Lave Cross was a very good baseball player for his day, but because he bounced around so much, his 2,651 career Hits, then fifth-most all time, are largely forgotten.

Cross played for nine different teams in four different leagues (American Association, Players League, National League & American League), with Philadelphia being represented in all four!  Also playing for St. Louis, Washington, Louisville, Cleveland, and Brooklyn, and had thirteen 130 Hit years, batting .292 overall.

Defensively, Cross usually played at Third Base, though he was exceptionally versatile, and he easily played at Catcher and the Outfield.  He finished in the top ten in Defensive bWAR six times.  Notably, he had 1,378 Runs Batted In over his career, an incredible number for any era, especially for someone who only had 47 career Home Runs.

Many baseball historians have painted Wally Schang as one of the better offensive Catchers of the deadball era.  In terms of his World Series Rings, you can argue that he is one of the most successful.

Schang won his first World Series as a rookie with the Philadelphia Athletics in 1913, and he would play there for the first five years of his career.  The Athletics dealt Schang to the Red Sox in 1918, where again, he was a World Series Champion in his first year with a Major League Team.  He batted over .300 for the BoSox in 1919 and 1920, but the Red Sox were in the middle of dismantling their team, and he was traded to the New York Yankees in 1921, where he again had two more .300 seasons, the second of which would see him win a World Series in 1922.  

Schang later played for the St. Louis Browns and the Detroit Tigers, and, in addition to his excellent offense, he was considered a very good defensive player.  He would also have five seasons in which he received an MVP vote, and he secured a fourth ring in 1930 as a reserve with the Athletics. 

While his 1,506 career Hits may not seem like a lot, for a Catcher of his time, it was a lot.  Throw in the lifetime Batting Averages of .284 and OBP of .393, and you have a special player.

When you look at the past MVPs in baseball history, Bobby Shantz is one of the more curious players to win it.

Cy Williams entered Notre Dame, having only played in a handful of baseball games.  He left them as an accomplished player whom the Chicago Cubs signed after he finished school. 

Williams joined the Cubs right away (1912), and a few years later, he was a regular in the Outfield.  Williams won the Home Run Title in 1916 (12), but he was a defensive liability and was viewed as expendable.  He was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies in 1918, and it turned out to be a lopsided transaction in the Phillies' favor.  

The Baker Bowl, where the Phillies played, fit the strength of Williams, and as the ball started flying out of the park in the 1920s, he was one of those who perfected the art of the long ball.  Williams led the NL in Home Runs in 1920 (15), 1923 (41), and 1927 (30), and he was also the leader in Slugging in 1926 (.568).  Williams would also have six .300 seasons for Philadelphia. 

At the time of his retirement in 1930, Williams was the all-time Home Run leader in the National League (251).  

From 1895 to 1899, Harry Davis was either a budding journeyman or a future star.  He played for four different teams in the National League and had a 28 Triple year in 1897 while batting .305.  Davis was in the minors for all of 1900, and Connie Mack, the owner/manager of the Philadelphia Athletics, saw him as a building block for his brand new American League franchise, and he was one of their first signees.

Eddie Rommel played his entire 13-year playing career with the Philadelphia Athletics (1920-32), where he became one of the first masters of the knuckleball.

After Rommel’s rookie year, he would become a workhorse for the Athletics, leading the American League in Wins twice (1922 & 1925) and Games Pitched (1922 & 1923).  His best year was in 1922, when he went 27-13 with a 3.28 ERA and a second-place finish in MVP voting.  Philadelphia became an AL power by the end of the decade, but by that time, Rommel was no longer the same Pitcher.  He would, however, come out of relief to win a game in the 1929 World Series, which was won by Philadelphia. 

Rommel would later have a successful career as an umpire, which included working in the 1943 and 1947 World Series.

The Philadelphia Athletics were a powerhouse in the early 1930s, but the Great Depression led owner Connie Mack to unload his best players to keep the team afloat.  As such, there was not a lot of talent left for the Athletics afterward, but Bob Johnson was an exception to that rule.

Debuting at Leftfield in 1933, Johnson played for the Athletics until 1942.  With Philadelphia, he would go to five All-Star Games.  With the exception of his last season with the Athletics, he has least 20 Home Runs, with three of those years seeing him exceed 30.  From 1935 to 1941, he hit the 100-RBI mark and had four .300 seasons.  Johnson joined Washington for one season, during which he was again an All-Star, and then completed his career with two seasons in Boston, where he was selected for his seventh and eighth All-Star Games.  Notably, in 1944, he would win the OBP and OPS titles, the only times that he would do so.

While Johnson had a good 1945, many of the players who served the U.S. during World War II were coming back, and he elected to retire rather than compete for a job.  He could have easily compiled more stats, but at age 39 and 2,051 Hits and 252 home runs, he had a great career.

