Baltimore Terrapins

The Baltimore Terrapins were one of the least successful teams in the short-lived Federal League of professional baseball from by|1914 to by|1915, but their brief existence led to litigation that led to an important legal precedent still intact as of 2006. The team played its home games at Terrapin Park.

Team history

While the by|1914 team posted a respectable 84–70 record and finished only 4.5 games out of first place under player-manager Otto Knabe, the team was far less than successful than expected at the box office, even though four of the eight teams in the league (Chicago, Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, and St. Louis) were competing with one and even two (Chicago and St. Louis) other major league teams in the same cities.

In an attempt to turn this situation around and attract a marquee player to help them at the box office, the by|1915 team recruited Chief Bender of the American League champion Philadelphia Athletics, effectively ending one of the most successful dynasties in Major League Baseball history.

Bender had come off an impressive 17–3 season where he compiled seven shutouts and a 2.26 ERA in 1914. However, his 1915 season at Baltimore was a low point of his Hall of Fame career when he slumped to a 4–16 record, no shutouts, and a 3.99 ERA. Baltimore's collapse to a 47–107 record, 40 games out of first, was overshadowed only by the collapse of Bender's former team who went from a 99–53 league championship season to a dismal 43–109 record, 58.5 games out of first in 1915. Bender, Philadelphia and the Baltimore Terrapins never made a full recovery from 1915.

The incident did show the Federal League could compete seriously with the National League and American League on a professional baseball level and led to the buy-out truce which ended the Federal League for good. However, the Baltimore team's owners were not offered a part in this buyout.

Impact

When the Federal League started, the Terrapins severely cut into the minor league Baltimore Orioles' attendance, causing financial problems for the owner. As a result, several players, including the young left-handed pitcher Babe Ruth, were offered for sale to major league teams. Ruth's contract was purchased by the Boston Red Sox, after being turned down by Connie Mack and the Philadelphia Athletics. In 1914, the Babe begin his career with the Red Sox of the rival American League. After the demise of the Federal League and the Terrapins, Baltimore would not see major league baseball again until by|1954, when the former St. Louis Browns moved into town and became the current-day Baltimore Orioles.

As the Terrapins' owners were not offered any part of the buyout offer made to most Federal League teams by the American and National Leagues, they decided to sue alleging that the buyout was in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. The resulting case led to the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that the scheduling and playing of "base ball games" did not constitute "interstate commerce" in any sense envisioned by the Framers of the United States Constitution and therefore the Sherman Act and other federal laws and regulations did not apply to baseball. The case, "Federal Baseball Club v. National League", was not ultimately decided until 1922.