Myth or Truth Sam Barkley and the Pirates Name
 

This information is from Card of the Day 1887 Old Judge

"In March 1886, the St. Louis Browns, with whom Sam had signed in 1885, had secured a deal to send him to the Baltimore Orioles, with whom Sam signed a non-binding agreement. The owner of the Pittsburgh Alleghenys, however, matched the Baltimore offer and convinced Barkley to sign with his club instead. The American Association suspended and fined Barkley for signing with Pittsburgh before the details of his sale to Baltimore had been worked out. In a move that predated Curt Flood’s reserve clause actions by over 80 years, Barkley had an injunction filed in a Pittsburgh court that would have prevented all intraleague play with Pittsburgh unless he was on the Pittsburgh team.

This incident prompted some sports writers to refer to the Pittsburgh team as the Pirates in reference to Pittsburgh “pirating” Barkley away from Baltimore."

That's too good of a story to be true, that's such a great story it has to be true.

And that's a nice looking card there.

Wiki page for Sam Barkley

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Barkley


And...

Wikipedia article about Pirates, look at 3rd paragraph in Franchise History. Similar story, different player? Lou Bierbauer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittsburgh_Pirates

I had always understood that the “Pirates” nickname was because of Louis Bierbauer. I had never read anything tying it to Sam Barkley.

Here are a few reports in the papers at the time.

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Nice articles

Here is a page from the "Pittsburg Pirates Encyclopedia, Second Edition" ,which mentions Sam Barkley