1884—Both leagues adopted a 112-game schedule. In general teams still played five games a week, but now the season stretched into early October. The practice of scheduling doubleheaders on Memorial Day and Independence Day was well-established by now; aside from those, doubleheaders were only played to make up rainouts. Sunday ball was still forbidden in the NBBL but half the ABBA clubs scheduled home games on Sundays.
For the second straight year the NBBL flag came down to a playoff, this time between perennial rivals New York and Chicago. This year’s game was a rout, with the Knicks triumphing 12-2 to win their fourth league pennant. The ABBA chase was also a nail-biter, with Cincinnati edging Brooklyn by a game and not clinching until the final game of the regular season. In spite of the exciting finishes, there was some concern over the relatively small percentage of teams that had actually been in contention for any length of time. In the NBBL, only Buffalo, who finished 5½ games out, stayed competitive into September; the rest of the league finished under .500 and at least 18½ games off the pace. In the ABBA, third-place St. Louis finished 13 games behind Cincinnati.
Although his Worcester Rubies finished in last place, some 40½ games behind New York, second baseman Alphonse Graff won the NBBL batting title with a .325 mark. In the ABBA Pittsburgh’s John Grace hit .353 to earn the crown. Chicago’s Abe Lowe was credited with the Senior Circuit’s ERA title, although he only worked 116.2 innings in posting his 1.77 mark, while New York’s Bill Bates, who finished at 1.80, threw 410. No one bested Bates in victories, but he did have to share the league lead with Buffalo’s Eli Taylor, who also won 32. Cincinnati’s Hiram Ballard was the top winner in the ABBA with 34 triumphs, while Brooklyn’s Erwin Morse paced that circuit in ERA at 1.65.
The upstart ABBA has taken root in some of the country’s larger cities, while the elder NBBL still had teams in smaller towns such as Troy and Worcester. When the owners of the ABBA’s Philadelphia franchise, which had failed to emerge as a powerhouse and had suffered diminishing attendance as a result, threw in the towel, the Senior Circuit pounced. The Worcester franchise was disbanded and the quickly replaced by a new NBBL Philadelphia entry, known initially as the Franklins. The ABBA would also see its Columbus franchise fold. Replacements would spring up in Toledo and Indianapolis.
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