The Buck stops here: an outstanding player, manager, coach, scout, and ambassador for baseball; why isn't Buck O'Neil in the hall of fame?

COACH: Where did you grow up as a child? How were you introduced to the game?

O'NEIL: I was born in Carrabelle, FL, but I spent my teenage years in Sarasota, FL. Before I left Carrabelle my daddy, John, worked in a sawmill and played baseball on the sawmill teams. I was the batboy and I always had good hands. Though I was just 8 or 9, the old men would throw me the ball and I would catch it. I was a natural ham. And the fans would toss me nickels and dimes. I loved that.

Baseball really got into my veins when we moved to Sarasota because the New York Giants and their manager, John McGraw, held spring training there. Up in Tampa, Miller Huggins and the New York Yankees trained. Down in Fort Myers, just 70 miles south of me, were Connie Mack and the Philadelphia Athletics. So I had seen great baseball all of my life. The only thing was that everyone I saw making a living playing baseball was white.

COACH: What made you decide to make baseball a career?

O'NEIL: I had no idea about playing baseball for a living until my uncle took me to West Palm Beach. That's when I had the chance to see Rube Foster [considered the father of Negro League Baseball] and the Chicago American Giants and C.I. Taylor and the Philadelphia ABC's. They would spend the winter in Palm Beach, FL. They all worked in area hotels, like The Breakers, and played on Thursdays and Sundays.

When I saw them, I said, "These people are making a living playing baseball. Maybe I can do the same thing." I was a teenager at the time and baseball was just a natural for me. My professional career began in 1937 with the Memphis Red Sox. In 1938, I moved to the Kansas City Monarchs and stayed with them until 1955.

COACH: What is your fondest recollection from your playing days? Is there a moment, a game, or season that stands out above the rest?

O'NEIL: Just the idea that I played with some of the greatest ballplayers in the world: Satchel Paige, "Bullet" Joe Rogan, and Newt Allen. They were great, great baseball players. I played against Josh Gibson, Cool Papa Bell, and Buck Leonard--the great Negro League players. I also played against Babe Ruth and Dizzy Dean.

The first time I played against Babe Ruth was on the South Side of Chicago. It was an exhibition game between the Satchel Paige All-Stars and the Babe Ruth All-Stars. Back then they didn't have a fence--they had these tall cedar trees in the outfield. His first time up, Babe hit the first pitch off Satchel and it went over those trees. It must have traveled 500 feet.

Do you know who was the first person to greet Babe Ruth at home plate after he trotted around the bases? It was Satchel Paige. He wanted to congratulate him. They held up the game for 15 minutes while they sent a kid out to find the ball, bring it back, and have Babe Ruth autograph it for Satchel Paige. And the fans just went crazy.

COACH: What is your greatest personal moment in baseball?

O'NEIL: It was the season opener on Easter Sunday, 1942 in Memphis, TN. The first time up, I doubled. The second time up, I singled. The third time up, I hit the ball over the left field fence. The next time up I hit it to left-center, and it looked like it was going out of the ballpark. As I was approaching first base I kept saying, "Hit the fence! Hit the fence! Hit the fence!"

It hit the fence and bounced back between the center fielder and the left fielder. When I got to third base, the coach told me to keep going and try for an inside the park home run. But I stopped at third. I wanted that triple to finish the circuit

That night, I'm at the hotel. Our team's traveling secretary called me to come down because he had some people he wanted me to meet. The man who ran the restaurant had a wife who was a schoolteacher. She had invited some young schoolteachers over to meet the ballplayers. When I got downstairs, there were several people standing in front of the door. I opened the door and saw a young woman and walked straight toward her. I introduced myself as Buck O'Neil. She said her name was Ora Lee Owens. We were married for 51 years.

I would call that finishing the cycle!

COACH: What kind of player were you? We've you compared to Mark Grace--a slick fielding first baseman and line drive hitter.

O'NEIL: Excellent fielder, one of the best. One season I committed only one error. And I was a line drive hitter. I could stroke the ball, but I wasn't a power-type hitter. After serving two years in the U.S. Navy (1944-45), I led the league in hitting in 1946, batting .353. The following season I bettered .353, but didn't lead the Negro League. Willard Brown, a teammate of mine, beat me out with his seventh home run title, second only to the great Josh Gibson's nine.

COACH: You were a teammate of Satchel Paige's on the Kansas City Monarchs. Tell us what made him so great?

O'NEIL: His charisma. We always were a very good ball team. But with Satchel Paige pitching, we were a great ball club.

Satchel brought the best out of everybody. But I'll tell you what--Satchel also brought out the best in the team we were playing so it was always quite a contest.

COACH: Josh Gibson of the Homestead Grays is considered the "Black Babe Ruth." What kind of player and hitter was he?

O'NEIL: He was an outstanding catcher. He could run your ball club for you and was one of the greatest hitters who ever lived. Babe Ruth was a great power hitter. Josh was a great power hitter. Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa were great power hitters, but not great hitters, like the Babe and Josh.

Both hit better than .340 lifetime. The difference between Ruth and Josh was that Babe struck out nearly 100 times a year. Josh struck out maybe 20 times a year. He had great eyes.

COACH: You spent a lot of time traveling from town to town during your career. What was it like in the early days?

O'NEIL: It was outstanding, because we were the stars. We played during an era when all of the black hotels had live music. All the bars had live music. The theatres had live music. We'd play at Yankee Stadium in front of 40,000 people in the afternoon. That night we'd go to Harlem and the Apollo Theatre and see Ella Fitzgerald.

After leaving New York, we might go to Philadelphia and go to the matinee at the Pearl Theatre and see Count Basie playing. From there we might go to Washington, D.C., and go to the Howard Theatre and see Red Foxx or Pearl Bailey. It was exciting.

