Showing posts with label Negro Leagues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Negro Leagues. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 15, 2021

Farwell Mudcat Grant: 1935-2021


Jim "Mudcat" Grant was determined to spread the Black Aces legacy for as long as he could, similar to how Buck O'Neil preached the gospel of the Negro Leagues well into his 90s. Walking with the aid of a cane, Grant traveled across the country to baseball events as a septuagenarian to tell the story of baseball's Black 20-game winners. It was a subject where Grant was an expert; he was the first Black pitcher to win 20 games in the American League.

Grant used his platform to share how Black pitchers faced an uphill battle their entire careers, often questioned by an establishment who doubted whether Black pitchers were "equipped" to outsmart big league hitters. His 2005 book, The Black Aces gave this brotherhood of 13 Major League Baseball pitchers (at the time of publishing) the opportunity to put their untold stories on record about how they succeeded against insurmountable odds.

Grant died June 11, 2021, in Los Angeles, leaving behind a legacy for many to discover. I profiled Grant's life and career for my Forbes Sports Money column, which includes Grant's own words from an interview I did with him in New York. His book and continuing efforts to promote this select group's legacy will continue to inspire future generations of Black athletes to follow his lead on the mound.


 

Monday, May 10, 2021

Willie Mays Turns 90: A Legend Throughout The Years

Willie Mays celebrates his 90th birthday at Oracle Park in San Francisco.

Hall of Fame legend Willie Mays turned 90 on May 6, 2021, and the entire baseball community celebrated the milestone with a variety of tributes including a grand celebration at Oracle Park.

As part of the festivities, the Giants announced the creation of the Willie Mays Scholars program, which will offer college prep and support to Black high schoolers in San Francisco. The initial class this fall will include five students who will receive $70,000 in support, including up to $20,000 in scholarships.

“I have always made kids my priority by helping them in any way I could throughout my playing career and life,” Mays said in a statement. “To have the Giants Community Fund and the Giants ownership group create this program in my name and to provide a path to college for Black children in our community means the world to me. I can’t wait to meet the first class of Willie Mays Scholars to offer my encouragement and support.”

Mays was a World Series hero for the New York Giants in 1954, his infamous catch of Vic Wertz's smash during Game 1 paved the way for the Giants to sweep the Indians. While the World Series odds seemed a longshot at +6000 for the Giants to start the 2021 season, the club's first place standing during Mays' celebration could be the inspiration needed to drive towards another championship appearance.

While honors have poured in across the landscape offering Mays his flowers, we take a look back at our coverage of Mays throughout his career, often through the words of his teammates.


Thursday, February 18, 2021

How Bob Oldis Missed His Opportunity To Face Satchel Paige In The Major Leagues


Bob Oldis only played in seven games during his 1953 rookie season with the Washington Senators, yet one almost perfect game stands out in his mind nearly 70 years later. 

On June 25, 1953, Oldis was in the starting lineup against the St. Louis Browns. Making only his second major league start, he played flawlessly. He went 3-3 at the plate with an RBI, and threw out the lone baserunner who dared to steal that day. 

Most rookies would have been elated with that type of performance, but something about that game didn't sit right with the young catcher. With the Senators down 3-1 in the bottom of the 9th inning, Oldis was due to bat third in the inning. 

Pitching in relief for the Browns was the ageless Satchel Paige. Undaunted by his presence, the first two batters were able to get on base with a walk and a single. This set the stage for Oldis, who was swinging a hot bat that day, to be the hero ... or so he thought. 

As he approached the top steps of the dugout, Oldis represented the winning run. After battering starter Harry Breechen for three hits, the tap on the shoulder from manager Bucky Harris wasn't what he expected. Instead of words of encouragement, Harris let him know outfielder Carmen Mauro would be taking his place at the plate. 

Dejected, Oldis returned to the dugout to watch Mauro hit a pop-up to third base, and Gil Coan finish the game by hitting into a 4-6-3 double play. He never was able to test himself against Satchel Paige in the majors, as he was sent down a short time afterwards.

When the 93-year-old was reached recently via a letter to his Arizona home, I asked if he was upset with Harris' decision to remove him for a pinch-hitter against Paige.

"Yes!" Oldis wrote. 

He later had his chance to face Paige in the minor leagues during the 1958 season when he played for the Richmond Virginians and Paige hurled for the Miami Marlins; however, seven decades later it is the meeting they didn't have that stands out in his memory. 


Saturday, January 23, 2021

Hank Aaron - 'I Had To Teach That Kid Something' | Davey Johnson's Favorite Story

Hank Aaron (l.) and Davey Johnson (r.) with Bowie Kuhn

Davey Johnson spent three glorious seasons alongside Hank Aaron on the Atlanta Braves from 1973-1975. Playing with Aaron as he surpassed Babe Ruth’s home run record, Johnson witnessed many of the hardships Aaron faced as he pursued the historical mark. 

Watching Aaron chase baseball's cherished milestone, Johnson also secured his own place in the record books alongside the future Hall of Famer. In 1973 along with Darrell Evans, they all reached the 40 home run plateau, becoming the first trio of teammates to accomplish the feat in the same season. 

Even though Johnson was a three-time All-Star and World Series champion with the Baltimore Orioles, he soaked up Aaron's lessons in their time together. He credited Aaron, who died this week at 86, for teaching him how to hit one of the nastiest pitches in baseball. 

“Playing with Henry Aaron and [I watched] him really make the game look easy,” Johnson said during a 2010 interview. “Henry hit whenever he wanted to. I saw so many times things he would do that just were impossible to do. He taught me how to hit a left-hander’s slider off the plate [inside] fair. He did it all the time. … Most normal human beings with the ball slider in, you have to hit it over the dugout over there, but he would be able to hit it fair.” 

After Aaron seized his place as MLBs all-time home run leader in 1974, the Braves usually rested him after flying to the West Coast. Johnson recalled how the legend made an exception from his rest day after he read some incendiary remarks by a opposing rookie pitcher. 

 “We were going to San Francisco from Atlanta,” he said. “When [we] traveled all night, Henry wouldn’t play the next day. 

