page_title: Bill Armour
section_title: Cleveland Bronchos/Naps
hierarchical_section_title: Bill Armour / Baseball manager / Cleveland Bronchos/Naps
caption_attribution_description: English: Baseball players, Chicago Orphans and Cleveland Bronchos, looking across on the baseball field at West Side Grounds in the Near West Side community area of Chicago, Illinois. Man shown at right with mustache and wearing suit appears to be Cleveland manager Bill Armour
context_page_description: William Reginald Armour was a professional baseball player and manager. He was the manager of the Cleveland Bronchos in 1902 when they signed Nap Lajoie to the most lucrative contract in baseball history and the manager of the Detroit Tigers when they acquired Ty Cobb in 1905.
  Armour played professional baseball from 1891 to 1896 as a center fielder and right fielder for several minor teams. He earned a reputation for his fielding abilities. He also had excellent speed and stole 43 bases in 69 games in 1891 and 52 bases in 126 games in 1896. Armour began his managerial career with the Dayton, Ohio baseball club, of which he was also the principal owner. He managed the Dayton club from 1897 to 1901.
  From 1902 to 1904, he was the manager of the Cleveland Bronchos/Naps. Armour took over a Cleveland team with a losing record, and during his three years there, the team's record improved each year, reaching 86-65 in 1904. From 1905 to 1906, he was the manager of the Detroit Tigers. In his first year in Detroit, the team improved by 17 games over the prior year.
context_section_description: In 1902, Armour was hired as the manager of the Cleveland Bronchos in the American League.  The team had finished the 1901 season in seventh place with a 54-82 record.  In the team's first season under Armour, the team opened the season by losing 24 of its first 35 games.  However, the team gained momentum and compiled a 69-67 record—a 15-game improvement over the prior year's finish.
  On May 31, 1902, during Armour's first season at Cleveland, the club signed future Baseball Hall of Fame inductee Nap Lajoie as a free agent; Lajoie compiled a .379 batting average for Cleveland in 1902. Armour announced that Lajoie would be paid the largest salary ever paid to a baseball player: "For his services with our club he will receive $28,000 for four years, every cent of which he will he paid, play or not, as the courts may direct. This is the largest salary ever paid a base ball player, and beats by $3000 the figure paid by Boston several years for pitcher Clarkson."  Armour also engineered the mid-season acquisition of pitcher Bill Bernhard, who Armour called "the best pitcher in present day baseball."  Bernhard ended up with a 17-5 record for Cleveland in 1902 (and a 23-13 record in 1904).
  In Armour's second year in Cleveland, the team continued to improve, finishing in third place with a 77-63 record. Lajoie won the American League batting crown with a .344 average.
  In Armour's third year in Cleveland, the team again improved, compiling an 86-65 record as Lajoie won his second consecutive American League batting crown.
  Despite the steady improvement each year during Armour's tenure with Cleveland, friction had developed between Armour and the team's star and captain, Nap Lajoie.  By the last half of the 1904 season, the two were reportedly "not on speaking terms."  On September 8, 1904, Armour announced his resignation as manager of the Cleveland club, effective at the end of the season.  The Cleveland Plain Dealer praised Armour's efforts in that city: "No better judge of a ball player's ability than Bill Armour lives, and not a small point necessary to win games escapes him. But the ability of the players to carry out his plans has, oftimes, been lacking."
caption: Cleveland Bronchos warming up in Chicago (Armour in suit at right).
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