SF Giants History in the 1880's

(1883)

I will start off my blog with some early 1800’s history of the San Francisco Giants.The San Francisco Giants are a major league baseball team established in 1883. John Day and Jim Mutrie, owners of the American Association’s New York Metropolitans formed the team which was originally called the New York Gothams. The manager of the Gothams was Jim Mutrie. All the players of the Gothams came from the Metroploitan Mets, which was a National League team back then. Later on in the season, the Gothams became the New York Giants.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Manager Jim Mutrie (1885-1891)

(1885)

The Giants’ first game was on May 1, 1885 at the Polo Grounds. They recorded the highest winning percentage in their franchise history with a record of 85-27, a .759 winning percentage. Their top pitchers in 1885 were Tim Keefe and “Smiling Mickey” Welch. These two men combined for 76 victories. Their star player was Roger Connor, who batted an outstanding .371. They officially became the Giants on June 3, after the Gothams beat the Phillies in an extra innings affair. Manager Mutrie was so happy with the win he screamed out the phrase “My big fellows! My Giants!” and ever since then the Gothams became the Giants. Even though the Giants had a great year in 1885, they finished in 2^nd place, behind Chicago.

 

 

 

 

Polo Grounds I (1883-1888)

(1888)  

The Giants claimed their first National League pennant in the 1888 season. Later on that year they defeat the American Association’s St. Louis Brown in the 19^th century version of the World Series, 6 games to 4. Tim Keefe set a franchise record by winning 19 consecutive victories and finished with a pitching record of 35 wins and 12 losses. He led the majors with an ERA of 1.74 and 157 strikeouts. Another moment in franchise history was when Mike Tiernan became the first Giant to hit for the cycle. A cycle is when a player hits a single, a double, a triple and a homerun all in the same game. Roger Connor smacked 14 homeruns while catcher Buck Ewing hit .306 to lead the offensive attack for the Giants. In the 10^th and final game in the 19^th century version of the World Series, Ed Crane, who pitched the 10^th game, threw a one hitter and the Giants prevailed to win 1-0 where the Giants scored their lone run on a wild pitch.

  

 

 

 

1888 & 1889 National League Champions (New York Giants)

 

(1889)

The 1889 was a season where the Giants started to crumble. Despite defending their National League Pennant and World Championship, the Giants were crushed when the Players League, which was started in 1890, crushed the Giants for the next 10 years. The Giants started the season at Polo Grounds Stadium before the city of NY evicted them out. After leaving the Giants played 2 games in New Jersey at Oakland Park and 23 games at Staten Island’s St. George Grounds. Keefe and Welch still was the Giants core pitchers, also Ed Crane threw the team’s first ever no hitter. Mike Tiernan was 1 of 5 players who hit better than a .300 average. Tiernan led the league with 147 total runs scored. One of the Giants first rivalries were the Brooklyn Bridegrooms, who the Giants beat for the World Championship this year. The Bridegrooms later on became known as the Brooklyn Dodgers.  

(1893)

A key moment in the franchise came in 1893 where third baseman George Davis set the first franchise record with an amazing 33 game hitting streak. He finished the year with a .355 average and 119 RBIs. His record of 27 triples hit also is a team record, which has still yet to be broke. Davis went later on to become the youngest manager in MLB history in 1895, where he was the manager for 33 games.

(1894)

The Giants had a good year in 1894 posting a record of 88 wins with 44 losses. They finished 3 games back of the division leading Orioles. These two teams faced off in a best out of seven National League Championship Series where the Giants swept them to become the National League Champions. The two winning pitchers in the series win were George Meekin and Amos Rusie. Each pitcher won 2 games in the series.

(1895)

1895 was a struggling year for the New York Giants. One positive out of this year was the pitcher Cy Seymour. Seymour pitched a daytime game and a night time game all in the same day and won both games. He let up a total of 7 hits combined in both games. Seymour, however, had a bad nack for walking batters as he issued 13 walks in one game and led the league in walks for 3 straight years. The manager of the 1895 Giants was George Davis, who was the previous third baseman for the Giants. The Giants really struggled this year, finishing ninth place with a record of 66 wins and 65 losses. Davis was relieved of his duties in the middle of this horrid season.  

 

If you’re a baseball fan and want to enhance your knowledge of the 1880’s in the MLB here is a link for interesting facts, questions and information of the 1880’s. Check it out and gain some history of what the early baseball years were all about.

Since this was the time that the Giants started up, most people would expect for the team to be absolutely horrible and not that good. They had a lot of good seasons in this time span and even won two titles and other pennants. The only season that was not so good for the Giants was the 1889 season. Other than that, I think for coming up and making a name for themselves, they did a very good job and the manager, Jim Mutrie did a heck of a job with these Giants.