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MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Years ago, when Oliver Luck was trying to get what is today known as Kendrick Family Ballpark built, he wanted me to research the history of professional baseball in West Virginia.Based on some conversations he had with fans around the state, he knew baseball was always important to West Virginians even though there has never been a Major League franchise here.Baseball fans in the northern part of the state follow the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Cleveland Indians.From about the middle of the state and below, the Cincinnati Reds are the preferred team.Eastern Panhandle baseball fans have always followed the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Nationals, or the Washington Senators when they were in existence.People who lived in cities that used to have clubs affiliated with major league organizations would follow those teams, too, and of course, there are pockets of New York Yankees and St. Louis Cardinals fans, as there are everywhere.Luck, although growing up in Cleveland, could sense this when he came to West Virginia University as a college football player in the late 1970s and later when he returned as the school’s athletic director in 2010. After spring football, he reasoned, fans needed something to occupy their time until football started back up in the fall.As a result, in 2013, he wanted me to put together something that sort of encapsulated the state’s long history of baseball that could help him educate legislators voting on a Tax Increment Financing (TIF) bill to construct a new ballpark.The wild goose chase Luck sent me on ended when I tracked down retired professor William Akin, former dean and athletic director at Ursinus College in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. In 2006, he published a book West Virginia Baseball: A History, 1865-2000 that is still available for purchase on Amazon.Akin told me he became interested in the state’s minor league baseball history when his mother-in-law was sick while living in Clarksburg. During trips down to West Virginia to take care of her, he would occasionally drive up to the West Virginia and Regional History Center on the sixth floor of the Wise Library in Morgantown to research newspaper articles for a book that he wanted to write about the state’s coal industry.But minor league baseball was much more interesting to him when he began reading stories in the Wheeling Intelligencer about the Hunkidori Base Ball Club, organized in 1866 to play the first-ever baseball game in the state. Born from that was an extensive history of minor league baseball in Wheeling that extended well into the 1900s. Some of the best 19th century professional baseball players with Mountain State ties got their starts in the Nail City.”Wheeling was the first city in West Virginia to have a minor league team in 1887,” Akin once recalled. “Honus Wagner had a contract (to play for the Wheeling Stogies) but he never actually played for them, so we can’t count him. But Ed Delahanty, who played for Wheeling, is in the Baseball Hall of Fame.”Jack Glasscock was the first West Virginian to play in the major leagues, and he played for Wheeling when he was on the downside of his career,” the author added.Outfielder Jesse Burkett, another prominent 19th century major leaguer with Wheeling ties, was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1946.In the state’s Eastern Panhandle, Martinsburg got its first minor league team in 1915 when the Martinsburg Champs formed to play in the Blue Ridge League. They later changed their name to the Martinsburg Mountaineers when pitcher Lefty Grove and catcher Hack Wilson were on their roster.

Hall of Fame pitcher Lefty Grove is the only known player to ever be traded for an outfield fence when the Martinsburg Mountaineers sold him to the Baltimore Orioles for $3,500 (Submitted photo).

The organization, struggling to pay its bills, infamously sold Grove to the Baltimore Orioles for the sum of $3,500 – the amount it cost to replace the team’s outfield fence.

According to Akin, a 20-year period from 1900 to about 1920 was the state’s peak for minor league baseball. There were professional teams in Clarksburg, Fairmont, Grafton, Follansbee, Parkersburg and even the tiny Marion County village of Mannington, which boasted a professional ballclub for one year in 1910. 

“During the Depression, there really weren’t (many baseball teams), but after World War II, teams in the southern part of the state really got going,” Akin noted. “Bluefield, Princeton, Charleston and Huntington all had very good teams.”

Charleston became the state’s epicenter of professional baseball in the early 1950s when the city basically stumbled into a series of Triple-A franchises, starting in 1952.

The Toledo Mud Hens of the American Association became the Charleston Senators in 1952, and the Senators existed there until 1960.

Then, Akin said the city sort of backed into another Triple A franchise in 1961 when the owner of the Miami Marlins became dissatisfied with accommodations in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and moved them to West Virginia.

“They were called the Miami Marlins when they moved, but there were not many marlins swimming in the Kanawha River, and the owners of the Charleston franchise said, ‘No, no, there are lots of Marlin rifles in the area, and we’re not going to have a fish logo but a rifle logo instead.’ I thought that was ingenious,” he laughed.

The Marlins lasted just a couple of months in Charleston before moving to Atlanta to become the Crackers.

