John George Heileman (August 10, 1872 – July 19, 1940) was an American professional

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

infielder An infielder is a baseball player stationed at one of four defensive "infield" positions on the baseball field, between first base and third base. Standard arrangement of positions In a game of baseball, two teams of nine players take turns pla ...

. He played briefly in

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...

for the 1901 Cincinnati Reds. He was erroneously known as Chink Heileman.

Biography

Heileman played five games for the

Cincinnati Reds The Cincinnati Reds are an American professional baseball team based in Cincinnati. The Reds compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League Central, Central Divisi ...

in July 1901, registering two hits in 15

at bat In baseball, an at bat (AB) or time at bat is a batter's turn batting against a pitcher. An at bat is different from a plate appearance. A batter is credited with a plate appearance regardless of what happens upon completion of his turn at bat, ...

s along with one run scored and one

run batted in A run batted in or runs batted in (RBI) is a statistic in baseball and softball that credits a batter for making a play that allows a run to be scored (except in certain situations such as when an error is made on the play). For example, if th ...

. Defensively, he played four games as a

third baseman A third baseman, abbreviated 3B, is the player in baseball or softball whose responsibility is to defend the area nearest to third base — the third of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. In the Baseball scorekeep ...

and one game as a

second baseman In baseball and softball, second baseman, abbreviated 2B, is a fielding position in the Infielder, infield, between Baseball field#Second base, second and Baseball field#First base, first base. The second baseman often possesses quick hands and f ...

. The only other team Heileman is known to have played for was the

minor league Minor leagues are professional sports leagues which are not regarded as the premier leagues in those sports. Minor league teams tend to play in smaller, less elaborate venues, often competing in smaller cities/markets. This term is used in Nort ...

Beaumont Oil Gushers of the South Texas League in 1903, appearing in 115 games and compiling a .172

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average is ...

. Heileman later became a night watchman at a music hall; he died in 1940. He was survived by his wife, a daughter, and a son. Before May 2021, Heileman was listed on the Baseball-Reference.com site under the nickname "Chink" Heileman. However, contemporary newspaper reports from his brief baseball career are only known to have referred to him by his surname, and his death notice made no mention of a nickname. His son, George, who was also a professional baseball player (although not in the major leagues), ''was'' known by that nickname.

References

External links

1872 births 1940 deaths Baseball players from Cincinnati Major League Baseball third basemen Cincinnati Reds players Beaumont Oil Gushers players {{US-baseball-third-baseman-stub