Talk About Big Shoes To Fill

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It’s always a challenge for children to live up to their celebrity relatives.This article in the “Argus and Patriot” (Montpelier, VT) dated August 28, 1895 illustrates that this is not a new phenomenon. The article is a recount of a game between National Life Insurance Company and the Vermont Mutual Fire Insurance Company. The game was played on Seminary Hill in Montpelier, Vermont on a rather inclement day. The final score was 14-7 in favor of the “fire boys”. The game account is written in the ‘flowery style” of the day and interesting for that alone. However, about halfway into … Continue reading →

Hal Bock’s Vote For Doc Adams

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For many years, Doc Adams contribution to baseball was overlooked. That’s a shame, because without him, baseball would have been a vastly different game. There would be no shortstop because shortstop was Doc’s invention, redefining the geography of the game. And the distance between the bases wouldn’t have been 90 feet because that’s the distance Doc introduced to the game. There might not have been nine players to a team or nine innings to a game. Both were Doc’s ideas. Daniel Adams, equipped with degrees from Yale and Harvard, played baseball for exercise almost 200 years ago and refined the … Continue reading →

Daniel Lucius “Doc” Adams, Baseball Pioneer By Peter Mancuso

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When the Society for American Baseball Research’s (SABR’s) Nineteenth Century Research Committee signed on to write and publish, “Base Ball’s 19th Century ‘Winter’ Meetings: 1857-1900” (the precursor to two volumes written by SABR’s Business of Baseball Research Committee covering 1901 – 2016’s Winter Meetings) we knew we had to start from the beginning.  And, that beginning was 1857, when baseball’s first true convention was held. Sixteen teams and forty-eight delegates in all met over two meeting dates in 1857 to codify the rules of play based on “the New York Game.”  They selected the then President of New York City’s … Continue reading →

Bob Lazzari On Doc Adams’ And The Hall Of Fame

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Doc Adams should have been elected to Baseball’s Hall of Fame a LONG time ago. In 2015, his first time on any Hall of Fame ballot, he got the most votes but fell TWO votes short in the Pre-Integration Era Committee’s voting. Quite frankly, it’s nothing short of a TRAVESTY at this juncture that this man is not enshrined alongside the other greats of baseball. Just SOME of Doc’s contributions to the game: 1) setting the distance between bases at 90 feet 2) an early advocate for nine inning games/nine players per side 3) putting in place the “fly game”, … Continue reading →

Doc Adams For Baseball’s Hall Of Fame By William Ryczek

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Note: This was written before the Special Early Baseball Overview Committee inexplicably left Doc Adams off the Early Base Ball Era ballot; however, we still want to share Mr. Ryczek’s thoughts. In December, Hall of Fame electors will decide whether Daniel Lucius (Doc) Adams will be enshrined in baseball’s hallowed corridor, and if his plaque will join those of 333 others whose accomplishments and contributions to baseball earned them the sport’s highest honor.  Most Hall of Famers were selected because of their feats on the playing field.  They hit more home runs than their peers, won more games than other pitchers, … Continue reading →

Doc Adams Base Ball Biography (Base Ball Executive)

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In May of 1846, his first full year with the Knickerbockers, Doc was elected Vice-President of the club and would, over his seventeen years of membership, go on to serve six terms as President (’47, ’48, ’49, ’56, ’57 and ’61) and several terms as a Director. In 1848, Doc headed the Knickerbocker committee to revise the original rules and regulations from the 1845 formation of the club. And in 1853 with the formation of the Gothams (1850) and the Eagle Base Ball Club (1853), Doc was appointed (along with two other teammates) to be part of the committee at … Continue reading →

Historian and Author, Robert D. Sampson, Ph.D., Supports Doc Adams

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As a historian who has researched, written and published a book, several academic journal articles (including two on 1860s-era baseball) and has a manuscript on the early game under review by a publisher, it is clear to me that accuracy is essential. And that develops only out of intensive research revealing verifiable facts—not legends. It is from that perspective that I happily urge the election of Daniel Lucius “Doc” Adams to the Baseball Hall of Fame. John Thorn, Major League Baseball’s official historian, and other researchers familiar with the 1840-1860 era have agreed on Adams’ essential role in the game’s … Continue reading →

Maine Baseball Historian, Jacob Newcomb, Endorses Doc Adams

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I am writing this message today as an endorsement for Daniel Lucius “Doc” Adams for induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. His contributions to the game, as a player, manager, and general pioneer of the sport, put him head and shoulders above many other figures of his era. As has been confirmed by Major League Baseball’s official historian, John Thorn, and Baseball Hall of Fame researcher Freddy Berowski, Adams’s cultural impact on the game is defined by his contribution of the shortstop position, as well as helping establish the number of players in the field at a given time, … Continue reading →

What Doc Adams Means To Me By Corky Gaskell

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When I started playing vintage base ball in 2009, my baseball history knowledge didn’t go much further back than my youth.  Playing was a lot of fun, but a few years into it, I really wasn’t getting any education out of it. The year I was made captain of my Minnesota vintage club, we hosted annual Vintage Base Ball Association conference.  It was at that conference where I learned that we were not playing base ball by the New York rules and customs.  It was then that I started to really study base ball history. One of the things that … Continue reading →

Doc Adams Base Ball Biography (Base Ball Player)

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“I used to play shortstop, and I believe I was the first to occupy it as it had formerly been left uncovered.”¹ Doc is credited with creating the position of shortstop in 1849/50 because the very light-weight balls would not carry into home base from being tossed from the outfield. “The advent of the short fielder, or shortstop…was a radical development and distinct innovation…however, when Adams first traipsed out to a spot between and beyond second and third bases, it was not to bolster the infield but to assist in relays from the outfield. The early Knickerbocker ball [that Doc … Continue reading →