The bases were loaded. It was the bottom of the eight. This was it: first place was on the line. Toronto and Newark headed into that Saturday afternoon battling for the lead in the International League — along with the team in Jersey City. With only a couple of weeks left in the 1887 season, every win was vitally important. And with only an inning left in their second game of the day, Toronto was losing to Newark by three runs.

That’s when Ned “Cannonball” Crane came to the plate. He was the ace of the Toronto pitching staff; a giant of a man: big and tall and impossibly strong. He once threw a ball more than 400 feet — a world record; impressive even by today’s standards — and he could throw a ball faster than anybody else could, either. He was one of the game’s first big power pitchers. He combined the blistering speed of his fastball with a “deceptive drop ball” that baffled opposing hitters. It was a deadly combination. He won 33 games for Toronto that year — more than any other pitcher has ever won on any Toronto team.

And he could hit, too. Crane was one of the best hitters in the whole league that year. His .428 average is still considered to be the best batting average by a pitcher in professional baseball history. (If he’d hit that in the Majors, it would put him sixth on the all-time list for any position.) On the days when Crane wasn’t pitching, he was in the outfield or at second base so they could keep his bat in the line-up. On that Saturday afternoon in September, Crane had already done more than his fair share. Toronto and Newark were playing a double-header — two games at the Torontos’ new stadium at Queen & Broadview, on a spot overlooking the Don Valley. It was originally known as the Toronto Baseball Grounds, but it would soon be nicknamed Sunlight Park in honour of the nearby Sunlight Soap Works factory. Spectators could walk in off Queen Street or ride up in their carriages and park their horses on the grounds. Admission was a quarter — plus an extra dime or two to sit in the best seats in the house. The sheltered grandstand had enough room for more than 2,000 people, and there was standing room for another 10,000 — a capacity not that much smaller than a Leafs game at the Air Canada Centre today. But the stadium had never seen attendance like this. Those two games against Newark drew a record-setting crowd.

In the first game, Crane pitched all nine innings, keeping the Newark hitters at bay while the Toronto bats smashed their way to victory. The final score was 15-5.

But there was still one more game left to win. And now the Torontos had already used up their ace. The scheduled pitcher for the second game was a fellow by the name of Baker — and as the first pitch drew near, he was out on the field, getting ready just as everyone expected. And then, a surprise: as the Toronto team took the field to start the second game, Baker didn’t head toward the pitcher’s box. Instead, it was Cannonball Crane who came back to take his spot in the middle of the diamond. A reporter from the Globe was there: “As soon as it was made clear that Crane was to pitch the second game, hundreds leaped to their feet and cheered frantically, a mighty whirl of enthusiasm took everybody within its embrace and an astounding volume of sound shook the stands and swept down toward the city and out over the grounds like the march of a tornado.” Cannonball Crane was going to pitch two games in one day. Still, even with Crane in the pitcher’s box, the second game didn’t get off to a good start. Toronto fell behind and stayed there. It wasn’t until the eighth inning — behind by three runs — that they rallied to load the bases, bringing Cannonball to the plate with a chance to play the hero. And that’s exactly what he did. The slugger hit a double, clearing the bases. Three runs scored. The game was tied. It would head to extra innings. Crane kept pitching. He held Newark scoreless in the tenth. And then again in the eleventh. He had now pitched 20 innings in one afternoon. In the bottom of the eleventh, Crane came to the plate with a chance to play the hero yet again. He crushed a pitch high into the sun above the Don Valley: deep, deeeep, gone. A walk-off home run. Toronto had won both games. According to the Globe, as Crane rounded the bases “the mighty audience arose and cheered and stamped and whistled and smashed hats… the frantic fans dashed on to the field and carried Crane aloft as his foot touched home.” The team’s owner — a stock broker by the name of E. Strachan Cox — headed over to the scoreboard. He wrote a message for the crowd:

“CITIZENS, ARE YOU CONTENT? TORONTO LEADS THE LEAGUE.” The team had taken first place — and they would keep it for the rest of the season, winning every single game for the rest of the year. By the time it was all over, they’d won 16 in a row. Toronto had our first baseball championship.