Mysterious Walker

Frederick Mitchell Walker

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Weight 185 lb.
• School University of Chicago
• Debut June 28, 1910
• Final Game September 29, 1915
• Born March 21, 1884 in Utica, NE USA
• Died February 1, 1958 in Oak Park, IL USA

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Biographical Information

"Fred Walker, cured of the belief that the over-use of his uncontrollable spitter is essential, ought to make a great pitcher. . . Walker and his speed ought to serve him a lot better than his constant and unlimited use of the spitter which often gets him in trouble. We make this 'plaint on the authority of the great veteran, Captain Anson, who declares that the one puzzle of his life is that Fred Walker is not up among the world's great pitchers." - Sporting Life of February 6, 1915

"Fred Walker, who pitched for the Rebels last season, played football for the All-College eleven here on Saturday, against an All-Indian team. The All-College men won by a single touchdown, and it was husky Fred's terrific line plunging that enabled the college men to score the lone touchdown. If Fred could only play baseball the way he plays football . . ." - from the Sporting Life issue of December 12, 1914

Mysterious Walker, who had attended the University of Chicago from 1904-1907, pitched for five years in the major leagues, jumping in 1914 to the Federal League. His best major league game was probably his last before moving to the new circuit, a two-hit complete game for the Brooklyn Superbas for a 3-1 win over the Philadelphia Phillies on September 30th, 1913 (with that one run allowed an unearned 9th inning tally). Walker's two Federal League seasons were difficult (to put it kindly), with a 6-20 record, 4.14 ERA, 76 ERA+, and -2.7 WAR, the last three ranked, respectively, 3rd worst, 2nd worst and worst among FL pitchers with 200 or more IP.

Walker is the only major league ballplayer with the nickname "Mysterious", although the name would have seemed a natural for Moe Berg, who was called mysterious by Elden Auker. Fred pitched in the minors for the San Francisco Seals in 1910 using the surname Mitchell, where his nickname first emerged as "Mysterious Mitchell" because he seemed to come out of nowhere to be a success. He threatened to break the cameras of photographers who took his photo and even refused to take the field until umpires banished photographers. Finally after photographs ran in newspapers, he was identified as Fred Walker, who had played multiple sports at the University of Chicago, pitched for the Cincinnati Reds earlier in the 1910 season and jumped from the New York Giants after accusations of assaulting a woman in his residence hotel. Walker disappeared for an extended period after the hotel incident, resurfacing only when he showed up in San Francisco, with that disappearance fostering another version of the origin of his nickname. After initial success and emerging as a fan favorite, Mitchell faltered and other players bristled at his perceived arrogance. After an arrest for a drunken drive on a beach and issues with teammates and club staff, Mitchell was released from the Seals in October.

In the spring of 1911 he was baseball coach for Oregon State University. A photo of him while at Oregon State shows the same solemn face with folded arms as his photo above. It was reported in 1912 that Connie Mack signed a pitcher named "Fred Walker", identified as a "local amateur" who pitched well against Cornell. It is not clear if this is the same or a different Fred Walker, since Mysterious Walker in 1912 was said to be pitching semi-pro ball in Washington, DC at one point and coaching a San Francisco basketball team at another point in time.

A genealogical site says that he played football at the University of Chicago. Later he coached college football and sold bonds. Those points are consistent with a detailed and comprehensive writeup of Walker found on Wikipedia. Before trying his hand at professional baseball, Walker was employed in 1907 as the 23-year-old Athletic Director of Utah Agricultural College (now Utah State University). That engagement, apparently like many throughout his life, was very brief, as the Utah athletic program was torn asunder by the death of a football player during a 1908 game, a difficult situation for an experienced college administrator, likely an impossible one for a 24-year-old fresh out of college himself. Regardless, Walker may be the only player who can say he was a college AD before he played his first professional baseball game.