Forty-one individuals who played
professional baseball at the major league level lack identified
given names. Identification of players remains difficult due to a lack of information; a
Brooklyn, New York directory, for instance, lists more than 30 men that could be the professional player "Stoddard". Possible mistakes in reading
box scores from the 19th century could have also led to players without given names: "Eland", for example, could be another player from the
Baltimore Marylands roster whose name was simply misread. Four of the 41, McBride, Stafford, Sterling, and Sweigert, were local players added to the
Philadelphia Athletics team by manager
Bill Sharsig for Philadelphia's last game of the season against the
Syracuse Stars on October 12, 1890. Sterling pitched five innings for the Athletics and conceded 12
runs. McBride, Philadelphia's
center fielder, and Stafford, the team's
right fielder, both failed to reach base, but
left fielder Sweigert reached base on a
walk and
stole a base.
Society for American Baseball Research writer Bill Carle "doubt[s] we will ever be able to identify them".