“Well the next day, he read the paper and a guy named [John] 'Count' Montefusco said in the paper, ‘Why I gotta face this Atlanta club? I’d rather face a good hitting club.’ Henry went to [Eddie] Mathews and said, ‘I’m in the lineup, I’ve gotta teach this guy a lesson.’ He had a wicked slider. I remember two guys were on. Henry’s up, first inning, he looked for his best pitch. He threw him a low and away slider and Henry hit it over the left field wall and came in and said, ‘I had to teach that kid something.’” 

[Ed. Note - Aaron hit the home run in the second inning as the lead off batter facing Montefusco in a September 18, 1974, game.]

Monday, April 22, 2019

Let's Play Two: The Life and Times of Ernie Banks by Doug Wilson | Book Review

As the April sun peaks through the clouds to signal the start of a new baseball season, excited children and parents echo Ernie Banks’ famous “Let’s Play Two!” at fields across the country. While the Hall of Famer died in 2015, author Doug Wilson ensures that fans remember his shining spirit through his new biography, “Let’s Play Two: The Life and Times of Ernie Banks”.

Let's Play Two / Rowman and Littlefield

Wilson provides a fascinating look at Banks’ early life in Dallas, Texas, connecting with Banks’ few living high school teammates and classmates to detail not only his early athletic prowess but also the history of the segregated North Dallas neighborhood.

Wilson pours through a seeming encyclopedia of sources to chronologically reconstruct Banks’ life on and off the field. While fans may be familiar with the narrative of his 512 career home runs, stories like Banks’ ill-fated run for local office serve to spice up the details of a man who projected an overwhelmingly positive public persona.

“He refused to acknowledge that anything other than good existed, in every person and every situation,” Wilson wrote. “He was a true-life Don Quixote de la Mancha, seeing the world not as it was, but as it should be, climbing aboard his trusted steed, ready to charge windmills to undo wrongs and bring justice to those in need.”

Shaving another layer of the seemingly impenetrable curtain that Banks maintained, Wilson dug into the tumultuous relationship between Banks and his manager Leo Durocher. When Durocher arrived after the end of the 1965 season, he sets his sight on Chicago’s largest target, Ernie Banks.

“He turned his wrath on Ernie Banks—something no one has ever done before,” Wilson wrote. “He nagged incessantly about little things … he quickly added complains about Ernie not taking a big enough lead as a baserunner.”

Durocher thought that Banks was damaged goods and wanted to replace Banks with faster and younger talent, similar to what he did when he jettisoned Johnny Mize and Walker Cooper from the New York Giants in 1949. However, with his hands tied by the Wrigley family, Durocher used the only power he had to voice his displeasure—his lineup card.

“Leo really treated him badly,” Cubs first baseman Lee Thomas said to Wilson. “He would ignore him; he wouldn’t play him. Sometimes he would say things in front of the team or in the papers. It bothered me, and I know the other players didn’t like it either.”

Banks maintained his composure and eventually, he played well enough that even Durocher could not keep him on the bench. It was only much later in Durocher’s life that he apologized for how he treated Mr. Cub.

Throughout the remainder of his career and retired life as a Hall of Famer, Banks befuddled the media with his bureaucratic retorts. Wilson explained how Banks frustrated writers in their attempts to gain depth into his thoughts and character.

“For whatever reason, he had decided he would not discuss subjects painful to himself or others. His image was a hard-candy protective coating. No one was ever able to crack it open to find out what was inside. … Ernie’s polished dance with writers was his way of saying the same thing but doing it while still looking like a nice guy. Writers who accepted this at face value and were content with the status quo were allowed to remain, pleasant acquaintances, even friends. Those who didn’t were doomed to frustration.”

After his playing days were finished, Banks encountered many speed bumps as he tried to escape his career in a baseball uniform. He faced multiple divorces, failed business ventures, and a reputation sullied by his inability to follow through on his promises to make public appearances. At the end of the day, there was only one place where he truly found success, and that was being Mr. Cub himself.

Wilson was not able to get Banks to open up for this work, as a Chicago area entrepreneur Regina Rice kept the Hall of Famer protected in his later years through a series of muddy dealings that Wilson explores in detail. As of the writing of his book, Banks’ will remained contested between Rice and his former wife Elizabeth Banks.

“The man famous for cooperation and peace was the subject of a nasty public battle after his death,” Wilson said.

Whatever Wilson's book lacks in the absence of Banks’ direct narratives, is bolstered by the vivid sources used for the intimate details of Banks’ career. “Let’s Play Two” shows that while heroes like Ernie Banks appear to be impenetrable on the field, away from the game, they are susceptible to imperfections that cannot be measured by the stats on the backs of their baseball cards.

Sunday, March 31, 2019

Chuck Harmon tells how a wild week in the Negro Leagues unexpectedly opened his door to the majors in 1947

Chuck Harmon’s name may not resonate with baseball fans when discussing the sport’s color barrier in the same way as trailblazers Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby; however, the talented multi-sport athlete followed his counterparts into baseball in 1947 to ultimately carve out his own niche in baseball’s record books.

The University of Toledo basketball star who became the first African-American player ever for the Cincinnati Reds died March 19, 2019, at his Cincinnati home. He was 94.

1955 Topps Chuck Harmon / Topps
Harmon initial athletic fame came from his achievements not on the baseball diamond, but on the hardwood courts across Indiana. He was a basketball star at Washington High School, leading the team to consecutive Indiana state championships in 1941 and 1942. Upon graduating, he played one year at the University of Toledo before he was whisked off to serve in the Navy during World War II.

University of Toledo Basketball Stardom

Harmon had his first taste of stardom when the All-American helped to lead Toledo to the 1943 NIT championship game against St. John’s at Madison Square Garden. He scored six points in their 48-27 loss. It was there where he caught the attention of Abe Saperstein, the legendary owner of both the Harlem Globetrotters.

“My freshman year in college basketball we went to the final game in the NIT,” Harmon told Baseball Happenings via telephone in 2008. “St. John’s beat us in the final game. Saperstein was trying to get us. Back then, the NIT was the big tournament.”

