Candy Cummings
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| Candy Cummings | ||
|---|---|---|
 |
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| Pitcher | ||
| Born: October 18, 1848 | ||
| Died: May 16, 1924 (aged 75) | ||
| Batted: Right | Threw: Right | |
| MLB debut | ||
| April 22, 1872 for the New York Mutuals |
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| Final game | ||
| August 18, 1877 for the Cincinnati Reds |
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| Career statistics | ||
| Win-Loss record | 145-94 | |
| ERA | 2.49 | |
| Complete games | 233 | |
| Teams | ||
| Career highlights and awards | ||
| Member of the National | ||
 Baseball Hall of Fame |
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| Elected | 1939 | |
| Election Method | Veteran's Committee | |
William Arthur "Candy" Cummings (October 18, 1848 – May 16, 1924) was a 19th-century professional baseball pitcher in the National Association and National League.
At 17, Cummings began playing baseball with the Brooklyn Excelsior baseball club of the NABBP.[1] His first game with the team was on August 24, 1866 against the Newark Eurekas, where he led his team to a 24-12 win.[1] Baseball writer Henry Chadwick commented on the skills of the young Cummings after this first game and his promising future with the Excelsior club.[2].
During a 6 year career which lasted from 1872 until 1877, Cummings compiled a 145-94 career record and 2.49 ERA while playing for five different teams. Among other records, Cummings was the first player to record two complete games in one day: September 9, 1876 when he beat the Cincinnati Reds 14-4 and 8-4.[3]
He is often credited with being the first pitcher to throw a curveball, which he reportedly threw at a game in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1867 while playing for the Brooklyn Excelsiors, with other sources saying the Brooklyn Stars. Cummings says that he discovered the idea of the curveball while studying the movement sea shells made when thrown. After noticing this movement, he began to attempt to make the same motion with a baseball, thus creating the curveball.[1]
Another pitcher to lay claim to inventing the curveball is New Haven, Connecticut-born Fred Goldsmith, who is credited for giving the first publicly recorded demonstration of the curveball (to legendary sportswriter-baseball historian Henry Chadwick) on August 16, 1870, at the Capitoline Grounds in Brooklyn, New York.[4] Goldsmith later claimed he had given a public demonstration of his curve ball to the Yale baseball team around 1866.[1]
But it was Cummings who was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1939[1], the same year that former major-leaguer Goldsmith died in Berkley, Michigan.
In 1877, Cummings left the National League after pitching only 19 games with the Cincinnati Reds to become the president of the new International Association for Professional Base Ball Players.[1]
Candy Cummings was born in Ware, Massachusetts on October 18, 1848 and died May 16, 1924 in Toledo, Ohio.[5]
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b c d e f David L. Fleitz (2004). Ghosts in the gallery at Cooperstown: sixteen little-known members of the Hall of Fame. Jefferson, N.C: McFarland & Co. ISBN 0-7864-1749-8.
- ^ The Chronology - 1866 BaseballLibrary.com
- ^ Nemec, p. 134.
- ^ Legendary sportscaster Bill Stern also credits Goldsmith with inventing the curveball, p. 87.
- ^ Baseball-Reference.com.
[edit] References
- Broughton, Howard (1939) Fred Goldsmith Invented The Curve Ball (Assistant Sports Editor), The London Free Press, June 21, 1939.
- Nemec, David (2004) Great Baseball Feats, Facts, & Firsts (2004), Signet Books, New York.
- Stern, Bill (1949) Bill Stern's Favourite Baseball Stories, Blue Ribbon Books, Garden City, New York.
[edit] External links
- Career statistics and player information from Baseball-Reference
- baseballhalloffame.org – Hall of Fame biography page
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