The History of Baseball

Everybody who is a baseball fan believes that Abner Doubleday invented the sport in the small New York community of Cooperstown, New York, in the 1830s. However, the original rules of the game were set down by Alexander Cartwright around 1845, and the sport has continued to evolve from there. The Cincinnati Red Stockings were the first fully professional team, in 1869. A few years later, in 1876, the National League was founded with teams in eight cities -- Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Hartford, Louisville, New York, Philadelphia and St. Louis. (Of these, only the Chicago and Boston franchises -- the latter now in Atlanta -- remain.)

Since the 1960s, baseball has expanded its scope internationally, establishing teams in Canada, and drawing great players from all over the Caribbean and Latin America, and more recently, Japan and South Korea. With the addition of teams first in 1961-62 and then 1969, baseball expanded its postseason to add a round of league playoffs. After rounds of expansion in 1977 and 1993, baseball's postseason added another level of games in 1994 (although not played until 1995), when the leagues were restructured into three divisions each and a wild card team was added to the playoff mix.