While Saperstein’s interest was deferred by Harmon’s military duties, local scouts kept him on their radar. After returning to Toledo in 1947 to star for their basketball and baseball teams, local scout Hank Rigney took notice and offered the collegian a spot with the Indianapolis Clowns.

“I was at the University Toledo and it was summer vacation,” Harmon said. “I was hanging around school and was supposed to get a recreation job with the city. I was waiting on that to come through. Meanwhile, Hank Rigney, an old scout for the Browns, ran the concession stand at the school. He was an all-around go-getter, baseball scout, football scout, and basketball scout. He was scouting the Clowns, so he knew about me playing basketball and baseball at Toledo.

“He asked me one day if I wanted to play with the Clowns. I was still waiting for the job around school. I was tired of waiting around, so I didn’t know if it was going to come through with the playgrounds or recreation, so I told him yeah. He said, ‘I’ll sign you up with the Clowns.’ I said, ‘Anything to get out of here, I’ve been waiting here doing nothing.’”

A Chance in the Negro Leagues

Suddenly, Harmon went from being an unemployed college student to a member of one of the Negro Leagues most storied franchises. Rigney sent him right into the fire as the Clowns prepared to face the formidable Kansas City Monarchs.

“The Clowns were in Indianapolis playing,” he said. “Hank Rigney gave me a letter to give to the manager of the Clowns. I went over there, signed, and started playing with them. I wouldn’t call it playing with them; I signed with them. On a Wednesday, they had a game that night against the Kansas City Monarchs. I got over there that afternoon, dressed, and played that night. Of course, I didn’t play. I was there; you know trying out, whatever they called it. They were picking up guys as they went along. It wasn’t nothing real formal.”

While the tryout process lacked formality, Harmon assumed the name Charlie Fine to preserve his amateur status while playing with the Clowns. Once the travel rigors of Negro League Baseball set in, Harmon quickly discovered the ride was not as glorious as promised.

“It was one of them deals, we climbed in the bus to go to Michigan to play,” Harmon recalled. “We played up there, and after that game, the next day we went to Michigan City, Indiana. We played that night. You get off one bus, get on another bus, and go for 300 miles and play; you don’t sleep. When we got to Fort Wayne to play a team, it got rained out, so we stayed all night there. We stayed in private homes, that’s where we stayed all the time when we [went] to those towns.”

Due to the barnstorming nature that fed the Negro Leagues, teams did not have the luxury of rescheduling rained out contests. Harmon walked right into the middle of one of the miseries of road life that was markedly different from the first class treatment he experienced while playing college basketball.

“We got rained out in Michigan City and Fort Wayne, and when we went to Chicago — that was the first night we stayed in a hotel. I think we had a Sunday doubleheader. I dressed there. To this day, I don’t think I got into a game at all from Wednesday to Sunday. That was too much for me [coming from] playing in college, staying in hotels, and eating in the fine restaurants. Playing in Toledo, we stayed in the best hotels and played in Madison Square Garden.”

Harmon thought that he could parlay his experience with the Clowns to stay on with Saperstein’s Globetrotters. After his miserable week with the Clowns, he decided to pivot and return to Toledo for the summer.

“I don’t remember getting in a game or not because we had four or five games, we played two, the first night and the night in Chicago, and then we got rained out,” Harmon said. “I said to myself, ‘This isn’t for me.’ In my mind, what was going to happen was, the Globetrotters [would take] me and another guy. He had been trying to get us to play with them anyway. The basketball was probably worse traveling than the baseball. Traveling on the bus and sleeping in private homes if you could. I told him no thanks.”

A Door Opens with the St. Louis Browns

Back in Toledo from his brief foray into the Negro Leagues, Harmon waited on the city for his recreation job. By that time, the St. Louis Browns signed both Hank Thompson and Willard Brown to major league contracts. With the organization’s door open, Rigney jumped at the opportunity to get Harmon into the fold.

“A couple weeks later after being back there, the job with the city still hadn’t come through,” Harmon said. “Finally, he came over to school and [told me] they wanted me at the [Toledo] Mud Hens office [because] St. Louis wanted to sign me to a contract. That was like going to the World Series hearing that. Going with a major league team, as they always said, that was ‘organized ball.’”

While Brown and Thompson are often touted as Major League Baseball pioneers, Harmon was part of a select group who quietly pried opened doors at a time when only a few teams embraced integration. Standing in those offices, he saw the hope that was newly available to African-American ballplayers.

“We went to the office there in Toledo,” he said. “I didn’t have any idea of signing a Triple-A contract, but still that was a step to the major leagues. They wanted to send me to upstate New York, to the Canadian-American League, Class C. They sent me up to Gloversville [New York]. It was organized ball, and you could see the footsteps to major league ball if you were good enough.”

During our talk, Harmon chose not to focus on struggles with Jim Crow segregation, but the joy of being paid to play baseball. He thrived in his new environment.

“I did pretty good and finished the season out there,” he said. “I played 50 something games, and I was on cloud nine. You didn’t care [because] you saw them checks! The first time you saw a check, you got paid. Some guys played week to week. They played and spent it. Being in organized ball, we got paid and stayed in hotels. It was a glory road for me.”

Harmon returned to Toledo to play basketball for the 1947-48 school year. He put his minor league dreams on hold to play for the Fort Wayne General Electrics in 1948 while finishing his college basketball eligibility. With his college basketball career behind him, Harmon came back to the Browns, even after they sent him down a level in the minor leagues.

“Gloversville bought my contract and they sent me to Olean, New York in Class D,” he said. “Up there I was hitting about .370-.380 each year. When Gloversville sent me up there, I started hitting, and I got married. My wife was expecting, and I told them that when they sent me down. That’s when I really started wearing the ball out there. I talked to Gloversville and my wife was expecting, so I told them if I was hitting over so-and-so, would [they] bring me back to Gloversville. That incentive helped. Meanwhile, the Browns were having money problems, moving their clubs, and getting rid of players. During the winter, they sold the teams to independent buyers, and Olean bought my contract.”

A Cincinnati Reds Courtship

Unbelievably, it took two years of Harmon hitting .374 and .375 with Olean before the Reds bought his contract in 1952. He jumped to their Double-A team in Tulsa in 1953 and those footsteps he saw in 1947 were finally starting to lead on the right path.

