English baseball player and manager (1874-1933)
Baseball player
Harry Thomas Smith (October 31, 1874 – February 17, 1933), was an English professional baseball player and manager.[1] He played in Major League Baseball as a catcher from 1901 to 1910.[1]
Baseball career
Smith was born in October 31, 1874 in Yorkshire, England. He played as a back-up catcher for Pittsburgh Pirates (1902–07, 178 games) and Boston Doves (1907–11, 154 games), after starting at Philadelphia Athletics for 11 games.[1] Smith had planned to retire as a player and become a scout in 1909 but, when manager Frank Bowerman resigned in mid-July, the Doves named him as a player-manager for the remainder of the season.[2][3] He was replaced as manager by Fred Lake for the 1910 season but, remained on as a catcher. He played in his final major league game in 1910 at the age of 35.[1]
Career statistics
In a ten-year major league career, Smith played in 343 games, accumulating 214 hits in 1,004 at bats for a .213 career batting average along with 2 home runs, 89 runs batted in and an on-base percentage of .262.[1] He had a .967 career fielding percentage as a catcher during his career.[1] He was a strong defensive catcher with a 47.32 career caught stealing percentage that ranks 50th among all major league catchers.[4]
Minor league managerial career
After his playing career went on to manage in the Minor Leagues for several seasons.[5]
