Out of the Shadows: The Eclipse League

[luckymann]

This save - despite its somewhat politically-charged premise - is, like all of my saves, merely a "what-if" exercise and nothing more.

Specifically, in the case of The Eclipse League, that "what-if" asks what may have happened if the color-line worked the other way and white players were the ones excluded from the game.

The EL is set in 1968, and consists of 20 teams selected from the Negro League ranks filled with historical players from both the MLB and NeL (an AAA level will be introduced a few seasons in once the pool is big enough) entering in a random debut format via manual import.

I have never done as much preparatory work as I have with this exercise; nor have I derived so much enjoyment and learned so much (both about the players and OOTP itself) in the doing thereof. I won't bore you with the details, other than to say the vast majority of NeL historical players have been hand-curated to give them more accurate ratings and biographical / anecdotal veracity. I want to thank my friends LansdowneSt and Makonnen, with whom I have been for some time now engaged in an ongoing project to try and sort out these NeL players in a way that can hopefully be incorporated into OOTP at some stage down the track. Their help along the way has been invaluable. The graphics are courtesy of the amazing modding skills of txranger, NeilsonCP and the Silvam / Adion dream team.

I've still got a fair few profiles to finish for the EL's inaugural FA Draft, so there will be radio silence for a bit while I get them done, as there will be on a regular basis. With only somewhere in the vicinity of 6000 players available, this sort of deeper dive work is needed to make the league function as I want / need it to over the course of 50-60 seasons. This save will be one that (hopefully) rewards your patience, as I plan to take my time with it so as to do it justice. But I just wanted to whet your appetites in the meantime and get this thread underway.

Here's how the teams will line up in 1968 (those of you following my AtHoL save will now understand why some franchise changes were necessary in that league). Back with updates as news comes to hand. Next, I'll give you a quick run-through of the settings I'll be using.

[luckymann]

As much as I like how recalc works, this is too speculative an exercise to be overly bothered about historical verisimilitude. Plus there is the issue of NeL stat accuracy and how they are treated in-game.

And so, after much deliberation, I decided to set this up as a fictional league with dev on and set to 0.9 with ageing at 0.75 to lengthen careers a bit. I've also put TCR at 160 to spice things up, make some of the lesser-known players "pop" but hopefully not too much at the expense of others.

AI eval is at 25/50/20/5.

Because I will merely be observing rather than participating in how clubs and players are managed, scouting is set at 100% with full ratings on.

Coaching / owner goals are ON for a bit of fun but personalities are OFF because they are just too arbitrary. Morale is also OFF.

To begin with, injuries are at EXTREMELY LOW. Once the pool has grown sufficiently this will be ticked up to LOW. Position player fatigue is AVERAGE, pitcher stamina HIGH. Suspensions are ON but LOW.

Trading is at one notch below HARD and about halfway toward FAVOR PROSPECTS.

A 162-game interleague schedule will be used.

DH will start OFF but enabled a few years down the track.

Financials are ON and set to 1968, then will roll along with the timeline. Service Days are set to 90 to avoid manipulation. 5 years for FA / 3 for Arb. When the AAA league begins, MiLB FA will be introduced along with option years etc. 2017 CBA rules for lost FAs with max 1 QA.

3-week ST with an ASG.

Playoffs will involve just the 4 Association winners in a 7-game series with the WS also best-of-seven.

No min batter faced / kinky XI rules thanks very much.

Active rosters at 26 throughout. 6 relievers / 16 position players. Reserve Roster in place until the minors kick off, then 40-man. 10-day IL for all players.

Trading ON and set to HIGH. 10/5 Rule ON and Draft Picks can be traded.

Rookie Draft in December every year, 5 Rounds. Rule 5 will start after the MiLB level comes in.


One of the major challenges with such a small playing group and manual import being used is ensuring adequate coverage around the field. Catcher ad SP are the most problematic, and for these I have had to make a couple compromises.

Any player who played even just a small number of innings at C will be given a rating there, albeit a low one. This will at least give clubs some depth there should a rash of injuries or poor AI decisions occur. I have also imported players with position ratings based on their entire career.

Some pitchers who would under different circumstances be designated as straight-up relievers have had their stamina pumped up a tad to enable them to spot start if needed.

To help make sure the rotations work smoothly and not allow pitchers to amass ridiculous amounts of IP, they will initially be set to 4-man strict order / occasionally highest rested with reliever usage at NORMAL and closers SOMETIMES.

