| Joe Jackson | |
|---|---|
| Outfielder | |
| Born: July 16, 1887 Pickens County, South Carolina |
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| Died: December 5, 1951 (aged 64) Greenville, South Carolina |
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| Batted: Left | Threw: Right |
| MLB debut | |
| August 25, 1908 for the Philadelphia Athletics | |
| Last MLB appearance | |
| September 27, 1920 for the Chicago White Sox | |
| Career statistics | |
| Batting average | .356 |
| Hits | 1,772 |
| Runs batted in | 785 |
| Teams | |
| Career highlights and awards | |
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Joseph Jefferson Jackson (July 16, 1887 – December 5, 1951), nicknamed "Shoeless Joe", was an American baseball player who played Major League Baseball in the early part of the 20th century. He is remembered for his performance on the field and for his association with the Black Sox Scandal, in which members of the 1919 Chicago White Sox participated in a conspiracy to fix the World Series. As a result of Jackson's association with the scandal, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, Major League Baseball's first commissioner, banned Jackson from playing after the 1920 season.
Jackson played for three different Major League teams during his 12-year career. He spent 1908–1909 as a member of the Philadelphia Athletics and 1910 with the minor league New Orleans Pelicans before joining the Cleveland Naps at the end of the 1910 season. He remained in Cleveland through the first part of the 1915; he played the remainder of the 1915 season through 1920 with the Chicago White Sox.
Jackson, who played left field for most of his career, currently has the third- highest career batting average in major league history. In 1911, Jackson hit for a .408 average. It is still the sixth-highest single-season total since 1901, which marked the beginning of the modern era for the sport. His average that year also set the record for batting average in a single season by a rookie.[1] Babe Ruth later claimed that he modeled his hitting technique after Jackson's.[2]
Jackson still holds the Indians and White Sox franchise records for both triples in a season and career batting average.[3] In 1999, he ranked number 35 on The Sporting News' list of the 100 Greatest Baseball Players and was nominated as a finalist for the Major League Baseball All-Century Team. The fans voted him as the 12th-best outfielder of all-time. He also ranks 33rd on the all-time list for non-pitchers according to the win shares formula developed by Bill James.
Jackson was reported to be illiterate, a charge to which he was sensitive. In restaurants, rather than ask someone to read the menu to him, he would wait until his teammates ordered, and then order one of the items that he heard.[4]
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Jackson was born in Pickens County, South Carolina, the oldest son in the family. His father George was a sharecropper. He moved the family to Pelzer, South Carolina, while Jackson was still a baby.[5] A few years afterwards the family moved to a company town called Brandon Mill, on the outskirts of Greenville, South Carolina.[6] Starting at the age of six or seven, Jackson worked in one of the town's textile mills as a "linthead", which means dusting the floors.[6] Since Joe was doing 12-hour shifts in the mill, and since education at the time was a luxury the Jackson family couldn't afford, Jackson was uneducated.[6] His lack of education would be an issue throughout Jackson's life. It would become a factor during the Black Sox Scandal and has even affected the value of his memorabilia in the collectibles market. Because Jackson was uneducated, he often had his wife sign his signature. Consequently, anything actually autographed by Jackson himself brings a premium when sold, including one autograph which was sold for $23,500 in 1990.[7] An attack of measles almost killed him when he was 10. He was in bed for two months, paralyzed while he was nursed back to health by his mother.[8]
In 1900, when he was 13 years old, his mother was approached by one of the owners of the Brandon Mill and he started to play for the mill's baseball team.[9] He was the youngest player on the team. He was paid $2.50 to play on Saturdays.[8] He was originally placed as a pitcher, but one day he accidentally broke another player's arm with a fastball. No one wanted to bat against him so the manager of the team placed him in the outfield. His hitting ability made him a celebrity around town. Around that time he was given a baseball bat which he named Black Betsy.[9] He was compared to Champ Osteen, another player from the mills who made it to the Majors.[9] He moved from mill team to mill team in search of better pay, even playing semi-professional baseball by 1905.[9]
According to Jackson, he got his nickname during a mill game played in Anderson, South Carolina. Jackson suffered from blisters on his foot from a new pair of cleats, and they hurt so much that he had to take his shoes off before an at bat. As play continued, a heckling fan noticed Jackson running to third base in his socks, and shouted "You shoeless son of a gun, you!", and the resulting nickname "Shoeless Joe" stuck with him throughout the remainder of his life.[10]
1908 was an eventful year for Jackson. He began his professional baseball career with the Greenville Spinners of the Carolina Association, married 15-year-old Katie Wynn, and eventually signed with Connie Mack to play Major League Baseball for the Philadelphia Athletics.[10]
For the first two years of his career, Jackson had some trouble adjusting to life with the Athletics; reports conflict as to whether he just did not like the big city, or if he was bothered by hazing from teammates. Consequently, he spent a great portion of that time in the minor leagues. Between 1908 and 1909, Jackson appeared in just 10 games.[11] During the 1909 season, Jackson played 118 games for the South Atlantic League team in Savannah, Georgia. He batted .358 for the year.
