On September 17th, 1921, James “Red” Bird, at the age of 31, pitched in his first and last Major League game for the Washington Senators.

Red Bird was born in Stephenville, Texas, on April 25th, 1890. Today Stephenville, in North-Central Texas, has a population of 20,000. In 1890, when Red was born, it had less than 1,000 souls. He died in 1972, in Murfreesboro, Arkansas.

Here is what I could find about him,

Bird was reportedly discovered by Washington Senators owner Clark Griffith. Bird was at the time pitching in the Texas League for the Shreveport Gassers (that is a great name for a team!). Bird pitched in his only Major League game on September 17, 1921, against Cleveland at Griffith Stadium. He entered the game in relief of Frank Woodward and allowed three earned runs over five innings pitched. That was his one and only outing.

As of August 20th, 2025, there has been 23,568 different Major League ballplayers since 1871. According to my math, that means that over the 154 years of professional baseball, 153 new players enter the game each year. Obviously, that number is just a rough number for any given season.

What we do know is that in 1921, a 31 year old rookie from the Texas League named Red Bird got his one shot at “The Show.” It didn’t go well, but it could have been worse. With that single game his Career ERA became 5.40. Not good, but not the worst.

Now, in the history of baseball, there are 791 pitchers who have had a 5.40 or greater ERA. What that means to me is that there is a long list of pitchers, many given more of a chance than Red was given, that have had worst careers.

There are also a number of Hall of Fame pitchers who had disastrous games. If things though had been different and that one bad game had been their only career game, they would have ended up with a Career ERA greater than Red’s 5.40 ERA.

All this is to say, Red Bird made the Major Leagues. That is something most of us can never say.