Negro Leagues Have Been Elevated to Major League Status

[joefromchicago]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

I get the logic here but I do think that the question still might be what the level of the white major leagues was at that point, comparatively speaking. Segregation did not just mean that there might have been players in the Negro Leagues who weren't at what we might call major league quality but also a great many white players on major league teams who probably shouldn't have been there and wouldn't have been had more talented black players been allowed to compete with them. I acknowledge that you are far more of an expert on the earlier days of professional baseball than I am, but I've always been under the impression that the gap between the most talented players and the least talented players in the major leagues in earlier (pre-integration) times was much wider than it has been for the past 50+ years.

That last point is probably true, although I think it has much, much more to do with the widespread use of modern analytics than with racial discrimination. And it's certainly true that some white players owed their jobs to the fact that they couldn't be replaced by superior Black players. But when integration finally came, only a relative handful of NeL players made the transition to the major leagues.

By my count, 70 players who played in the NeL appeared in the AL/NL in the years 1947-59. I think 1959 is a fair cut-off, as the last team to integrate its organization (the Tigers) did so in 1953. So that would give former NeL players at least six years to make it up through the organization and into the big-league club, which, I think, is generous. 1959 is also eleven years after the NeL stopped being a major league, according to MLB, although a tiny remnant persisted into the 1960s. Certainly, by 1959, there was little reason for players to make a stop in the NeL when the minor leagues were open to them.

So 70 former NeL players appeared in the AL/NL over the span of thirteen seasons. That's less than ten per team. I don't know how many white minor leaguers debuted in the AL/NL over that same span, but my guess is that it is quite a bit more than 70. And not all of those former NeL players were stars like Roy Campanella and Willie Mays. That suggests that the caliber of players in the NeL was somewhat comparable to that of the top level of the minor leagues.

Now, of course, there are a ton of caveats that have to be applied even to that tentative statement. Racial discrimination didn't magically disappear in 1947, and a few teams - most famously, the Red Sox - refused to integrate even though they probably would have benefitted from adding Black players on their rosters. And some MLB-caliber players never made it to the big leagues because of age or physical condition, like Josh Gibson. Still, I think it can be safely assumed that, after 1947, the best NeL players were signed by AL/NL teams, and of those, 70 made it to the bigs by 1959.

As a thought experiment, imagine if the AL went out of business today. How many AL players would be signed by NL teams? A quarter? A half? All of them? Well, that's pretty much what happened with the Negro Leagues. Once Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier, the NeL's days were numbered. Even MLB has decided that the Negro Leagues weren't a major league after 1948. The NeL didn't go out of business overnight, but it was pretty close. Yet only 70 former NeL players made it to the big leagues by 1959. Again, that indicates that the level of play in the NeL was somewhat lower than that of the established major leagues.

Now, imagine that the Japanese baseball leagues went out of business today. How many Japanese players would MLB teams sign? My guess is that it would be a significantly smaller percentage than if the AL went out of business. I think that's comparable to the situation with the NeL, which again suggests that the NeL played at about a "AAAA" level.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by TomVeal

Let's look at this question in a different way. In the period of the baseball color bar, the U.S. population was just about exactly ten percent black and a shade under 90 percent white. If baseball talent was evenly distributed by race and no other factors intervened, one would expect to find 40 black players with ability comparable to the 400 major leaguers of that era. For the average quality of the all-black major leagues to be equal that of their all-white counterparts, the former would have to be much smaller, or blacks would have to be inherently much better at playing baseball, or top-notch black players would have to be much more likely to play baseball professionally than top-notch white players.

In short, the hypothesis that the black and the white majors were equal as well as separate requires an explanation of a huge racial disparity, as well as an explanation of why that disparity vanished as soon as the color line was erased. That is a lot that must be explained in order to overcome the simpler hypothesis that the Negro Leagues, notwithstanding some superlative players, had to draw on a much smaller talent pool and were, as a consequence, weaker on the whole than the white leagues.

The population of the Dominican Republic is 10.63 million (as of 2018.) There are roughly 145 players currently in the MLB who are from the Dominican Republic.
The population of the State of Texas is 29 million. During the 2019 season there were 92 players in the MLB who were born in Texas.

As I've mentioned in a previous post here, total population of a place or demographic grouping of peoples bears very little relation to the number of athletes at the highest reaches of any particular sport. There are many reasons that this argument, which feels like it would be quite logical, just doesn't hold water.

