Frederick Flemming (courtesy Bowdoin.edu)
I have already listed all the Major Leaguers who are from this region. Today, I will list all the near Major Leaguers from Atlantic Canada. By near Major Leaguer, I am talking about guys who kind of made it but didn’t. These players were on a Major League roster but didn’t play a single game at the Major League level.
The players fall under one of three categories:
- Phantom Major Leaguers – These players were on the roster during the regular season but did not participate in a Major League game.
- Spring rosters – These players were on a MLB roster during spring training but didn’t play in a regular season game. Many of such players in history did however participate in spring training games.
- Non-roster invitees – These players were invited to Major League spring training but did not play during the regular season or was even placed on the Major League spring roster.
All info is courtesy of the SABR Near Major Leaguers page.
- Cook, George “Murray”, SS – Sackville, New Brunswick – Pittsburgh Pirates 1963 (Non-roster)
- Flemming, Fred, OF – Woodstock, New Brunswick – Detroit Tigers 1954-55 (Spring roster)
- Harvey, John, P – Saint John, New Brunswick – Chicago White Sox 1944 (Spring roser)
- Kimball, Leighton, 3B – Armond, New Brunswick – Brooklyn Dodgers 1946 (Spring roster)
- Leggatt, Richard, P – Chatham, New Brunswick – Pittsburgh Pirates 1982; Minnesota Twins 1986
The list doesn’t include the hometowns of players in the phantom Major Leaguers category, so they were not included in this list. If I discover an Atlantic Canadian on that list, I will update this post accordingly. Also, I couldn’t find a Baseball Reference page for Leighton Kimball. Interestingly, all five players listed are from New Brunswick.
To summarize, there have been 31 MLB players from Atlantic Canada and five near Major Leaguers from the region. That means there have been 36 players from the region who have spent time on a Major League roster in some form or another.
Maritime Pro Ball 