Derek Jeter recently entered the Baseball Hall of Fame’s Class of 2020 as one of the game’s elite shortstops. Coincidentally, not far from where Jeter captained the New York Yankees to many post-season championships, are the Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey where the origins of baseball in America was furthered by several New Yorkers including the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club (KBBC) and the inventor of the shortstop (the first man to play the position for the KBBC), a Harvard-educated physician from New Hampshire named Daniel Lucius “Doc” Adams, M.D. According to numerous reputable baseball historians, the creation of the … Continue reading →

Prior to the Pre-Interation Era ballot in 2015, Jay Jaffe of Fangraphs expressed his opinion on Doc Adams’ candidacy in his article “Breaking down the Hall of Fame’s Pre-Integration Era ballot, Part 1” in Sports Illustrated. Below is an extract from that article. Doc Adams, pioneer Roll over, Abner Doubleday, and tell Alexander Cartwright the news. No less an authority than MLB official historian John Thorn called Daniel Lucius Adams “first among the Fathers of Baseball” in a 1993 essay for Total Baseball and “the most significant figure in the early history of baseball” in his 2011 book Baseball in … Continue reading →