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The History of baseball in the United States can be traced to the 18th century, when amateurs played a baseball-like game by their own informal rules using improvised equipment. The popularity of the sport inspired the semi and fully professional baseball clubs in the 1860s. By the following decade, American newspapers were referring to baseball as the "National Pastime" or the "National Game." The first attempt at forming a "major league" produced the National Association, which lasted from 1871 to 1875. In response to the shortcomings of the National Association, the current National League was formed in 1876. After a series of rival leagues were organized but failed, the current American league, evolving from the minor Western League of 1893, was established in 1901.
In the early part of the 20th century, known as the "dead-ball era," baseball rules and equipment favored the "inside game" and the game was played more violently and aggressively than it is today. This period ended in the 1920s with several changes that gave advantages to hitters. In the largest parks, the outfield fences were brought closer to the infield. In addition, the strict enforcement of new rules governing the size, shape and construction of the ball caused it to travel farther when hit.
The first professional black baseball club, the Cuban Giants, was organized in 1885. Subsequent professional black baseball clubs played each other independently, without an official league to organize the sport. Rube Foster, a former ballplayer with a gift for organization, founded the Negro National League in 1920. A second league, the Eastern Colored League, was established in 1923. These became known as the Negro Leagues. The Negro National League did well until 1930, but folded during the great depression.
From 1942 to 1948 the Negro League World Series was revived. This was the golden era of Negro League baseball, a time when it produced some of its greatest stars. In 1947, Jackie Robinson signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers, breaking the color barrier that had prevented talented African American players from entering the white-only major leagues. Although the transformation was not instantaneous, baseball has since become fully integrated. In 1948, the Negro Leagues faced financial difficulties that effectively ended their existence.
Pitchers dominated the game in the 1960s and early 1970s. In 1973 the designated hitter (DH) rule was adopted by the American League, while in the National League pitchers still bat for themselves to this day. The DH rule now constitutes the primary difference between the two leagues. During the late 1960s, the Baseball Players Union became much stronger and conflicts between owners and the players' union led to major work stoppages in 1972, 1981, and 1994. The 1994 baseball strike led to the cancellation of the World Series, and was not settled until the spring of 1995. In the wake of the 1994 players' strike, functions that had been administered separately by the two major leagues' administrations were united under the rubric of Major League Baseball.
The earliest known mention of baseball in the United States was a 1792 Pittsfield, Massachusetts ordinance banning the playing of the game within 80 yards (73 m) of the town meeting house.
Another early reference reports that "base ball" was regularly played on Saturdays on the outskirts of New York City (in what is now Greenwich Village) in 1823.[1]
The first team to play baseball under modern rules were the New York Knickerbockers. The club was founded on September 23, 1845, as a social club for the upper middle classes of New York City, and was strictly amateur until its disbandment. The club members, led by Alexander Cartwright, formulated the "Knickerbocker Rules", which in large part dealt with organizational matters but which also laid out rules for playing the game. One of the significant rules prohibited "soaking" or "plugging" the runner; under older rules, a fielder could put a runner out by hitting the runner with the thrown ball. The Knickerbocker Rules required fielders to tag or force the runner, as is done today, and avoided a lot of the arguments and fistfights that resulted from the earlier practice.
Writing the rules didn't help the Knickerbockers in the first known competitive game between two clubs under the new rules, played at Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey on June 19, 1846. The self-styled "New York Nine" humbled the Knickerbockers by a score of 23 to 1. Nevertheless, the Knickerbocker Rules were rapidly adopted by teams in the New York area and their version of baseball became known as the "New York Game" (as opposed to the "Massachusetts Game", played by clubs in the Boston area).
In 1857, sixteen New York area clubs, including the Knickerbockers, formed the National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP). The NABBP was the first organization to govern the sport and to establish a championship. Aided by the Civil War, membership grew to almost 100 clubs by 1865 and to over 400 by 1867, including clubs from as far away as California. During the Civil war, soldiers from different parts of the United States played baseball together, leading to a more unified national version of the sport. Beginning in 1869, the NABBP permitted professional play, addressing a growing practice that had not been permitted under its rules to that point. The first and most prominent professional clubs of the NABBP era were the Cincinnati Red Stockings in Ohio, which lasted only two years. Businessman Iver Whitney Adams then courted manager Harry Wright and founded the "Boston Red Stockings" and the Boston Base Ball Club January 20, 1871.
In 1870, a schism developed between professional and amateur ballplayers. The NABBP split into two groups. The National Association of Professional Base Ball Players operated from 1871 through 1875, and is considered by some to have been the first major league. Its amateur counterpart disappeared after only a few years.
The National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs, which still exists, was established in 1876 after the National Association proved ineffective. The emphasis was now on "clubs" rather than "players". Clubs now had the ability to enforce player contracts, preventing players from jumping to higher-paying clubs. Clubs in turn were required to play their full schedule of games, rather than forfeiting scheduled games once out of the running for the league championship, as happened frequently under the National Association. A concerted effort was made to reduce the amount of gambling on games which was leaving the validity of results in doubt.
