The Cleveland Spiders and Cy Young
Soon after the game was invented, baseball was played in Cleveland. As early as 1857, only 12 years after the first game was played in Hoboken, New Jersey, under the modern rules devised by Alexander Cartwright, some of Cleveland's genteel citizens were protesting "ball playing" on Public Square.
In 1865, the Forest Citys, an organized Cleveland amateur baseball team, played its first game against the Penfields of Oberlin. Even with the home-field advantage, the Forest Citys suffered a 67 to 28 loss.
Four years later the Forest Citys hired three professional players and played its first pro game against he nation's first professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, on June 12, 1869. Cleveland lost, 26 to 6.
Over the next few year, Cleveland fielded teams in some of the emerging baseball associations, and, for a time, was without any ballclub. Then in 1879, a new Forest City team joined the National League, which had been organized in 1976. On June 12, 1880, the club was on the losing end of professional baseball's first perfect game, pitched by John Lee Richmond of the Worcester, Massachusetts, ballclub.
In 1885, the Forest Citys discreetly withdrew from the National League. But another Cleveland team joined in 1889. The team had played for two seasons in the American Association, affectionately known as the "beer- and-whiskey" league because its rules did not forbid quaffing alcohol. Owners Frank DeHaas Robison and George W. Howe had built a ballpark for their club at Payne Avenue and East 39th Street, so the Spiders, as the new National League entry was known, already had a home field.
The Spiders were no pushovers, fielding team that featured manager Pat Tebeau, catcher Charles Zimmer, and legendary pitcher Denton True "Cyclone" Young. On May 1, 1891, Cy Young pitched the opening game at National League Park, the club's brand new field, located at East 66th Street and Lexington Avenue, just a few steps from the trolley line owned by Robison. The seats held more than 9,000 fans, who watched the Spiders beat the Cincinnati Redlegs 12 to 3. Robison more than likely watched the game from the comfort of a box in the wooden stands reserved for the team president.
At the end of the 1892 season, playoffs between the Boston Beaneaters and the Spiders were held at League Park. Needing a name for the new playoffs, sportswriters called them the "World Series."
Guess who owns these records in Cleveland (hint: it's one person): The highest single-season batting average (.408 in 1911), most hits in a season (233 in 1911), most triples in a season (26 in 1912), and the highest lifetime batting average (.375).
None other than the legendary "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. After his time in Cleveland, Jackson joined the Chicago White Sox. As every fan knows, it was alleged that Joe was among a number of "Black Sox" players who caved in to gamblers and threw the 1919 World Series. It was the worst scandal in major league baseball history, and directly led to the creation of the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball. The first commissioner, Judge Kenesaw "Mountain" Landis, demanded absolute independence from team owners, then permanently banished the offending players.
