The (English) Baseball League (est. 1888): A History

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Baseball League 1922
Third Division Top Game Performances

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Baseball League 1922
Third Division Top 20 Batsmen and Pitchers

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Baseball League 1922
Third Division Top Systems

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Baseball League 1922
Third Division Financial Report

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The British Game of Baseball.

(From a Special Correspondent.)

The sport of baseball was introduced to Britain by the great Albert Goodwill Spalding almost half a century ago. From that time the game has grown tremendously, and while the baseball being played here looks nearly identical to that practised across the sea, our version has retained something of its unique Britishness. For example, our baseball begins not with the “first inning”, but with the first innings. We do not watch “hitters” or “batters” as American baseball does—we watch batsmen. There are no “fielders” here—only fieldsmen; except that our “centerfielder” is more correctly referred to as the centre fielder; and short stop is properly two words, not hastily slapped together into one as though part of a linguistic efficiency exercise. And although baseballers in Britain do hit singles and home runs off pitchers, rather than one and fours off bowlers, our batsmen typically do not hit “doubles” or “triples”, but rather twos and threes.

Despite such admittedly superficial differences, the game is enjoyed equally well on either side of the pond, a testament to its great popularity on each side. As baseball has taken on the mantle of “national pastime” in the States, the game has somewhat less hubristically become the sport of the summer in Britain as well. (Although, can anything reek of hubris more than the American provincial baseball championship being dubbed the “World’s Series” while not involving any clubs of foreign pedigree in the proceedings?) At least such is true of the North, especially Lancashire, the birthplace of British baseball. For despite herculean efforts by the Baseball League to render the sport a pastime of national proportions in England, there is no denying that the crowds in the North are still larger, the supporters more knowledgeable in matters of form and technical lore, and the “fans” more attuned to the play on the pitch than are the crowds of the South. The League clubs of London have been particularly terrible, with Tottenham Hotspur, the last remaining club in the First Division, in imminent danger of disappearing the City from the top tier altogether once the upcoming season has concluded. One can surmise easily that as long as a strong foothold is not held in the Capital, the sport of baseball is unlikely to fully displace cricket, football, racing or rugby atop the Mountain of British Sport.

And yet, it cannot be disputed that the future of the sport of baseball has never been brighter in this country. The League began with twelve clubs playing sixty six matches only at the weekends in a single table competition during the maiden season of 1888. To-day, thirty-five years on, there are 88 clubs competing in four tables on three levels, playing 126 total matches, with games played six days each and every week for twenty one weeks stretching from May into October, culminating in the EOI Cup challenge contested between the top two clubs of the League after each season's conclusion. Professional baseball has become wildly popular among the increasingly leisured working and professional classes of the country. The best estimates for 1888 are that about one and a half millions were in attendance for all the games played by the League that year; during the 1922 season, a deadly accurate count of 27,147,743 spectators crossed into the various grounds of the Baseball League to take in more than 5,300 League baseball matches played throughout the season, figures which do not even take into account the thousands of non-League professional baseball games throughout the kingdom drawing millions more of supporters to the gate. The progress of the sport in these breathless post-war years has been astounding. Baseballers have been arriving to play in the League not only from the Home Nations, but from across the Commonwealth, lands such as Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Gold Coast, South Africa, and oh yes, from that prodigal child America herself. There is talk of floodlit games starting at ten o’clock at night, and of matches broadcast to supporters by wireless. The prospects for the sport are, by all accounts, looking quite “up”.

The system of promotion and relegation has its advantage in the British game such that does not exist in America. Regardless of whether a club begins this season buried at the bottom of the Third Division, it is still possible that in two years’ time that same club could be competing for the EOI Cup, the winning of which has become inarguably the highest accomplishment in the British game. This should be of great comfort and hope for the supporters of baseball clubs in Barrow and Halifax; in Wrexham and Wolverhampton; in Portsmouth and Gillingham; in Swindon and Reading. With a few well-placed base hits, leaping one-handed catches, and sterling pitching performances, clubs in these and dozens of other cities and towns large and small may quite possibly experience the thrill of top flight baseball played sixty three times on their home ground very soon. On the other hand, pity the poor American baseball “fanatics” of Baltimore and Hartford; of Buffalo and Indianapolis; of Kansas City and Columbus; of Los Angeles and San Francisco. For no matter how well their favoured clubs play or how many matches in a season the teams win—even if every single one of them—none of that will matter even a whit. For the American major leagues constitute a monopoly that are closed to those cities, and the supporters who live in these and a thousand American other cities and towns—indeed, supporters who live in all but only eleven American cities—understand that in the end, without the opportunity to perform on the biggest stage in the sport, the accomplishments of their teams are, ultimately, meaningless.

