Before 1920, during the Deadball Era, a single baseball was used throughout a Major League game, leading to a notoriously dirty style of play.

Some say baseball's drug problem goes back to the late 1800s

At age 32, pitcher James “Pud” Galvin was feeling tired and decided to take "the Brown-Séquard elixir," which contained a testicular fluid from dogs and guinea pigs, believed to invigorate tired bodies. It might've worked: Galvin pitched a two-hit shutout the next day.

MLB 2023 rules changes were the most dramatic alterations in decades, drastically speeding up the game.

The first MLB All-Star Game was designed by a sports journalist who believed the spectacle would boost baseball's reputation during the Great Depression.

Every baseball used by the MLB only lasts about 7 pitches before it's discarded.

Every MLB baseball needs to be rubbed with a special kind of mud, provided by one New Jersey family.

Visualize how changes to lineups, driven by modern analytics, could have changed one of MLB's most iconic moments.

Fourteen ways to make baseball cool again

Baseball, while commonly known as America's pastime, gets a bit of a bad rap for being long, slow, and boring. Here are fourteen fun ideas to make the sport more interesting to combat dwindling attendance.

The 2026 MLB season is the first to allow players to challenge umpires' calls on balls and strikes.

Why ‘Shoeless Joe’ Jackson was banned from Major League Baseball

Few baseball stars are more infamous than "Shoeless Joe" Jackson, one of the game's greatest hitters. Jackson was part of the Chicago White Sox team (notoriously dubbed the "Black Sox") accused of fixing the 1919 World Series. This resource breaks down the criminal trial that investigated those allegations. Curiously, Jackson and his teammates were acquitted, but Major League Baseball commissioner Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis still banned them from the league for life.

In 1970, Pittsburgh Pirates' pitcher Dock Ellis threw a no-hitter—a rare feat that was just the 174th in MLB history—while high on LSD.

A history of the rare, chaotic moments when MLB batters charge the pitcher on the mound

They typically occur when a pitcher has slung a pitch a little too close to the batter—though the exact causes vary, from quick tempers to longstanding grudges. No definitive account of these infrequent but highly visible incidents has existed, so sportswriter Jon Bois compiled data on 264 such moments between 1950 and 2025. The resulting 23-minute video explores the rich narratives leading to these charged events.

In 1975, a Major League Baseball clause that kept players legally tied to their teams after retirement was dismantled, creating the modern concept of free agency.

Henry Chadwick invented the box score in 1859—and wrote off walks as a pitcher's failure

Major League Baseball, explained

Major League Baseball is America’s oldest professional sports league. Alongside triumphs, the league has faced scandals, including drug abuse and steroid use, shaping its path over the decades. Today, MLB embraces new rules, international talent, and a growing connection to legalized sports betting.

The 1919 Chicago White Sox, later known as the 'Black Sox,' were banned from baseball for fixing that year's World Series despite being acquitted in court.

How baseball shaped Black America during Reconstruction

A cornerstone of the budding Black culture following the Civil War was baseball, with several clubs springing up in Black neighborhoods and leaders like Frederick Douglass cheering on the players, including his son, who played for a team in Washington. This detailed history of the early Black leagues unpacks how the game enhanced the upwardly mobile community—and why that fact led to the segregation of what would become Major League Baseball.

MLB pitchers were charged with benefiting from sports betting

In November 2025, two pitchers for the Cleveland Guardians were charged with coordinating with sports bettors to enrich themselves and others. In many instances, they shared the kinds of pitches they would throw at specific points in the game. Bettors then placed money on those actions.

100 moments that shaped baseball history

Published in 2018 by baseball historian Jacob Kornhauser, this list examines the defining moments throughout more than a century of play on the field, from Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Dock Ellis purportedly throwing a no-hitter while on acid to Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

Fantasy sports' roots go back to an 1860s parlor game that simulated real-world baseball.

Inside MLB's robo-umping experiment

Human umpires call roughly 94% of pitches right overall, but performance reduces on borderline pitches in high-leverage moments, the calls that shape game outcomes most. A professor and historian analyze early experiments with the full "robot ump" system that helped shape MLB's decision to implement a compromise "challenge" system.

A 1930s card game birthed modern fantasy sports

"National Pastime" used the statistics of real Major League Baseball players to determine a winner, creating the template for the modern fantasy sports model.

Ballpark nachos—the messy but delicious combo of liquid cheese, pickled jalapenos, and tortilla chips—were invented for the Texas Rangers.

The evolution of the baseball bat

Torpedo bats may be the latest, most powerful kind of baseball bat, but the instrument's history is long. This Smithsonian resource traces the bat's evolution from handmade objects forged by the players to mass-produced marvels of physics designed by companies like Louisville Slugger. Along the way, you'll see some interesting takes on the form, including bats referred to as "mushrooms" and "bananas."

Minor leaguers once unionized for better pay, housing, and medical care

For decades, Minor League baseball players endured overcrowded housing, indifferent medical care, and all-night bus rides for a chance to make it to “The Show.” And they did it for as little as $4,800 a year.

Jackie Robinson's iconic 42 is the only number that's been retired leaguewide, meaning no current players can wear it except in his honor.

