Born in Buffalo, in Chambers County, Alabama, the left-handed-batting Finney stood 6 ft 0 in (1.83 m) tall and weighed 180 lb (82 kg). Finney was of Scotch-Irish descent; he was named in memory of Louis Klopsch, a German-American immigrant and founder of The Christian Herald magazine, who died in 1910. An older brother, Hal, was also a Major League player, a catcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates.\n', '

Lou Finney\'s professional baseball career began in the minor leagues in 1930; the next season, he was called up to the pennant-bound Athletics in September, and he batted .375 in nine games—including back-to-back three-hit outings against the Cleveland Indians on September 14–15. He did not appear in the 1931 World Series, which Philadelphia lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, and spent 1932 with the Portland Beavers of the Pacific Coast League, batting .351 with 268 hits.\n', '

Finney then split 1933 between the Athletics, getting into 74 games as a back-up outfielder, and the top-level Montreal Royals of the International League. In 1934, he made the Athletics for good, but the Mackmen were beginning a 13-year streak of futility that would see them plummet to the bottom of the American League standings nine times, including 1935, 1936 and 1938. Finney was the club\'s regular first baseman in both 1936 and 1938, batting .302 with 197 hits in the former year.\n', '

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