The 1876 Brown Stockings: Bad Dickey Covers Himself With Glory

The second game here between the Brown Stockings and Mutuals, yesterday afternoon, at the Grand Avenue Park, was witnessed by a small crowd, not over 800 persons being present. The slim attendance was no doubt due in a great degree to the weather, the sky being filled with dark, ominous-looking clouds, which threatened rain at every moment. McGeary was not able to play, not having recovered from the recent injury received to his hand, and Mack played second base, the veteran Pearce assuming his old position at short field, where, during the progress of the game, he covered himself with glory, and demonstrated his ability to still cover the post with honor, as he did in his palmiest days, years ago. The game was at first uninteresting, but the Browns got down to work and did some heavy batting before the close. They knocked poor Matthews' balls all over the field without difficulty, and aided by the miserable fielding of the Mutuals, scored eight runs and blanked the visiting club in the whole nine innings. Pearce and Battin did well at the stick, each securing three safe hits. Pearce batted free and hard, not attempting his fair fouls. The fielding of the Browns was very fair, the greatest feature, and one for which Pearce was enthusiastically cheered, was an exciting triple play, which was made in the sixth inning. Nichols was on third base, and Holdsworth on first. Start stepped up to bat, and drove a red hot liner to Pearce, who caught it, and quickly threw to first to head Holdsworth off, who had started for second. Dehlman caught the ball before Holdsworth could return to his base and then threw to Battin at third, thus cutting off Nichols, who had run in on the fly. The batting on the part of the Mutuals was very poor, Nichols and Hicks being the only men who batted safe, the former securing two and the latter one hit. In the field a number of glaring errors were committed, but Hallinan, with the exception of one ludicrous muff, Start, Nichols, Hicks and Booth did some fine playing.

-St. Louis Globe-Democrat, June 30, 1876

If you're scoring at home, the triple play went 6-3-5. Also, this was George Washington Bradley's eighth shutout of the year.

After getting swept by the Hartfords, the Brown Stockings rattled off seven wins in their next eight games, the only blemish being the 10-5 loss in Boston on June 15. And they picked up only one game in the standings. After going 7-1 in their last eight games (including six wins in a row), the Brown Stockings still found themselves five games back of Chicago. Between June 17 and July 24, the club would lose twice...and only pick up a half game on the White Stockings.