LOVERRO: Negro League slugger Oscar Charleston punched his way into the record book

Oscar Charleston knew just one way to play — smash whatever was in his path, whether it was a baseball, an umpire or someone who got on his wrong side.

The Negro League legend was pretty good at smashing all of them.

The Baseball Hall of Fame outfielder (he was inducted in 1976) was known for his temper as much as his skills on the diamond. He was one of the greatest hitters baseball has ever seen – and one of the most volatile, often compared to the fiery Ty Cobb.

In John Holway’s book, “Blackball Stars,” former teammate Ted Page said, “Oscar Charleston loved to play baseball. There was nothing he liked to do better, unless it was fight. He didn’t smoke, he didn’t drink, but he enjoyed a good fight with the opposition.”

He was feared as a hitter, and rightly so. 

Now that MLB has integrated Negro League statistics into the record books, Charleston is officially third on the all-time career batting leader list, with a .363 average, behind only Josh Gibson and Cobb.

He’s sixth all-time in on-base percentage with a .449 career mark; seventh in slugging percentage at .614; and fifth in OPS with a 1.063 record. His highest single-season batting average was .434, fourth all-time.

Charleston, who played and managed from 1915 to 1954 with multiple Black baseball teams, from the Chicago American Giants to the Homestead Grays, has passed the likes of Roger Hornsby, Tris Speaker and other all-time greats. Yet he rarely has come up in discussions of the greatest hitters in baseball history. That should change.

Negro League great Buck O’Neil, in his autobiography, “I Was Right On Time,” wrote: “To this day, I always claim Willie Mays was the greatest major league player I have ever seen … but then I pause and say that Oscar Charleston was even better. He was like Ty Cobb, Tris Speaker rolled into one.”

Charleston was born in Indianapolis in 1896. He worked as a batboy for the Indianapolis ABCs, a team he would later play for and manage. He ran away from home at 15, joined the U.S. Army and played baseball while stationed in the Philippines.

He began his career as an outfielder with the Indianapolis ABCs in 1915 and was immediately one of the team’s best hitters. He batted .446 with 14 home runs and a .774 slugging percentage in 1921. He played for the Harrisburg Giants from 1924 to 1927, hitting over .400 twice. He would go on to play for the Hilldale club and Homestead Grays until 1932, when he joined Gus Greenlee’s Pittsburgh Crawfords until 1938.

Against major league players in a barnstorming series, Charleston hit five home runs in five games and batted .458. 

The story goes that three times in the series after reaching first base, Charleston told the opposing pitchers he would steal second base on the next pitch.

He kept his word all three times. He is believed to have batted about .400 in barnstorming against major league players.

In Robert Peterson’s book, “Only The Ball Was White,” Negro Leaguer Jimmie Crutchfield told a story that illustrated Charleston’s batting talents. “We were playing a major league All-Star team one night in Des Moines, Iowa,” he said. “This was 1936 when Charleston was big and fat (Charleston’s weight reportedly ranged from 175 to 240 pounds). I heard him on the bench saying, ‘I just don’t get a thrill out of batting anymore unless there’s someone on the bases.’ He had popped up a couple of times. Sure enough, we got two men and Charleston said, ‘Now this is what I’ve been waiting for.’ He doubled against the left-centerfield wall and waddled into second base. That’s the kind of guy Charleston was. If I had to pick the best player I saw in my time, it would be hard to pick between Charleston and Josh Gibson. When the chips were down and you needed somebody to bat in the clutch … even at his age, he was as good as anybody playing baseball.”

He may have been as tough as anybody who ever played the game. There is a tale about how he once got into a fight on a train with wrestling champion Jim Londos and threatened to throw him off the train. There were also stories about how Charleston could supposedly tear the cover off the ball with his bare hands.

In a 1915 exhibition game against a White team in Indianapolis, Charleston was thrown in jail, charged with assault and battery after he punched an umpire over a disputed call, starting a riot on the field.

Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey created the United Baseball League for Black players in 1945 and hired Charleston to manage the Brooklyn Brown Bombers. He also scouted players for Rickey and urged him to sign a catcher named Roy Campanella. The league disbanded in 1947.

Charleston played and managed the Indianapolis Clowns until he died in 1954. Former Philadelphia Giants catcher Bill “Ready” Cash recalled that even as an aging player-manager, Charleston had remarkable batting skills. “When he was managing, he was about 50 years old,” he said. “He would dare any lefthander, give him two strikes and dare him to throw anything he wanted to and he’d never get it by him for the third strike.”

Negro Leaguer Newt Allen, in an interview on file at the Baseball Hall of Fame, said Charleston was “the best outfielder I’ve ever seen. Willie Mays was a good outfielder, and so was (Joe) DiMaggio, but this man Charleston had, I don’t know, there was something about him.”

• This is the latest in an occasional series of columns spotlighting Negro League ballplayers added to the Major League Baseball record books earlier this year. Catch Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.