Josh Gibson: The greatest there ever was.
Nearly 80 years after his death, baseball’s record book has finally been amended to properly acknowledge one of the sport’s all-time talents.
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There is no footage of Josh Gibson online.
At least, none that I can find.
No YouTube clips of his legendary home runs. No comprehensive breakdowns, contrasting his swing to that of Ken Griffey Jr or Juan Soto.
Not even long-ago film, restored and colourized, to give you some idea, visually if nothing else, about the type of player he was.
It is an unfortunate reality for someone so-often said to be one of the best pure hitters his sport has ever seen, in any era.
If not the best.
But that’s just it.
When it comes to Gibson, to the countless men of the Negro Leagues who were shut out, so unfairly, from established whites-only baseball for decades, their legacies are still their own.
Still brilliant.
From Pop Lloyd and Oscar Charleston, to someone like Satchel Paige: who, in 1948, after twenty years in pro baseball, became the first Black pitcher in the American League (and continued to play professionally until he was nearly 60).
Their names and the stories they inspired, towering over the rest. Passed down and maintained, in such a way that others can only dream to be remembered.
Myth and humanity both, in equal measure.
So in December of 2020, when MLB announced it was reclassifying the seven Negro Leagues that operated from 1920 to 1948 as major leagues, rightfully, for the first time, it meant another wall would be coming down.
That announcement began what would be a years-long effort between MLB’s research teams and their various collaborators to compile, categorize and definitively organize the resulting statistics.
All of the players of yesteryear, at last, standing side-by-side as they should have been from the very beginning.
And on Wednesday?
Josh Gibson, most prominently, was given his due.
With Negro League statistics being fully incorporated into MLB’s record books, he now stands alone, at the top of the following categories:
All-time career batting average: .372.
All-time slugging percentage: .718
All-time career OPS: 1.177.
The single season leader in all three (BA, slugging and OPS: .466/.564/.974, respectively).
No longer Ty Cobb, Barry Bonds or Babe Ruth.
No longer Nap Lajoie or Ted Williams.
Gibson.
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Gibson never did play in the National or American Leagues.
He died in January of 1947, at just 35, after a series of serious health complications (an untreated brain tumour defined the final years of his life - he died, in Pittsburgh, from a stroke).
It was only a few months before Jackie Robison made history, breaking the colour barrier in the NL, followed by Larry Doby doing the same in the AL not long afterwards.
But to focus on what could have been, in that respect, would be to miss what was.
A baseball lifer, as documented by the Hall of Fame, of which he was inducted in 1972 who was, perhaps, one of the most complete players to ever set foot on a diamond.
Outside of the American Negro Leagues, where he primarily played with the Homestead Grays and Pittsburgh Crawfords, he also spent time in the Mexican, Cuban and Dominican circuits.
He was almost exclusively a catcher, baseball’s most physically taxing defensive position, at a time when consistent rest and substitutions were unknowns.
Playing every inning, every game, every doubleheader. Crouched low, knees bent.
Pitch after pitch.
His reflexes, quick eye and tremendously strong arm though, made him a force behind the plate, the bane of baserunners the country over.
It was and remains, however, his exceptional hitting that endures.
He could hit for average, clearly. He could get on base. He had incredible power.
But for decades, the available records of the Negro Leagues were frustratingly incomplete.
Scattered and lost to the wind, held together only through the invaluable work of operations like Seamheads, the Negro League Baseball Museum and now, this MLB-overseen, joint project.
Per MLB, as of this writing, Gibson will be credited with 174 career home runs - but his Cooperstown plaque in Upstate New York? It speaks to numbers more in line with his legend.
Power-hitting catcher who hit almost 800 home runs in league and independent baseball during his 17-year career.
The great
who listed Gibson as the fifteenth greatest player ever in his terrific book, The Baseball 100, noted that Seamheads had confirmed 238 home runs, as of 2021.In the Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Leagues, by James A. Riley? Gibson is credited with 962 homers.
And that is the biggest question surrounding Gibson and so many of his Negro League contemporaries: working to nail down even the seemingly basic facts that have, for years, been elusive.
Researchers had to identify whether players with the same name were one person or separate, tracking dates of birth and [identifying] people listed by nicknames. Documenting transactions and identifying ballparks in a time when neutral sites often were used is ongoing, along with uncovering statistics for independent teams.
But again, to be drawn to the what could have been? It to miss what is known for certain.
Josh Gibson, taking his place amongst the larger baseball pantheon, in full, for all to see.
A historic moment.
For a historic player.