Interesting Article in SABR's National Pastime

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Posted By: Rob L

I just got the new "National Pastime" and there was an incredible article by Randall Brown titled "How Baseball Began". Has anyone else seen it?

The article first summarizes a San Francisco newspaper article from 1887 titled "How Baseball Began - A Member of the Gotham Club of Fifty Years Ago Tells About It". That member is William Wheaton, a lawyer that was played with the Knickerbockers. According to the article, Wheaton, along with several other older Knickerbockers, played on the Gotham Base Ball Club in 1837 and it was actually the first organized baseball club. The rules stopped the use of "soaking" a base runner and required that they be tagged out at the bag or on the run. They formed the diamond and used bases made with sandbags. Balls were pitched instead of thrown to an area that the batter chose. After a few months of play, Wheaton apparently wrote the rules down.

The original newspaper article had enough detail for Randall Brown to research and confirm much of the information. According to Doc Adams, a Knickerbocker president at one time "some of the younger members of the New York Club (Gotham) got together to form the Knickerbocker club".

A very interesting article that, if true, even predates the Abner Doubleday myth.

Rob L