What should have been a big mismatch sees the 1901 A’s face the horrible 1901 Giants. Other than Christy Mathewson there is a whole lot of terrible players. But once again the A’s underperform and Mathewson pitches like only he can and the Giants pull the biggest upset in the tournament so far.
Eddie Plank of the A’s pitched pretty well, but kept playing with fire all day and finally Charlie Hickman, one of the few good players on the team hits a towering homer to center to tie the game in the 5th in support of Big 6 who had allowed just 2 hits at this point, and their only run scored on a sac fly by Napoleon Lajoie. The game went to extra innings and the Giants win 2-1 on a sac fly by George Davis. Mathewson allowed just 3 hits in 10 innings.
The close games continued as the 1905 Tigers nip the 1905 Browns 2-1 on back to back singles by Christian Lindsay and Germany Schaeffer and a sacrifice fly by Sam Crawford. Both Harry Howell and Ed Killian pitched gems but only the Tigers advance.
The 1901 Braves kept the 1905 Indians in their sights the whole way as Vic Willis and Addie Joss kept the bats on ice until the 9th inning when a tiring Willis walks two batters and with two out Harry Bay drives home what looked like the winning run, but an RBI single by Rob Lowe tied the game with two out in the 9th.
Cleveland returns the favor in the bottom of the inning with two out as Jim Jackson doubles and scores on a single up the middle by George Stovall and the Indians win the tribal war 2-1.
Round one ends as the 1905 Dodgers faced off against the 1905 Pirates and Pittsburgh looked to win easily after a quick burst for a run in the second and with runners on first and third and two runs in already in the third with just one out the Dodgers get a momentum changing DP and are down just by three instead of much more. They chip back on a triple by Emil Batch and while they get one in the ninth on a Bill Bransfield error come up short 2-3 with the Pirates getting the close knit game.
