Major League Baseball was segregated until 1947, when Jackie
Robinson broke the color barrier by joining the Brooklyn Dodgers. Despite
that important first step, the trail blazing athlete was not a cure-all and the
game only gradually and begrudgingly trudged towards inclusion. The Boston Red
Sox were the last big league franchise to integrate, with backup infielder Pumpsie
Green’s appearance on their 1959 roster making them the final team to field
a black player. The franchise long battled a wretched
reputation when it came to race (which persists
to this day), and it might have been even worse if it weren’t for the work of Ed Scott.
An African American, Scott was born in 1917 and grew up in
Mobile, Alabama. Like many young boys, he became fascinated with baseball,
though at the time his only chance to play professionally would have come
through the Negro Leagues. He was good enough to play as an outfielder for
semi-pro and barnstorming teams before a lengthy stint with the Indianapolis
Clowns (1940-1952). One of his proudest
moments was winning a 32 piece dish set and barbecue basket by getting the
first hit against Satchel
Paige in a 1940 game. To make ends meet because baseball didn’t always pay
the bills, he also had a 20-year career working for a paper company.
Once he was no longer
able to hold an on-field position he took up scouting, which would become his defining
career. In a strange twist of irony, although baseball was slow to come around
on integration, once black players began to be signed some teams began what
amounted to an arms war to make sure they were not missing out on the new
available talent pool. With segregation polluting the country, in the earlier
days black scouts had better access and knowledge of black amateur players than
their white scouting counterparts.
Scott scouted for Negro League and major league teams. His most
famous find came early on, as he was able to secure the services of a young
outfielder named Henry “Hank”
Aaron for the Indianapolis Clowns. Not long after that the youngster was
signed by the Boston Braves and went on to have a Hall-of-Fame career as
baseball’s “Home Run King.”
Scott’s son, Ed Jr., later explained that Aaron came to be
signed when he was spotted playing in a Mobile softball game. “If that boy can
hit a softball that far, how far he can hit a baseball,” mused Scott
Sr.
Scott later explained that once he had secured Aaron for the
Clowns, he sent a report to the team, indicating
“Aaron was the greatest wrist hitter I had ever seen.”
Beginning in the early 1960s, Scott began working for the
Red Sox in a scouting capacity after being recommended by former player Milt Bolling.
Through the years he signed a number of players who went on to have outstanding
professional careers, including George Scott,
Oil Can
Boyd, Andre
Dawson and Amos Otis.
Bolling went so far as to later
say that if Boston had hired Scott earlier "we might have had Hank
Aaron and Ted Williams on the same team."
So respected was the work of Scott that he remained on the
Red Sox’s employee roll until the early 2000s, compiling a 34-year stint with
the team. When he passed away in 2010 at the age of 92, he left behind a wife
of 69 years, seven children, 27 grandchildren, 20 great-grandchildren and an
indelible mark on the game of baseball.
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