[CBeisbol]

Originally Posted by TomVeal

Let's look at this question in a different way. In the period of the baseball color bar

When baseball and the United States was overtly racist and didn't allow black players to play with white players due to that racism.

the U.S. population was just about exactly ten percent black and a shade under 90 percent white. If baseball talent was evenly distributed by race and no other factors intervened, one would expect to find 40 black players with ability comparable to the 400 major leaguers of that era.

44 players



I do agree with the overall point, the overall talent in the Negro leagues was probably less than the talent in the racist white AL and NL.

[TomVeal]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

The population of the Dominican Republic is 10.63 million (as of 2018.) There are roughly 145 players currently in the MLB who are from the Dominican Republic.
The population of the State of Texas is 29 million. During the 2019 season there were 92 players in the MLB who were born in Texas.

As I've mentioned in a previous post here, total population of a place or demographic grouping of peoples bears very little relation to the number of athletes at the highest reaches of any particular sport. There are many reasons that this argument, which feels like it would be quite logical, just doesn't hold water.

That's right, and the reasons for the Dominican Republic's outsized contribution to baseball are well known. Are there any similarly powerful factors that would explain how the black tenth of the U.S. population could, by hypothesis, have had as large a pool of Major League caliber players as the other ninety percent?

[TomVeal]

Originally Posted by CBeisbol

When baseball and the United States was overtly racist and didn't allow black players to play with white players due to that racism.


44 players



I do agree with the overall point, the overall talent in the Negro leagues was probably less than the talent in the racist white AL and NL.

Then I don't think that we disagree.

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

The population of the Dominican Republic is 10.63 million (as of 2018.) There are roughly 145 players currently in the MLB who are from the Dominican Republic.
The population of the State of Texas is 29 million. During the 2019 season there were 92 players in the MLB who were born in Texas.

As I've mentioned in a previous post here, total population of a place or demographic grouping of peoples bears very little relation to the number of athletes at the highest reaches of any particular sport. There are many reasons that this argument, which feels like it would be quite logical, just doesn't hold water.

Yes. Boys in Texas have ... a zillion opportunities for jobs and careers and all. Even if they're good at sports, they might study, I don't know, rocket science.

If you're a boy that's good at sports in the Dominican Republic, baseball will be right at the top of the list for career opportunities to pursue.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by joefromchicago

That last point is probably true, although I think it has much, much more to do with the widespread use of modern analytics than with racial discrimination. And it's certainly true that some white players owed their jobs to the fact that they couldn't be replaced by superior Black players. But when integration finally came, only a relative handful of NeL players made the transition to the major leagues.

By my count, 70 players who played in the NeL appeared in the AL/NL in the years 1947-59. I think 1959 is a fair cut-off, as the last team to integrate its organization (the Tigers) did so in 1953. So that would give former NeL players at least six years to make it up through the organization and into the big-league club, which, I think, is generous. 1959 is also eleven years after the NeL stopped being a major league, according to MLB, although a tiny remnant persisted into the 1960s. Certainly, by 1959, there was little reason for players to make a stop in the NeL when the minor leagues were open to them.

So 70 former NeL players appeared in the AL/NL over the span of thirteen seasons. That's less than ten per team. I don't know how many white minor leaguers debuted in the AL/NL over that same span, but my guess is that it is quite a bit more than 70. And not all of those former NeL players were stars like Roy Campanella and Willie Mays. That suggests that the caliber of players in the NeL was somewhat comparable to that of the top level of the minor leagues.

Now, of course, there are a ton of caveats that have to be applied even to that tentative statement. Racial discrimination didn't magically disappear in 1947, and a few teams - most famously, the Red Sox - refused to integrate even though they probably would have benefitted from adding Black players on their rosters. And some MLB-caliber players never made it to the big leagues because of age or physical condition, like Josh Gibson. Still, I think it can be safely assumed that, after 1947, the best NeL players were signed by AL/NL teams, and of those, 70 made it to the bigs by 1959.

As a thought experiment, imagine if the AL went out of business today. How many AL players would be signed by NL teams? A quarter? A half? All of them? Well, that's pretty much what happened with the Negro Leagues. Once Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier, the NeL's days were numbered. Even MLB has decided that the Negro Leagues weren't a major league after 1948. The NeL didn't go out of business overnight, but it was pretty close. Yet only 70 former NeL players made it to the big leagues by 1959. Again, that indicates that the level of play in the NeL was somewhat lower than that of the established major leagues.

Now, imagine that the Japanese baseball leagues went out of business today. How many Japanese players would MLB teams sign? My guess is that it would be a significantly smaller percentage than if the AL went out of business. I think that's comparable to the situation with the NeL, which again suggests that the NeL played at about a "AAAA" level.

