The phalanx of trucks has made its 1,100-mile trek from Houston to West Palm Beach (FL) with the gear needed for the Houston Astros’ Spring Training, in anticipation of the World Series Champions’ arrival on or before February 14.

As the Astros look to begin their repeat in 2018, it might be surprising to learn that the Bayou City has drawn crowds for professional baseball for well over a century. In fact, not only did two future Hall of Famers play in Houston during the Depression, this year marks the 130th anniversary of diamond history in what is now Champ City.

19th Century Baseball in Houston

Deep in the dark recesses of Houston’s sports history is the life of a cherished minor league team, born in 1888, the year that Republican Benjamin Harrison defeated incumbent president Grover Cleveland to become the country’s 23rd president. Daniel C. Smith was Houston’s mayor at the time.

For those who only know of Houston’s dip into the grassy and turf diamonds of MLB entrants Colt .45s (1962-1964) and Houston Astros (1965 to present), the story of the Houston Buffaloes (or Buffs, as longtime residents affectionately refer to them) is filled with stars, surprises, and beloved stadiums behind the cobwebs of decades past.

The Houston Buffs was an American minor league baseball team, and were the first minor league team in baseball history to be affiliated with a major league franchise, the St. Louis Cardinals. The club played in the Texas League at various levels throughout the bulk of its existence.

Blew Bayou

Most recently, from 1959 through 1961, the Buffs played in the American Association as a Triple-A affiliate of the Chicago Cubs. The Buffaloes derived their nickname from Buffalo Bayou, the principal 53-mile waterway that runs through Houston to the Houston Ship Channel, flowing out of Galveston Bay and into the Gulf of Mexico.

Houstonians flock, every spring, to The Reeking Regatta, a canoe race through 15 miles of the Bayou’s since-cleaned waters. The Reeking Regatta, born in the murky depths of the river’s 1972 sludge, celebrated its 46th running in March, 2018. This reporter has vivid olfactory memories of the 4th annual Regatta, manning a vessel in 1975, as a member of radio sponsor KLOL-FM’s team.

Touring the Turnstiles

The team’s last home was Buffalo Stadium, built in 1928, and used through 1961, just prior to the birth of Houston’s first MLB team, the Colt .45s. That first incarnation of the major league franchise occupied Colt Stadium, formerly located in what, since 1964, has been a portion of the Astrodome parking lot (its home plate area marked there with a plaque).

1/17/19: On the 58th anniversary of the moment the current iteration of the Houston MLB franchise was born, noted Astros historian, Mike Acosta, tweeted this concise and cogent account:

“The Houston Sports Association buys the minor league Houston Buffs [1/17/61], and acquires territorial rights that clear a path for a new Major League team in 1962. The team name dating back to 1888 would not be used past 1961. The ‘Houston Colts’ name was unveiled two months later.”

Related: Houston’s Astrodome is 50: Hats Off to the Grande Dame

Buffalo Stadium was built in what is now the east end of downtown Houston. In fact, the railroad tracks leading to Union Station, site of the Houston Astros’ current home, Minute Maid Park, ran behind Buffalo Stadium’s centerfield wall. Three miles from the University of Houston, the stadium was also home to the Houston Cougars baseball team during the 1940s.

The Record-Setting Game

On February 21, 1931, the Chicago White Sox and New York Giants played an exhibition game at Buff Stadium in the first night game ever played by MLB teams.

Before that, the Buffs played at West End Park from 1905–1928, and at Herald Park prior to that. West End Park was located at the southeast corner of Andrews and Heiner Streets, on the southwest edge of present-day downtown Houston. Home plate’s specific location, until 2013, was commemorated by a plaque in the Houston Sports Hall of Fame, which was part of Finger Furniture Store’s Gulf Freeway location. It closed in January 2014 with another Houston-area Finger’s, when the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Houston Hall-of-Famers: Before Biggio and Bagwell, Dizzy…..

Two future MLB Hall of Famers played for the Houston Buffaloes: Dizzy Dean and Joe Medwick. In fact, Dean had other Texas-related roots, even before the start of his Houston baseball career: Dizzy enlisted in the Army at age 16, actually pretending to be two years older, and was stationed at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas. Built in 1876, “Ft. Sam” is still in use.

