Thomas F. Drohan (August 26, 1887 – September 17, 1926) was a 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 ...

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("Pitch (baseball), pitches") the Baseball (ball), baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of out (baseball), retiring a batter (baseball), batter, ...

from 1908 to 1917. He played one season 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 Washington Senators. Drohan was 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighed 175 pounds."Tom Drohan Statistics and History"
baseball-reference.com. Retrieved October 9, 2011.

Career

Drohan was born in

Fall River, Massachusetts Fall River is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. Fall River's population was 94,000 at the 2020 United States census, making it the List of municipalities in Massachusetts, tenth-largest city in the state, and the second- ...

, in 1887. He started his professional baseball career in 1908. That season, he had a

win–loss record Win–loss may refer to: * Win–loss analytics, analysis of the reasons why a visitor to a website was or wasn't persuaded to engage in a desired action * Win–loss record, also winning percentage * Win–loss record (pitching), the number of ...

of 11–12 in the

Central League The or , also known as the for sponsorship reasons, is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league championship plays against the winner of the Pacific League i ...

."Tom Drohan Minors League Statistics & History"
baseball-reference.com. Retrieved October 9, 2011. In 1911, Drohan joined the

Central Association The Central Association was an American minor league baseball league. The Central Association began play in 1908, evolving from the 1907 Iowa State League. The Central Association played continuously through 1917 before folding. The league reforme ...

Kewanee Boilermakers The Kewanee Boilermakers were a minor league baseball team based in Kewanee, Illinois. From 1908 to 1913, the Boilermakers played exclusively as members of the Central Association, hosting home games at Terminal Park. The 1948 Kewanee A's succeed ...

and was the team's top pitcher, with a record of 19–10. The following season, he improved to 24–6. He won 17 of 19 games at one point and was pitching so well that Kewanee received a number of offers from other clubs to buy him. He pitched a

no-hitter In baseball, a no-hitter or no-hit game is a game in which a team does not record a hit (baseball), hit through conventional methods. Major League Baseball (MLB) officially defines a no-hitter as a completed game in which a team that batted in ...

against Hannibal on August 29, winning 4–0. The following year, '' Sporting Life'' wrote that he was a "natural pitcher" and "considered an unusually good prospect." Drohan was drafted by the

American League The American League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the American League (AL), is the younger of two sports leagues, leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada. It developed from the Western L ...

's Washington Senators in the 1912 rule 5 draft. He appeared in two games for them in May 1913, allowing two

earned run In baseball, an earned run is any run that was fully enabled by the offensive team's production in the face of competent play from the defensive team. Conversely, an unearned run is a run that would not have been scored without the aid of an erro ...

s in two

innings pitched In baseball, the statistic innings pitched (IP) is the number of innings a pitcher has completed, measured by the number of Batter (baseball), batters and baserunners that have been put out while the pitcher is on the Baseball field#Pitcher's mou ...

. Soon afterwards, Washington released him. The

Cleveland Naps The Cleveland Guardians are an American professional baseball team based in Cleveland. The Guardians compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central Division. Since , the team has played its home gam ...

claimed Drohan off waivers, but he never pitched for Cleveland, and his major league career was over."The Sensation"
''Sporting Life''. June 7, 1913. p. 1. He then returned to the Central Association in 1914. He spent most of the season with the Waterloo Jays and went 15-7 for Waterloo. The following year, his record dropped to 14–17. Drohan then joined the

Clinton Pilots Clinton is an England, English toponymic surname, indicating one's ancestors came from English places called Glympton or Glinton, Cambridgeshire, Glinton.Hanks, P. & Hodges, F. ''A Dictionary of Surnames''. Oxford University Press, 1988 Clinton (g ...

in 1916 and went 9–6 with a 2.34

earned run average In baseball statistics, earned run average (ERA) is the average of earned runs allowed by a pitcher per nine innings pitched (i.e. the traditional length of a game). It is determined by dividing the number of earned runs allowed by the number ...

. He stayed in the Central Association for one more campaign in 1917 before his professional baseball career ended. Overall, Drohan pitched in 220

minor league baseball Minor League Baseball (MiLB) is a professional baseball organization below Major League Baseball (MLB), constituted of teams affiliated with MLB clubs. It was founded on September 5, 1901, in response to the growing dominance of the National Le ...

games and had a career win-loss record of 101–76. He died in

Kewanee, Illinois Kewanee () is a city in Henry County, Illinois, Henry County, Illinois. "Kewanee" is the Ho-Chunk, Winnebago word for greater prairie-chicken, which lived there. The population was 12,509 in the 2020 census, down from 12,916 in 2010. Geography ...

– the site of his former glory – in 1926 and was buried in Pleasant View Cemetery.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Drohan, Tom 1887 births 1926 deaths Major League Baseball pitchers Washington Senators (1901–1960) players 20th-century American sportsmen Terre Haute Hottentots players Kewanee Boilermakers players Waterloo Jays players Terre Haute Terre-iers players Clinton Pilots players People from Kewanee, Illinois Baseball players from Fall River, Massachusetts Attleboro Angels players