All a very logical argument and I certainly can't say for certain that any of this is wrong.
But I would suggest, as you somewhat allude to, that the color barrier being broken didn't mean that all at once there was full inclusion and a purity of meritocracy. As you noted, many teams were loathe to integrate while I think there is plenty of evidence that other teams were happy to have one or two black players but certainly weren't comfortable with much more than that, at least to begin with. And I don't think it is unreasonable, given any understanding of societal systems and cultural history, that where there was anything like equality of talent between an already established white MLB player and a black player, the white player wasn't likely losing his job.

The most talented players from the Negro Leagues, if they were young enough and healthy enough, migrated to the MLB. (And yes, there were a few lesser players who made the transition in those early days as well, the exceptions to the rule.) That is the nature of the glacial progress of integration; the exceptional must succeed first and then eventually the average, the non-noteworthy, the merely competent finally get their chance. The numbers you give are powerful, but without a discerning contextual framework I suggest they aren't really that meaningful. The fact that more players did not make the transition is not proof that more weren't capable of doing so, had they been given the chance.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by TomVeal

That's right, and the reasons for the Dominican Republic's outsized contribution to baseball are well known. Are there any similarly powerful factors that would explain how the black tenth of the U.S. population could, by hypothesis, have had as large a pool of Major League caliber players as the other ninety percent?

Well, given what the options were for young black men in America in the time period we are talking about, not very different at all from the reasons for the D.R.'s outsized contribution.

This argument about population totals and persons who succeed at the highest levels of a field somehow being proportional all seems quite silly to me. There are nations (or regions, or cities, etc.) that produce an outsized number of world famous chefs, celebrated poets, brain surgeons, etc.
There are always many factors in play and trying to extrapolate how many professional ballplayers exist in any one place or demographic group based upon population is a fool's game.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Yes. Boys in Texas have ... a zillion opportunities for jobs and careers and all. Even if they're good at sports, they might study, I don't know, rocket science.

If you're a boy that's good at sports in the Dominican Republic, baseball will be right at the top of the list for career opportunities to pursue.

Right- kind of like being a young black man in America for most of the history of this nation.

[CBeisbol]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

Right- kind of like being a young black man in America for most of the history of this nation.

Except baseball wasn't a field in which young black men could expect to succeed - being barred from the biggest most successful two leagues.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by CBeisbol

Except baseball wasn't a field in which young black men could expect to succeed - being barred from the biggest most successful two leagues.

Do you really believe that is true?
Don't you think that any young black man of the time who had the honor of playing for the Kansas City Monarchs (especially a young black man without an education who perhaps had as his other alternatives only an array of back-breaking and thankless jobs), would have deemed himself a success?

I would suggest that for Black Americans during much of the history of the Negro Leagues (pre-integration) there was a clear path to success by being a baseball player and that even though much of the path was rocky, low-paying, and agonizing (not unlike the path to the MLB), to finally suit up to play for Rube Foster's American Giants or the Detroit Stars of Turkey Stearnes or the aforementioned Monarchs was to be a great success indeed.

While the color bar was despicable, I think we do a great disservice to the vibrant Black culture of the time, of which the Negro Leagues were such a powerful symbol, when we conclude that it was only playing in the white major leagues that defined success in the sport. The top Negro Leagues, and certainly the very best Negro Leagues' teams, were incredibly successful, drew huge crowds, were covered in major (Black) newspapers around the nation, and the players in those leagues were hugely adored and emulated and revered, even if tragically little known to most White Americans of their time.

Edit: Let me put this a slightly different way. From all of my reading about the Negro Leagues, I get the distinct impression that the men who played in it, and the people in this country who followed it, did not consider it an inferior league. So for them there was no shame, no second-class status, in being a player at the highest level of baseball available to a person with darker skin in this nation. Sure they thought it was wrong that they couldn't play, at least not in an organized, official capacity, against the other greatest baseball players in America. But they knew they were just as good. It is only from the perspective of the dominant, majority white culture that one could say that they were barred from playing at the highest level. They knew better.

[CBeisbol]

Originally Posted by TomVeal

That's right, and the reasons for the Dominican Republic's outsized contribution to baseball are well known. Are there any similarly powerful factors that would explain how the black tenth of the U.S. population could, by hypothesis, have had as large a pool of Major League caliber players as the other ninety percent?

I doubt that baseball players were evenly distrubuted geographically.
Where were most baseball players from that era from?
I'd guess the east and south.
I'd also guess those areas had higher proportions of African Americans

I'd also guess that including that factor would decrease the disparity.

