February 6 Happy Birthday to Former Tigers or Detroit Wolverines

As there are no birthdays today, here are a couple of players who played in Detroit but have no known birthday.   There are a few days like this that have no Tiger or Wolverine birthdays.   I have found it ironic that my birthday is also on one of the days with no Tiger or Wolverine birthdays.  However, I do share a birthday with arguably the greatest baseball player of all time, Babe Ruth, who almost became a Tiger in 1934.  The thought was he would replace Bucky Harris as manager.  However, Babe went off to Hawaii rather than interview with the Tigers for the job of player manager.   He felt quite confident that the Tigers would wait for his return to determine their new manager.  After all, he was "The Babe".  However, while "The Babe" was away Philadelphia Athletics owner and manager, Connie Mack, had one of his fire sales and the Tigers picked up Mickey Cochrane as player manager.  Mickey immediately led the Tigers to the World Series in 1934 and to their first Worlds Championship in 1935.  Babe ended up going to the Boston Braves of the National League and ended his playing career in 1935.  He then became a coach for the Brooklyn Dodgers.  He died in 1948 and his greatest lament was that he never got to manage in baseball.  

Tom Morrissey was born in 1860 in the month of May and played for the Wolverines.   It is interesting that it is not known when Tom was born as his older brother, John, who also played major league baseball has a known birthday of December 30, 1856.  Both were born in Janesville, WI.  In fact, Tom’s time in Detroit was originally attributed to his older brother John.  The confusion must have come about as both bothers played third base.  John played only one year in the majors in 1884 with the Buffalo Bisons of the National League.  Younger brother Tom made his major league debut before John with the Detroit Wolverines in 1882.  He played two games with the Wolverines and had two hits in seven at bats.  He also scored a run.  In the field for the wolverines he had seven chances and made four put outs and one assist.  He also made two errors for a .714 fielding percentage.  However, since the league average was only .843, he was not that far off.  In 1883 he played for the Bay City team of the Northwestern league.  In 1884 Tom started the season with the death of his brother John who died on April 29^th at the age of 27.  He was buried in Janesville.  Tom played for the Minneapolis Millers of the Northwestern League that season and the Milwaukee Brewers of the Northwestern League.   1884 was also the year that the Union Association began play as a major league.  However, it was not an established league nor a stable league.  The first team to fold was the Altoona Mountain City in May and they were replaced by the Kansas City Cowboys.  Later in August the Philadelphia Keystones folded and were replaced by the Wilmington Quicksteps.  In September Wilmington collapsed as did Pittsburgh, who had moved there from Chicago.  These two teams were replaced by the Minneapolis and Milwaukee teams of the Northwestern League.  So once again Tom was a major leaguer.  He played all 12 games for the Brewers that season and was the only third baseman.  He went 8 for 47 including two doubles and had a .710 fielding percentage.  The manager, Tom Loftus was 27 years old.  The only older player of the 12 players on the team was their pitcher, 32 year old Ed Cushman.  The Brewers were 8-4 for the season.  At the end of the season the league collapsed entirely.   Tom continued to play ball in the minors through 1897 and died in 1941. 

Joe Farrell played most of his career as a Detroit Wolverine.  He was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1857.  Beyond that we don’t know.  He started his career in the majors the same time as Tom Morrissey and like Morrissey played third for the Wolverines in 1882.  Joe was the starting third baseman for the Wolverines and the reason Tom was a back up.  Joe also spent some time at second and short.  While Tom came in for a look see.  Joe was the third best hitter on the team with a .247 average.  Charlie Bennett, the catcher, was the team leader with a .301 average.   1883 found Joe again at third for the Wolverines but his average dropped slightly to .243.  And the Wolverines also dropped from a 42-41 team to a 40-58 team.    1884 found Joe still at third for Detroit while Tom was trying to find a home in Minnesota and Wisconsin.  Joe’s average continued to drop to a .226 average and the Wolverines also continued to drop to 28-84.  1885 found Joe out of baseball due to a cold and lame leg.  But 1886 found him back in baseball but no longer in Detroit.  Joe was playing major league ball in Baltimore of the American Association.  He was no longer a starter but a utility infielder playing mainly second base and his average was down to .209.    He continued to play in the minors through 1888 while suffering multiple maladies.   He had “rheumatism” twice and also suffered from malaria.  In 1889 he was no longer playing ball but working for the Nassau Gaslight Company of Brooklyn.   On April 17, 1893, Joe died.  A benefit game was played in his honor a week later according to Sporting Life.  Joe was believed to be about 36.  He was buried in Brooklyn.