trea Turner. (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/05/sports/baseball/trea-turner-nationals.html) Kepner called Turner “baseball’s most overlooked superstar,” pointing out that the Nats’ shortstop topped the much-touted Fernando … Continue reading Trea Turner: the “most overlooked superstar” →

Before Juan Soto finished with the National League’s highest batting average in 2020, playing in 47 of Washington’s 60 games, four players with the original Washington Senators had won American League batting titles. One of them – Mickey Vernon -- did it twice: in 1946 and 1953. Unlike the other three winners, his batting titles, … Continue reading Did Goslin and Myer really lead the A.L. in batting? →

The original Washington National Baseball Club was a top-level, ostensibly amateur, team in the 1860s. But like other highly skilled teams of that era, the team was made up of what are often known as “ringers” brought in from elsewhere and given no-show jobs by wealthy and well-connected baseball enthusiasts. The first professional league, the … Continue reading The 1867 Nationals Western Tour →

Try to answer these before looking at BaseballReference.com. The answers to many of them can be found in posts elsewhere on this site. Who played in the last game of the original Senators and in the last game of the expansion Senators?Who in the A.L. finished second in batting average to Ted Williams the season … Continue reading A Washington baseball quiz →

One of those rare players who never spent a day in the minors, Eddie Yost was the regular third baseman for Washington from 1947 through 1958. Despite batting averages between .224 and .249 in six of those seasons in D.C., Yost walked enough to lead the American League six times. He amassed a season-high 151 … Continue reading Eddie Yost, the Nats’ “Walking Man” →