Monday, March 30, 2009

The History Boys of Summer 4

"History is just one fookin' thing after another."
from "The History Boys, " by Allen Bennett, 2004

The Giants' First Superstar

Buck Ewing is considered by many to be the greatest ballplayer of the 19th century. One of the players who came from Troy to form the original Gothams/Giants, he captained the team during its championship years of 1888 and 1889.
Writing in the 1938 Spalding Guide, John Foster said of him, "As a thrower to bases Ewing never had a superior, and there are not to exceed ten men who could come anywhere near being equal to him. Ewing was the man of whom it was said, "He handed the ball to the second baseman from the batter's box."
His offensive career numbers include a .303 batting average, 354 stolen bases and 178 triples.



2 comments:

Theo said...

Can we clone him?

Brother Bob said...

The HOF numbers don't agree with the numbers from my original source, Wikipedia. I suspect one set includes stats from his time in the renegade Players League and the other doesn't.