The historical LTMs will be used for each season until they run out, at which point I'll start selecting appropriate historical ones from season to season. This save starting in the pitcher-dominant 1968 season will hopefully keep the hinky offensive output you often see at the start of a new game to a minimum.

OK, that's all that, then. Next some historical context on the teams being used, to which I'll then add the game-specific details of players / lineups etc to familiarise y'all with who is playing for whom.

[luckymann]

The Bacharach Giants was a Negro league baseball team first based in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The team originally were the Duval Giants out of Jacksonville, Florida but relocated to Atlantic City in 1916. They were named after the city’s mayor Harry Bacharach, and were managed by pitcher Dick “Cannonball” Redding. The roster included shortstops John Henry “Pop” Lloyd and Dick Lundy, outfielder Spotswood “Spot” Poles, first baseman Ben Taylor, Oliver Marcelle at third base, and Redding and Jesse “Nip” Winters on the mound as pitchers.

The Bacharach Giants joined the Negro National League (NNL) in 1920 as an associate member, and briefly split into two separate teams in 1922. By 1923, they reunited as one team, and the Bacharach Giants became the founding members of the Eastern Colored League (ECL). After Dick Lundy took over as manager in 1926, the team brought home two consecutive pennants (1926, 1927), but were unsuccessful in winning the Negro League World Series. Lundy brought in center fielder Chaney White, and pitchers Luther Farell, Arthur “Rats” Henderson, and Claude Grier, but the team could not pay player salaries because of low attendance at games. The Bacharach Giants played as an independent team when the ECL failed in 1928 and finished the season with a 19-45 record. They disbanded after the 1929 season.

In 1931, a white Philadelphia sporting goods storeowner and sports promoter, Harry Passon, decided to resurrect the Giants team. He took over a vacant lot at 48th and Spruce streets in Philadelphia and named it Passon Field. The new owner installed lights and seating for 6,000 fans, hoping to draw crowds. The owner of the Philadelphia Stars baseball team, Ed Bolden, argued that the city could not support two Black baseball teams, and Passon and the new Philadelphia Giants were denied membership into the Negro National League.

The League decision, however, did not stop Passon from continuing to field his team, and in 1934, the team was offered membership into the National Negro League. Passon Field was plagued by violence, and the Philadelphia Bacharach Giants withdrew from the league in 1935 but continued to play at the field until Harry Passon died in 1942. At that point they disbanded.

Source: Blackpast

[luckymann]

Owner Tom Wilson's franchise originated in Nashville in 1921, evolving from the Nashville Standard Giants, and entered the Negro National League in 1930, but in search of a large population base for financial support, the team was subsequently moved to Columbus in 1935 and to Washington, D.C., in 1936-1937, before finding a home in Baltimore in 1938.

The ballclub remained a fixture in the city for the next thirteen years. During the Elites' years in the Negro National League, the Homestead Grays were the dominant team, claiming nine consecutive titles, and competition was fierce between the two teams. The Elites battled them every year for league supremacy, and in 1939 the Elites claimed a tainted championship when they defeated the pennant winning Grays in a four team postseason tournament.

When the league folded after the 1948 season, the Elites joined the Negro American League, which assimilated the four remaining solvent franchises from the defunct Negro National League. In 1949, the first season of the restructured league and under the tutelage of new manager Lennie Pearson, the Elites won both halves of the split season to capture the Eastern Division title, and swept the Western Division's Chicago American Giants in four straight games to claim the league championship.

Tom Wilson was the force behind the Elites for a quarter century but, in declining health, he sold the franchise to longtime associate Vernon "Fat" Green in 1946. The franchise was floundering under his leadership, but he placed Dick Powell in charge of the team's operations in 1948. After Green's death Powell continued to run the team under power of attorney from Green's widow, and he temporarily resurrected the team for a final hurrah in 1949. But after slipping to second place in the East in 1950 and suffering financial problems, the club was sold to William Bridgeforth in the spring of 1951 for $11,000. After returning the team to Nashville for a final season, the team was dissolved and the Elite Giants' identity was lost.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Except for 1926, when they played in the Negro Southern League, the Black Barons were members of the Negro National League from 1924 through 1930; and except for 1939, they were members of the Negro American League from 1937 through 1950. Actually the franchise continued as members of the Negro American League on into the 1950s, but the league was strictly a minor operation then, and the focus here is on the teams before the doors of organized baseball were opened to the best black athletic talent in the country.

