Philadelphia Athletics (American Association)

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This article is about the 1882-1891 Philadelphia Athletics baseball team. See Philadelphia Athletics (1860-1876) for the first so-called "Philadelphia Athletics" team, and see Oakland Athletics for the 1901-1954 Philadelphia Athletics (AL).

The Philadelphia Athletics were a professional baseball team, one of six charter members of the American Association, a 19th-century major league, which began play in 1882 as a rival to the National League. The other teams were the Baltimore Orioles, Cincinnati Red Stockings, Eclipse of Louisville, Pittsburgh Alleghenys, and St. Louis Brown Stockings. The team took its name from a previous team, which played in the National Association from 1871 through 1875 and in the National League in 1876.

Over the ten years of their existence, the Athletics were a successful club on the field, winning 633 games and losing 564, for a winning percentage of .529. The team won the AA pennant in 1883, finishing one game ahead of the St. Louis team. That same year, however, the National League set up its own team in Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Quakers (later Phillies). The Quakers finished last in 1883, but soon improved on the field and at the gate.

The last straw for the AA Athletics, and several other American Association teams, was the creation of the Players League in 1890. The established leagues lost players to the upstart league, player salaries soared (by the standards of the day), and there simply were not enough fans to support three baseball leagues. Though the Players League folded after a single season, it had taken its toll. In September 1890, the Athletics released or sold their players and finished the season with a pick-up team, losing the final 21 games. The Athletics were expelled by the league at the end of the season and was replaced by a new Philadelphia Athletics team, which previously played in the Players League as the Quakers. The new team hired the former Athletics manager Bill Sharsig.[1]

Their home games were played at Oakdale Park in 1882, at the Jefferson Street Grounds from 1883 to 1890, and at Forepaugh Park in 1891. In addition, games were also occasionally played at Gloucester Point Grounds. They had eight different managers, with Bill Sharsig having the longest tenure.

Notable players for the Athletics included future Baseball Hall of Fame member Wilbert Robinson and Al Atkinson. Atkinson is one of the few pitchers to throw more than one no-hitter, and he threw them both for the Athletics, on May 24, 1884 and May 1, 1886. In the first no-hitter Atkinson beaned leadoff hitter Ed Swartwood and then retired 27 batters in a row. In 1888 the Athletics would have two no-hitters within a week, with Ed Seward throwing one on July 26 and Gus Weyhing on July 31.

Fred Chapman, who pitched in one game for the 1887 Athletics at the age of fourteen years and eight months, is the youngest player in MLB history.