Uncle Robbie
Hall of Fame member Wilbert Robinson began his career as a catcher. As a Baltimore Oriole in the 1890s the hard-nosed but congenial receiver joined John McGraw, Wee Willie Keeler, and other greats on the roughest team of the game’s toughest era. He went on to make a reputation with McGraw’s New York Giants as a great developer of pitchers. Subsequently he took over the Brooklyn Dodgers, quickly turning them into pennant winners and gradually becoming the borough’s beloved Uncle Robbie.
About the Authors
Jack Kavanagh is a former vice president of the Society for American Baseball Research and the author of numerous sports biographies. Norman Macht is the secretary for the Society for American Baseball Research and the author of a number of baseball books.
"It is doubtful that baseball ever produced a more colorful figure than the esteemed Wilbert Robinson. Like Falstaff, he was not only witty himself but the cause of wit in others. His conversation was a continuous flow of homely philosophy, baseball lore, and good humor. . . . He knew baseball as the spotted setter knows the secrets of quail hunting, by instinct and experience."
—New York Times