The first significant success enjoyed by the Black Barons was their second half title in the 1927 Negro National League split season, before losing the League Championship Series in a four game sweep by the Chicago American Giants. The high points of Birmingham's nineteen-year black baseball history were the three Negro American League pennants in 1943, 1944, and 1948. Unfortunately, each time they lost the Negro World Series to the Homestead Grays.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Organized in 1905 by John Connors, the portly black owner of the Brooklyn Royal Cafe, they were one of the best ballclubs in the East during the first decade of the century, and claimed eastern championships in 1909, 1910, 1914, and 1916. In 1914 they lost a challenge playoff against the western champion Chicago American Giants.

Before the onset of World War I, Connors sold the team to Nat Strong, a white booking agent in New York City. He was a good promoter and was a powerful figure in black baseball. When the Eastern Colored League was organized in 1923, the Royals became charter members, finishing third with an even .500 winning percentage, their highest finish during their stay in the league. After dropping to the second division in 1924-1925, they dropped to the cellar for the next two seasons, and dropped out of the league after the 1927 season.

They continued as an independent team and in 1933 were an associate member of the Negro National League, but after Strong died of a heart attack, the quality of both the administration of the team and the level of play dropped below major league standards, and during the late 1930s and afterward they played mostly against white semi-pro teams.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Organized by Rube Foster, who built the team into a dynasty before his demise, the organization was the longest continuous franchise in the history of black baseball. The team began in 1910 when Rube Foster and Frank Leland, who were the manager and owner, respectively, of the Leland Giants, separated and formed two different ballclubs. Foster retained the team name of Leland Giants for the first season, but beginning in 1911 the club became known as the American Giants. For the first decade of the team's existence, they won every declared western championship, losing only to the 1916 Indianapolis ABCs. The American Giants' dominance continued after Foster organized the first black professional league, the Negro National League, in 1920, winning the first three pennants.

After Foster's incapacitation from his mental illness, his white business partner, John M. Schorling, ran the ballclub, and in 1926 and 1927, with Foster's lieutenant David Malarcher at the reins, the team won both the Negro National League flag and the Negro World Series, each time facing the Eastern Colored League's champion Bacharach Giants. In the spring of 1928 Schorling sold the ballclub to William E. Trimble, a white florist, alleging that he was "squeezed out" by a conspiracy of the other owners to diminish the gates by keeping the best clubs out of Chicago.

After Foster's death and the demise of the Negro National League, the franchise again rose to prominence as Cole's American Giants, under the management of new owners Robert A. Cole and Horace G. Hall, in 1932-1934, winning pennants the first two years before losing a hard fought League Championship Series to the Philadelphia Stars in 1934. The first of the two pennants came while playing in the Negro Southern League and the second in the newly reorganized Negro National League. After dropping out of the Negro National League to play as an independent team in 1936, the American Giants prospered again under new ownership as Dr. J.B. Martin took control of the team, and the American Giants became a charter member of the Negro American League in 1937. Although the franchise encountered many difficulties during the 1940s, the ballclub remained in the league even after it had ceased to be of major-league caliber.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

In 1942, when the franchise was first organized, some games were played in Cleveland, but a permanent move was not made until the ballclub moved from Cincinnati in 1943 and remained until 1949, when they moved to Louisville for a season before returning in 1950.

The highlight of the franchise's history came in 1945, when catcher manager Quincey Trouppe led the Buckeyes to a Negro American League pennant (winning both halves of the split season and finishing with an overall 53-16 record for a .768 winning percentage and a sweep of the Homestead Grays in the Negro World Series. The Buckeyes, under Trouppe's tutelage, captured another flag in 1947 with a 54-23 record (.701 pct.) but lost the World Series to the New York Cubans in five games.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

The version of the Cuban Stars that played on the east coast, in the Eastern Colored League and American Negro League is identified by historians as Cuban Stars (East).

The team played independent baseball from 1916 to 1922. The team was then a charter member of the ECL from 1923 until the league collapsed in 1928. The Stars then joined the ANL in 1929. After the eastern leagues the team played under the Cuban House of David moniker in the early '30s. The team also played in the East-West League in 1932.

Source: BBRef.