The Athletics finally gave up on Jackson in 1910 and traded him to the Cleveland Naps. He spent most of 1910 with the New Orleans Pelicans of the Southern Association, where he won the batting title and led the team to the pennant. Late in the season, he was called up to play on the big league team. He appeared in 20 games and hit .387. In 1911, Jackson's first full season, he set a number of rookie records. His .408 batting average that season is a record that still stands and was good for second overall in the league behind Ty Cobb. The following season, Jackson batted .395 and led the American League in triples. On April 20, 1912, Shoeless Joe Jackson scored the first run in Tiger Stadium.[12] The next year, he led the league with 197 hits and a .551 slugging percentage.
In August 1915, Jackson was traded to the Chicago White Sox. Two years later, Jackson and the White Sox won the American League pennant and also the World Series. During the series, Jackson hit .307 as the White Sox defeated the New York Giants.
Jackson sat out most of 1918 because of World War I. In 1919, he came back strongly to post a .351 average during the regular season and .375 with perfect fielding in the World Series. However, the heavily-favored White Sox lost the series to the Cincinnati Reds. The next season, Jackson batted .382 and was leading the American league in triples when he was suspended, along with seven other members of the White Sox, after allegations surfaced that the team had thrown the previous World Series.
After the White Sox lost the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds, Jackson and seven other White Sox players were accused of accepting $5,000 each to throw the Series. In September 1920 a grand jury was convened to investigate the allegations.
During the series Jackson had 12 hits (a Series record) and a .375 batting average—leading individual statistics for both teams. He committed no errors and threw out a runner at the plate.[13]
It is often said that the Cincinnati Reds hit an unusually high number of triples to left field where Jackson played during the series.[14] This is not supported by the contemporary newspaper accounts. According to first hand accounts, none of the triples were hit to left field. In fact, more triples were muffed by Shano Collins than were hit to Jackson. (Collins was ironically listed as the wronged party in the indictments of the conspirators. The indictments claimed he was defrauded of $1,784 ($22,655 today) by the actions of those charged.)
In testimony before the grand jury on September 28, 1920, Jackson admitted under oath that he agreed to participate in the fix. Contemporary news accounts contend that Jackson told the grand jury:[15]
| “ | When a Cincinnati player would bat a ball out in my territory I'd muff it if I could—that is, fail to catch it. But if it would look too much like crooked work to do that I'd be slow and make a throw to the infield that would be short. My work netted the Cincinnati team several runs that they never would have had if we had been playing on the square. | ” |
No such direct quote or testimony to this effect appears in the actual stenographic record of Jackson's grand jury appearance.[16] However, Jackson did admit to receiving a cash payment of $5,000 ($63,494 today) and that he had been originally promised a $20,000 ($253,977 today) bribe. Legend has it that as Jackson was leaving the courthouse during the trial, a young boy begged of him, "Say it ain't so, Joe," and that Jackson did not respond. In an interview in SPORT nearly three decades later, Jackson contended that this story was a myth.[17] A contemporary press account does refer to an exchange of Jackson with young fans outside of the Chicago grand jury hearing on September 28:
When Jackson left criminal court building in custody of a sheriff after telling his story to the grand jury, he found several hundred youngsters, aged from 6 to 16, awaiting for a glimpse of their idol. One urchin stepped up to the outfielder, and, grabbing his coat sleeve, said:
"It ain't true, is it, Joe?"
"Yes, kid, I'm afraid it is," Jackson replied. The boys opened a path for the ball player and stood in silence until he passed out of sight.
"Well, I'd never have thought it," sighed the lad.[18]
Regardless of whether Jackson's exchange with the shocked young fan was a true historical event or a fabrication by a sensationalist journalist, the "Say It Ain't So" story remains an oft-repeated and well-known part of baseball lore.
In 1921 a Chicago jury acquitted Jackson and his seven teammates of wrongdoing. Nevertheless, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, the newly appointed Commissioner of Baseball, declared all eight accused players ineligible for future MLB play, citing baseball's need to maintain a clean image as his top priority. Jackson never played in organized baseball after the 1920 season.
During the remaining 20 years of his baseball career, Jackson played and managed with a number of semi-professional teams, most located in Georgia and South Carolina.[19] In 1922, Jackson returned to Savannah and opened a dry cleaning business.
