Pitching Man (2009).
Meta-data is a runtime of 55m (not on IMDb).
Genre: Documentary.
DNA: 108-stitches. (If you know, then you know; and if you don’t, then you don’t.)
Verdict: Incomparable.
Tagline: If you quit, then the bastards win.
An hour spent in the singular company of Leroy ‘Satchel’ Paige from hungry poverty in Mobile Alabama to international celebrity on the strength of a fastball that no one, including Joe DiMaggio, could hit. He become the Major League’s Baseball’s Rookie of the Year at age 42. The Jolter was one of many who said Paige was the most difficult pitcher he ever faced, and even a windbag like Dizzy Dean said Paige was from another planet.
Know a man by his enemies: Taylor Sphinx (the tyrannical owner of the Sporting News) despised Paige. That is one for Satchel. Know a man by his friends. Bill Veeck was his best friend. Add another credit for Satchel. Here’s another for him: Teddy ‘Baseball’ Williams used his own induction speech at the Valhalla of Cooperstown to advocate the inclusion of historic black players and he named Satchel Paige as the best pitcher he had ever faced, and he saw a 42-year-old Satch.
All things considered in long hindsight the most remarkable thing about Paige was that he never complained about the constraints that racism put on him. He just got on with what he did best – pitching. He was no civil rights campaigner like Jack Robinson. I don’t know what conclusion to draw from that comparison but perhaps a reader does.
I saw him pitch an inning once in an exhibition game when he must have been sixty, and he struck out the side on nine pitches. I lined up for his autography later which he kindly provided but that artefact is now lost, perhaps it was kept by a buddy who lined up with me.