The home run has not captured the imagination of the British public in the way it has the apparently easily distractible Americans. While Neanderthal “sluggers” such as Rogers Hornsby, Cy Williams, Tillie Walker and, of course, Babe Ruth hold slack-jawed Americans in thrall to their stupefying exploits, the keenly discerning British fan still roars his approval for the well-placed sacrifice; the surprise bunt base hit; the double base-steal; the putout tag at home plate; and that most exciting of base hits, the legged-out three. Even if it can be fairly argued that the proficiency of baseball talent in Britain still lags behind that of the United States, it cannot be seriously argued that the American game of bludgeoning the opponent to death with home runs is, aesthetically, a competition preferable to that of the comparatively thrilling British game. We know fully well here that there is more to the game of baseball than a twenty-stone behemoth lumbering around the bases at a snail’s pace for a score without liability to be put out practically every time he bats. Perhaps the lords of American baseball will realize such before it is too late, and before their sport is overtaken in popularity and gate receipts by the bastardization of the game of football that prevails in that country.

All in all, the baseball fanatic here at home should be quite pleased with the progress his favourite sport has made within the pantheon of British leisure pursuits. The sport is as healthy as any other in this country which speaks to its ongoing viability and, indeed, growth. The 1923 season is nigh, and the baseball supporter bates his breath in anticipation as the temperatures warm and the leaves sprout onto the trees, signalling that it is time for his return to the hallowed ground of his favourite club.

Play ball!

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1923 Baseball League Season to be Begun Monday.

Another League baseball season will be begun on Monday afternoon. There can be no doubt that since the war, the League has made great progress. Public interest has increased in such a degree that many clubs last season had gates of 10,000, as compared to 4,000 in 1914. Indeed, the Walsall club averaged over 12,000 at the gate per game, while Manchester United drew almost 9,000 on average. Exeter City and Preston North End averaged gates of more than 8,500 as Second Division clubs, and even Third Division sides such as Watford, Swansea City and Accrington Stanley hosted on average more than 6,000 “fans” per game. These are indeed great times in Great Britain to run a professional baseball club at the highest levels.

The clubs in the three divisions will be remarkable for the unusually small number of changes that have taken place in the teams. Walsall, for instance, will be represented by exactly the same side of Price, Elcock, Bestwick, and Ramsay inside; Sherriff, Thomas, and Lowe outside; and Stanton and Eadie as battery; as that which won the Championship last September and the EOI Cup last October against Sunderland at Roker Park. Many clubs will be in much the same position. Walsall had no urgent need for new men except, perhaps, for a good fielding and batting short stop, but the majority of clubs would have been glad to have strengthened their own clubs with Walsall’s current short stop, or with any decent starting position player if it had been possible. They profess that they will not pay the extravagant trading pieces that are demanded, but, if this be but one reason for the few exchanges made, there is another—namely, that there is a shortage of real talent. The number of clubs competing for players has been increased very considerably during recent years, and the supply is now not large enough to satisfy all requirements. The most notable trade has been that of Bragger, the Walsall bench third base man, for whose services Sunderland has been said to have paid over £5,000. Black Cats will now insert Bragger directly into the line-up, starting at third base and in the second batting position, and hope that Bragger will bring up the country some of the Swifts’ Championship magic. Another “capture” is the singing on by Aston Villa of the South African national, the catcher Fergus Sables, aged 21, from the Transvaal United club. Sables is a catcher, and set up a “record” for South African school ball three winters ago by making sixteen home runs in just 44 games.

The London clubs have secured only a few men, at any rate for the first teams. Fulham have first base man Riach, a Scotsman, from Tottenham, who received in turn the young players Nelson, Broadly and Gorman; Charlton Athletic have Sawyer, a starting pitcher, from Barrow; Queens Park have Harmer, the young short stop, whom they are trying to covert to an early order batsman; and Millwall obtained Skinner, the experienced centre fielder, from West Ham United.

The Championship has been won four times in five season by only one club, Liverpool, in their Halcyon days of 1907 through 1911; Walsall now seek to match that accomplishment in this, the 1923 season. As they have the advantage of beginning their season with last year’s side intact, it is probable that they will at once settle down to effective combination. Although their pitching staff is quite long in the tooth, with three top starters aged 29 or higher, their field starters are all quite young, seven of them in their prime years between ages 24 and 27. They have the perfect combination of experience and youth which should serve them well into several coming seasons, but first things first, and this year’s Championship will be the one and only focus of the squad.

Swifts will have especially fervent competition in Chesterfield, the purveyor of many trades during the past few years deemed questionable enough at the time to effect changes in law preventing the exchange of players between teams with less than 30 days remaining in season. But Spireites, far from being the thin squad led by the great M’lord Bridgeman in years past, have a strong young core Fox, Maudlin, Robertson, Stallone, Blair and Roberts. It remains to be seen only if the pitching and fielding can match the promise of the attack, and lead Chesterfield to glory. Crewe Alexandra, Blackburn, and Bolton round out the list of challengers most likely to appear in October’s EOI Cup tie.

