Obscure sports trivia

Sorry, forgot about this. It's Don Wilson.

Wise hit two in his. And crazy in this Google world, I can't find the others.

 

Doing more research, it looks like Curt Gowdy was wrong. Earl Wilson hit a home run and threw a no hitter in the same game but it doesn't look like Don Wilson did.

It looks like Allan Roth, baseball's first full-time statistician, messed up. I did a summer internship in 1982 keeping stats for Roth. He had some great stories but would have been a great candidate to be featured on Hoarders.

 

Who gave up Willie Mays’s first home run in the majors?

 

As long as we're doing firsts, who scored the first touchdown in the first NFL championship game?

 

I’m pretty sure Bronco Nagurski scored the winning touchdown in the first nfl championship (played on an 80-yard field surrounded by piles of elephant shit), but don’t think it was the first.

 

Bronko did not score a touchdown in the game, but he did throw a TD pass.

The game you're referring to was in 1932 when the Bears and Portsmouth Spartans finished their schedules tied for the league lead -- the Bears were 6-1-6 and the Spartans (who later became the Detroit Lions) were 6-1-4 -- so they added another game to the season to decide the title. That game was played indoors (because of terrible weather) at Chicago Stadium on a reduced-size field. The Bears won that one 9-0 on a fourth-quarter touchdown pass from Nagurski to Red Grange, followed by a safety.

But that was NOT a playoff game. It was considered a regular-season game (which is why Portsmouth finished third in the standings, as the loss dropped it below Green Bay).

The first NFL Championship Game was in 1933 -- Bears vs. Giants.

 

Warren Spahn; Mays was 0-for-12 since his promotion from MSP then blasted one out of the Polo Grounds for his first MLB hit. I believe Spahn's quote was that it was a perfect pitch for the first 60 feet.

 

No other football history nerds on here?

Going once... going twice...

 

I'll guess Ken (?) Strong because he's the only player from that era I remember.

 

Good guess. He kicked the extra point.

 

OK, time's up.

Hall of Fame end Red Badgro scored on a 29-yard pass from Harry Newman in the second quarter to give the Giants a 7-6 halftime lead -- Chicago had opened the scoring with two field goals by Jack Manders.

The Giants led 21-16 in the fourth thanks to a crazy, improvised flea-flicker on a broken play that resulted in a TD pass from Newman to Ken Strong, but the Bears came back with a hook-and-lateral play for a TD. Bronko Nagurski took the ball up the middle but pulled up at the line of scrimmage and hit Bill Hewitt with a jump pass (think Derrick Henry). As the Giants defense closed in on him, Hewitt tossed a long lateral across the field to Bill Karr, who got a block and ran in for the winning score of a 23-21 victory.

Just FYI, Newman had a fabulous passing performance for that era, completing 13 of 19 passes for 209 yards and two touchdowns, though he did throw an interception -- a 118.1 passer rating, according to Pro Football Reference. Nagurski had 64 yards rushing and went 2-for-2 passing for 42 yards and two TDs for a perfect 158.3 rating.