George Walter "Watch" Burnham (May 20, 1860 – November 18, 1902) was an American

umpire An umpire is an official in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The term derives from the Old French , , and , : (as evidenced in cricke ...

and

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a government bodies through business administration, nonprofit management, or the political science sub-field of public administra ...

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 ...

who was briefly in the

National League National League often refers to: *National League (baseball), one of the two baseball leagues constituting Major League Baseball in the United States and Canada *National League (division), the fifth division of the English football (soccer) system ...

in the 1880s. He was born in

Albion, Michigan Albion is a city in Calhoun County in the south central region of the Lower Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 7,700 at the 2020 census. Albion is part of the Battle Creek Metropolitan Statistical Area. The earliest ...

Umpiring career

Burnham began his major league officiating career in when he called 41

games. On July 25 of that season, he called balls and strikes for 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 ...

thrown by "Old Hoss" Radbourn of the

Providence Grays The Providence Grays were a Major League Baseball team based in Providence, Rhode Island who played in the National League from until . The Grays played at the Messer Street Grounds in the Olneyville neighborhood. The team won the National ...

. Only a day or two later, he resigned from the position after it was reported that he was likely to be fired at the request of multiple teams. He said that he had grown very tired of trying to do the most thankless job in the world. At the same time, there were also rumors that Radbourn and catcher

Barney Gilligan Andrew Bernard Barney Gilligan (January 3, 1856April 1, 1934) was an American professional baseball player whose career spanned 12 seasons, 11 of which were spent with the Major League Baseball (MLB) Cleveland Blues (1879–1880), Providence G ...

had conspired to purposely hit Burnham in the stomach with a pitch during a game. His next appearances as an umpire were single games in and another in , but he returned to part-time officiating when he called 33 games in , and 31 games in . In all, Watch umpired 107 games, 99 of which were behind the plate.

"Watch" nickname

The Cleveland Leader ''The Cleveland Leader'' was a newspaper published in Cleveland from 1854 to 1917. History The ''Cleveland Leader'' was created in 1854 by Edwin Cowles, who merged a variety of abolitionist, pre-Republican Party titles under the ''Leader''. Fr ...

'' reported on July 26, 1883 that Burnham was gifted a gold watch following a Cleveland Blues game by an unnamed "certain prominent citizen of Cleveland." An inscription inside the watch reportedly read "Presented to George W. Burnham by his Cleveland friends." According to the article, that was all Burnham or anyone else seemed to know about it. Five years later, the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...

'' reported on the incident more skeptically. The article alleges that Burnham "endeavored to establish himself in public esteem" by buying the watch himself and having it delivered to him on the field during a game.

John McGraw John Joseph McGraw (April 7, 1873 – February 25, 1934) was an American Major League Baseball (MLB) player and manager (baseball), manager who was for almost thirty years manager of the New York Giants (NL), New York Giants. He was also the ...

wrote in 1923 that Burnham got his nickname from an incident in which

Joe Kelley Joseph James Kelley (December 9, 1871 – August 14, 1943) was an American left fielder in Major League Baseball (MLB) who starred in the outfield of the Baltimore Orioles teams of the 1890s. Making up the nucleus of the Orioles along with Jo ...

unknowingly slapped his own watch out of Burnham's hand and kicked it across the infield after Burnham called Kelley out on a play at second base. However, Burnham was known as "Watch" at least as early as 1887, when Kelley would have been only fifteen and McGraw thirteen years old.

Managerial career

Burnham, who was described in the ''Chicago Tribune'' as the main promoter of the effort to get an Indianapolis club in the National League, began the season as the manager of the upstart National League team, the Indianapolis Hoosiers. However, after a very slow start, the team had a 6–22 record and was in last place. He was fired on June 2. Fred Thomas took over as interim manager in addition to his front office duties.

Later life

Watch Burnham died at the age of 42 in

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

, and is interred at Oakwood Cemetery in

Saline, Michigan Saline ( ') is a city in Washtenaw County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 8,948 at the 2020 census. The city borders Saline Township to the southwest, and the two are administered autonomously. History Before the 18th cent ...

References

External links

Baseball-Reference.com
- career managing record

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Burnham, Watch 1860 births 1902 deaths Indianapolis Hoosiers (NL) managers Sportspeople from Michigan Major League Baseball umpires People from Albion, Michigan