The biggest star of the 1900s was Honus Wagner "The Flying Dutchman" of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Honus lead the league in most batting categories in the decade. Otherwise the decade was domainated by pitching stars such as Cy Young, Christy Mathewson, Ed Walsh, Joe McGinnity. Pitchers had the advantage of using a ball that could be scuffed, discolored and spat upon. The hitters had the disadvantage of not being able to call for a new ball. The resulting advent of the deadball era made kings of men on the mound. Below Honus front and center with his 1900 Pittsburgh Pirates club.
the statsOur first decade 1901-1909, when the ball was really dead and you would hit 'em where they ain't.
highlights the series
John Henry "Pop" Lloyd was one of the early Negro Leagues brightest stars. Like Wagner he was able to overcome the advantages pitchers had due to the condition of the baseball. John was preceded by Andrew Foster who left school after the eighth grade, set on becoming a professional baseball player. At 17, he made his way to the Midwest and, by 1902, was making $40 a month playing for the Chicago Leland Giants. Rube Foster (front row, center) had built the preeminent black baseball team of the era, the Chicago American​​ Giants, into perennial winners.
Images from
Milwaukee Brewers.
St. Louis Cardinals
St. Louis Cardinals
Washington Senators.
Brooklyn Robins
Booklyn Robins
Boston Beaneaters
Boston Beaneaters
New York Highlanders
St. Louis Cardinals
Cincinnati Reds
Cincinnati Reds
Stars of the decade included Honus Wagner (top left), Nap Lajoie (second top) dominated the leaderboards from the plate while Ed Walsh (third on top), Cy Young (top right) and Rube Waddell (bottom right) were tops from the mound. John Henry Lloyd (second on bottom) was 4th in batting with a .333 average and 3rd in slugging with a .462 pct. Grant Johnson (third on bottom) was 4th in slugging behind Lloyd. Jose Mendez (bottom right) was second in era with 1.57 behind Ed Walsh.
1901- Boston defeates Pittsburgh in first series. Buck Freeman doubled in Collins for the winning run in the 12 inning of the seventh game. Frank Grant batted .343 for Milwaukee.
1902- Boston defeats Pittsburgh again in series. Three contests go into extra innings. Rube Foster goes 8-8 with a 1.79era, 5th lowest in league in his rookie season.
1905- Rube Waddell of the Philadelphia Athletics wins pitching triple crown, tops in wins, era and strikeouts, 29, 1.06 and 283. 1907- St. Louis behind Rube Waddell sweep Boston in series. First series with former Negro League players on both clubs. John Henry Lloyd and Jose Mendez on Boston and Frank Grant on St. Louis. At the end of the season Frank Grant retires after 7 seasons in the league. He played in 562 games and batted .291.
1908- Grant Johnson bats .363 second to Wagner's .366 and is now on slugging pct leaderboard 3rd behind Wagner and Lajoie.
1909- John Henry Lloyd in his 4th season bats .348 third behind Lajoie and Cobb. Athletics win first three of World Series only to see New York take the next four and the series. Luis Druke wins series on mound and at bat knocking in the winning run and holding the A's to two runs in game seven.
Highlight team is World Series Winner, (#-#) win-loss
* Batting triple crown winner, tops in average, home runs and RBI. Or a pitching triple crown winner, tops in wins, era and strikeouts.
Bold Red indicates Negro League player.
