February 19 in Tigers and mlb history:
1889: A tour of baseball players led by John Ward stages its first game in Europe, playing in Naples, Italy.
1892: Dan Brouthers, batting champion of the American Association while with the Boston Reds in 1891, signs a contract to play with the Brooklyn Grooms. It will be his fifth team in five years.
1935: Lou Gehrig signs a contract with the New York Yankees for $30,000, $7,000 less than he asked for, but still making him the highest-paid player.
1953: Ted Williams safely crash-lands his damaged Panther jet after flying a combat mission in Korea. The plane was hit by enemy fire.
1954: 19-year-old Roberto Clemente signs with the Brooklyn Dodgers for one year at $5,000 with a $10,000 signing bonus. The Dodgers thus beat out a number of other clubs in the Clemente sweepstakes. They've outspent the prior two entrants, their cross-river rivals in Manhattan and the Bronx, and simply beaten the Milwaukee Braves to the punch. By far the biggest spenders of the bunch (by all accounts exceeding Brooklyn's offer by at least 150%), the Braves were just a tad tardy, Clemente having already accepted the Dodgers' terms. The Dodgers may have won the first battle, but they will lose Clemente's services in one year when they fail to protect him in the 1954 Rule V Draft.
1957: The Kansas City Athletics ship pitchers Art Ditmar, Bobby Shantz, and Jack McMahan, and infielders Clete Boyer, Curt Roberts and Wayne Belardi to the Yankees. In return they receive pitchers Mickey McDermott, Tom Morgan, Rip Coleman and Jack Urban, OF Irv Noren, plus infielders Billy Hunter and Milt Graff. Roberts will not go to New York City till May 4th, while Boyer goes a month later, conveniently just when his mandatory service time in the majors as a result of the bonus rule expires. Hunter and Urban don't switch until April 5th. The veteran Shantz and Boyer will be valuable pick-ups for New York, with Shantz leading the American League in ERA this year, and Boyer a tough defensive 3B for eight years in pinstripes. The A's will eventually admit that when they signed Boyer for a $40,000 bonus in 1955, it was on behalf of the Yankees, with the understanding that they'd ship him to NY as soon as he became eligible to be sent down to the minors.
1970: Commissioner Bowie Kuhn announces the suspension of Detroit Tigers ace Denny McLain, effective April 1st, for McLain's alleged involvement in a bookmaking operation. The suspension will last three months, setting off what will basically be a lost season for the two-time Cy Young Award winner.
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1983: Fernando Valenzuela wins his salary arbitration case with the Dodgers and becomes the first player to win a $1 million salary through the process. The Dodgers had offered Valenzuela $750,000 for this season.
1984: Hitting coach Gates Brown says the Tigers have "the potential" for a great year like 1968.
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1995: The Detroit Tigers signed Scott Aldred as a free agent.
2002: The Detroit Tigers signed Melvin Nieves as a free agent.
2014: The Detroit Tigers signed Kevin Whelan as a free agent.
2016: The Detroit Tigers signed Bobby Parnell as a free agent.
2016: The Federal Bureau of Investigations arrests player agent Bart Hernandez on charges of human trafficking and conspiracy stemming from his association with two convicted fraudsters and their role in extorting large amounts of money from Cuban players seeking to defect to the United States. A lawsuit filed by OF Leonys Martin prompted the FBI investigation.
2018: Commissioner Rob Manfred announces that he has come to an agreement with the Players Association on pace of play initiatives. Contrary to what he had announced a month earlier, the Commissioner retreats from his threat of imposing a pitch clock unilaterally. However, the two sides agree to place limits on the number of mound visits and to reduce the allotted time between innings.
2019: Manny Machado signs the biggest free agent contract in history, agreeing to a ten-year deal worth $300 million with the San Diego Padres. This tops the $275 million given by the Yankees to Alex Rodriguez following the 2007 season. There were many teams interested in the infielder's services, but only the unlikely Padres, in the middle of a rebuild, were willing to to give the kind of long-term commitment that Machado was seeking.
2021: The Detroit Tigers signed Wily Peralta as a free agent.
2021: The Detroit Tigers signed Ben Taylor as a free agent.
Tigers players birthdays:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/sulliru01.shtml
Russ Sullivan 1951-1953.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/mooreja01.shtml
Jackie Moore 1965.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/z/zachach02.shtml
Chris Zachary 1972.
Tigers players who passed away:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/l/loudear01.shtml
Art Loudell 1910.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/d/demmira01.shtml
Ray Demmitt 1914.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/b/barnesa01.shtml
Sam Barnes 1921.
Baseball Reference
