Instead, there were segregated leagues in which dark skinned players exclusively competed against one another in a separate environment that did not command the attention nor money that the major leagues enjoyed.
On Wednesday, this week the major leagues took a step finally to recognize the Negro Leagues as truly professional caliber baseball on par with the major leagues, granting respectability to over 3,400 players who traversed the country in the sports and entertainment business to which they were relegated outside of the American and National Leagues.
The word most often used about this announcement was “overdue” as the separate-but-equal playing environments are being legitimized for the quality of its players and its competition while never before gaining coverage outside of the black community.
It’s not as if there has been a total disregard for the stars of the Negro League era. In fact, 32 players in the Cooperstown Hall of Fame had roots having played in that “other” environment.
Some are relatively household names like Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson and Cool Papa Bell, but for the many others who were the tops of their game they toiled in relative obscurity from the mainstream media.
Now, not only will the players become known, but also the statistical accumulations achieved in these leagues will now be measured against the major league stats for standard metrics like hits, home runs, RBIs, batting average, wins, saves, strikeouts and ERA.
There will now be seven leagues recognized as part of formal baseball history, including the original Negro League that existed from 1920 to 1931, the Eastern Colored League that ran for five years from 1923 through 1928, the one-year phenomena of the American Negro League in 1929, the East-West League of 1932 and the Negro Southern League of 1932.
In addition, there was the Negro National League that ran for 15 years from 1933 to 1948 and the Negro American League which ran for 11 years from 1937 through 1948.
Baseball has in the past recognized other professional leagues starting in 1969 when the MLB Special Committee on Baseball Records collectively decided that the old American Association, the Federal League, the Union Association and the Players League all had their baseball metrics recognized as truly legitimate and on par with the National League and American League that dated back to 1876 and 1901 respectively.
During the period of American history when there were leagues for white players and leagues for brown players (Negro or Hispanic) it was a great dichotomy in which the white players were perceived as more “real” and more talented.
There was a seminal book written several years ago called Only the Ball Was White in which the long, uncovered story of baseball life for the non-white players was extensively catalogued. In addition, researchers compiled the Negro League statistics to try to push the issue onto the MLB consciousness.
Some people feel that the 2020 season’s 60-game schedule which was considered fully legitimate helped contribute to the misgivings of non-standard scheduling during the Negro League heyday. The quality of play was excellent as demonstrated by exhibition games where Negro Leagues would face off against MLB teams and soundly trounce them.
The main difference between the two groups beyond race was finance. The major leagues could fund home stadiums and the whole going-to-the-game experience whereas the Negro Leagues were more of a barnstorming endeavor as their team owners were not as wealthy and unable to do what the white owners in the major leagues could do.
All around baseball, from famous researchers like Gary Ashwill and his Seamheads.com database of Negro Leagues, to the few remaining ballplayers alive from that era, to their families and fans, this move was hailed with great enthusiasm and appreciation.
Cool Papa Bell once proclaimed that the only difference between the leagues was color and that they were every bit as professional as the players in MLB. It’s nice finally to confirm his conjecture and yes, it was long overdue.
2 comments:
What a shame that the black community was not allowed to be in the major leagues far sooner. No doubt there were huge talents like Gibson who would have been superstars in the game of the day. Bigotry was awful.
That said, I wonder what a player like Gibson's stats would have been if he had played in the majors back then. Always a possibility he might have been better than the Babe.
A good follow up article might talk more about how the head-to-head white vs. black star games actually went, and if Gibson's numbers in those games were compiled anywhere.
Thanks Reese. Long overdue respect. Tremendous job by the people at Seamheads.com documenting these statistics.
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