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A baseball pioneer has died. Ron Teasley was among the first wave of African American players signed to the major leagues after Jackie Robinson broke the racial barrier. He was also a standout in the Negro National Leagues. With his death Tuesday at the age of 99, it is believed that now there may just be one living veteran left of the Negro Leagues. NPR's Debbie Elliott reports.
DEBBIE ELLIOTT, BYLINE: Ron "Schoolboy" Teasley signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1948. He got the tryout after excelling at Detroit's Northwestern High School and in college at Wayne State University, where he still holds a batting record.
RONALD A TEASLEY: He was actually signed by Branch Rickey, who was the same person who signed Jackie Robinson. So that's kind of historic right there.
ELLIOTT: That's his son, Ronald A. Teasley. He says the Dodgers assigned his father to a minor league team but cut him a few months later. That's when he joined the New York Cubans of the Negro Leagues.
RONALD A TEASLEY: Now, there's a little bit of uniqueness in that as well, because that means that my dad actually played in the minor leagues, MLB minor leagues before playing in the Negro League. And that - I don't think anybody - other player did that.
ELLIOTT: Teasley Sr. was born in 1927 in Detroit. He had an early interest in baseball, and by the time he was 11 or 12, he was playing Industrial League ball with the pros at a local rec center.
RONALD A TEASLEY: So as a youngster, my dad would be a batboy for some of these teams. He'd hang around up there and watch them practice. Sometimes not enough guys would show up, so they'd let the batboy, you know, play right field. So that's how he got a start, really, is that - kind of working out as a batboy with older guys, which, you know, was some great experience. A lot of these guys were former Negro Leaguers.
ELLIOTT: That's where he earned the nickname Schoolboy. Teasley served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and worked as a sports journalist. After his stint with the New York Cubans, he played in Canada, where he was an all-star.
LAYTON REVEL: At every level he played, he was exemplary.
ELLIOTT: Layton Revel is the founder of the Center for Negro League Baseball Research.
REVEL: You can't talk about baseball in the '40s and '50s in the African American community and Ron Teasley not be at the center of that conversation.
ELLIOTT: He's being lauded as not only a baseball great who helped change the face of the game, but for his grace and kindness. Teasley's legacy continued as an educator and coach at his high school alma mater, where he developed a pipeline of standout players. His family says he was committed to returning baseball to the inner city. In this interview with mlbplayers.com, Teasley recalled traveling with the Negro Leagues.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
RON TEASLEY: Especially the African American fans, they felt like we were some kind of a savior or something. Things were pretty tough sometimes. A lot of discrimination and that sort of thing. But whenever we came to town, they just - that was like the circus was coming to town.
ELLIOTT: Teasley said the players tried to instill hope that eventually things would change for the better. Debbie Elliott, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF BADBADNOTGOOD'S "TIMID, INTIMIDATING") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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