“I went to Tulsa next year and I was leading the team in everything,” he said. “I was driving in all those runs. I had a bad day if I just got three hits. If I got two hits, it was bad.”

Harmon spent that winter sharpening his skills in Puerto Rico by playing for the Ponce team. He tore through the league and finished second in hitting, just below Luis “Canena” Marquez, and three points ahead of a young Hank Aaron. On the cusp of realizing his major league dreams, Harmon sensed that being in the presence of young talent and hardened Negro League and Puerto Rican veterans primed him for the next step.

“They had a lot of great players in winter ball,” he said. “You knew they were going to make it.”

Making History in the Major Leagues

He made the Reds out of spring training, and on April 17, 1954, against Aaron’s Milwaukee Braves, Harmon made history. His seventh-inning pinch-hitting appearance minted him as the first African-American to appear in a game for the Reds. Historians have argued that Nino Escalera, a Puerto Rican who batted right before Harmon, was the first black player for the franchise. Almost 65 years later, Harmon was more concerned with being on the team than being first.

“All that didn’t faze me a bit,” he said. “You knew you were good and that you were one of the best. That’s all you thought about. Not being the first black. It didn’t dawn on me at all. You know, all the players down there, you’re just trying to beat them. You’re trying to be better than them so that you get picked. You didn’t think that you would get picked before this guy or that guy, all you thought about was being on the team.”



Harmon played in the majors for four seasons from 1954-1957, batting .238 in 592 at-bats with the Reds, St. Louis Cardinals, and Philadelphia Phillies. He continued to play in the minors until 1961. He made one last Negro League connection in 1958 when the Phillies sent him to their Triple-A team in Miami with Satchel Paige.

“He could throw that ball,” Harmon said. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to face him, at 52! ... You just couldn’t believe that old what he could do in there. You were in awe of him more than trying to figure him out.”

He remained in the game for a few years as a scout with the Atlanta Braves and Cleveland Indians before settling in as a clerk for the Hamilton County Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. The Reds honored him in 2015 with a statue at their Youth Baseball Academy in Roselawn, Ohio.

Wednesday, February 20, 2019

Don Newcombe dies at 92 | A baseball and civil rights pioneer

Don Newcombe, the famed Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher died Tuesday February 19, 2019 in Los Angeles after battling a long illness. He was 92. The Dodgers released the following statement regarding his passing.


Don Newcombe 1956 Topps / Topps
Newcombe had his start with the Newark Eagles of the Negro Leagues in 1944 where he played two seasons for Effa Manley's outfit. Branch Rickey signed him to the Dodgers in 1946, sending him along with Roy Campanella to their farm team in Nashua. Together they integrated the New England League.

He continued to break barriers throughout his career, even earning Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s praises for furthering the Civil Rights Movement. He won the Little World Series in 1948 with playing with their Triple-A team in Montreal. When the Dodgers called him up in 1949, he was the third African-American pitcher to appear in a Major League game, following teammate Dan Bankhead and the venerable Satchel Paige. He wasted little time in making an impression, as he raced through the competition with a 17-8 record en route to winning the 1949 National League Rookie of the Year award.

His rapid rise included becoming the first African-American pitcher to win 20 games (later known as one of the Black Aces), a feat he accomplished three times in 1950, 1955, and 1956. In the latter season, Newcombe went an astonishing 27-7 to earn both the Cy Young and the National League MVP awards. He was the first Rookie of the Year to win both of the aforementioned honors in the same season, a record he held for 55 years until Justin Verlander joined him in 2011. In the video below, Newcombe gives Verlander a humorous introduction at the 2012 BBWAA Dinner.




While many thought Newcombe was on the path to a Hall of Fame career, his struggles with alcoholism derailed his path to Cooperstown. After becoming sober in the late 1960s, the Dodgers employed him as a director of community relations in 1970, and he has worked for the club ever since, spending copious amounts of time helping others to learn from his mistakes.

Newcombe was a fixture at Dodgers Stadium, serving as a bridge and ambassador for the team's Brooklyn history. His looming presence was evident from the many online tributes by not only fans but also many of the Dodgers players who cherished his guidance and advice. The video below of a passionate Newcombe saluting the 7th inning stretch, who was a Korean War veteran, perfectly captures the essence of his reverence and respect for the game.



Tuesday, January 15, 2019

How New York Yankee Jim Coates battled both Satchel Paige and Luke Easter

The year was 1957. Jim Coates was a hard-throwing right-hander who just had his first taste of big league ball with the New York Yankees. The 25-year-old was biding his time with the Richmond Virginians in the Triple-A International League, waiting for a permanent spot to open in New York. While Coates was cutting his teeth in preparation to join Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle in Yankee Stadium, the International League had a few Negro League veterans ready to show the youngster that he still had some work to do.

Satchel Paige with the Miami Marlins / Author's Collection
Toiling with Coates in the International League was future Hall of Fame pitcher Satchel Paige. The 50-year-old Paige was pitching for Bill Veeck’s Miami Marlins, fresh off a season where he led the league with a microscopic 1.86 ERA.

“Satch was a guy that in his prime, he could throw the ball really good,” Coates said to the author in 2013.

Once in awhile Paige would reach into his bag of tricks and pull out his famed blooper pitch. More than 50 years later, Coates recalled how Paige dared hitters to swing at his slow one.

“He came up with the blooper pitch and threw it real high,” he said. “Satch was a type of guy that was great to watch. He could do it all, believe me. He’d tell ‘em, ‘Here, hit it.’ He’d throw that ol’ big blooper.”



While Paige managed to stun hitters half his age, Coates sensed that the legend was pitching more off smarts and guile than he was with the trademark speed of his younger days.

“Satch, he knew wanted to do it, but he just couldn’t,” Coates said. “He was at an age and state where he tried but he just couldn’t do it.”

During our talk, Coates brought up how great not only Paige was in the International League, but also his Negro League counterpart Luke Easter. The slugging 6’4” first baseman was a few years removed from his time with the Cleveland Indians; however, his power still rivaled the all-time greats. Coates said that he had the perfect remedy to quell Easter’s powerful stroke.