297 Wins.

With the exception of Roger Clemens, Bobby Matthews has the most Wins of any player who is not in the Baseball Hall of Fame.  One of the main differences is that unlike Clemens, Matthews has never received Hall of Fame consideration once.

Matthews' pro career began in 1871, when he played in the National Association and the dawn of pro ball.  Over the next few seasons, he bounced around in the infant league for teams like the Fort Wayne Kekiongas, Baltimore Canaries, and the New York Mutuals, and the 5' 5" Pitcher did well with three straight (1872-74) years where he led his league in Strikeouts.

The Mutuals would join the National League, and Matthews joined Cincinnati after the Mutuals folded.  From 1887 to 1891, he slumped and bounced around from league to league, major to minor.  In 1892, he had a comeback season with the Boston Red Stockings, where he led the league in FIP (2.15), BB/9 (0.7), SO/9 (4.8), and SO/BB (6.95). 

Matthews joined the Philadelphia Athletics in 1883, where he had an even 30 Wins in the next three seasons.  He had another first-place finish in BB/9 (1883), one more in FIP (2.17 in 1885), and twice in SO/BB (1883 & 1885).

He retired after 1887, with the aforementioned 297 Wins with an ERA of 2.86.

If you look at the career of Harry Stovey, accumulatively, the offensive statistics seem very good, but not Hall of Fame good.  1,775 Hits, 122 Home Runs, and a .288 Batting Average don't stand out, but another look shows that is not the case at all.

Stovey played from 1880 to 1893, an era not known for offensive greatness.  Beginning his career with three decent seasons with the Worcester Ruby Legs of the National League, he would join the first incarnation of the Philadelphia Athletics, an inaugural team of the American Association.  With Philadelphia, Stovey had four seasons in which he led the AA in Runs Scored, and his lowest total was 110.  He won three Home Run Titles, two Triples Titles, and was a base-stealing machine.  Four of his seasons saw Stovey bat over .300, and he also won two Slugging Titles.  

He would finish his career with stops in Boston during the brief Players’ League and with three more teams in the NL (Boston, Baltimore, and Brooklyn).  While hitting 100 Home Runs doesn't seem like much, he was the first to do so as a pro, and that means something.

An old rookie at 26 with the Washington Senators, Connie Mack's Philadelphia Athletics would trade for him, and from 1922 to 1925, he had three .300 seasons, and in the one year he didn't hit that mark, he batted .299.  He was deemed expendable and was dealt with the St. Louis Browns in 1926, but was back in 1928.

It took a long time for George Earnshaw to make the Majors, but once the 6’ 4” did, he wasted little time proving that he belonged.

John Phalen “Stuffy” McInnis was signed by the Philadelphia Athletics before the 1909 season, and he would play off the bench, usually at Shortstop for his first two seasons.  McInnis would take over at First Base in 1911, and became the youngest member of Connie Mack’s “$100,000 Infield”. 

In 1946, most of the majors had given up on Eddie Joost, who had issues with Braves Management and was assigned to AAA when he joined the St. Louis Cardinals organization.  Joost was 31, and it could easily be believed that his best seasons were behind him.  As it would turn out, that was not the case at all.

Bobby Shantz was overlooked by a lot of scouts as they considered him too small (5’ 6”) but the Philadelphia Athletics would sign him in 1948, and after a couple of mediocre years, he would have a two-year run as one of the best starting pitchers in the game.

Born in Slovakia, Elmer Valo immigrated to the United States as a child and would live the American Dream to become a Major League Baseball Player.  Valo would debut with the Philadelphia Athletics in 1940, and as history would tell us was one of the most intense players to don the uniform of the Athletics.

Arriving in the Philadelphia Athletics organization via the Rule 5 Draft for the 1918 season, Jimmy Dykes was an excellent fielder, who was believed to have limited hitting ability.  That was the case in his first two seasons, where he batted below .200 but this would change as he matured into the role of an everyday starter in Major League Baseball. 

There were a lot of great players that the Philadelphia Athletics in the 1900s and early 1910s, and this is likely why Danny Murphy has not received some of the due that he should have.

After a breakout season with the Chicago Orphans in 1901 where he batted .335 with 187 Hits, Tully “Topsy” Hartsel, bolted from the National League to the American League and Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics.

Ferris Fain was plucked in the Rule 5 Draft after the 1946 Season, and he was inserted as the starting First Baseman the year after.  Fain immediately showed extraordinary plate discipline as he had a ,414 OBP as a rookie.  Fain played his first six seasons in the Majors with the Philadelphia Athletics, and he never had an OBP less than .412, and he was always in the top seven in that category.  Fain would be named an All-Star in 1950, and would be again in 1951 and 1952, with the latter year seeing him win the OBP Title with .438.

When you think of home run champions, Ralph Orlando “Socks” Seybold doesn’t come to mind, but there are a lot of anomalies in this man’s career.