As a teenager every winter I would scour baseball publications issued by The Sporting News. The "1970 Baseball Guide" showed an unusual footnote below the 1969 Eastern League standings. A game had been played by mistake!

I put the "1970 Official Baseball Guide" in my baseball book collection, but never forgot about this odd footnote.  I graduated from high school and college.  In the fall of 1979 I had some spare time in between my part-time jobs so I decided it was time to investigate this baseball oddity.

I wrote letters to the major league teams that operated the Double-A Elmira, NY and Waterbury, CT franchises to see if there was an explanation.  The Kansas City Royals and San Diego Padres, which shared control of Elmira, had little to say.  The Cleveland Indians, however, were intrigued.  One of their front office executives had owned the Waterbury franchise in 1969 and he drafted the Eastern League schedule.  In the pre-email days, he wrote an "Inter-Office Memorandum" to his boss to explain what he knew.

It took another 40 years to have the time in retirement to properly research the 1969 Eastern League season.  I tracked down players on the Elmira Pioneers and the Waterbury Indians and interviewed them, but they didn't remember playing an extra game.  They told some great stories though.  

Larry Agrella, a 20 year old infielder from San Jose, CA had a hard time finding an affordable apartment in the Elmira area.  He convinced the Royals to increase his salary by $100 a month to help cover the rent plus food and gas.

Jeff Pentland, a star pitcher with Arizona State University played first base for Elmira, which was cooperative team operated by the Royals and Padres.  He said 200 players were evaluated in the expansion Padres first spring training.  He said ten players were cut from team daily and as a result he had five roommates through spring training.

I searched on line for clues looking at the results of the games between Elmira and Waterbury from April through September.  Clearly rain outs were a factor.  By June 2 five games had been postponed or suspended due to rain.

I scoured local newspapers on microfilm in the Elmira and Waterbury public libraries to see if the sports writers covering the teams reported any schedule discrepancies.  Nothing.

It was time to reconstruct the schedule, cross referencing the scheduled games, postponed games and games played.  I used the official 1969 Eastern League scheduled as published on April 25 in the Gazette and Daily from York, PA.  That was the hometown of the York White Roses, the Pittsburgh Pirate Double-AA affiliate.

Using the official schedule and game results I created a spreadsheet to follow what happened with each of the eleven games scheduled in Elmira and Waterbury.

The chart below shows the date of each scheduled game and the result.  Here's a review guide:

• Initial columns show the month, day and location of scheduled games, and the original season game number.

• The next columns show additional identifying information, the winner and location.

• The final column shows postponed/suspended games with the original and played dates identically colored.

• The turquoise row shows the game added to the schedule in error.

Ultimately I wrote a story about the extra game for the Society For American Baseball Research (SABR). You can read the full story here complete with background, player quotes, the box score and historical footnotes including 1969 rainfall data for Waterbury and Elmira.

So how did the letters from the Indians, Padres and Royals get to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY?