What the Buck?!?

Why are National League pitchers still throwing to Albert Pujols? When is Hank Aaron’s defense going to get half the attention of his bat? Will Barry Bonds and “Got Steroids?” grow synonymous? There are lots of questions in baseball. The official date that John Jordan “Buck” O’Neil gets inducted into Cooperstown should not be one of them. It would have been a travesty if next week, when Bruce Sutter and 17 Negro League players/figures are enshrined into the Baseball Hall of Fame, O’Neil’s name would have been called. That, in itself, would have been a decade too late. Sadly, that’s not even the case, as O’Neil –in a vote that even mystifies George Bush supporters- was not elected into the Hall by the Veteran’s Committee.

If you watched ESPN, Fox Sports or even Jay Leno over the past few days, you heard Buck O’Neil’s name because on July 17 he became the oldest pro baseball player ever when he walked twice for the Kansas City T-Bones, a Minor League club that has proven to be one of the strongest lobbyers for O’Neil’s Hall induction. But taking swings at 94 isn’t why O’Neil should be shoulder to shoulder with Satchel, Mickey and Babe; it’s the man’s dedication to the preservation of the sport that should earn enshrinement. Put it like this, if Dick Vitale (basketball) and John Madden (football) are in their respected sport’s hall of fames for things they did after their coaching days, Buck should be, too. Neither has done any more for his game than the former Kansas City Monarchs manager has—and it’s an absolute insult that voters think otherwise.

“Tell ya what,” begins Ambassador O’Neil, the first African American coach and scout for a Major League franchise, “baseball changed a lot of things in this country. When Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson to that contract, that was before Brown vs. Board of Education. That was before Rosa Parks said, ‘I’m tired today. I’m not going to the back of the bus.’ Dr. King was a sophomore at Morehouse at the time. So, this actually started the Civil Rights Movement. Now I just want people to know this story, the story about the Negro Leagues and what happened before and after.”

That’s why Buck O’Neil should have a plaque. The diamond griot shared those words with me nearly two years ago. That’s what the man did and still does nearly every day of the year—share life stories as they relate to line drives and left fielders, all in an attempt to keep the triumphs of the Negro League from ever falling into some dusty dugout in sports fans’ minds. “Before the Ken Burns documentary [Baseball],” O’Neil continues, “90% of the people in this country didn’t know anything about the Negro League. But after the Ken Burns documentary, people started to gather information pertaining to the Negro League." That might explain why 17 seemingly forgotten names will be called on July 30.

I’m taking nothing away from Mule Suttles’ bat or Effa Manley’s brains; fans should get to know both well. But until John Jordan “Buck” O’Neil makes sports headlines for making his own speech on the podium, and not for being a 94-year-old player in some stadium promotion, Cooperstown strikes out at being the complete galaxy of stars it was destined to be.