[BirdWatcher]

I would also like to point out, once again, that players in the Negro Leagues didn't just come from the population of African Americans. There were many Negro Leagues players from other nations whose skin was considered too dark for them to play in the white major leagues.

This population percentage game (which admittedly I think is silly, as I've already said) isn't a simple as many of you wish to portray it.

[CBeisbol]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

It is only from the perspective of the dominant, majority white culture that one could say that they were barred from playing at the highest level.

Right
And this has been my reaction to this whole thing from, almost, the first moment.

Do you really believe that is true?

Yes
I do not believe the lure of playing in the Negro Leagues was as great as the lure of coming to America and potentially earning a million dollars or hundreds of millions of dollars to a boy in the Dominican Republic.

I do not believe baseball was as big a part of the culture back then as it has been in the Dominican Republic.

I could be wrong

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by CBeisbol

Right
And this has been my reaction to this whole thing from, almost, the first moment.


Yes
I do not believe the lure of playing in the Negro Leagues was as great as the lure of coming to America and potentially earning a million dollars or hundreds of millions of dollars to a boy in the Dominican Republic.

I do not believe baseball was as big a part of the culture back then as it has been in the Dominican Republic.

I could be wrong

Fair enough. I didn't mean to imply that the motivations were the same or even equivalent.
My argument mostly was that given the choices a young black man had, especially one from a poor family and without an education, becoming a star in the Negro Leagues was not an insignificant level of success. And as with many skilled professions, lack of options has a way of driving ambitious people to exceed at very high levels.
Also, that before 1947 most young black men wouldn't have seen the pinnacle of success for themselves as baseball players being the white major leagues. That just wasn't even an option and not worth thinking about. But playing for the Monarchs or the AmGiants or the Homestead Grays or the Birmingham Black Barons, well, I think that was the pure definition of success and something to be strived for mightily.

And, as you said, I could be wrong.

[mitchkenn]

Originally Posted by joefromchicago

Yeah, I don't think the decision by MLB will have any effect on player ratings in OOTP. Those ratings are based on the stats, and the stats won't suddenly get more accurate and comprehensive just because the commissioner waved his magic wand to make over a century of discrimination disappear.

That said, I think OOTP's ratings tend to hurt Negro League players simply because those players almost always played fewer league games than their white counterparts. OOTP will adjust ratings downward for players who didn't appear in a minimum number of games. That way, the benchwarmer who hit .415 in 15 games doesn't automatically run away with your league's batting title. The problem with the Negro Leagues is that, for some seasons, there may only be stats for 20 or 30 league games. So OOTP dings all of their ratings. That's not something that will be changed by MLB's latest pronouncement. It may, however, be something that OOTP's design team might want to consider when it comes up with ratings for those players.

i completely agree with this Joe. Take a hitter as Albert Toney (lifetime .234 hitter according to Seamheads stats). To me a .234 hitter in the major leagues is a better hitter than a .234 hitter in AAA even though on paper they are equal. i don't know how the game adjusts or dings according to levels. That the Negro Leagues have been designed AAA level in the game, that "ding down" to AAA level hurts when playing against ML level talent. So all i am hoping for is they no longer get that reduction, even if it's for a measley .234 hitter. i've no idea what their formula for rating the levels is , or if they'll equalize the Negro League players in the upcoming version. Just hoping is all.

[Garlon]

If you go to the Steam Workshop, subscribe to Baseball Greats. There is a team of every Negro League player in the Hall of Fame and 1291 total players.

[joefromchicago]

Originally Posted by mitchkenn

i completely agree with this Joe. Take a hitter as Albert Toney (lifetime .234 hitter according to Seamheads stats). To me a .234 hitter in the major leagues is a better hitter than a .234 hitter in AAA even though on paper they are equal. i don't know how the game adjusts or dings according to levels. That the Negro Leagues have been designed AAA level in the game, that "ding down" to AAA level hurts when playing against ML level talent. So all i am hoping for is they no longer get that reduction, even if it's for a measley .234 hitter. i've no idea what their formula for rating the levels is , or if they'll equalize the Negro League players in the upcoming version. Just hoping is all.

I'd certainly be in favor of that.

[OutS|der]

Originally Posted by Garlon

If you go to the Steam Workshop, subscribe to Baseball Greats. There is a team of every Negro League player in the Hall of Fame and 1291 total players.

Just play Cooperstown’s Negro League QuickStart to see a full compliment of negro league players