Babe Ruth and Walter Johnson named Chase the best first baseman ever, and contemporary reports described his fielding as outstanding.

Despite being an excellent hitter and his reputation as a peerless defensive player, Chase's legacy was tainted by a litany of corruption.

And nearly every year, as the major league season approached, Chase looked for a way to remain playing in California.

[8] On June 1, 1913, Yankees traded him to the Chicago White Sox for Babe Borton and Rollie Zeider.

White Sox owner Charles Comiskey filed an injunction to prevent Chase from playing citing a violation of the reserve clause.

[15] In 1918, his career in Cincinnati ended after his manager, Christy Mathewson, accused him of “indifferent playing”, or betting on baseball and throwing games.

The league president noted that in one game where Chase was accused of betting against Cincinnati, he hit a home run to put his team ahead.

[17] Despite the exoneration, the Reds wanted no part of Chase, and arranged a trade with the New York Giants for Walter Holke and Bill Rariden.

The deal was held up by Reds president August Herrmann because Chase sued the club for back pay from his suspension.

[23] In late 1920, pitcher Rube Benton accused Chase and Heinie Zimmerman of attempting to bring him $800 to throw a game when the three played for the Giants.

[28] In his only formal hearing on the matter, National League president John Heydler found him not guilty.

In early March 1925, newspapers reported that Chase was negotiating with the President of Mexico to become the commissioner of a new Mexican Baseball League.

[29] For a time, Chase was player-manager of an outlaw team in Douglas, Arizona that included banned Black Sox players Buck Weaver, Chick Gandil and Lefty Williams.

When American League president Ban Johnson got word of it, however, he pressured Mexican authorities to deport Chase.

Despite his unsavory past, Chase received a certain amount of National Baseball Hall of Fame support early in its history.

This total was more votes than 18 future Hall of Famers including such greats as Connie Mack, Rube Marquard, Mordecai "Three Finger" Brown, Charlie Gehringer, and John McGraw as well as the banned Shoeless Joe Jackson.

[32] He never received the required 75 percent support, largely due to an informal agreement among the Hall of Fame voters that those deemed to have been banned from baseball should be ineligible for consideration.

Chase spent the rest of his life drifting between Arizona and his native California, working numerous low-paying jobs.

[15][33] In his day, Hal Chase was almost universally considered one of the best fielders in the game — not just at first base, but at any position, even compared to catchers and middle infielders.

In his Historical Baseball Abstract, Bill James quotes a poem entitled "You Can't Escape 'Em": Sometimes a raw recruit in spring is not a pitching find; He has not Walter Johnson's wing, nor Matty's wonderous mind.

A more recent work by Bill James, Win Shares, suggested Chase was only a C-grade defensive player at first base.