This is the first in a series of biographies (or in this case, links to biographies) of the major participants of the Detroit Tigers’ first championship. I’m putting these out to get everyone familiar with the players so the 1935 diary will make a little more sense.

Mickey Cochrane was the best catcher in all of baseball prior to World War II. He not only played and managed the pennant winning 1934 team (arguably the best Tiger team ever), but he also played and managed the 1935 team. Prior to coming to Detroit, he won two World Series and another pennant under Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics.

Mickey had a career .320 average, and a career .419 OBP. The most mind boggling stat is his amazing strikeout to walk ratio. He walked 857 times, and struck out only 217 times. He won the AL MVP in 1928 and 1934, and finished in the top 10 four other times.

I’m going to make this one brief, because I want to also point you to a special project SABR is working on. The Baseball Biography Project is a grand plan to document each and every baseball players biography. The ones that are complete are simply great reading, and highly recommend you take some time to check out the site.

Fortunately, one of the biographies that’s completed is Mickey Cochrane’s. I highly recommend you check out the biography here.

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