“I played my first formal baseball game when the Third Wagon Company met the Twelfth Field Artillery,” Dizzy once told The Saturday Evening Post. “Top Sergeant Johnny Brought, of the Twelfth, liked the way I done in the game. He said if I’d transfer to the Twelfth I could play ball more and shovel manure less.” Raised in Arkansas, Dean never made it past the second grade.

“Diz,” hard-nosed and flamboyant, plowed through Houston’s 1931 Texas League competition with his speed. In the 1992 biography Diz: The Story of Dizzy Dean and Baseball During the Great Depression, Robert Gregory wrote, “It was also at Ft. Worth that he pitched his first doubleheader of the season. On June 29, he said, ‘If I beat ’em in the first game, I might as well go ahead and pitch the second.’

“He won both, 12-3 and 3-0. The next night, he relieved in the first inning with the bases loaded and nobody out. He struck out the side—and stayed on to pitch eight innings more, went 4 for 4 at bat, stole a base, and said, ‘Shoot no,’ when somebody asked if he was tired after three games in two days. ‘I’ll pitch tomorrow if they want me to.'” The dominance of the Diz resulted in a 26-10 record and a 1.53 ERA for the Buffs.

“Dean’s parents gave him the name of Jay, but his antics and eccentricities and whimsicalities earned for him the nickname of “Dizzy,” declared the Boston Globe in 1932. “Speaking of his name, Dean himself said: ‘I may be dizzy off the field, but I am not dizzy when I am out there pitching a game.'”

Not exactly huge at 6’2″, 182 pounds, this kind of Dizzy Dean bravado and persistence was par for the day, especially when put up against the near-delicate way pitchers are handled these days. Former Astros Hall-of-Famer Nolan Ryan (who, at the same height, had “only” 13 pounds on Dean) was certainly a call-back to this kind of physical and psychological toughness and intimidation, and his era pretty much marked the end of the routine 300 innings-pitched-a-year starter.

Dean, a 1953 HOF inductee, logged three years of 300+ IP with the Cards (1934-36), and nibbled at the figure the two years prior. Ryan’s 1973 and ’74 seasons with the Angels were his only two 300+ IP campaigns (326 and 332.2, respectively). Ryan had five of his nine Houston seasons top 200 innings, with his closest to the 300 mark occurring in 1982 (250.1). In fact, 1980 saw the last MLB pitcher to touch the three century IP mark: Phillies’ lefty workhorse Steve Carlton, with 304.

Related: Days of Dominance: Astros’ 1986 Rotation, Featuring Nolan Ryan

…….and Ducky

Outfielder Joe “Ducky” Medwick acquired his unusual waterfowl nickname for his distinctive waddling gait (in fact, his HOF plaque actually lists his nickname as “Ducky Wucky”). The 19-year-old Medwick hit .305 for Houston in 1931. He got called up to the Cardinals in the middle of the 1932 season, played in 26 games for St. Louis, and compiled a .349 batting average. It was the beginning of a storied career that ended with a .324 batting average, nearly 2,500 hits, and a 1937 NL MVP Award in just under 2,000 games.

The Baseball Hall of Fame website says this about 1968 inductee “Ducky”: “Though Medwick could hit for power, it didn’t come at the expense of his ability to put the bat to the ball, as he never struck out more than 100 times in a season (over 17 seasons). He was a well-rounded hitter, capable of going outside of the strike zone to drive in runs when needed.”

It’s a description sounding eerily prescient of the contact-conscious Biggio, who, in his 20 years in a Houston uniform, struck out 100 or more times in only seven seasons. Interestingly, Medwick and Bidge (both right-handed batters) were virtually the same size: Ducky came in at 5’10”, 187 lbs, while Biggio measured an inch taller and two pounds lighter.

For further reading, and deeper dives into the beginnings of Houston baseball, consider these:

A collection of links to text and photos regarding the Buffs and Buff Stadium,

Before the Colt .45s: A Brief History of Houston Baseball 1861-1961, and

Men of the Houston Buffaloes