1890 - The Robinson, McMahon, Welch deal

Saturday September 13, 1890 found the O’s in Philadelphia splitting a double header against one of the most troubled teams in the American Association. The Athletics were a club spiraling downward and had tumbled from first place to sixth in a handful of weeks. The financial woes that plagued Brooklyn and the rest of the American Association were even more so in Philadelphia. Like Baltimore in 1884, the Athletics had not one, but two teams in town to compete with. Unpaid bills mounted so fast that by mid August the players threatened to strike if not paid. The situation grew worse on a road trip when the club was forced to pay their players per game out of the gate receipts instead of under their set contracts. Upon their return home, manager Bill Sharsig was shocked to discover that the Athletics no longer had a ball field to play on. City officials had seized all of the Athletics property while they were gone to pay back the mounting deficit. The Sheriff’s office sold the grandstands and fencing as scrap lumber and netted only $600 ($15K) for the bank. In September Philadelphia began to sell off its players. Any and all offers were accepted. 

On September 17, 1890, the Base Ball Gods smiled upon Billy Barnie as he very smartly purchased the contracts of veteran outfielder Curt Welch, young pitcher Sadie McMahon and reliable catcher Wilbert Robinson. Thought to be the centerpiece of the trio and by far the most expensive, Welch was once chased through the streets of Baltimore by an angry mob. Curt was a hard drinking, hard playing, uneducated rabble rouser who had helped St. Louis win three straight pennants and a made a daring slide to win the 1886 World Series, but Chris Von Der Ahe dealt him to Philadelphia after only those three seasons. Early successes drove up Welch’s contract price and the only thing that exceeded his ego was his thirst, and nobody wanted him. He led the American Association in hit-by-pitch three times and it’s pretty certain most of them weren’t accidents. By all accounts he was a jerk, but now he was the Orioles best hitter and suddenly all was forgiven (sort of). Welch’s contract was costly, but the package included the battery of McMahon-Robinson, which was Barnie’s ultimate prize in the first place. The key to the entire deal was that both Welch and McMahon had "extra baggage" that made them less attractive to buyers, but it would prove to be the greatest signing in the history of baseball in Baltimore since Lipman Pike in 1872. Period. A handful of bird seed for McMahon-Robinson at a fire sale.

     Wilmington, Delaware native John Joseph “Sadie” McMahon was in his sophomore year of professional baseball in 1890. It is rumored that he acquired the nickname Sadie when a teammate called out to a girlfriend that McMahon was standing next to and McMahon responded to the call of “Sadie” before she did. Instead of protesting when his teammates taunted him with it, the rough Irishman let it stick and made it his own. Good natured as he was, McMahon was no stranger to controversy. In May 1888 while a member of the Brandywine Club of West Chester, Pennsylvania, McMahon was charged with the murder of Carmen Malacalza. The recent Italian immigrant Malacalza was working as a peanut vendor on the Forepaugh Circus grounds in Wilmington, Delaware when he was harassed by a group of men believed to be McMahon’s teammates. A scuffle broke out in which several men shoved the innocent vendor and yelled at him. Malacalza was hit in the head with a rock and fell to the ground unconscious. His skull was fractured and he died a few hours later of a brain hemorrhage. The rock was thrown at a good distance and no one saw exactly who threw it, but McMahon was taken into custody on May 23^rd and denied bail ten days later. When McMahon finally stood in court on October 1^st, the trial came to an abrupt end. With the evidence being thin and contradictory, the State abandoned the case and cleared his name, but the stigma of the incident stuck with him. Sadie McMahon had an immediate effect on the Orioles and between Philadelphia and Baltimore; he went 36 and 21. His value to the pitching staff after the loss of Matt Kilroy is beyond estimation and he would remain an Oriole for the next six years, but he is easily eclipsed by the third piece from the Athletics deal: Wilbert Robinson.