London is in danger of losing all representation in the top tier, as Tottenham Hotspur are widely considered to be among the worst teams in the loop and the “favourite” to move down after the season to the Second Division, where five clubs—the Arsenal, Charlton Athletic, Chelsea, Fulham, and Clapton Orient—from the Capital Region already play, with only the last club given much if any chance to advance forward. Grimsby Town, Blackpool, and Burnley are also seen as favourites for promotion to the First Division. Of the remaining five London clubs in the League, who play in the Third Division, Watford and West Ham United are the favourites among the punters to rise to the Second Division from the Southern Section, with their strongest competitors deemed to be Swansea Town, Gillingham and new League entry Torquay United. The strongest sides in the Northern Section are seen to be Birmingham, Darlington, erstwhile Champion Hull City, and long-time top tier exile Wolverhampton Wanderers, a hard luck club who recently regained admission to the League in 1921 after being out the previous nine seasons, and who have been out of the First Division since 1898.

The troubles that wracked Ireland for the past few years and which culminated in the establishment of the Irish Free State are not expected to affect the flow of baseball talent from either there nor the newly christened Northern Ireland, and most baseballers from that island have flowed from the latter in any case. Traditional ties to the Kingdom have always rendered baseball a more popular sport in the northern counties with some three fourths of all Irish players emanating from that area, and the influx of such had not been hampered by the troubles there anyway. Scotland remains the largest source of foreign baseball talent, and is expected to remain so as the game has been going great guns there for some time now.

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Baseball League 1923: Clubs

<<<<< All updated uniforms courtesy of forum member No Pepper >>>>>

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Baseball League 1923: Club Locations


First Division




Second Division




Third Division North




Third Division South (Queen's Park Rangers Not Labelled)

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Long Scoreless Match Finally Ends.

On a very warm and windy Tuesday in front of over 7,600 Oldhamites in attendance, the match between the Athletic club and the visiting Blackburn Rovers stretched on into the fourteenth innings without a run plated by either side. In an age of increasing levels of attack, the pitching and the defence ruled the day.

A mereseven men ever made it to third base, including in the top of the first innings when Rovers short stop Powell lined a three against the right field wall, only to be stranded on the base. Third base was subsequently reached in the top of the second; top of the fifth; bottom of the eighth; and bottom of the eleventh; and that was it through thirteen. Each reach of third base occurred after two had already made outs. The last instance mentioned almost ended the game, after Latics right fielder Harris singled and stole second, but was put out at the plate trying to score on a single by team mate Durrant.

In the top of the fourteenth innings, Powell singled after one had made out. He promptly stole second base, then reached third on a passed ball by McAdam, who was the third Latics catcher of the day. Powell scored on a fly out by left fielder Mawby to finally break the scoreless draw and take the lead.

Latics made it very interesting in their half of the innings, when Durrant led off with a base on balls and centre fielder Edmonds singled, putting runners at first and third with none out. The thousand or so remaining supporters, delaying high tea to see the match resolved, provided their full-throated support of this activity. Short stop Bell grounded out first base man to pitcher, however, moving Edmonds to second but keeping Durrant planted at third. Pitcher Kerridge, made to bat for himself, flew out to short left field, and left fielder Skerritt ended the affair with ground ball out to the second base man, sending the remaining and presumably hungry Latics supporters at last to their homes. Rovers pitcher Cornelius Boradhurst had relieved starter Herb Bostock and was rewarded with his sixteenth win, the most of any pitcher in the division to date.

[Herrbear]

I have just finished the first 10 pages and I absolutely love what you have done and enjoying it very much. I look forward to keep reading about the growth of baseball in England.

Thank you for the work you have done to create this story.

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Originally Posted by Herrbear

I have just finished the first 10 pages and I absolutely love what you have done and enjoying it very much. I look forward to keep reading about the growth of baseball in England.

Thank you for the work you have done to create this story.

Thank you very much, and I am pleased to give you your first "thanks" on the board! What year are you up to by now?

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Results

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Baseball League 1923
EOI Cup Series

Walsall defeated Crewe Alexandra
Four Matches to One

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Champions and EOI Cup Winners




Walsall Swifts

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Baseball League 1923
EOI Cup Runners Up

Crewe Alexandra Railwaymen

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Table

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Team Batting and Pitching

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Award Winners


Baseballer of the Year and Batsman of the Year: Jamie Ramsay




Pitcher of the Year: Cornelius Broadhurst




Newcomer of the Year: Fergus Sables

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Baseball League 1923
First Division League Leaders

Batting Leaders




Pitching Leaders

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Baseball League 1923
First Division Top Game Performances