[luckymann]

The Cuban Stars were members of the Negro Leagues from 1904 through 1930. From 1916 through 1929, two teams used that name - one playing on the east coast, one in the midwest. Historians differentiate them as Cuban Stars (West) and Cuban Stars (East). The western team played in the Negro National League from 1920 through 1930. Usually a traveling team, they spent two years in Cincinnati, OH (1921-1922) and were called the Cincinnati Cubans in 1921. The eastern team was called the New York Cubans in 1916, Havana Cuban Stars in 1917 and All-Cubans in 1921. The Cuban Stars were called the All Cubans in 1904-1905. In the 1930s it became known as the Cuban House of David and in 1932 became the New York Cubans. From 1923-1928 that group of Cuban Stars played in the Eastern Colored League and in 1929 in the American Negro League.

Unlike the previous Cuban Giants and Cuban X-Giants, the teams actually were composed of Cuban players. As they had both light- and dark- skinned Cubans, several Cuban Stars played in both the Negro Leagues and Major League Baseball, including Rafael Almeida (Stars member 1907), Mike Gonzalez (1914, 1917), Pedro Dibut (1922), Mike Herrera (1928)

Prominent players included Jose Mendez (1909-1912), José Muñoz (1910), Cristobal Torriente (1913-1919), Bernardo Baro (1916-1929), Alejandro Oms (1917, 1922-1928), Martin Dihigo (1922-1927, 1930), Valentin Dreke (1923-1927), Lazaro Salazar (1924, 1930), Cocaina Garcia (1927-1928), Ramon Bragana (1928, 1930) and Agustin Bejerano (1928).

The teams never won a title, but were competitive frequently. Had they joined together to form one team, they might have won a title.

Source: BBRef.

[luckymann]

Organized in 1919, the franchise fielded a team of outstanding players that defeated Rube Foster's Chicago American Giants in a showdown series and were in all probability the best team in the West that season. They became a charter member in the Negro National League in 1920 and remained an annual entry until the league's demise after the 1931 season.

Afterward the Motor City made two efforts to reprieve the Stars' legacy by entering franchises in the inaugural season of new leagues, the Negro National League in 1933 and the Negro American League in 1937.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

This ballclub began as a boys' team in 1910 but became a professional-level club in 1916. In 1917 they had Spot Poles and Bill Pettus in the lineup and posted a record of 23-15-1. For postseason exhibitions against major leaguers they added Smokey Joe Williams, Louis Santop, Dick Lundy, and other "ringers" to the lineup. The next year, 1918, they improved the quality of their team considerably and became competitive with any team in the East.

In 1923 they became a charter member of the Eastern Colored League, and won the first of three pennants with records of 32-17 and 47-13. The latter two years, they played in the first two Negro World Series between their league and the more established Negro National League. After losing the first Series to the Kansas City Monarchs in 1924, they defeated the Monarchs in a rematch between the same two teams in 1925, to claim the first (and only) World Series victory by an Eastern Colored League team.

After the dissolution of the Eastern Colored League early in the 1928 season, the ballclub joined the American Negro League in 1929, which was essentially the same league with a new name. That league also folded, after only one season, and Hilldale played as an independent team for the next two seasons.

The franchise was sold to John Drew, who owned a bus line from Darby to Philadelphia, in 1929 and he called the team the Darby Daisies, but to the public, the team remained Hilldale. Under Drew's direction the club faltered, and in 1932 Ed Bolden resumed control. He and manager Judy Johnson tried one more effort for financial stability by joining the East-West League, but both the league and the franchise folded in the throes of the Depression.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

One of the best known black baseball teams, the Homestead Grays' ballclub was organized in 1910, and Cum Posey, who would become the owner of the team, joined it as a player in 1912. Homestead was a steel mill town, and the workers at the U.S. Steel mill formed a baseball team for weekend recreation. Posey, a former football player and basketball star at Penn State University, was a railway mail worker and joined the steelworkers to play for the team. Playing on West Field in Homestead. the team began also playing twilight games during the week in addition to weekends. New players kept joining the team, and their reputation increased to the point of their becoming the leading attraction in the tri-state area. At first they added a little comedy to the game to enhance their appeal as a good gate attraction.

