New Play-by-Play Data Added to Baseball Reference

Thanks to our friends at Retrosheet, we have added Play-by-Play for 3,868 games from 1912 to 1972. The additions mean we now have Play-by-Play for all games back to 1969. Before this update our coverage was 100% back to 1973. Additionally, we have Play-by-Play coverage for over 99% of games in each season back through 1957. You can see our full NL/AL/Federal League Play-by-Play coverage map by season here.

This new data is searchable in Stathead tools and is also available in statistical tables on Baseball Reference such as batting against, win probability, starting pitching, reliever pitching, ratio pitching, baserunning & situational, baserunning & misc., situational batting, etc. Additionally, league-wide registers exist for these tables. Here, for instance, you can see that Ty Cobb was thrown out at home 18 times (!) in 1912, leading the league. In 2023, no player was thrown out at home more than 5 times. Additionally, Cobb was caught stealing home 9 times, which also led the league.

Here, using our Batting Event Finder is a list of all of the known walk-off HR from 1912-20.

The biggest increases in PxP coverage are in 1912 (all 1,232 games added), 1913 (819 games added), 1917 (501 games added), 1919 (461 games added), 1918 (351 games added) and 1920 (266 games added).