In 1933, the Jacksons moved back to Greenville, South Carolina. After first opening a barbecue restaurant, Jackson and his wife opened "Joe Jackson's Liquor Store", which they operated until his death. One of the better known stories of Jackson's post-major league life took place at his liquor store. Ty Cobb and sportswriter Grantland Rice entered the store, with Jackson showing no sign of recognition towards Cobb. After making his purchase, the incredulous Cobb finally asked Jackson, "Don't you know me, Joe?" Jackson replied, "Sure, I know you, Ty, but I wasn't sure you wanted to know me. A lot of them don't."[20]
As he aged, Jackson began to suffer from heart trouble. In 1951, at the age of 64, Jackson died of a heart attack.[19] He was the first of the eight banned players to die, and is buried at nearby Woodlawn Memorial Park. He had no children.
Jackson remains on MLB's ineligible list, which automatically precludes his election to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. In November 1999 the US House of Representatives passed a motion lauding Jackson's sporting achievements and encouraging MLB to rescind his ineligibility.[21] The motion was symbolic, as the US government has no jurisdiction in the matter. At the time MLB commissioner Bud Selig stated that Jackson's case was under review, but no action has been taken that would allow Jackson's reinstatement.
Jackson spent most of the last 30 years of his life proclaiming his innocence, and evidence has been uncovered which casts doubt on his role in the fix. For example, Jackson reportedly refused the $5000 ($63,494 today) bribe on two separate occasions—despite the fact that it would effectively double his salary—only to have teammate Lefty Williams toss the cash on the floor of his hotel room. Jackson then reportedly tried to tell White Sox owner Charles Comiskey about the fix, but Comiskey refused to meet with him.[22] Unable to afford legal counsel, Jackson was represented by team attorney Alfred Austrian—a clear conflict of interest. Before Jackson's grand jury testimony, Austrian allegedly elicited Jackson's admission of his supposed role in the fix by plying him with whiskey.[13] Austrian was also able to persuade the nearly illiterate Jackson to sign a waiver of immunity from prosecution.[22] Years later, the other seven players implicated in the scandal confirmed that Jackson was never at any of the meetings. Williams said that they only mentioned Jackson's name to give their plot more credibility. Jackson's performance during the series further suggests his innocence.[13]
An article in the September 2009 issue of Chicago Lawyer magazine argued that Eliot Asinof's 1963 book Eight Men Out, purporting to confirm Jackson's guilt, was based on inaccurate information, and that Asinof omitted key facts from publicly-available documents such as the 1920 grand jury proceedings and the 1924 trial. Asinof's use of fictional characters within a supposedly non-fiction account added further questions about the historical accuracy of the book.[23]
See: Baseball statistics for an explanation of these statistics.
| G | AB | H | 2B | 3B | HR | R | RBI | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | SLG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,332 | 4,981 | 1,772 | 307 | 168 | 54 | 873 | 785 | 519 | 158 | .356 | .423 | .517 |
Shoeless Joe has been depicted in a few films in the late 20th century. Eight Men Out, a film directed by John Sayles, based on the Eliot Asinof book of the same name, details the Black Sox scandal in general and has D. B. Sweeney portraying Jackson.
The Phil Alden Robinson film Field of Dreams, based on Shoeless Joe by W. P. Kinsella, stars Ray Liotta as Jackson. Kevin Costner plays an Iowa farmer who hears a mysterious voice instructing him to build a baseball field on his farm so Shoeless Joe can play baseball again. (Liotta portrays Jackson as batting right-handed and throwing left-handed, although Jackson actually batted left and threw right.)
Jackson's nickname was worked into the musical play Damn Yankees. The lead character, baseball phenomenon Joe Hardy, alleged to be from a small town in Missouri, is dubbed by the media as "Shoeless Joe from Hannibal, MO." The play also contains a plot element alleging that Joe had thrown baseball games in his earlier days.
Jackson was also an inspiration, in part, for the character Roy Hobbs in The Natural. Hobbs has a special name for his bat (as Jackson did), and is offered a bribe to throw a game. In the book (but not the film), a youngster pleads with Hobbs, "Say it ain't so, Roy!"
Shoeless Joe is a character in the song "Kenesaw Mountain Landis", by Jonathan Coulton, although the song takes many liberties with the story for comedic effect.
Even though Jackson was banned from Major League Baseball, people after his death would build parks and statues for him. One of the landmarks built for him was a Memorial Ballpark which can be found in Greenville, South Carolina. The baseball field that was built in his name is called Fluor Field (formerly known as West End Field).
A life-size statue of Jackson, created by South Carolina sculptor Doug Young, stands in Greenville's West End.
In 2006, Joe Jackson's original home was moved to a location adjacent to Fluor Field at the West End in downtown Greenville. The home was restored and opened in 2008 as the Shoeless Joe Jackson Museum and Baseball Library. The address is 356 Field Street, in honor of his lifetime batting average.
Jackson was inducted into the Shrine of the Eternals by the Baseball Reliquary.
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