Overview

During the 1890s, Cleveland's National League team, called the Blues and later the Spiders, built a reputation as baseball's roughest, toughest club. Baseball became a war in the Gay Nineties, full of cheating, intimidation, and violence on and off the field, from which the concept of sportsmanship had virtually disappeared. The Spiders were the rowdiest team of all. Managed by Oliver (Patsy) Tebeau, a hard-charging, quick-fisted infielder, the Spiders cut a swath through the National League. They fought with umpires, opposing players, and fans at home and on the road, and though they never won a pennant, their battles with the Baltimore Orioles became the stuff of legend. Their story is not all unpleasant. Cy Young, who won more games than any pitcher who ever lived, spent his first nine seasons with the Spiders. They were also ahead of their time from a racial perspective when they signed Louis Sockalexis, the first recognized Native American in major league ball. The Spiders ended their run on a sour note when the 1899 club compiled the worst record in major league history, winning only 20 of 154 games. Shortly afterward, the Spiders were no more. They left a complicated legacy, but an interesting one.

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Reviews

Baseball buffs will be crawling all over this account of the star-crossed Patsy Tebeau and the storied Cleveland Spiders, who worked their way down from excellence to the worst record in major league history. As usual, David Fleitz packs his story with compelling detail gleaned through prodigious research. --Edward Achorn, author of Fifty-Nine in '84 and The Summer of Beer and Whiskey; David Fleitz has once again combined his dogged research and his talent for telling a story to bring Patsy Tebeau and his Cleveland Spiders into a modern light. Unlike the names of Cobb and McGraw, which have endured, the name of the highly intense and successful Tebeau has become mostly obscure to all but devoted baseball historians. Today's baseball fan will be rewarded here with historical accuracy and an enjoyable read. --Peter Mancuso, chair, Nineteenth Century Research Committee, Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).

Author Information

David L. Fleitz is a web developer and database analyst who lives in Pleasant Ridge, Michigan. A longtime SABR member, he has written eight previous books on baseball history, including biographies of Cap Anson, Shoeless Joe Jackson, and Napoleon Lajoie.

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