Wilbert Robinson

On June 10, 1892, in the first game of a doubleheader against St. Louis at Union Park in Baltimore, Wilbert Robinson went 7-for-7 with 11 RBI. Six singles and a double. The Orioles won 25-4. The game lasted one hour and fifty minutes. Robinson caught the second game too and added two more singles. No one matched his 7-for-7 in a nine-inning game until Rennie Stennett of the Pirates did it eighty-three years later.

Robinson was not a graceful player or a sophisticated strategist. He was five feet eight inches tall, eventually weighed 215 pounds, and inherited his father's butcher shop before choosing baseball. He became, over more than four decades in the game, one of the most beloved figures in its history. Brooklyn named its team after him.

Bolton to Baltimore

Robinson was born on June 29, 1864, in Bolton, Massachusetts, one of seven children of Henry Robinson, a butcher, and Lucy Jane Handley. His brother Fred played three games for the 1884 Cincinnati Outlaw Reds. When his father died in 1883, Robinson inherited the family shop but abandoned it for baseball. A minor league manager named William Prince noted that Robinson "looked like a choice cut of sirloin" and described him as "a great catcher from the first day we placed him behind the bat."

Robinson reached the majors with the Philadelphia Athletics of the American Association in 1886 and moved to the Baltimore Orioles in 1890. In Baltimore he found his career. Under manager Ned Hanlon, the Orioles won three consecutive National League pennants from 1894 through 1896 with a roster that held six future Hall of Famers at once. John McGraw played third base, Hughie Jennings anchored shortstop, Willie Keeler hit line drives through the infield, Joe Kelley patrolled left field, and Dan Brouthers played first base in 1894. Robinson caught them all.

He batted .353 in 1894, .347 in 1896, and .315 in 1897. He averaged .312 over seven seasons in Baltimore. He was known less for physical tools than for his ability to handle pitchers and call games, skills that later defined his career on the other side of the diamond.

McGraw and the Diamond Cafe

Robinson and McGraw became close friends despite opposite temperaments. Robinson was 215 pounds of genial warmth. McGraw was 150 pounds of combative intensity. Together they co-owned the Diamond Cafe near Union Park, an establishment with billiards, a bar, a dining room, and a bowling alley. They purchased adjoining homes on St. Paul Street.

At a reunion of old Orioles teammates following the Giants' 1913 World Series loss to the Philadelphia Athletics, a drunk McGraw blamed Robinson for mishandling the Giants' pitching staff (Robinson had been serving as pitching coach since 1909). Robinson responded with his own criticism of McGraw's managing. McGraw ordered Robinson out. Robinson showered McGraw with beer. The two did not speak for seventeen years.

Robinson took the Brooklyn job roughly one month later, turning the Giants-Dodgers rivalry into something deeply personal.

Uncle Robbie's Brooklyn

Robinson managed Brooklyn from 1914 through 1931, compiling a record of 1,375 wins and 1,341 losses with two National League pennants. Sportswriters began calling the team the Robins in his honor, and the name became semi-official for the duration of his tenure. His players called him Uncle Robbie. New York Times writer John Kieran described him as being "like Falstaff, not only witty himself but the cause of wit in others."

He won the pennant in 1916 with a 94-60 record, then lost the World Series to the Boston Red Sox in five games. He won again in 1920 at 93-61, then lost to the Cleveland Indians in the best-of-nine World Series, five games to two. Game 5 featured Bill Wambsganss's unassisted triple play. Robinson said, "I've been in baseball forty years, and I never saw one like this."

During spring training in Daytona Beach in March 1915, aviator Ruth Law was dropping golf balls from her airplane. Robinson, then fifty, volunteered to catch a baseball dropped from the plane at 525 feet. Law forgot the baseball at her hotel and substituted a grapefruit. It exploded on impact, spraying Robinson with juice and pulp. Convinced the red-tinged citrus juice was blood, he fell to the ground shouting for help. His players howled. Robinson thereafter referred to airplanes as "fruit flies."

In 1925, team owner Charles Ebbets died, and his successor Ed McKeever caught pneumonia at the funeral and died within a week. Robinson was elected team president on May 25, 1925, while remaining field manager. With his attention split, Brooklyn deteriorated. The teams of the late 1920s became known as the Daffiness Boys for their distracted, error-prone play. On August 15, 1926, three Brooklyn runners occupied third base simultaneously after Babe Herman doubled and was tagged out trying to stretch it into a triple. Two of the three were called out. Brooklyn finished sixth four consecutive seasons from 1926 through 1929.

The Reconciliation

At the National League winter meetings in December 1930, Robinson and McGraw embraced publicly, ending seventeen years of silence. McGraw died on February 25, 1934. Robinson died on August 8, 1934, in Atlanta, where he had been serving as president of the Crackers in the Southern Association. He had fallen in his hotel room, struck his head on a bathtub, and broken his arm. When attendants arrived, he told them, "Don't worry about it, fellas. I'm an old Oriole. I'm too tough to die." He died of a brain hemorrhage shortly after.

He was seventy years old. He and McGraw are buried near each other at New Cathedral Cemetery in Baltimore. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1945 by the Old Timers Committee, alongside three of his Baltimore teammates.