Maybe I'll Pitch Forever: A Great Baseball Player Tells the Hilarious Story Behind the Legend

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Leroy Robert ("Satchel") Paige 

(1906-1982)

Baseball Pitcher

Leroy Robert ("Satchel") Paige (1906-1982) -- born in Mobile, Alabama -- became the first African American pitcher in the American League when he joined the Cleveland Indians in 1948. With Paige on the pitcher's mound, the Indians won the 1948 World Series. By 1952 Paige was pitching on the American League All-Star squad.  According to American ballplayer Dizzy Dean, the greatest pitcher of all time.

He was the sixth child of twelve, which included a set of twins of John Page, a gardener, and Lulu Coleman Paige, a domestic and washerwoman.

Leroy Paige earned his nickname as a boy who carried satchels, or suitcases, at the Mobile train station. At age 12, Satchel was sent to the Industrial School for Negro Children in Mount Meigs, Alabama, for shoplifting and truancy from W.C. Council School. There, he developed his pitching skills. 

A Satchel Chronology

1924 -- joined the semi-pro Mobile Tigers.

1926 (May 1) -- made professional pitching debut with the Chattanooga Black Lookouts of the Negro Southern League. 

1928 -- purchased by the Birmingham Black Barons, paid Page a phenomenal $275.00 a month. 

1932 -- jumped from the Black Barons to the Black Sox of Baltimore to the Nashville Elite Giants and finally the Cleveland Cubs, before settling with the Crawfords of Pittsburgh

1935 -- teamed with four other future Hall of Famers: Charleston, Bell, Johnson, and Gibson to win the Crawfords a league championship. 

1937 -- enticed by Dominican Republic dictator, Rafael Trujillo, along with other prominent stars of the Negro Leagues, to stock his politically motivated team.

1942 -- became the ace of the Kansas City Monarchs pitching staff, led them to the Negro World Series, swept Homestead Gray, in which Page won three of the four contests

1946 -- led Monarchs again to the Negro World Series 

1948 --  signed with Bill Veeck, owner of the Cleveland Indians on his 42nd birthday. A record crowd of 78,383 for a night game watched Paige make his first major league appearance. In his first starting role, he drew 72,434 fans in Cleveland's Municipal Stadium. As the oldest rookie in baseball, he won six times against one loss, helping the Indians to a pennant and a world series appearance against the Boston Braves.

1951 -- signed by the lowly St. Louis Browns in 1951, he promptly signed old Satchel again. Incredibly, the following year, 

1952 -- enjoyed one of his finest major league seasons at the age of 46  with the St. Louis Browns. Won twelve games and was selected to the All-Star team, achieving another honor as baseball's oldest selection.

1953-1956 -- with the Miami Marlins, over 50 years old, only walked 54 batters in 340 innings

1965 -- appeared for three innings with Kansas City Atheletics. when his two-month contract for $4,000 expired, the 59 year old legend retired from baseball.

1967 -- pitched his last game for the Indianapolis Clowns

1971 (August 9) -- became the first player from the Negro Leagues elected to Cooperstown's National Baseball Hall of Fame. When he accepted his award, he told the admirers that in the Negro Leagues, "there were many Satchels and many Joshes."

1982 ( Jume 5) -- made his last public appearance, suffering from the lingering illness of emphysema. Speaking from a wheelchair, he graciously received recognition at the dedication of a $250,000 renovated park, to be called the Satchel Paige Memorial Stadium, in Kansas City, Missouri

1982 (June 8)-- died in Kansas City, Missouri

1991 (October) -- honored with the dedication of a new magnet school called the Leroy "Satchel" Paige Classical Greek Academy, which promotes the Greek philosophy of "body and spirit," symbolizing Paige as one of the most physically talented and spirited bodies to play the sport.

By his own count, Paige threw 55 no-hitters and won over 2,000 of the 2,500 games he pitched. 

Satchel Philosophy Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. Ain't no man can avoid being born average, but there ain't no man got to be common. Avoid fried foods which anger the blood.  If your stomach disputes you, lie down and pacify it with cooling thoughts. Go very lightly on the vices, such as carrying on in society -- the social ramble ain't restful,

Satchel Philosophy  "Age is a question of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter." "Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you." "Don't pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines." "Money and women. They're two of the strongest things in the world. The things you do for a woman you wouldn't do for anything else. Same with money." "Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching." "Mother always told me, if you tell a lie, always rehearse it. If it don't sound good to you, it won't sound good to no one else."

Source: Leroy Satchel Page, et al. Maybe I'll Pitch Forever: A Great Baseball Player Tells the Hilarious Story Behind the Legend  (1962; 1993).