“I didn’t have any trouble with Luke,” he said. “All I had to do was knock him down first pitch and he didn’t want any part of that plate.”

Luke Easter
Easter was no stranger to being dusted off at the plate. While Coates felt that he had Easter’s number from a few knockdowns earlier in the season, the Negro League veteran patiently waited for the perfect opportunity to let the youngster think he had the upper hand. The two squared off when Easter played for the Buffalo Bisons during the 1957 International League playoffs. This time Easter tipped the scales in his favor.

He sent one of Coates’ offerings soaring over the center-field wall, nearly clearing the scoreboard. Coates admitted that Easter had a knack for making the ball disappear, even off himself.

“He hit ‘em out of there in Richmond in the International League like a golf ball,” he said.

Sunday, January 13, 2019

Thou Shalt Not Steal by Bill 'Ready' Cash and Al Hunter Jr. | Book Review

One can hear the voice of Bill “Ready” Cash guiding you as you experience his career in the Negro Leagues in his new biography Thou Shalt Not Steal (Love Eagle Books, 2012). Dying only a few months prior to the release of his life story, Cash revels in telling the narrative of playing in the famed league.


Co-authored by Philadelphia Daily News writer Al Hunter Jr., Thou Shalt Not Steal stands out from other athlete biographies, as it feels like you are sitting on the couch next to Cash as he reels you in with the details of his life and career, while neither bragging nor complaining.

Cash was a catcher for the Philadelphia Stars of the Negro Leagues during the 1940s, earning the nod for the East-West All-Star games twice during his career. During that time, Cash played alongside some of the finest players in baseball history, including Josh Gibson and Satchel Paige. He regarded both players respectively as, “the best hitter and pitcher ever.”

After Jackie Robinson broke down the color barrier, major league teams began to further inspect the Negro League rosters for talent. As the Negro Leagues met its decline around 1950, Cash, a bona fide star at the time, was itching to prove that he too belonged in the major leagues, alongside the same talent that he excelled against in the Negro Leagues.

Possessing little control over the dealings between management at the major league clubs, Cash discovered that the Philadelphia Stars’ owner Eddie Gottlieb set the market too high for his services when the clubs beckoned. Gottlieb received at least three offers from the Dodgers, Giants, and Braves for Cash’s services; however, when he doubled the asking price on his star receiver, he effectively priced him out of the market for these clubs.

Cash was eventually whisked away from the Stars, but it was not by a major league club. His route to a chance in the majors would come through Mexico, signing with Mexico City Red Devils in 1950. His time in the Negro Leagues was finished.

Like many African-American players of his time, Cash experienced greater fortunes in Latin America.

He was so well regarded in Mexico for his stellar play, that newspapers in that country ranked him ahead of Roy Campanella when they spoke of the best catchers who ever played there. Every winter, teams would feverishly bid for his services, paying top dollar salaries and offering improved racial conditions in places like Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela, and the Dominican Republic.

After a torrid winter season in Mexico, Cash was whisked away by Granby of the Canadian Provincial League for the princely sum of $10,000. Batting close to .300 for Granby in 1951, major league teams could simply no longer deny his talent. Cash signed with the Chicago White Sox in 1952, looking for a chance to prove his skills on baseball’s biggest stage.

Excited to have the opportunity at the major leagues, Cash reluctantly signed or far less than what he made in Canada. Lured by the promise of a fair shot at their Class-A Colorado Springs farm team, Cash went in to spring training competing with fellow Negro League alum Sam Hairston for the top catching spot on the team. 

Battling through phlebitis in his leg, Cash outpaced Hairston that spring, batting .375 compared to Hairston’s .214. In a cruel twist of fate, Cash painfully describes in the book how the White Sox brass already decided at the beginning of spring training that the job was Hairston’s no matter how well Cash fared.

Persisting through injuries and broken promises, Cash finished the 1952 season in the White Sox organization. He continued to play baseball in the United States and the Caribbean through 1955, hanging it up for good at the age of 36.

Facing life away from the diamond, Cash worked as a machinist at Westinghouse Electrical, while upholding the virtues of a longstanding Mason and church deacon.

As interest in the Negro Leagues increased in the early 1990s, Cash helped to spread the word, serving on the board of the Negro League Baseball Players Association and making frequent appearances across the country as he approached the age of 90.

Cash passed away in September of 2011 at the age of 91, one of the last surviving members of the glory days of the Negro Leagues prior to baseball’s integration. I have a feeling that if Cash lived to see his book published, that he would have been “ready” to take the field once again to tell as many people as possible about the wonderful players in the Negro Leagues. Fortunately, with some help from Mr. Hunter, Cash’s stories will continue to be told in grand fashion for generations to come.

Thursday, August 9, 2018

Reggie Smith sharing Chet Brewer's lessons at MLB Elite Development Invitational

Reggie Smith has a passion for teaching baseball that stems from the lessons he learned in Los Angeles during the early 1960s that continues to resonate through his instruction at the 2018 Major League Baseball Elite Development Invitational in historic Dodgertown. The 73-year-old Smith was excited to return to Vero Beach where he spent many years honing his craft as a both a player and coach with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

It’s always great to be back here at historic Dodgertown,” Smith said via telephone from Dodgertown.  “It’s home, I spent a lot of time hereJust as important, the collaboration between Major League Baseball and MLBPA to run such an event and have such a project where we can interact and spend time with kids at the Elite Development Invitational here at Vero Beach is just gratifying.”

Reggie Smith at the Elite Development Invitational
Courtesy of Ruth Ruiz

The two-week Elite Development Invitational is part of the MLB Diversity Pipeline, aimed at encouraging and developing minority participation within the game. Smith views the interaction between the kids and the former players as the key link to this program’s success.

“To see how this collaboration put their shoulder into a project with not only the financial resources, but the human resources too, that is really special to me,” he said. “[We are able] to provide the opportunity for kids that need financial help and educational help to be able to use baseball as a vehicle to get into college and professional baseball. As it relates to the African American kids, it is just exciting for me to be here to impart that kind of knowledge that is necessary so that these kids have some hope.”

