Joe McGinnity

Joseph Jerome McGinnity won 246 games across ten major league seasons and earned the nickname "Iron Man" for pitching both games of a doubleheader three times in a single month. He played for the Baltimore Orioles, the Brooklyn Superbas, and the New York Giants, won 20 or more games in eight consecutive seasons, and continued pitching in the minor leagues until he was 54 years old.

From the Iron Foundry

McGinnity was born in Cornwall Township, Henry County, Illinois, on March 19, 1871. Before his baseball career, he worked in his father-in-law's iron foundry, which gave rise to the nickname. He reached the major leagues with the Baltimore Orioles of the National League in 1899, going 28-16 in his rookie season. When Baltimore's National League franchise was eliminated after that year, McGinnity moved to the Brooklyn Superbas in 1900 and went 28-8 under manager Ned Hanlon.

In 1901, he jumped to the American League's Baltimore franchise, managed by John McGraw, and won 26 games. When McGraw moved to the New York Giants midseason in 1902, McGinnity followed him.

Iron Man

McGinnity's 1903 and 1904 seasons defined his career. He went 31-20 in 1903, leading the National League in wins and innings pitched. In 1904, he went 35-8 with a 1.61 ERA, pitching 408 innings. During August 1903, he pitched both ends of a doubleheader three times in a single month, winning all six games. Pitching two complete games in a day was rare even in the dead-ball era, and McGinnity did it with a consistency that no other pitcher matched.

He worked alongside Christy Mathewson, and the two formed the best pitching combination in the National League. Mathewson threw with finesse. McGinnity relied on an underhand delivery that produced a rising curveball contemporaries called the "Old Sal." The pitch rose as it crossed the plate, and batters swung underneath it repeatedly. The combination carried the Giants to pennants in 1904 and 1905. In the 1905 World Series against Connie Mack's Philadelphia Athletics, McGinnity won Game 4 with a shutout.

On September 22, 1904, McGinnity pitched the game in which Jim O'Rourke, at age 54, caught all nine innings for the Giants in the pennant-clinching victory over Cincinnati.

The Minor League Years

McGinnity's major league career ended after the 1908 season, when he was 37. He had won 246 games in ten seasons. Most pitchers would have retired. McGinnity kept pitching.

He spent most of the next 17 years in the minor leagues, winning games and managing teams across the Eastern League, Pacific Coast League, and other circuits. He pitched for Newark in the Eastern League, Tacoma and Vancouver in the Northwestern League, and Dubuque in the Mississippi Valley League, among other stops. He won 20 or more games in a minor league season multiple times after turning 40. He pitched his last professional game in 1925, at age 54.

A Late Honor

McGinnity died on November 14, 1929, in Brooklyn, New York, at age 58. The Old Timers Committee elected him to the Hall of Fame in 1946. His major league career was relatively short, but his ten seasons produced numbers comparable to pitchers who played far longer, and his minor league durability remains one of baseball's most remarkable second acts.