At the same time, a "gentlemen's agreement" was struck between the clubs to exclude non-white players from professional baseball, a bar that remained until 1947. It is a common misconception that Jackie Robinson was the first African-American major-league ballplayer; he was actually only the first after a long gap. Moses Fleetwood Walker and his brother Welday Walker were unceremoniously dropped from major and minor-league rosters in the 1880s, as were other African-Americans in baseball. An unknown number of African-Americans played in the major leagues by representing themselves as Indians, or South or Central Americans. And a still larger number played in the minor leagues and on amateur teams as well. In the majors, however, it was not until the signing of Robinson (in the National League) and Larry Doby (in the American League) that baseball began to remove its color bar.
The early years of the National League were tumultuous, with threats from rival leagues and a rebellion by players against the hated "reserve clause", which restricted the free movement of players between clubs. Competitive leagues formed regularly, and also disbanded regularly. The most successful was the American Association (1881–1891), sometimes called the "beer and whiskey league" for its tolerance of the sale of alcoholic beverages to spectators. For several years, the National League and American Association champions met in a postseason championship series—the first attempt at a World Series.
The Union Association survived for only one season (1884), as did the Players League (1890), an attempt to return to the National Association structure of a league controlled by the players themselves. Both leagues are considered major leagues by many baseball researchers because of the perceived high caliber of play (for a brief time anyway) and the number of star players featured. However, some researchers have disputed the major league status of the Union Association, pointing out that franchises came and went and contending that the St. Louis club, which was deliberately "stacked" by the league's president (who owned that club), was the only club that was anywhere close to major league caliber.
In fact, there were dozens of leagues, large and small, at this time. What made the National League "major" was its dominant position in the major cities, particularly New York City, the edgy, emotional nerve center of baseball. The large cities offered baseball teams national media distribution systems and fan bases that could generate revenues enabling teams to hire the best players in the country.
A number of other leagues, including the venerable Eastern League, threatened the dominance of the National League. The Western League, founded in 1893, became particularly aggressive. Its fiery leader Ban Johnson railed against the National League and promised to build a new league that would grab the best players and field the best teams. The Western League began play in April 1894 with teams in Detroit (the only league team that has not moved since), Grand Rapids, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Sioux City and Toledo. Prior to the 1900 season, the league changed its name to the American League and moved several franchises to larger, strategic locations. In 1901 the American League declared its intent to operate as a major league.
The resulting bidding war for players led to widespread contract-breaking and legal disputes. One of the most famous involved star second baseman Napoleon Lajoie, who in 1901 went across town in Philadelphia from the National League Phillies to the American League Athletics. Barred by a court injunction from playing baseball in the state of Pennsylvania the next year, Lajoie was traded to the Cleveland team, where he played and managed for many years.
The war between the American and National caused shock waves throughout the baseball world. At a meeting at the Leland Hotel in Chicago in 1901, the other baseball leagues negotiated a plan to maintain their independence. On September 5 1901 Patrick T. Powers, president of the Eastern League announced the formation of the second National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues, the NABPL or "NA" for short.
These leagues did not consider themselves "minor" -- a term that did not come into vogue until St. Louis Cardinals GM Branch Rickey pioneered the farm system in the 1930s. Nevertheless, these financially troubled leagues, by beginning the practice of selling players to the more affluent National and American leagues, embarked on a path that eventually led to the loss of their independent status.
Ban Johnson had other designs for the NA. While the NA continues to this day, he saw it as a tool to end threats from smaller rivals who might some day want to expand in other territories and threaten his league's dominance.
After 1902 both leagues and the NABPL signed a new National Agreement which achieved three things:
First and foremost, it governed player contracts that set up mechanisms to end the cross-league raids on rosters and reinforced the power of the hated reserve clause that kept players virtual slaves to their baseball masters. Second, it led to the playing of a "World Series" in 1903 between the two major league champions. The first World Series was won by Boston of the American League. Lastly, it established a system of control and dominance for the major leagues over the independents. There would not be another Ban Johnson-like rebellion from the ranks of leagues with smaller cities. Selling player contracts was rapidly becoming a staple business of the independent leagues. During the rough and tumble years of the American-National struggle, player contracts were violated at the independents as well: Players that the team had developed would sign deals with the National or American leagues without any form of compensation to the indy club. The new agreement tied independent contracts to the reserve-clause national league contracts. Baseball players were a commodity, like cars. $5,000 bought your arm or your bat, and if you didn't like it, find someplace that would hire you. It set up a rough classification system for independent leagues that regulated the dollar value of contracts, the forerunner of the system refined by Rickey and used today.
It also gave the NA great power. Many independents walked away from the 1901 meeting. The deal with the NA punished those other indies who had not joined the NA and submitted to the will of the 'majors.' The NA also agreed to the deal to prevent more pilfering of players with little or no compensation for the players' development. Several leagues, seeing the writing on the wall, eventually joined the NA, which grew in size over the next several years.
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