While Major League Baseball has seen a slight rise in the percentage of African-American players on major league rosters (8.4% as of Opening Day 2018), that number is still well below the double-digit amounts during Smith’s heyday in the 1970s. He felt a responsibility to help foster a passion for baseball with the current generation.

“Looking at the contribution that the African American player and the Hispanic player contributed to baseball, it’s disappointing to see the decline in that area of the communities that were given the opportunity to play baseball,” he said. “Baseball is expensive and unfortunately for economic reasons, it became difficult for African-Americans to play. Some of the glamour in baseball was lost because it is a long hard road to play this game to get to the highest levels of it, going through the minor leagues and hopefully on into the major leagues. 

“We have an opportunity to reintroduce the sport to kids to give them hope so that they can one, get an education by using baseball as a vehicle and two, see if they can provide economic mobility as well as educational mobility by getting back into the sport and playing baseball. It was incumbent on the ex-players like myself and many others who have the knowledge and informational resources to provide it to these kids and get them back out there to fall in love with the game again.”

Smith’s presence at the camp is a continuation of Chet Brewer’s legacy. Brewer was a famed pitcher who spent over 25 seasons in the Negro Leagues, where he was a frontline starter alongside Satchel Paige on the Kansas City Monarchs. He mentored a young Jackie Robinson in the California Winter League, and continued in that role well after his playing days were over, guiding the likes of Smith and many others towards major league careers

When the conversations of great Negro League pitchers come up, rarely does it include Chet Brewer. It should,” said Bob Kendrick, president of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. “Chet was an outstanding pitcher and is one of the most important players in Black Baseball history because of his global play, his role as a pioneering major league scout, and his dedication to youth baseball where he nurtured and developed future MLB stars like Smith, Bob Watson, Dock Ellis, and Enos Cabell.”

Brewer holds a treasured place in Smith’s heart for showering him with baseball wisdom at a young age. Relishing the opportunity to reminisce about his teacher, Smith cited the invaluable contributions that Brewer made to not only his own career, but also a host of other African-American major league stars.

“The love [I have] for Chet is always remembering him and the contributions that he made not only to the Negro Leagues, but to professional baseball from the standpoint of the number of young African-Americans with that he came into contact with,” Smith said. “He provided us with infinitely valuable information and knowledge to continue to play the game.

Smith had the fortune of playing for Brewer as a teenager against seasoned Negro League veterans. The sage Brewer slowly introduced Smith to the fierce competition, giving him the necessary time to find his place.

“Chet was very instrumental to me because I first started playing with him when I was 15 years old and at the time there were kind of the remnants of the many players that were in the old Negro Leagues. … At the time, [Negro League] players would always come out west and barnstorm. I was fortunate enough in 1960 to be able to play for him because Chet had spotted me and gave me the opportunity to sit on the bench, learn a little bit, and then get into a game or two until ultimately that I was able to play with him on a regular basis. In doing so, that brought in other players like Bob Watson, Bobby Tolan, Leon McFadden, Dock Ellis, and a whole group of other young African-American players who had an opportunity to play with that team. They all went on to have long and prosperous major league careers. Chet was very influential in the number of players that he came into contact with to teach us not only how to play this little boy’s game, but that we had to be men to do it.”

Smith’s deep baseball lineage created an opportunity at the EDI to link almost a century of knowledge that started from Chet Brewer’s time in the Negro Leagues in the 1920s. He applied those lessons and combined them with his fifty-plus years in professional baseball to pass along the fundamentals to the next wave of African-American talent in Vero Beach. 

“You take the information and the old school mentality that baseball is still a game where you still have to catch the ball, you have throw it, you have to hit itand you have to run,” he said. “You have to try to do all these things as efficiently, expertly,and as smartly as you possibly can. The nuances of the game that we learned back then; these are the things that we try to teach the kids to help in their development to make it that much more fun and ultimately get to the professional level.”

While Smith is committed to refining their skills within the lines, his ultimate goal is to show them how to make their baseball careers a path to education. With odds of a major league career rather slim for the few hundred in attendance at the EDI, he stressed the primary importance of using baseball as a tool to gain an advanced degree

“Education is first on the list,” he said. “At any given time, we look at the number of people that actually have a chance to make it to the major leagues and play at the highest level; you would probably have a better chance going to your local store and buying a lottery ticket. You have a better chance of winning than making it to the major leagues, but the one thing they can never take away from you is education, so I teach that first. Out of that, I hope that they play not only the love of the game, but also as a vehicle to further an education and get something that can never be taken away from them.”

Friday, January 19, 2018

Baseball Happenings Podcast - The Other Boys of Summer Negro Leagues Documentary

Lauren Meyer, the executive producer and director of the upcoming Negro Leagues documentary, "The Other Boys of Summer," sat down with the Baseball Happenings podcast to explain a journey that has been over ten years in the making.

Meyer, an Emmy nominated director, began meeting with players in 2007, traveling all over the United States to interview the last surviving members of the Negro Leagues. She met with stars of the segregated league including Hall of Famer Monte Irvin, Minnie Minoso, John "Mule" Miles, and Mamie "Peanut" Johnson (all of whom are now deceased), to find out how they persisted in the face of social injustice to play the game they love.

Minnie Minoso / The Other Boys of Summer
With the film 98% completed, Meyer launched a Kickstarter campaign on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to raise the necessary funds to license rare footage and music that are critical to the completion of the project. In the first four days, Meyer has raised over $13,000 towards her goal, putting her in a position to finally be able to tell the stories of these players that she grew to love and cherish.

Baseball Happenings Podcast Interview with Lauren Meyer - 1/18/2018



To keep up with "The Other Boys of Summer," you can follow on social media via the following links:

Twitter - @NegroLeagueFilm
Instagram - @TheOtherBoysofSummer
Facebook - @TheOtherBoysofSummer

Thursday, December 28, 2017

Jackie Robinson's lone day as shortstop for the Brooklyn Dodgers

When the Brooklyn Dodgers signed Jackie Robinson in 1945, he was playing shortstop for the Kansas City Monarchs in the Negro Leagues. His signing worried league veterans, as they questioned his ability to adequately field the position at the major league level.