Nevertheless, the Capital City’s run of Triple-A baseball continued until 1983. When the Charleston Charlies were affiliated with the Pittsburgh Pirates, some of the organization’s top players either got their start in Charleston, guys like Dave Parker, John Candelaria, Kent Tekulve and Richie Zisk, or were on the downside of their careers like Steve Blass.

Tony LaRussa, Bobby Valentine, Art Howe, Willie Randolph and many others also spent a portion of their pro careers living and playing in Charleston. Professional baseball at some level has continued uninterrupted in the city since 1949.

Bluefield has had a long tradition of supporting Appalachian League baseball going back to the late 1940s, while Princeton’s three-decade professional baseball history concluded in 2020 when Major League Baseball overhauled its entire minor league system.

When the Williamson Red Birds were operating, right before the start of World War II, outfielder Stan Musial’s early development happened there in 1939 before he quickly advanced through the Cardinals’ system.

Beckley, Huntington, Logan and Welch were other southern cities boasting minor league franchises.

“After World War II, it seemed like everyone wanted to go to ballgames in West Virginia, but then about 1951 or 1952, it was like minor league baseball fell off a cliff,” Akin observed. “What happened? Television and Little League Baseball. There were many places in West Virginia where there were more people watching little league games than there were professional games.”

Today, baseball remains alive and well in the Mountain State, thanks to West Virginia University’s recent diamond success.

The 24^th-ranked Mountaineers will be making their second consecutive Super Regional appearance this weekend in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

For the first time since the early 1960s, West Virginia has qualified for the NCAA Tournament three consecutive years. During this most recent span, the Mountaineers have shared and won Big 12 regular season championships in 2024 and 2025, and have remained in the national rankings while boasting an impressive 124-58 overall record.

No less than 10 Major League players have been developed at WVU during coach Steve Sabins‘ time here as an assistant and head coach, including last year’s No. 7 overall pick JJ Wetherholt, considered one of pro baseball’s top minor league prospects.

Outfielder Victor Scott and pitchers Ryan Bergert and Kade Strowd have appeared in big league games this season, while injured pitchers Alek Manoah, John Means and Michael Grove are looking to return.

Nearly 11,500 came out for the Cincinnati series at Kendrick Family Ballpark earlier this year and a record 4,629 fans showed up for this year’s Backyard Brawl against Pitt.

The Mountaineers averaged more than 3,000 spectators for their 24 home dates this year, and if there was more seating, that number could have easily been much higher.

When West Virginia played Marshall at GoMart Ballpark in Charleston on Wednesday, April 30, the announced attendance for that game was 9,639. Those people were there either to see the nationally ranked Mountaineers or to watch Marshall upset the nationally ranked Mountaineers.

You can’t go anywhere in Morgantown right now without running into someone who is talking about the West Virginia University baseball team. At the drive-through window to pick up my coffee this morning, the person who saw my Flying WV logo and recognized my name on the credit card I handed him noted his disappointment that Little Rock was unable to pull off the big upset against LSU, keeping West Virginia from hosting its first-ever Super Regional.

During last Saturday’s 9-6 victory over Clemson, my Facebook profile was tagged with a video showing a large group of people sitting in an outdoor bar in New Martinsville celebrating West Virginia’s come-from-behind, 9-6 victory over the 12^th-ranked Tigers while watching on a big-screen TV.

There were scenes just like that in many other places around the state as well.

There has always been a long love affair for baseball in West Virginia, and Sabins’ Mountaineers are continuing to tap into it.

“We’re in a bubble, and you just work and continue to recruit,” the coach admitted earlier today. “I was on a FaceTime call earlier this morning trying to convince a kid from Pennsylvania now in the portal why he needs to be a Mountaineer, so you get lost in this.

“But I get goose bumps hearing these stories, and I appreciate it; it doesn’t go unnoticed,” Sabins added. “For me, the biggest difference is when you look at your phone after some of these wins and I’ve got 189 text messages (to answer). If that many people want to personally reach out, that is multiplied to every staff member, all our team and players.

“I’m so excited, because I think a lot of people were watching the Little Rock-LSU game, and for this place to be the best, you do have to have a fan base and support. The more people we have invested in this, the closer we are to being the best, and I am certainly proud to be a part of it,” he said.

Indeed, the Mountaineers today are continuing West Virginia’s enduring love of baseball that first began way, way back in 1866, three years after the state’s birth.