13. Sam Crawford
Baseball / Wahoo / 1880-1968
QUICK FACTS:
Played for: Cincinnati Reds and Detroit Tigers
Best athlete from Nebraska played with or against: He never played against Grover Cleveland Alexander in a major league game, but he must have somewhere along the line. In the majors, his Nebraska contemporaries included Pleasanton-born pitcher Winfield Noyes, catcher Les Nunamaker of Aurora, catcher Ted Easterly of Lincoln, Omaha catcher Frank Gibson, and Omaha outfielder "Gloomy Gus" Williams.
Best moment as an athlete: Probably the 1907 season, when he ranked second in the American League in batting average (.323), doubles (34) and triples (17), scored a league-high 102 runs and led the Tigers to the first of three straight losing World Series appearances
In 1898, Sam Crawford, with other Wahoo boys ages 16 through 18, traveled around on a horse-drawn lumber wagon for several weeks, pulling into towns and challenging local teams to a game.
During this tour, the manager of the West Point team asked Crawford to play with his team in the Canadian League, getting Crawford his start in pro baseball. He was in the major leagues the next year and went on to become the all-time leader with 309 career triples.
A tremendous RBI man, Crawford was considered the best power hitter of the dead-ball era. He led the National League with 16 homers in 1901, and, after jumping to the new American League in 1903, he retired as the AL's all-time leader with 70 homers. Statistic guru Bill James figures Crawford would have had 494 homers (and only 101 triples) if he had begun his career in 1919 rather than 1899. He finished with 97 homers, 1,525 RBIs, 2,964 hits, a .309 average and 363 stolen bases.
He and Detroit Tigers teammate Ty Cobb weren't best friends, but they worked magic together on the bases. Often, with Cobb on third, Crawford would draw a walk and speed up before reaching first and scoot toward second, forcing teams to decide whether to make a play on him. "Most of the time, they were too paralyzed to do anything," Crawford said in the book "The Glory of Their Times."
The Tigers reached the World Series from 1907 through 1909, but lost all three. After campaigning from Cobb, Crawford joined the Hall of Fame in 1957, 40 years after his career ended.
-- Rob White
QUICK FACTS:
Played for: Cincinnati Reds and Detroit Tigers
Best athlete from Nebraska played with or against: He never played against Grover Cleveland Alexander in a major league game, but he must have somewhere along the line. In the majors, his Nebraska contemporaries included Pleasanton-born pitcher Winfield Noyes, catcher Les Nunamaker of Aurora, catcher Ted Easterly of Lincoln, Omaha catcher Frank Gibson, and Omaha outfielder "Gloomy Gus" Williams.
Best moment as an athlete: Probably the 1907 season, when he ranked second in the American League in batting average (.323), doubles (34) and triples (17), scored a league-high 102 runs and led the Tigers to the first of three straight losing World Series appearances