“All us old fellas didn't think he could make it at short,” Hall of Famer Cool Papa Bell told Sports Illustrated in 1973. “He couldn't go to his right too good. He'd give it a backhand and then plant his right leg and throw. He always had to take two extra steps. We was worried. He miss this chance, and who knows when we'd git another chance?”

Jackie Robinson / National Archives
If anyone was qualified to evaluate Robinson’s readiness to play shortstop at an elite level, it was Bell. Regarded as the fastest the Negro Leagues had to offer, Olympian Jesse Owens reportedly refused to race against the fleet-footed outfielder. Even though Bell was in his mid-40s when he faced Robinson in Negro League competition, he could still draw on his legendary speed when necessary. He devised a plan to send a not-so-subtle message that Robinson needed to look for another place on the field if he was going to be their representative to break the color barrier.

“So I made up my mind to try and show him he should try for another spot in the infield,” Bell said. “One night I must've knocked couple hundred ground balls to his right and I beat the throw to first every time. Jackie smiled. He got the message. He played a lot of games in the majors, only one of 'em at short.”

Intrigued by Bell’s mention of Robinson’s lone game in the majors at shortstop, I looked for the story behind his brief return to a position he had not played professionally in eight years. On September 22nd, 1953, Dodgers manager Chuck Dressen gave the Brooklyn fans a treat during the final home game of the season, as he penciled in Robinson at shortstop next to his cleanup spot in the batting order.

Pee Wee Reese, the Dodgers captain and shortstop, stepped aside so Robinson could have a taste of the position he last held with the Monarchs. Ironically, Reese was the catalyst for this move, as it was his dare that provoked Robinson to change positions. In true form, the ever-competitive Robinson didn't hesitate to accept the challenge.

“Jackie Robinson played shortstop yesterday on a dare by Pee Wee Reese,” Dave Anderson wrote in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. “The man-in-motion now has played every infield position this season as well as left field.”


Robinson’s charge at shortstop was witnessed by only the most diehard Brooklyn faithful, as a scant 2,365 fans showed up to Ebbets Field for the game. His appearance passed with little fanfare except for a lone wire photo of Robinson snaring a line drive from the bat of Pittsburgh’s Danny O’Connell.

So was Bell accurate in his assessment of Robinson playing shortstop in the major leagues? Robinson handled five chances without an error, but his clean sheet left out one curious detail. In the first inning, the Pirates lefty-hitting Hal Rice reached safely at first base on a groundball to shortstop. While the news reports made no mention as to where Rice hit the ball, one can wonder if he tried to slap one in between short and third and test Robinson like Bell did in the Negro Leagues almost a decade earlier.

* Note - A tip of the cap to Luke Epplin (@LukeEpplin) for his assistance with the newspaper research.

Tuesday, December 19, 2017

Mamie Peanut Johnson, female Negro League pitcher, dies at 82

Mamie “Peanut” Johnson, a pioneering female baseball player in the Negro Leagues has answered the ultimate call to the bullpen. Johnson, who was only one of three females to play in the Negro Leagues, passed away Tuesday December 19, 2017 according to Bob Kendrick, president of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. She was 82.


Born September 27, 1935 in Ridgeway, South Carolina, Johnson moved to New Jersey to live with relatives after her grandmother died. She honed her chops on the diamond playing on the boys’ baseball team at Long Branch High School.

Mamie Peanut Johnson in 2010 / N. Diunte

The five-foot-six right-handed pitcher earned the nickname “Peanut” when one batter called out to her, “How do you expect to get me out? You’re no bigger than a peanut!” After sending the hitter back to the dugout in defeat, the nickname stuck and a legend was born.

She played for the Indianapolis Clowns from 1953-55 during a time when the league was trying to survive after major league teams signed many of their top young talents. Determined to prove that her signed was more than a publicity stunt, Johnson dazzled batters from the mound en route to a lifetime 33-8 record. She also held her own at the plate, posting a career batting average in the .260s.

Moving on from the rigors of barnstorming, Johnson went to school at North Carolina A&T and became a nurse for thirty years. She spent the latter part of her retirement traveling the country promoting the game due to the resurgence of interest in the Negro Leagues in the early 1990s.

As she outlasted her peers, Johnson was honored with praise and awards. She was the subject of a 2002 inspirational book for young adults, “A Strong Right Arm,” which highlighted how she earned her place in history among the giants of the game. In 2008, the Washington Nationals selected her in Major League Baseball's Negro Leagues draft.

Mamie Peanut Johnson with Hall of Famer Dave Winfield (r.) in 2008 MLB Negro Leagues draft

Saturday, September 16, 2017

John 'Mule' Miles, Negro League star, dies at 90

John “Mule” Miles, an outfielder / third baseman with the Chicago American Giants of the Negro Leagues, passed away Friday, May 24, 2013, at his San Antonio home. He was 90.

Miles earned the nickname “Mule” from Giants manager “Candy” Jim Taylor after a display of power led him to remark, “You hit as hard as a mule kicks.” He upheld that reputation by blasting home runs in 11 consecutive games in 1947.
John 'Mule' Miles in 2010 - Steve Thurow

In addition to being one of a dwindling number of remaining ex-Negro League players, he was also a member of the prestigious Tuskegee Airmen, who were the first African-American aviators in the United States Armed Forces.

Miles served with the Airmen in World War II starting in 1942 for a three-year period. He returned to San Antonio after his discharge to work as an aircraft mechanic.

"We had it hard at Tuskegee; buildings weren't completed when we got there, it was hard, but we made it, I wasn't complaining, because at Tuskegee, I learned a trade, I learned how to work with my hands - to do something," Miles said in a 2009 interview with the United States Army.

It was shortly after his return that fellow San Antonio native Clyde McNeal approached him about playing in the Negro Leagues. McNeal had just finished his rookie season with Chicago.

“He was the one who enticed me to go,” Miles said to the San Antonio Express in April 2013. “If I had to go by myself, I don't think I would have done it.”

He played three seasons for the Chicago American Giants from 1946-1948, facing the best the Negro Leagues had to offer. One of his favorite opponents was Satchel Paige.

“Satchel was a great pitcher. He could throw hard and he was smart. Nobody could touch Satchel when he didn’t want ‘em to,” Miles said in Brent Kelley’s “Voices from the Negro Leagues.

