The Other Baseball

Wishing a very happy birthday to the incomparable Ms Faut...

Happy 96th birthday to living legend, former AAGPBL pitcher Jean Faut - born on this day, 1925, in East Greenview, Pennsylvania. Faut grew up a multi-sport athlete, but had a special fondness for baseball. She spent so much time hanging around the local mens' semipro team, they eventually let her s**g fly balls and pitch batting practice. Impressed by her natural ability, some of the guys worked with her on adding different types of pitches to her repitoire.

Sticking with baseball, Faut played in the AAGPBL (All-American Girls Professional Baseball League) from 1946 to 1953. While most of the players came from a softball background, Faut had the advantage of knowing how to throw a baseball. As the league rules incrementally changed - from something that looked a lot like softball in the early years to a game that more closely resembled traditional baseball - Faut had an easier time transitioning to the smaller ball, longer distance to home plate, and overhand throwing angles.

However, the familiarity with baseball wasn't the only factor in her success. She was also an extremely intelligent player. She could remember the pitching sequences she had previously thrown to her opponents and keep them off guard by always throwing them something different. During her eight seasons in the league, she threw a remarkable four no-hitters, two of which were perfect games (plus one in which she allowed only one baserunner via a walk). She accumlated 140 wins against 64 losses with a 1.23 career ERA and

Happy post-humous birthday to Clarence "Fats" Jenkins!

On January 10, 1898, Clarence "Fats" Jenkins was born in Harlem, New York, as the youngest of eight children. In 1952, a panel of baseball historians named him one of the nine greatest outfielders in Negro League history. In 1962, Harlem Globetrotters founder Abe Sapperstein picked Jenkins as one of the ten men on his all-time all-star basketball team... one year before he was inducted into the professional basketball Hall of Fame. As a young man, his boxing skills nearly qualified him for the 1920 Olympics. Clarence Jenkins is undoubtedly one of the greatest athletes you've never heard of. He may have been one of the smartest too.

When he wasn't playing basketball, Jenkin's elite talent was in high demand throughout the black baseball circuit. During his 20-year negro leagues career, he slashed .339/.411/.433 over 633 official league games. Jenkins was a contact hitter, a strong defender, and an exceptional base stealer. He played some of his best baseball, in the mid-1920s, as the lead-off hitter for the Harrisburg Giants. From '24 to '27, he formed one-third of the "Million Dollar Outfield" along side Hall of Famer Oscar Charleston and Hall of Fame-worthy Rap Dixon, He enjoyed arguably his best year in 1927 scoring 66 runs in 66 games while batting .377 with 22 stolen bases.

On July 5, 1930, Jenkins played left field for the Lincoln Giants against the Baltimore Black Sox in the first Negro League games ever played at Yankee Stadium. In '33, he was selected to the inaugural East-West All-Star Game as a member of the New York Black Yankees. Off the field, he played piano and sang in a quartet. Upon his retirement in 1940, he became a successful business manager and coached basketball at the local YMCA. (sources SABR player profile by Stephan V. Rice; Negro League Baseball eMuseum player profile; statistics from Seemheads Negro League Database; photo from SABR)

Remembering the Clemente family on New Year's Eve...

Roberto Clemente: Last mission completed entitled "The Flight for Humanity." Inspired by a dream, Eliezer Rodriguez, with his wife Fiordaliza by his side, set out to complete Mr. Clemente's last humanitarian effort--33 years after his...

Sadly, Mr. Allen passed away four days after I posted about him one year ago today.

On December 3, 1974, the White Sox traded seven-time all-star Dick Allen to the Atlanta Braves. Allen, the 1972 AL MVP who slashed .307/.398/.589 during his three years in Chicago, refused to report to his new team. He remembered the threats and harassment he endured in 1963 as the first black man to play minor league baseball in Little Rock, Arkansas, and had no intention of going back to the south.

Allen instead expressed interest in returning to Philadelphia, where he started his MLB career in 1964. The news came as somewhat a surprise. Never afraid to speak his mind, Allen had a contentious relationship with the Phillies' management and fans. As the first African-American headliner to play for the late-to-integrate Phillies, he was often made scapegoat of the team's struggles, despite being its best offensive player. At one point, Allen had to wear a batting helmet while on defense, to protect himself from the projectiles hurled at him by fans. He also grew tired of the team administration referring to him as "Richie", which Allen perceived as a nickname typically reserved for a small child, in both its written material and verbal statements to the press.

By the end of his sixth season in Philadelphia, Allen had accumulated 591 runs, 544 RBIs, and 177 home runs (yearly averages of 99, 90, and 30 respectively), but was unhappy in his relationship with the team and demanded a trade. In 1970, he went to the Cardinals, then the Dodgers, then the White Sox, where he had his MVP season, and back to Philly. Ironically, the return package from the Cardinals included star veteran Curt Flood, who also refused to report to his new team in a move that became the first serious challenge to MLB's reserve clause. (sources: SABR article on Dick Allen, Rich D’Ambrosio; Baseball-Reference.com; Wikipedia)