Misfits!: The Cleveland Spiders in 1899 : A Day-By-Day Narrative of Baseball Futility

by J. Thomas Hetrick

Hetrick, J. Thomas

Genres: Baseball

216 pages, Hardcover

First published November 7, 1991

Reviews

[Keith M Altomare · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh the pain

Throughout the book I marveled at the dedication of many of the spiders who entered each game expecting to lose. A well researched piece

[Chip Rickard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a story of the worst team in baseball history. The Cleveland Spiders finished the 1899 National League season with a 20-134 record. The record has to be put in the proper context though. The Spiders were actually one of the best teams in the NL in the 1890s. In 1899 the Robison brothers owned the Spiders. They proceeded to buy the bankrupt St. Louis Browns (today's Cardinals.) This was known as syndicate ownership. There was cross ownership with other teams as well. For a variety of reasons the Robisons sent all the Spiders good players to StL. During the season, any players that showed promise were sent to StL. Cleveland fans were so disillusioned that their attendance dropped like a stone. Visiting teams couldn't meet expenses and the league decided to keep the Spiders on the road for the remainder of the season save for a few games.

This book is the story of the season. It's written in a different way. As the title says, it's a day to day narrative of the season. No flowery in depth profiles of the players. The author mostly used newspaper articles about the team from the Cleveland Plain Dealer and The Sporting Life - a national sports newspaper. Although the team was awful they were not short on personalities. The appendix has batting and pitching stats for every player and short biographies of each player and the Robison brothers.

[Fred · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't really expect this book to be great, but I always wondered about this team. a book this size should take a weekend, if that. it took me two months. I thought Christmas could help me finish it, it couldn't. a flight to England didn't help. a flight back from England didn't help. a blizzard didn't help. reading each pathetic showing by these misfits was like sitting through one of their lifeless games. I wished, as I read, that I got a little more of the personalities of the men who made up this team, and then, at the end, I did. by that time, however I was so happy to be done with the drudgery of the season that I could barely follow along.