Before playing for Cleveland, Blanding was the ace on a pitching staff that led the 1909 Michigan Wolverines baseball team to an 18-3-1 record.

Blanding also played amateur baseball for the Detroit Athletic Club and won 20 games for the San Antonio Bronchos of the Texas League in 1910.

After retiring from baseball, Blanding operated an early Ford Motor Company dealership and service center in Lansing, Michigan.

[5][6] After graduating from Michigan, Blanding played amateur baseball for the Detroit Athletic Club team during the last half of the 1909 season.

[7][8] A newspaper article in September 1909 noted: "Fred Blanding, the human catapult from the University of Michigan, was on the firing line for the DAC.

in 1909, he confessed in March 1911 that he had also played professional baseball that summer in the Central Kansas League under an assumed name, though he refused to disclose the identify of the club.

[11] After his strong showing in the Texas League, Blanding was drafted by the Cleveland Naps and joined the team late in the 1910 season.

The big fellow needed all his nerve in the ninth, when a double and a single after one man had died gave the foe a run ..."[3] In October 1910, Blanding also won the tying game in the post-season series between Cleveland and the Cincinnati Reds.

[14] In July 1922, Blanding was praised in the press for his "manly qualities in makeup" after he asked the Cleveland team president Somers to allow him to return to the minor leagues.

Blanding told Somers that "he felt that he was not giving value received for his salary and that in justice to the team he thought he had better go back to a minor league.

[17] At the end of the 1913 season, Sporting Life editor Ed Bang wrote of Blanding: "Fritz has always proved himself a willing worker and game to the core.

When Fred was ready and anxious to pitch and warmed up with enough speed to throw the ball through a brick wall, Birmingham wouldn't let him work.

[29][30] After retiring from baseball, Blanding owned and operated the Ford Motor Company agency, sales office, and service facility for Lansing, Michigan, and adjacent territory.

[34] In the early 1920s, Blanding also served as the president of the Lansing Senators, a baseball team that played in the Central League in 1921 and 1922.

In May 1921, The Sporting News reported that Blanding "has announced on various and sundry occasions he intends leaving his auto sales-rooms and going out to the lot, where he is going to take off his coat and put the young pitchers of the Lansing team through a course of sprouts.

"[35] At the time of the 1920 and 1930 United States Censuses, Blanding was living in Lansing, Michigan, with his wife Clara, three children (George, Robert and Katherine) and a live-in maid or servant.

He continued in that business for 15 years with the exception of a period during World War II when he worked at the Radford Arsenal.

[12] In a draft registration card completed in April 1942, Blanding noted that he was living in Roanoke and employed by the Hercules Powder Co. in Radford, Virginia.