Miles left the Negro Leagues after the end of the 1948 season to return to his mechanic job. He continued to play in local leagues; however, the lure of professional baseball drove him to try out for the Laredo Apaches of the South Texas League in 1952. He made the team, breaking the league's color barrier while batting .281 in limited action. At the age of 30, Miles was past prospect status and returned home to his job that he kept until his 1971 retirement.

As the Negro Leagues experienced a renewed interest in the 1990s, Miles’ career returned to prominence. He made frequent appearances across the United States at reunions and speaking engagements.

In 2007, Topps honored him with a baseball card in their Allen and Ginter set. The release of the card caused him to be showered with mail requests daily for his signature, something he relished in his later years. He would often send back signed cards with inspirational phrases, “I’m not complaining, just explaining,” or, “Without those passing yesterdays, there can be no bright tomorrows.” It was no surprise that his 2009 autobiography was titled, “A Legacy to Leave Our Youth.

“I loved baseball and I was willing to play it anytime, anywhere. … When I started playing for money, it wasn’t enough to make a living on. You’ve got to understand this was during the forties and fifties. The only baseball players making any kind of money were the ones in the majors," said Miles in Dick O’Neal’s “Dreaming of the Majors."

"We just loved the game, and if someone was willing to pay to watch me, that was fine.”

* This was originally published for the now-defunct Examiner.com on May 25, 2013.

Friday, July 21, 2017

2017 Topps Series 2 gives a nod to unforgettable moments for baseball fans

With their flagship base series product, Topps gives a nod to unforgettable baseball moments in their 2017 Topps Series 2 release. Focusing on their "Memorable Moments" subset, one groundbreaking debut jumped out of the box of cards provided for this review.

Winding up with a laser-eyed focus, Satchel Paige knew the cameras were on him as he stepped to the mound to deliver the goods for the Cleveland Indians on July 9, 1948. Topps captured the intensity of this moment in a colorized version of a classic photo of Paige rearing back to pitch for the Indians.

While Topps fills in many missing pieces to their 2017 Series One product, the real catch of this set are the inserts, specifically the aforementioned subset. In honor of Paige's debut, below is a piece that I originally wrote in 2012 about Paige's debut that includes interviews with players who appeared in that game.


Just two days after the record books said he turned 42, Satchel Paige made his major league debut with the Cleveland Indians on July 9, 1948 in front of a crowd of 34,780 at Cleveland Stadium. The sheer magnitude of the situation shouldn’t have fazed the legendary hurler, who once pitched in the championship game of dictator Rafael Trujillo’s league in the Dominican Republic under the threat of a machine gun toting militia. Yet, for Paige, toeing the rubber on major league soil brought a sense of high drama, shaking one of baseball’s most experienced moundsmen.

“I felt those nerves … they were jumping every which way,” Paige recalled.

Standing at the plate for the St. Louis Browns was 29-year-old first baseman Chuck Stevens, who entered the game sporting a .252 batting average with one home run, certainly not the type of numbers that would rattle fear into opposing hurlers. While Paige admitted his nerves, Stevens on the other hand saw a familiar target. Back in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Paige came out to Stevens’ California hometown of Long Beach to play winter ball. The two squared off many times before that fateful day.

“I played against him about ten times before that night. I played against him when he could really smoke it,” said the 94-year-old Stevens from his home in California. “When Satch relieved against us [in Cleveland], he was just spotting the ball around. [It seemed like] he had lost 60 mph off of his fastball. He threw his breaking stuff and he had great control so you knew he was going to be around the plate all the time. He wasn’t going to overpower you like I had seen him in his earlier days.”

Stevens wasted no time getting acquainted with his old friend. He promptly laced Paige’s offering into left field.

“The ballgame in Cleveland was not a big deal for me because I was just hitting off of Satch," he said. "I singled into left field, between [Ken] Keltner and [Lou] Boudreau. … I always had pretty good luck off of him.”

Stevens dates his success against Paige back to a meeting they had a few years prior, just as he returned from his service in World War II.

“One of the longest home runs I had ever hit in my life was off of Paige," he said. "I had just gotten out of close to four years in the service, and we played an exhibition game in Long Beach and Satch pitched against our ball club. The ball I hit, I guess it must have been well over 400 feet. I wondered where all that power came from when I was rounding the bases.”

Stevens’ teammate Ned Garver was a 22-year-old rookie relief pitcher. Only in the major leagues for two months, he found himself right in the middle of this historical event.

“There was never a time when there wasn’t a bunch of hoopla around Satchel because he was such a colorful guy,” said the 85-year-old Garver from his home in Ohio.

Garver pitched two and one-thirds innings of scoreless relief for the save that day, but his clearest memories from that game started before a pitch was even thrown.

“We had a man on our team who hit cleanup and played left field [Whitey Platt]. He was from Florida. He told the manager he wasn’t going to play,” Garver recalled. “Zack Taylor was our manager, and you know back in those days, you didn’t tell somebody you weren’t going to play. You didn’t get away with that kind of crap. [Taylor] said, ‘No, you’re gonnna play.’ So he put him in the lineup.” Platt wasn’t a happy camper to say the least, and when he batted against Paige, he let him know it. “The first pitch Paige threw to him, he threw his bat at Satchel, and it whistled out there about belt high. He just wanted to show that he did not like that situation.”

Paige fooled Platt so badly for strike three with his famed hesitation pitch, that his bat once again took flight, this time flying up the third base line. Looking to extract some sort of revenge for Platt’s first toss of the bat, Garver said Satchel pulled one from his bag of tricks to finish the deal.

“If he threw a bat at Satchel like he did, Satchel was not going to look on that with favor, so he was probably going to give some of his better stuff along the way. To strike him out gave him some satisfaction.”

Paige pitched two scoreless innings that day, quickly shaking whatever nerves he had when Stevens stepped to the plate. He finished the season with a 6-1 record and helped the Indians get to the World Series, where he made one appearance in relief. Even though his best days were behind him, he still had enough left to outsmart major league hitters and give fans a taste of what the major leagues missed in his prime.