tween club secretaries. By the end of the 1850s, victories and the prospect of gate receipts were becoming more important factors. As more clubs embraced these goals, greater emphasis was placed on obtaining good players at whatever affronts to amateur standards. The popularity of amateur baseball clubs that played between 1845 - 1865, led to the introduction of the first professional baseball club, the Cincinnati Red Stockings. They are called the first professional baseball team because they were the first team to pay their players. In 1869, they traveled the country playing baseball and had a total payroll of less than 9,400 dollars. While traveling across the country, the Red Stockings made a phenomenal feat, earning eighty-four consecutive wins. This record is still held today. In the year of their streak, the Cincinnati Red Stockings hit with an average of over .400, and produced baseball's first left-handed pitcher, Bobby Mitchell. The Red Stockings' success against the amateur teams provided incentive to create America's first professional baseball league, the National Association of Baseball Players in 1858. It was formed by representatives of twenty-five clubs for the purpose of codifying rules and establishing guidelines for organized clubs and team competition. The Association quickly established itself as the new arbiter of the game. Among its early rulings were the establishment of a pitcher's box and the standardization of the nine-inning game. The Association also approved the practice of charging paid admissions at games and that year saw 1,500 spectators pay 50 cents each to watch a game played between Brooklyn and New York "all-star" teams. Although the Association established no league or formal playing schedules, its authority was accepted and it lasted until 1871, when it was replaced by a lame organization called the National Association of Amateur Base Ball Players. American baseball's popularity was at high tide...
