Eckford of Brooklyn - League Era

League Era

In winter 1871, Eckford did not participate in founding the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players (NA), nor did it enter a team in that first professional league season. The team did win about half of about thirty games against NA opponents, including some late summer games picked up after the Fort Wayne Kekiongas went out of business.

For 1872 Eckford paid the $10 entry fee and assembled a team but it was a woefully weak one that lost all of its 11 games played to July 9, with average score 5-22. Five of the league's eleven teams would drop out by late August but the Eckfords survived. Fortified by seven players from Troy and Cleveland, including both pitchers and three other regulars, they returned to the field August 9. The strengthened team won three of 18 games with average score 5-9.

The old amateur rivals Atlantic and Eckford won only four and three of their last 18 games in the much stronger six-team league from mid-August. In four matches they each won two and scored 37 runs. They may have been equals on the field once again, but Eckford went out of business while Atlantic improved its team and moved in to share the Union Grounds with the Mutuals for the last three National Association seasons.