There was only Major League Baseball player born in the small town of Madison, Virginia, according to baseballreference.com.
And while Carl Yowell pitched in only 16 contests in the Majors, he played a small role in one of the wildest games of the 20th century.
Born in Madison on Dec. 20, 1902, Yowell made his Major League debut on Sept. 5, 1924, for the Cleveland Indians against the Detroit Tigers.
It did not go well.
Yowell pitched five innings and allowed nine runs on 11 hits with two walks. He appeared in three more games that season with Cleveland, and ended the season with a record of 1-1 with an ERA of 6.67 in four games, with two starts.
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A crazier game came a few months later.
The following season, on June 15, 1925, Cleveland was leading 15-2 against the host Philadelphia Athletics going into the last of the eighth inning at old Shibe Park.
Starting pitcher Jake Miller of Cleveland was rolling along and took the mound to start the eighth, but could only retire one batter as the A’s put several runners on base, and Miller was eventually charged with allowing seven runs on the day – sixth in the fateful eighth.
By Speece came in to pitch and did not retire a batter, while allowing four runs.
Next came Yowell, who also did not record an out and he was charged with giving up two runs.
Cleveland native George Uhle finally got the last two outs, but not before allowing four more runs while being charged with the loss.
The A’s took a 17-15 lead, and Cleveland, despite getting a runner on in the top of the ninth, did not score and lost by the same margin.
The Cleveland lineup that day featured future Hall of Fame outfielder Tris Speaker, while Philadelphia boasted of two Cooperstown-bound sluggers: Al Simmons and Jimmy Foxx.
The game was featured in Baseball Digest in 1974 under the title “Baseball’s Most Incredible Rally.”
Yowell ended the season with a record of 2-3 with an ERA of 4.46 in 12 games, with four starts.
His last MLB appearance was on Oct. 1, 1925, as he started and pitched all eight innings in a 3-0 loss on the road to the Chicago White Sox.
Yowell played in one game for Newark in the Double-A International League in 1927, according to baseballreference.com. As a pitcher, he did post a record of 13-4 in the minors in 1924 with two teams and he was 11-1 the next year with Rochester, in between his big-league outings.
The native of Madison died on July 27, 1985, in Jacksonville, Texas, and is buried at the Berryman Family Cemetery in Alto, Texas, according to baseballreference.com.
There are no details on how Yowell ended up in Texas.
Name game
Another Virginia native who pitched in the Majors in the 1920s was Hank Hulvey, a native of Mount Sidney who appeared in one game in 1923 for the A’s as he faced Babe Ruth and the New York Yankees.
Besides Yowell, other future big-leaguers born in Virginia in 1902 were:
- Ollie Tucker, a native of Radiant in Madison County who went to Woodberry Forest, is in the International League Hall of Fame and died in Radiant in 1940.
- Bill Deitrick, a native of Hanover County who played for the Philadelphia Phillies.
- Cloy Mattox, who was born in Leesville in Campbell County, played three games for the A’s in 1929 and died in Danville in 1985.
Deitrick, a World War II veteran, passed in Maryland in 1946 and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Tucker played in 34 games for Washington and Cleveland.
Walt Yowell, born in Etlan in Madison County in 1930, played in the minors for the White Sox in the 1950s. He died in Charlottesville on Feb. 12, 2012, but is not clear if he was related to Carl Yowell, though there is a pretty good chance that he was. He was the son of Albon and Mary Elizabeth Yowell. One of his stops in the minors was Lynchburg, in 1955.
William Carl Yowell Jr., who was born in 1926, was an educator in Rockingham County Schools for 35 years and a graduate of Virginia and Virginia Tech.
He passed in 2013 in New Bern, North Carolina and is buried at the Dayton Cemetery. He lived just off Silver Lake Road in Dayton for many years.
It is unclear if he is related to the two baseball players.
His sister, Betty Kindig, was living in Waynesboro at the time of her death in 2022.
More Madison
Madison County used to have a team in the Valley Baseball League, from 1969 to 1988. Former Blue Jays who made the majors include Richmond native Johnny Grubb and Chris Knapp, a native of North Carolina who went to high school and college in Michigan.
A graduate of Meadowbrook High, Grubb played at Florida State and then was an outfielder in the Majors from 1972 to 1987. He was an All-Star with the San Diego Padres and part of the Detroit Tigers team in 1984 that won the World Series. That team featured second baseman and Martinsville High product Lou Whitaker and Tom Brookens, who also played in the Valley League.
Knapp pitched for the White Sox and Angels from 1975-1980 and won 14 games in 1978. The right-hander started and lost a game to the Baltimore Orioles in the 1979 ALCS.
Veteran ODU head coach Chris Finwood played at Madison in the Valley League under head coach Ray Heatwole, who held the same post at Bridgewater College, Turner Ashby High and JMU and is in the Virginia High School League Hall of Fame.
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