Babe Ruth made his first start for the Boston Red Sox 100 years ago Friday at Fenway Park.
The Red Sox purchased Ruth, along with Ernie Shore and Ben Egan, from the Baltimore Orioles on July 10, 1914, and the next day, he made his major league debut, pitching Boston to a 4-3 win over the Cleveland Naps (the Orioles were a minor-league team in the International League at the time). Ruth-to-the-Red Sox didn’t come cheap, though, as then-owner Joseph Lannin paid more than $25,000 (!) for the three players, according to The Boston Globe.
Ruth pitched seven innings on that July day a century ago, allowing three runs (two earned), striking out one batter and walking none.
Ruth built a name for himself during his six seasons in Boston and had a reputation for strong pitching and hitting long home runs. He was a member of three World Series championship teams with the Red Sox and broke baseball’s single-season home run record in 1919, after converting to an outfielder. After the 1919 season, then-Red Sox owner Harry Frazee sold Ruth to the New York Yankees, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Though The Bambino was one of the first Red Sox players to trade red and white for Yankees pinstripes, he was far from the last.
