Tom Zuppa submitted this 1912 Owen Wilson APBA card for today’s Weird Wednesday column.
He says:
Attached is a 1912 John Owen "Chief" Wilson, Pirates right fielder. It’s part of an all-star set the game co. released a few years back for download.
Wilson hit 11 HR and a league-leading 36 triples that season, carded with a rare (unusual?) 2-2-5-5. Even stranger, Wilson never had more than 14 triples elsewhere in his nine-year career.
| Year | G | PA | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | SB | BB | SO | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1912 | 152 | 643 | 583 | 80 | 175 | 19 | 36 | 11 | 94 | 16 | 35 | 67 | .300 | .342 | .513 |
The bio on Wilson on SABR’s website is worth a read (most of them are, by the way). From that I gathered these pertinent facts:
- Even without Owen Wilson’s 36 triples, the Pirates would have still led the league in triples.
- Not much was made of Owen’s 36 triples at the time. Napoleon Lajoie was mistakenly attributed 43 triples in 1903 instead of the 11 he actually hit. Lajoie was assumed to have the record.
- Many of Wilson’s 36 were doubles stretched into triples. Others were triples that he tried in vain to stretch into inside-the-park homeruns such as his 36th and last one.
thanks Tom!
With regard to Wilson’s 36 triples the Pirates nearly always led the league in 3B, because Forbes Field’s unique outfield was coducive to triples. But no one can explain how Wilson did it. I suspect it was a fluke, like Bobo holloman’s no-hitter, for instance.
Interesting, Charlie. I didn’t know that about Forbes Field.
Just noticed, I misspelled conducive. Beg pardon.
What was it about Forbes field that made it conducive to triples ?
In 1909, when opened, Forbes was huge. Foul lines were 360′ in left, 376′ in right, and center field measured 462′ feet from the plate. The alleys, of course, exceeded 400′. With all this outfield space I’m not surprised so many triples were hit. I would guess there were quite few inside the park hrs hit as well. My source is Lost Ballparks by Lawrence Ritter.
Thanks for the explanation, Charlie. I had always wondered about his abnormal numbers.
For anyone interested, I went to visit the location of where Forbes Field was a few years back and took some photos.
http://www.apbablog.com/fun/cant-avoid-baseball-in-pittsburgh
Thomas, I understand they’ve preserved a the section of the lf fence where Maz hit the hr to win the ’60 Series. Is anything else left of Forbes? All that’s left of Municipal Stadium in KC is an information display and a vacant lot. That old park was built in 1923, shared by the AAA KC Blues and the Negro League Monarchs, then enlarged for the A’s in ’55. The Royals and football Chiefs even used it until their present stadiums were completed. Kinda sad. I saw a lot of great games there.
Charlie, the home plate is there. It’s actually in the hallway of a university building but they have it encased. :) Portions of the outfield wall are also still standing (outside :) ). There are photos of the plate and wall here. http://www.apbablog.com/fun/cant-avoid-baseball-in-pittsburgh