George Neely "Slats" McConnell (September 16, 1877 – May 10, 1964) was a

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

. He played for the New York Highlanders/Yankees,

Chicago Cubs The Chicago Cubs are an American professional baseball team based in Chicago. The Cubs compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as part of the National League (NL) Central division. The club plays its home games at Wrigley Field, which is located ...

, and

Chicago Whales The Chicago Whales were a professional baseball team based in Chicago. They played in the Federal League, a short-lived "third Major League", in 1914 and 1915. They originally lacked a formal nickname, and were known simply as the "Chicago Feder ...

. His key pitch was the

spitball A spitball is an illegal baseball pitch in which the ball has been altered by the application of a foreign substance such as saliva or petroleum jelly. This technique alters the wind resistance and weight on one side of the ball, causing it to mo ...

. He was born and raised in Bedford, Tennessee, the son of Neely S McConnell and Martha Jane Morton, married Elizabeth Pokorney (born 1895 in Illinois) and lived in Chattanooga, Tennessee. They had three children, 1 boy and 2 girls, although Elizabeth's age would imply that the first child (born about 1909) may have been from an earlier marriage. George McConnell is buried in Forest Hills Cemetery, Chattanooga. The Genealogy of John Shofner of Bedford Tennessee, Susie Helme, 2011

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1877 births 1964 deaths Major League Baseball pitchers New York Highlanders players New York Yankees players Chicago Cubs players Chicago Whales players Baseball players from Tennessee People from Shelbyville, Tennessee Dayton Veterans players Wheeling Stogies players Buffalo Bisons (minor league) players Rochester Bronchos players Jersey City Skeeters players Kansas City Blues (baseball) players {{US-baseball-pitcher-1870s-stub