Soon after Posey started handling the team, it became a full-time job. He booked all the leading teams around the Pittsburgh area and, with the Grays playing as an independent team, made a good profit every year from 1912 to 1929. They joined the American Negro League in 1929, but the league lasted only one year. The next two seasons the Grays fielded its strongest teams since the franchise's inception, winning eastern championships both seasons. The 1931 club is called by many the greatest black team of all time.

But when the Depression hit in the thirties, there were some lean years for the Grays, and Gus Greenlee took advantage of Posey's economic situation to lure some of his best players to the Pittsburgh Crawfords. With no league in the East and the collapse of the Negro National League in the West, in 1932 Cum Posey organized the East-West League, but it didn't even last the year and folded in June.

In 1933 the Negro National league reorganized, and a year later, with Posey forming a partnership with Rufus "Sonnyman" Jackson to bring some money back to the organization, the Grays entered the Negro National League as associate members and became full members the following year, fielding a team each year until the league folded after the 1948 season.

During this time the Grays dominated the league, building a dynasty around the power tandem of Josh Gibson and Buck Leonard, dubbed the "thunder twins" and also called the black Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig by the media. The Grays won nine consecutive Negro National League pennants, 1939-1945, and also annexed the last flag in 1948. During this time they also played in five of the seven World Series played between the Negro National League and the Negro American League, including the first and the last of these Series. They lost the first Series to the Kansas City Monarchs in 1942 and lost to the Cleveland Buckeyes in 1945, but defeated the Birmingham Black Barons in each of the other three Series, in 1943-1944 and 1948. After the league broke up the Grays continued to play for two more years as an independent team, playing against lesser opposition, but disbanded after the 1950 season.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

This was previously a franchise of lesser distinction, but owner Thomas Bowser and manager C.I. Taylor stocked the team with players of major league caliber in 1914, and it immediately became one of the best teams in black baseball. An intense rivalry developed between Taylor and Rube Foster, the two managers acknowledged as the best in black baseball. After losing a hard fought championship series to Foster's Chicago American Giants in 1915, the ABCs overcame a division within the management between Bowser and Taylor to defeat the Chicago American Giants for the western championship in 1916.

A schism had developed between Bowser and Taylor following the 1915 season, and at the beginning of the 1916 season there were two ABC teams, with Bowser leading one and Taylor the other. Eventually Taylor's aggregation retained the quality players who formed the nucleus of his championship squad, and Bowser's team melded into obscurity. Under Taylor's leadership the ABCs became charter members of the Negro National League and fielded a team each year from 1920 to 1926. After Taylor's death in 1922, his wife tried to run the team with C.I.'s brother Ben at the helm, but wholesale defection of players to the new Eastern Colored League and a misunderstanding that led Ben also to take a managerial position in the East led to financial difficulties for Mrs. Taylor, and the team was disbanded.

In later years, a different franchise under new ownership but bearing the same name entered into league play in 193133, and again in 1938-1939 in the Negro American League. Each of the teams from the Depression years of the 1930s who bore the once proud ABCs name were characterized by instability and confusion. About the only commonality between the 1931 and 1932 teams was the manager, Candy Jim Taylor (another of the famous Taylor brothers). The players were different and they played in different leagues, with the former team in the Negro National League and the latter in the Negro Southern League.

In 1933 the team started in Indianapolis but very early in the spring moved to Detroit and played as the Stars. In the last effort to bring an ABCs team back to Indianapolis, the 1938 ABCs franchise shifted operations to the Midwest and played as the St. Louis Stars in 1939 40, while the Atlanta Black Crackers of 1938 moved into Indianapolis and played under the ABCs banner for a short time in 1939.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Owned by J.L. Wilkinson, a white businessman, the Monarchs were one of the best known and most successful black teams. The Monarchs captured a total of ten pennants, tying the Homestead Grays for the most flags by any Negro League team, and suffered only one losing season during their entire association with the Negro Leagues. And that season was during World War II, when the roster was decimated by the loss of players to military service. The Monarchs also hold the distinction of having won the first World Series ever played between opposing leagues, both in the initial World Series in 1924 between the Negro National League and the Eastern Colored League, and again in the reinstated World Series in 1942 between the Negro National League and the Negro American League.

A charter member of the Negro National League, they played through the 1930 season, winning pennants in 1923-1925 and 1929 while never experiencing a losing season. They narrowly missed a fourth straight pennant in 1926, when they won the first half title but lost a bitter nine game playoff to the Chicago American Giants by dropping a doubleheader on the last day. The Monarchs played in the first two World Series ever played, facing the Hilldale team on both occasions.

