Youngstown Champs

The Youngstown Champs were a minor league baseball team that competed in the Ohio-Pennsylvania League in 1907 and 1908. The club won the league championship in 1907cite web | url = http://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Ohio-Pennsylvania_League | title = Ohio-Pennsylvania League | publisher = Baseball Reference | accessdate = 2007-10-10] but disbanded in the middle of the 1908 season."Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide" (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 217.]

Origins

The Champs were among several minor league ball clubs that operated in Youngstown, Ohio, in the early 20th century. The team was preceded by the Youngstown Ohio Works, which won two consecutive league championships in 1905 and 1906.

In 1907, the Ohio Works' sponsors, local industrialists Joseph and Thomas McDonald, approved the sale of the franchise to Zanesville investors.cite news
title = Franchise, Team and Marty Hogan are Coming Here
work = The Zanesville Signal
page = 1
date = February 18, 1907 ] A new club was organized, with Sam L. Wright as manager. That year, the Youngstown Baseball Company took an office on the mezzanine floor of the Dollar Bank Building in downtown Youngstown.cite news
title = A Century of Sports: The Mahoning and Shenango Valleys
work = The Vindicator
page = D-6
date = April 11, 1999]

Wright, who was city editor and former sports editor of "The Youngstown Daily Vindicator",cite news
title = A Century of Sports: The Mahoning and Shenango Valleys
work = The Vindicator
page = D-6
date = April 11, 1999] went on to serve as president of the Ohio-Pennsylvania League in 1909."Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide" (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 217.]

Championship and dissolution

The Youngstown club won the 1907 championship in a close race with a Newark, Ohio, franchise. The Champs closed the season with an 86–53 record, while the Newark Newks worked up an 86–52 record, placing second in the league. The Champs met with less success the following season.

On June 9, 1908, "The Youngstown Daily Vindicator" reported the Champs' claim that two losses suffered at East Liverpool, Ohio, and McKeesport, Pennsylvania, resulted from "putrid" drinking water at East Liverpool that made the players sick.cite news
title = A Century of Sports: The Mahoning and Shenango Valleys
work = The Vindicator
page = D-6
date = April 11, 1999] The Champs' situation failed to improve, and in the middle of the 1908 season, the club's owners withdrew their sponsorship."Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide" (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 217.]

The team was later replaced by the Youngstown Indians, which competed in the Ohio-Pennsylvania League in 1909, under the sponsorship of a New Castle, Pennsylvania, stock company."Spalding's Official Athletic Library Baseball Guide" (New York: American Sports Publishing Co., 1910), p. 217.]

References