Perhaps the most hated team owner in baseball history, Freedman owned the New York Giants from 1895 to 1902. He conspired unsuccessfully with John T. Brush in 1901 to create a trust in which all NL teams would be pooled and owned through shares held by the club owners. Upon his death, The Sporting News said, “He had an arbitrary disposition, a violent temper, and an ungovernable tongue in anger which was easily provoked and he was disposed to be arbitrary to the point of tyranny with subordinates.” The Giants floundered during his regime and attendance dwindled. An influential Tammany Hall politician, he used his political clout to tie up possible sites where an AL team might play in New York until the peace treaty between the leagues in 1902.