After dropping out of the league they played independent ball until joining the Negro American League as a charter member in 1937 and remaining even after the league lost its major status. During the first six seasons (1937-1942) they won five pennants, missing only in 1938. After the return of many of their best players, who had been called to service during World War II, they annexed another flag in 1946. In 1942, the first World Series since 1927 was played between the Monarchs and the Homestead Grays, with the Monarchs sweeping the Grays in four straight games. In 1946 the Monarchs lost a tough seven game Series to the Newark Eagles.

In 1948 the Monarchs won the second half of the split season but lost a seven game play off to the Birmingham Black Barons for the pennant and thereby missed a chance to appear in the last Negro World Series ever played. Following that World Series, the Negro National League folded and the Negro American League absorbed some of the franchises and expanded into division play. The Monarchs won the first half title in 1949 and annexed a division title in 1950.

Wilkinson had sold the franchise after the 1948 season to Tom Baird, who continued to operate the Monarchs through the 1950s, but by then the league was strictly a minor league operation.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

The Memphis Red Sox franchise was owned by two brothers, Dr. J.B. Martin and Dr. B.B. Martin, members of a prominent family in Memphis. Both men were dentists, and J.B. also operated a drugstore and a funeral home and had investments in real estate. He built his own ballpark for the team, owned a hotel next to the park, and operated the concession stand where he served chitterlings in addition to the standard ballpark cuisine. The franchise fielded a team in the Negro National League each year between 1924 and 1930, except for 1926, when they joined the Negro Southern League in its inaugural season. The Red Sox also fielded a team in the Negro Southern League in 1932, the only season when it was designated as a major league.

In 1937 Memphis became a charter member in the Negro American League and won the first half championship in 1938 with a 21-4 record. In the playoff with the second half winner, the Atlanta Black Crackers, the Red Sox won the first 2 games but the Series was canceled because of discord between the managements of the two ballclubs. The Red Sox remained in the league through 1950 but never again contended for the title.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

The New York Black Yankees' franchise was basically an extension of the New York Lincoln Giants, filling a void created when the Lincoln Giants folded operations after the 1930 season. In 1931 John Henry Lloyd managed an interim New York team, the Harlem Stars, which served as a bridge between the two longtime franchises.

In 1932 the New York Black Yankees began operation, with George Scales installed as manager. In 1936 the Black Yankees entered the Negro National League for the second half, finishing with an 8-7 league ledger, and for the next dozen seasons (1937-1948) the Black Yankees fielded a team in the Negro National League. But rather than dominating their league, as did their white counterparts (the New York Yankees), they were the doormats of the Negro National League, usually finishing in the cellar and never higher than fifth in a six team league.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

The New York Black Yankees' franchise was basically an extension of the New York Lincoln Giants, filling a void created when the Lincoln Giants folded operations after the 1930 season. In 1931 John Henry Lloyd managed an interim New York team, the Harlem Stars, which served as a bridge between the two longtime franchises.


Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Abe Manley acquired ownership of two floundering teams, the Brooklyn Eagles and the Newark Dodgers, and consolidated the two franchises into the Newark Eagles. The Eagles joined the Negro National League in 1936 and remained a highly competitive team until the league's demise in 1948. The highlight of the franchise's history was in 1946, when they won the Negro National League pennant and defeated the Kansas City Monarchs in a hard-fought 7-game World Series.

The next season they again started strong, winning the first half title, but lost Larry Doby to organized baseball and slumped in the second half, losing the pennant to the New York Cubans without a play off. After the league folded in 1948, the Eagles were sold and moved to Houston.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum

[luckymann]

Organized by Ed Bolden in 1933, the Stars won a Negro National League flag in 1934, their first season in the league. After copping the second half title, the Stars defeated the Chicago American Giants in a bitterly contested 7-game championship series. One of the games in the playoff was protested by the Chicago American Giants, but the Stars' victory was upheld, and Philadelphia claimed the pennant. Unfortunately, this was to be their last flag, even though they remained in the league until its demise in 1948.

The nearest they came to another title were strong second half finishes in 1938 and 1944, with their front office claiming they were cheated out of the latter pennant. After the Negro National League folded, the Stars entered the Eastern Division of the Negro American League but without any appreciable success.

Source: James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1994. / NLB eMuseum