Last update 10/16/2007
1876 - The National League is formed
1901 - The American League is formed
1902 - The Milwaukee Brewers move to St. Louis to become the Browns.
1903 - The first World Series is played with The Boston Pilgrims (AL) beating the Pittsburgh Pirates (NL) 5 games to 3. (Best of nine series)
- The Baltimore Orioles move to New York and become the Highlanders.
1908 - The Chicago Cubs are the first team to "repeat" as they beat the Detroit Tigers 4 games to 1. This is the last time that the Cubs have won a world series.
1911 - Ty Cobb of the Detroit Tigers(AL) and Frank Schulte of the Chicago Cubs(NL) are the first League Most Valuable Player award winners.
1913 - The New York Highlanders change thier name to the Yankees.
1918 - The Boston Red Sox defeat the Chicago Cubs 4 games to 2 in the World Series.This will be the last World Championship for the Red Sox until 2004.
1919 - The famous "Black Sox scandal" occurs when 8 players are reported to heve purposley lost the World Series to the Cincinnatti Reds.
1920 - The "Spitball" is outlawed, and the major leagues use a tighter wound ball ending the "deadball era"
-Kennesaw "Mountain" Landis is named the first commisioner of baseball.
1932 - Babe Ruth hits his famous "called shot".
1934 - July 10th, in the All-star game Carl Hubbell strikes out five consecutive future Hall of Famers. (Babae Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Al Simmons, and Joe Cronin)
1936 - The National Baseball Hall of Fame is opened with Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Christie Matthewson, and Walter Johnson being the first inductees.
1938 - Johnny Vandermeer pitches no-hitters on two consecutive starts. 6/11 versus the Boston Bees, and 6/15 versus the Brooklyn Dodgers.
1939 - 5/2 Lou Gehrig removes himself from the Yankee lineup, ending his streak of 2130 consecutive games played.
- 7/4 on Lou Gehrig Day at Yankee Stadium, Lou Gehrig gives his famous farewell speach.
1941 - Joe DiMaggio gets a hit in 56 consecutive games from May 15th - July 17th.
1943 - With World War II taking many Major leaguers into the armed services, the All American Girls Baseball League is formed.
1947 - Jackie Robinson breaks the "color barrier" on April 15th against the Braves, by being the first black player in the Major Leagues. Later that same season, Larry Doby is the first black player in the American league, playing for the Cleveland Indians.
-The first "Rookie of the Year" is chosen. Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers is the first ever recipiant.
1949 - the Rookie of the Year award is given out to each league for the first time. Priviously it had been one award for both leagues.
1951 - On October 3rd, Giants third-baseman Bobby Thompsen hits the famous "Shot Heard 'Round the World"
1953 - The Boston Braves move to Milwaukee.
1954 - The St. Louis Browns move to Baltimore to become the Orioles.
1955 - The Brooklyn Dodges defeat the New York Yankees for the first time in the world series as they lost to them in 1941, '47, '49, '52, and '53.
- The Philadelphia Athletics move to Kansas City.
1956 - On October 8th, Don Larsen pitches the only perfect game in World Series History. (link)
- The Cy Young Award is created for the major 's best pitcher. Don Newcombe of the Brooklyn Dodgers is the first recipiant.
1958 - The Brooklyn Dodgers move to Los Angeles.
- The New York Giants move to San Fransisco.
1959 - May 26th. In a game against the Braves, Harvey Haddix takes a perfect game in the 12th inning. Thirty-six consecutive batters were retired by Haddix before the thirteenth inning — when it all ended on an error by Don Hoak, an intentional walk of Hank Aaron, then a home run by Joe Adcock (Which is later ruled a double because he passed Aaron on the basepaths).
1960 - Bill Mazeroski hits the first ever World Series winning walk off homerun in the bottom of the ninth innin of game seven against the Yankees.
1961 - The American League adds two more teams (Washington Senators #2 and Los Angeles Angles) to go to ten teams.
- The Original Washington Senators move to Minnesota to become the Twins.
- October 8th. Roger Maris hits his 61st home run of the season, breaking Babe Ruth's 34 year old mark of 60.
1962 - The National League adds two more teams (New York Mets and Houston Colt .45's) to expand to ten teams.
1965 - The Los Angeles Angels move to Anahiem and change thier name to the California Angels.
1966 - The Milwaukee Braves move to Atlanta.
1967 - The Cy Young award is changed from one award for both leagues to one award per league.
1968 - The Kansas City Athletics move to Oakland.
1969 - The American league adds 2 teams (Seattle Pilots and Kansas City Royals) and the National League adds two teams (Montreal Expos and San Diego Padres).
-Both leagues split into two division (east and west) and create the best of five League Championship series to decide the World Series representatives.
-Due to low offensive output in both leagues, the pitcher's mound is lowered.
1970 - The Seattle Pilots move to Milwaukee to become the Brewers.
1972 - The Washington Senators move to Texas and become the Rangers.
1974 - April 8th. Hank Aaron hits his 714th career home run off of Al Downing of the Los Angeles Dodgers, breaking Babe Ruths career record.
1976 - Rawley Eastwick of the Cincinnati Reds(NL) and Bill Campbell of the Minnesota Twins(AL) are the first Rolaids Relief Award winners.
1977 - The A.L. adds the Seattle Mariners and the Toronto Blue Jays.
- Dave Kingman became the first player ever to play for four different divisions in the same season. He played for the New York Mets, San Diego Padres, California Angels, and New York Yankees in that order during the season.
- Reggie Jackson of the New York Yankees hits three homeruns on three pitches off of three different pitchers in game 6 of the World Series versus the Dodgers.
1980 - The Philadelphia Phillies defeat the Kansas City Royals in the World Series for thier first championship in thier 98 year history.
1981 - Frank Robinson is the first black manager in the National League with the San Francisco Giants.
- As a rusult of a player's srtike, the season is divided into two halves. The winner of each half in each division play a best-of-five playoff to determine who will represent each division in the League Championship Series. The Cincinnati Reds hold the best record in baseball, yet fail to make the postseason as they do not win either half.
- Fernando Valenzuela is the first player to win both the Rookie of the Year and the Cy Young Award in the same season.
1985 - September 11th. Pete Rose gets career hit #4,192 off of Eric Show of the San Diego Padres breaking Ty Cobb's all-time mark.
1988 - August 9th. Wrigley Field, being the last Major League stadium to put in lights, plays it's first official night game. It was originally scheduled for August 8th (8/8/88), but the game was rained out in the fourth.
- Game 1 of the World Series. In his only atbat of the series, Kirk Gibson hits a walk-off homer off of A's reliever Dennis Eckersley. The Dodgers went into the 9th inning losing by 1 run.
1993 - The National League adds the Colorado Rockies and the Florida Marlins.
- Both leagues change to a three division format, and the "Wild Card" is created adding the Divisional Series tier to the playoffs.
1994 - Due to the season ending as a result of a player's strike, there is no World Series.
1997 - The Florida Marlins become the first Wild Card team to win the World Series, defeating the Cleaveland Indians in seven games.
1998 - The National League adds the Arizona Diamondbacks, and the American League adds the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
- Milwaukee Brewers move from the American League to the National League.
2004 - The Boston Red Sox break the "Curse of the Bambino" by ending an 86 year Championship drought with a 4 game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals.
2005 - The Montreal Expos move to Washington, DC and become the Washington Nationals.
- The Chicago Whitesox defeat the Houston Astros in the World Series ending a 88 year Championship drought.
- BawBags formed
2007 - Barry Bonds Breaks Hank Aaron's all-time home run mark of 755.
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