Sidearm pitchers—who throw the ball at an odd angle, sometimes very close to the ground—are a rarity in modern baseball, which often makes them more difficult for batters to hit.

A 2004 brawl led to a strict dress code for NBA players

After the Malice at the Palace brawl between the Indiana Pacers and the Detroit Pistons, Commissioner David Stern wanted to tamp down the league's bad-boy image, instituting a business casual dress code for all players on the sidelines and at team-sanctioned events.

In 1985, New York Mets star Keith Hernandez said 40% of his MLB peers used cocaine, highlighting an open secret about drug use in the league.

A Bay Area lab was supplying MLB players with steroids

The Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative, also known as BALCO, began as a modest vitamin shop, but by the 1990s it was at the center of a doping scheme that rocked Major League Baseball and other professional sports.

The original basketball was hand-sewn

When the first basketball landed in a peach basket in 1891, it didn't look like the leather Wilson ball you see on today's NBA courts. The basketball evolved from the nondribbling days, when a hand-sewn ball with stitching like a football was used.

Baseball legend Joe DiMaggio's hitting streak, which ended at 56, cost him a sponsorship deal with Heinz.

NHL players used to not wear helmets or masks

Until the 1970s, hockey goalies didn't wear masks to protect their faces with any regularity. Instead, they took pucks off their cheeks, foreheads, and mouths, resulting in serious scars. Any player who entered the league after June 1, 1979, was required to wear a helmet, but several players who'd started before then chose to continue playing without one.

The Pete Rose scandal was exposed by Sports Illustrated

In the spring of 1984, a reporter at Sports Illustrated answered a call on the newsroom tip line claiming player/manager Pete Rose was gambling on baseball games. That March, the magazine published the bombshell report that led Major League Baseball to investigate and then ban Rose for life.

Explore the data behind every Major League Baseball player's success rate with ABS, its new tech-assisted challenge system.

Teddy Roosevelt's intervention helped save football, which previously had been a brutally violent game.

An eephus is a high-arc pitch usually thrown by position players filling in for pitchers in blowout games.

How pitcher Pedro Martinez helped reverse the curse of the Red Sox

The team had not won a World Series for nearly 100 years—while their rivals, the Yankees, had won 26. The Dominican pitcher joined the club in 1997 and helped lead the team to reverse the curse.

Cricket used to be America's pastime

Before baseball, American football, basketball, or hockey ever organized in the US, there was one sport which could be found up and down the East Coast: cricket. The second-most popular sport in the world, cricket is mostly ignored by Americans, despite its prevalence in early American history. Learn more about the forgotten role cricket played in the US with this article.

The MLB's reserve clause gave owners rights to players after their contracts expired

The clause was added to contracts in 1879, allowing owners to hang on to players after the expiration of their contracts, sometimes in perpetuity.

Why professional tennis players are so picky about balls before serving

Just as swimmers shave their bodies before competitions to swim faster, experiments show that tighter, less fluffy balls experience less drag forces when moving through the air and thus produce faster serves at the cost of less control. Players may select a fuzzier ball in scenarios that call for safer, more cautious play.

The story behind one infamous World Series moment

“The Bartman Incident” during Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS forever changed the life of Cubs fan Steve Bartman, who quickly descended into anonymity. This 2005 ESPN story attempts to find answers behind the notorious Bartman.

The word 'jazz' evolved from slang for 'energy' and was used to describe a baseball pitch before it came to mean a genre of music.

Listen to how the 1902 'poison squad' experiments changed food safety in America

As part of government research, a group of young men were paid to eat standard American food—replete with food additives like borax and formaldehyde—which revealed the dangers of unregulated food. The work was led by the first FDA commissioner, Harvey Wiley, who helped end the "century of the great stomachache."

The biggest controversies of the NFL

Some of the biggest controversies in NFL history didn’t just spark debate—they changed the game. From Spygate and Deflategate to concussion research and the league's ambivalent stance on it, these moments led to new rules, safety measures, and major policy shifts. Explore how each scandal shaped the league and its future.

Tim Donaghy and the NBA game fixing scandal

A two-year investigation by ESPN details how former NBA referee Tim Donaghy conspired to fix games, who he was working with, and where the money was going. In a lengthy statement, the NBA denied much of the new claims in the article, saying the data ESPN used was not strong and they were unable to replicate it. Donaghy was given a lifetime ban and served nearly all of his 15-month sentence.

A sophisticated data analysis found that stadiums with roofs or in cities that regularly have sunny skies are the easiest for outfielders to play in.

'Out in left field' is an idiom used to describe an eccentric person, and some researchers believe it likely originated at a minor league baseball park in Massachusetts that had an unusual outfield.

'The Star-Spangled Banner' became associated with sports at the 1918 World Series thanks to an impromptu rendition during the 7th inning stretch.

The betting scandal that rocked college basketball

In the 1940s and '50s, illegal bookmaking in college basketball was rampant at Madison Square Garden. In the 1949-50 season, City College of New York players shaved points during games, though they played honestly in the NIT and NCAA tournaments, winning both. This OddsShark.com article explores how the points-shaving scandal was exposed, who went to jail, and its impact on the NIT and CCNY.