1876 National League
| 1876 in baseball |
|---|
| 1876 National League |
| Japanese baseball |
| Negro Leagues |
| << 1875 1877 >> |
The 1876 season of the National League was the first season of the league, however it had strong ties to the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players. Six of the league's eight teams had played in the Association's 1875 season, while the other two clubs were formed of players jumping from the non-league Association clubs.
Season summary[edit]
On February 2, 1876, representatives from six baseball teams gathered at the Grand Central Hotel in New York City. It was here that the second major league, the National League, was born, striking a death blow to the struggling National Association, from which the clubs were defecting. The six clubs were the Philadelphia Athletics, Boston Red Stockings, Hartford Dark Blues, New York Mutuals, Chicago White Stockings and St. Louis Brown Stockings; except for Hartford, they represented the largest cities in the N.A. Team representatives William Hulbert from Chicago and Charles A. Fowle from St. Louis held the proxies for two clubs that were not present at the meeting: the Cincinnati Red Stockings and the Louisville Grays. The reason for the lack of representation from these two clubs was because there had been a couple of meetings between the western clubs over a course of two days on December 16th and 17th, where the four clubs had gathered at the Galt House in Louisville, Kentucky to discuss the formation of a new league. It was at this meeting that the representatives had decided to appoint Hulbert and Fowle to visit the Eastern clubs and inform them about the formation of this new league.
It has been reported that Hulbert was not happy with the direction of the National Association, but he was not the only one. Both Henry Chadwick, and Harry Wright disliked the many shortcomings and faults of the league, particularly the gambling, the rowdiness as well as the lack of competitiveness of many of the teams in the league, some of which represented very small towns. Along with team representatives, Red Stockings manager Harry Wright was reportedly in attendance to present proposed changes to the playing rules, Lewis Meacham of the Chicago Tribune, who was the only member of the press who had been invited. These men met in secret due to the fact that had their real motives been revealed, they would not have been warmly welcomed. Hulbert wanted the league to include square dealings with players and other teams; recognition of all players contracts and the league to conduct itself with integrity. It should be noted that while Hulbert may not have been uncomfortable with the National Association, and wanted an honest league, Hulbert took advantage of the sneakiness of signing players mid-season, as noted in the 1873 and 1875 seasons.
Bylaws and a constitution were drawn up. League officials were selected with Hartford's Morgan Bulkeley elected as league president. It is believed that he was selected as a way of allowing the eastern clubs to have a say in the proceedings. In reality Bulkeley was merely a figurehead with Hulbert being the real power in authority. The name of the league was suggested by Boston’s president Nicholas Apollonio, who suggested the league take its name from the league constitution.
Although this was the first season that the National League was in existence, modern fans would hardly recognize the game played. While the underlying game was the same, many of the rules were different (e.g. nine balls to a base-on-balls, only underhand pitching was allowed, etc.) Additionally, despite the league's stated goal of providing a strong centralized leadership, the teams were only loosely bound to the National League. The teams played many teams outside of the league and scheduling was done by the team, not the league - it only required that the clubs play ten games against each other League club (five games at home and five away) between April 22 and October 21.
OF the eight clubs in the inaugural season, Only two clubs in this league have survived to this day; the league champion Chicago White Stockings are now the Chicago Cubs, while the Boston Red Stockings are today's Atlanta Braves after two relocations. Two of the teams were expelled for the league after the season; at the end of the season the Philadelphia Athletics and New York Mutuals, both over twenty games behind the leading White Stockings refused to fulfill their commitment of a Western Road trip and were forced out of the league as a result.
Differences in the game[edit]
The style of play was tremendously different from the game modern fans know, due to a number of factors - many of which dealt with pitching and fielding. First, the location from which a pitcher threw the ball was closer to home plate. Rather than throwing from a pitcher's mound at sixty feet, six inches, the pitcher threw from a box fifty feet away from home plate. Second, the pitcher was allowed to run up to make the pitch; instead of having to keep a foot planted as is currently the rule, the pitcher could run up much in the way a cricket bowler takes several steps before releasing the ball. Third, the pitch came in underhand, as sidearm, three-quarters, and overhand deliveries were illegal. A fourth difference was that the current four-ball base on balls had not yet come into being it took nine balls for a walk. A fifth difference was that players had not yet begun wearing gloves in the field and partially for this reason, fielding errors were frequent. A final difference was that rosters were smaller, and most clubs carried two or three pitchers, leading to limited rotations or the use of single pitcher to start nearly all games.
