Fordham Rams | |
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Founded | 1860 |
University | Fordham University |
Conference | A-10 |
Location | Bronx, NY |
Head coach | Kevin Leighton (5th year) |
Home stadium |
Jim Houlihan Park at Jack Coffey Field (Capacity: 1,000) |
Nickname | Rams |
Colors | Maroon and White |
NCAA Tournament appearances | |
1987, 1988, 1990, 1993, 1998 | |
Conference tournament champions | |
Patriot League: 1993 Atlantic 10: 1998 |
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Conference champions | |
MAAC: 1987, 1988, 1990 Patriot League: 1991, 1992 |
The Fordham Rams baseball team of Fordham University in New York City has been existence since its first game played against the now-defunct St. Francis Xavier College in Manhattan, the first collegiate baseball game played with nine-man teams as today.
The team's 4,010 wins as of the 2009 season are the most of any NCAA Division I baseball team. This is mainly because Fordham began playing baseball half a century before many other schools took up the sport. While they have reached five NCAA Tournaments, the last appearance was in 1998. Nonetheless, they heavily stress their record number of wins when recruiting.
Founded in the late 1850s, the Fordham Rose Hill Baseball Club of St. John's College (the precursor to Fordham University, and of no connection at all to St. John's University) played against St. Francis Xavier College in the first ever college baseball game under modern nine-man-team rules (Knickerbocker Rules, or "The New York Game") on November 3, 1859.
There have been 56 major leaguers who have played for Fordham, including All-Star pitcher Pete Harnisch and Baseball Hall of Famer Frankie Frisch. Frisch, a star athlete in four different sports at Fordham, was known as the "Fordham Flash".Steve Bellán, a Cuban who attended what was then St. John's College from 1863 to 1868, played in the major leagues, primarily as a third baseman, and was the first Latin American in professional baseball.Gil McDougald, who played for the New York Yankees, was a coach on the team. Announcer Vin Scully, who played outfield at Fordham before achieving greater fame in the broadcast booth, hit one home run in his Fordham career, which included a game against George H.W. Bush who was playing for Yale University. Fordham's most recent Hall of Fame inductee class in 2012 included a member of the baseball team, Bob Cole.