We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball: "1st Inning"–"2nd Inning"

Several teams wouldn’t play another team if it had a Negro on the roster; and in some states, Negroes weren’t allowed to play at all.

His scarred shins gave him the idea to attach wooden staves from a barrel to his legs for protection. They were the first shin guards and the first protective gear in baseball.

It just gave them a little more ambition to slide feet first when a Negro was covering the base.

Soon after the Great Migration of Negroes from the southern states to northern cities during the twenties, Negro baseball began to grow.

Back then, managers almost always played, because the owners couldn’t afford to pay a man to just sit in the dugout.

Rube’s game was built around speed and his own invention called the “bunt-and-run.” It was a simple play. They’d put a racehorse on first base, and the batter would bunt the ball down the third-base line.

He wanted to create a league that would exhibit a professional level of play equal to or better than the majors, so that when it came time to integrate professional baseball, Negroes would be ready. See, Rube didn’t want to put just one or two Negroes in the major leagues, he wanted to put a whole league into the major leagues.

He gave black baseball dignity and set the standard for things to come.

We had some white umpires from another league call our game, once.

We would whip that ball around the infield with such precision, they’d applaud.

Negro baseball was fast! Flashy! Daring! Sometimes it was even funny. But always very exciting to watch.

Most of that clowning was done in the early days of Negro baseball, before Rube founded the league. The teams that clowned were not allowed in the league, because their acts were too much like the buffoonery you would see in the movies.

Did you know that the major league home-run champ Hank Aaron played with the Clowns before he went up to the majors?

Get in the runner’s way, and he’d step on the catcher’s foot or run him right over, knock all his gear clear off. Come sliding in with his cleats high. Runners could tear your uniform off with those spikes.

Sometimes those guys would come late and have to ask around, “What happened in the first inning? “Who did what?” or they’d just make up the stats.