Standings[edit]
- Bold indicates league champion
| Rank | Team | G | W | L | T | WPCT | GB | RS (RS/G) | RA (RA/G) | AVG | OBP | SLG | ERA | FPCT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chicago White Stockings | 66 | 52 | 14 | 0 | .788 | -.- | 624 (9.45) | 257 (3.89) | 0.337 | 0.353 | 0.417 | 1.76 | 0.899 |
| 2 | Hartford Dark Blues | 69 | 47 | 21 | 1 | .681 | 6.0 | 429 (6.22) | 261 (3.78) | 0.267 | 0.277 | 0.322 | 1.67 | 0.888 |
| 3 | St. Louis Brown Stockings | 64 | 45 | 19 | 0 | .703 | 6.0 | 386 (6.03) | 229 (3.58) | 0.259 | 0.276 | 0.313 | 1.22 | 0.902 |
| 4 | Boston Red Stockings | 70 | 39 | 31 | 0 | .557 | 15.0 | 471 (6.73) | 450 (6.43) | 0.266 | 0.281 | 0.328 | 2.51 | 0.862 |
| 5 | Louisville Grays | 69 | 30 | 36 | 3 | .435 | 22.0 | 280 (4.06) | 344 (4.99) | 0.249 | 0.256 | 0.294 | 1.69 | 0.875 |
| 6 | New York Mutuals | 57 | 21 | 35 | 1 | .368 | 26.0 | 260 (4.56) | 412 (7.23) | 0.227 | 0.233 | 0.261 | 2.94 | 0.824 |
| 7 | Philadelphia Athletics | 60 | 14 | 45 | 1 | .233 | 34.5 | 378 (6.30) | 534 (8.90) | 0.271 | 0.279 | 0.342 | 3.22 | 0.839 |
| 8 | Cincinnati Reds | 65 | 9 | 56 | 0 | .138 | 42.5 | 238 (3.66) | 579 (8.91) | 0.234 | 0.247 | 0.271 | 3.62 | 0.840 |
League leaders[edit]
- Bold indicates league record, Italics indicate all-time record
Batting[edit]
Pitching[edit]
Notable events[edit]
Umpires[edit]
- Ham Allen*
- A.D. Ayers*
- William Blodgett
- Warren Burtis
- Jack Chapman*
- John Cheppu*
- Bobby Clack
- Dan Collins*
- Fred Cone
- Robert Crandall
- John Cross*
- John Curran*
- Charles Daniels
- Harry Deane*
- Dan Devinney
- Ed Ducharme
- John English*
- Norman Fenno*
- Cherokee Fisher*
- Bill Fouser*
- Eddie Haley*
- John Hatfield*
- Charlie Hautz*
- George Heubel
- Amory Hodges
- George Hurll*
- John Kenney*
- Lon Knight*
- Ben Laughlin*
- Phonney Martin*
- Charlie Mason*
- Bobby Mathews*
- Pat McGee*
- Billy McLean
- John McMullin*
- William Medart*
- Cliff Megrue*
- John Morris*
- Thomas Muir*
- William O'Brien*
- William Osborne*
- F. Ritchie*
- Adam Rocap*
- Roll*
- George Seward
- Joe Simmons*
- Pop Smith*
- Benjamin Sommer*
- James Sumner
- Ezra Sutton*
- Otis Tilden*
- William Walker
- Mike Walsh
- George Walton*
- Luther Warren*
- Gideon White*
- Warren White*
- Dale Williams*
- Jimmy Wood*
- Harry Wright*
* Denotes a fill-in umpire
We're Social...for Statheads
Every Sports Reference Social Media Account
Site Last Updated:
Question, Comment, Feedback, or Correction?
Subscribe to our Free Email Newsletter
Subscribe to Stathead Baseball: Get your first month FREE
Your All-Access Ticket to the Baseball Reference Database
Do you have a sports website? Or write about sports? We have tools and resources that can help you use sports data. Find out more.