Cool Papas and Double Duties: The All-Time Greats of the Negro Leagues

This 2001 book combines biographies of several top Negro League players with a methodical effort to determine which of those stars deserve inclusion into Baseball's Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Author William McNeil provides brief biographical looks at several talented but slightly second-tier (or less-remembered) players, like Mules Suttles, Biz Mackey, Turkey Stearns, Ted "Double Duty" Radcliffe (who lived to 103), Newt Allen, etc. He also gathers opinions from experts, historians, and former players, allowing them to rate which players deserve inclusion into the Hall of Fame. As many know, accurately rating Negro Leaguers is made somewhat more difficult due to a shortage of surviving statistical records. Still, the experts do their best, and five years after this book was published the Hall of Fame posthumously welcomed 15 additional players (including Suttles, Mackey, Cristobel Torriente and Ray Brown) plus two Negro League executives. Later in these pages, the experts offer their lists of top overall players, and here one finds many better-known favorites already in the Hall, including Josh Gibson, Oscar Charleston, Satchel Page, Cool Papa Bell, etc. Somehow I'd have preferred fewer expert lists and more biographical information on the players. Still, this book is nicely informative, reminds of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum (in Kansas City), and offers information on several less-remembered players.