Let’s do a sample game to celebrate the release of 1893.
The pennant-winning Boston club will host 3rd place Cleveland, who I’m picking only as an excuse to get Cy Young a start here!
It’s a high run-scoring environment and there’s plenty of errors expected in the 19th century seasons, but anything could happen in a one-off.
Let’s see what happens…
Top of 1st
Ed McKean reaches when Boston 2B Bobby Lowe’s throw goes wide of first with two outs and also swipes a base, but other than that it’s SS Herman Long taking a lineout and handling two ground balls for the outs. No score.
Bottom of 1st
Long leads off with a base hit and steals second but is thrown out at the plate by RF Buck Ewing while trying to score on a Lowe single. No score.
Top of 2nd
Patsy Tebeau reaches second when Lowe commits his second error of the game – throwing the ball wide of first and into the dugouts. He comes around to score on a Jack O’Connor double and none other than Cy Young brings home a second run with an RBI single. McKean flies out to the wall in center with the bases loaded to end the inning. Cleveland leads, 2-0.
Bottom of 2nd
Young records the first strike out of the game and also makes a nifty play on a grounder in front of the mound off the bat of Cliff Carroll. Cleveland leads, 2-0.
Top of 3rd
Jake Virtue hits an improbable 2-run homer to pad the Cleveland lead. Virtue had just 1 HR in 433 PA. Here he rolls a 00 for a Deep Drive. Then he rolls a 97 from the Deep Drive portion of his card, which gives him a Park reading. And all rolls at Boston’s South End Grounds result in a long ball, so there you go! Cleveland leads, 4-0.
Bottom of 3rd
Boston pitcher Kid Nichols helps his own cause with a two-run homer. Cleveland leads, 4-2.
Top of 4th
Cupid Childs connects for another South End Grounds-assisted “park homer”. Cleveland leads, 5-2.
Bottom of 4th
A busy inning for the Cleveland catcher O’Connor who fields three pop ups. He drops one of them for an error, but the other two work out! Cleveland leads, 5-2.
Top of 5th
Young bats with the bases loaded but hits a hard grounder to Long for the final out. Cleveland leads, 5-2.
Bottom of 5th
Boston chips away with three straight singles from the top of their order, leading to a run. Cleveland leads, 5-3.
Top of 6th
Tebeau’s two-RBI single extends the Cleveland lead and things aren’t looking good for the home team. Cleveland leads, 7-3.
Bottom of 6th
Billy Nash leads off with a single and moves up on a wild pitch, but he’s stranded there as Young gets out of it. Cleveland leads, 7-3.
Top of 7th
Nichols works around a walk and a balk with no further damage. Cleveland leads, 7-3.
Bottom of 7th
Two assists and a putout for the third baseman, Tebeau. No runs. Cleveland leads, 7-3.
Top of 8th
A trio of two-baggers give the Cleveland two more runs. Cleveland leads, 9-3.
Bottom of 8th
Rain starts to fall in Boston as Young tosses a 1-2-3 inning, striking out Carroll to end things. Cleveland leads, 9-3.
Top of 9th
A flawless top of the 9th is punctuated by a nice play from off the mound by Nichols. But can his team rally? Cleveland leads, 9-3.
Bottom of 9th
The answer to that question above turns out to be “no”.
Cleveland wins, 9-3.
11 hits for Cleveland, 10 for Boston.
3 errors committed by Boston and just 1 for Cleveland.
Young allows 3 runs (all earned) with one walk against two strikeouts.
Nichols allows 9 runs (7 earned) with four walks and two strikeouts.
The big day at the plate is turned in by Patsy Tebeau, who drives in three runs with two hits, including a double and one time reaching base via error.
For Boston, Lowe had three hits including a double and RBI, but was also thrown out stealing and made two errors in the field. A bit of a mixed bag there.
Deep Drive Baseball 