COACH: What kind of impact did the Negro League have on today's African-American players?

O'NEIL: A lot of them only know movies like "The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings" and "Soul of the Game." That wasn't Negro League Baseball. What they don't know is that Negro League Baseball was the third largest black business in this country. First were the large black insurance companies. Because the big white insurance companies only gave a 10-cent policy, which was just enough to bury us. Second was Madame C.J. Walker. She made millions in the cosmetics business. Next was Negro League Baseball. All you needed was a bus and a set of uniforms and you could have about 20 of the greatest athletes who ever lived. We played and made money.

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The Negro Leagues were not the way Hollywood portrayed them. Not at all. When I was a boy, only one percent of major league players were college men because most of the big leaguers came right out of high school.

But 40% of Negro League players were college men. That was because the Negro League teams always trained in black college towns. That's who we played during spring training. When the college season was over, the student-athletes, coaches, and teachers would come play Negro League Baseball. When our season was over, they would go back to school.

The legacy of the Negro League is educating today's black players about the history of baseball and the history of this country. Why do you think we had a Negro League? Because of segregation. We had to start a league of our own.

COACH: How did you feel when you discovered that Jackie Robinson would break the color barrier in 1947 and play in the majors?

O'NEIL: When Jackie signed that contract I was in the Navy at the Subic Bay Naval Base in the Philippines. The executive officer called me at 11 p.m. that night and said, "Bowsman O'Neil, come to my office at once."

I was wondering what I did wrong. When I walked into his office, he said, "Branch Rickey just signed Jackie Robinson to an organized baseball contract." I remember saying, "Thank God. It finally happened." I then grabbed the horn while everyone was sleeping and said, "Hear this, hear this, hear this. Branch Rickey just signed Jackie Robinson." Everybody whooped and hollered. We didn't sleep much that night.

COACH: Why do you think Brooklyn Dodgers GM Branch Rickey decided to integrate baseball?

O'NEIL: We played in Yankee Stadium before 40-45,000 people on a Sunday afternoon. Branch Rickey had 20,000 people over at his ballpark. Ninety-nine and nine-tenths of those 45,000 people we had at Yankee Stadium were black. That was a brand new clientele. Branch Rickey, being an astute businessman, recognized that. He was in direct competition with the Giants and Yankees in New York. He needed some help. Signing Jackie made great sense.

A lot of people have asked me, "Why did it take so long for the Yankees and Red Sox to sign a black ballplayer?" I'd tell them, "The Yankees didn't need a black ballplayer. They were filling up the ballpark everywhere they went." And Boston was filling up Fenway Park. They didn't need help. But Branch Rickey needed help. It's that simple.

COACH: You were not only a player/manger during your career with the Monarchs. You also became the first African-American to coach in the majors when the Chicago Cubs hired you in 1962. During that time you helped instruct future Hall of Famers' Ernie Banks, Lou Brock, and Billy Williams. What did you enjoy about coaching?

O'NEIL: Coaching is still baseball, and I love baseball. To see a kid and be able to help him--you can't beat that. That's my life.

COACH: What does it take to be a successful manager/coach in today's game?

O'NEIL: Baseball is still the same, except maybe for the designated hitter. The only difference now is the money. I remember a time when Babe Ruth made more than the manager. But usually the manager was the highest paid guy on the team. That's all changed. The ballplayer can now get the manager fired. He makes more money. You're paying the player $10,000,000 and the manager maybe $1,000,000. It makes things difficult.

COACH: If you were the commissioner for one day, what, if anything, would you change in today's game?

O'NEIL: Baseball is drawing more fans that ever before. People tend to talk about small market teams and how they can't compete with the big market clubs. That's the way it's always going to be in every sport. Everybody can't be New York City or Boston. They say the same thing here in Kansas City about the Royals, complaining about being small market. I just tell them, "Listen, we won the World Series as a small market team (1985). The current World Champions (Florida Marlins) are also small market."

You can't use that as an excuse. George Steinbrenner can't have more than 40 ballplayers on his roster, and there are more than 40 good ballplayers in the world. You just have to get off your seat, scout for good players, and develop what you've got. If you do that, the people will come. The winning will take care of itself.

COACH: Many people wonder why you have not been elected to the Hall of Fame. Does it bother you or mar your career in any way?

O'NEIL: No. Anybody in baseball would like to go to the Hall of Fame. But if I was Hall of Fame material, the thing that might have kept me out to this point was the fact that I was on the Veteran's Hall of Fame Committee when they started inducting the black ballplayers. I couldn't be voted in. Since I haven't been on that committee over the past two years, I can now be voted in.

COACH: How would you like to be remembered in baseball?

O'NEIL: I think my greatest deed in baseball was starting the Negro League Baseball Museum in 1990. But I'd like to be remembered as a fellow who's still learning.

RELATED ARTICLE: BUCK O'NEIL CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:

1911 Born November 13, 1911, Carrabelle, FL.

1937 Played first base for the Memphis Red Sox of the Negro League Baseball Players Association.

1938-1955 Player-manger, Kansas City Monarchs.

1940 Led the Negro League in hitting with a .345 batting average.

1942 Named to the first of three East-West All-Star Classics (1943, 1949).

1946 Led Negro League in hitting with a .353 mark. In the Negro League World Series he batted .333 with two homers.

1948-53 Led Monarchs to four league titles and one championship.

1956 Scout for the Chicago Cubs.

1962 Hired by the Cubs as the first African-American coach in the major leagues.

1988 Scout for the Kansas City Royals.

Present Chairman of the Negro League Baseball Museum Board of Directors: former member of the Veteran's Committee of the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

INTERVIEW BY KEVIN NEWELL