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Major League Past

Warren County has major leaguers other than Guy Hecker and Sherry Magee

Photo from baseball-reference.com Harry Weaver

Guy Hecker and Sherry Magee are probably the two best baseball players to ever come out of Warren County.

But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t others from here that made it to the Major Leagues.

Here’s a little on each of Warren County’s remaining major leaguers in the chronological order in which they played. Several sources were used to put this story together but the statistical data came from baseball-almanac.com and baseball-reference.com.

Here are the first three:

Joe Brown

Brown was born in Canada in April 1859 and made his debut in 1884 with the Chicago White Stockings of the National League.

Debuting on August 16, 1884, Brown would pitch seven games – starting six – during the duration f that year, winning four and posting a 4.68 ERA in 50 innings.

At the plate, he hit .213 in 61 at-bats with a double and 3 RBI while playing primarily in the outfield. However, he also made appearances at second base and as a catcher during that season.

The following year he only pitched in four games with the Baltimore Orioles of the American Association and lost each one – posting a 5.68 ERA in 38 innings pitched.

His batting average also took a dive that season, finishing at just .158 in 19 at-bats with three hits and a double.

No minor league statistics are available.

Brown died young – at the age of 29.

But he died in Warren and is buried at Oakland Cemetery.

Frank Quinn

Franklin Cody Quinn was born on Aug. 24, 1876, in Sheffield.

Quinn’s minor league career kicked off at the age of 22 when he played for Bay City in the level D Michigan State League.

1898 saw him move to the Port Huron Tigers of the International League and 1899 found Quinn a member of a squad from Mansfield (Ohio) Haymakers in the Interstate League.

Late in that 1899 season, Quinn got his cup of coffee in the major league with the Chicago Orphans, who became the Cubs in 1903.

Making his debut on August 9, the 5’8″ 157 pound Quinn played in just 12 games – one at second base and the rest in the outfield.

According to Rank & File of 19th C. Baseball, Quinn made his debut in Washington as the left fielder for the Orphans, finishing 2-5 in a 6-3 win.

That text said he was added as an “extra man” on August 9 and said that “his appeal was that he played both the infield and the outfield and could be had for just $500.

Quinn was reserved by Chicago for 1900 but went back to Mansfield when the NL (National League) lopped off four teams after the 1899 season, flooding the market with better players than he.”

Quinn tallied 34 at-bats over the rest of that 1899 season, hitting just .176 with a triple and one RBI and one stolen base.

The 1900 season saw Quinn hit just .230 in 69 games and he wouldn’t make it back to the major leagues.

In 1901 he hit .258 for the Evansville River Rats in the Illinois-Indiana-Iowa league, .229 in the Central League in 1903, .234 with the South Bend Greene in 1903 and was a member of the 1906 Terre Haute Hottentots.

He died in 1920 and is buried in New Jersey.

Harry Weaver

Harry Abraham Weaver was born on Feb. 26, 1892 in Clarendon.

His professional debut appears to have been in the major leagues with the Philadelphia Athletics in 1915, starting two games – both complete games – giving up six runs.

In 1916, he pitched in three games with the Athletics – tallying an ERA of 10.13 – and throwing 231 innings with New Haven of the Eastern League, winning 11 and dropping 15.

1917 was similar for Weaver – splitting the season between the majors and minors.

He pitched to a 14-3 record and a 2.09 ERA in New Haven which earned a promotion to the majors with the Chicago Cubs. He pitched in four games, totaling 19.2 innings and an ERA of 2.75.

He threw 32.2 innings of 2.20 ERA ball with the 1918 Cubs but struggled with Oakland of the minor Pacific Coast League in 1919, tallying a 6.11 ERA in 84 innings and an 18.90 ERA in just 3.1 innings for the Cubs, his last major league innings.

Weaver returned to the minor leagues in 1920 with teams in Kansas City and Oakland, working to a 4.68 ERA in 102 innings and a 6.23 ERA in 47.2 innings, respectively.

To be continued in next Saturday’s Times Observer

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