1945 Cleveland Buckeyes Season Timeline

This article was published in From Setbacks to Success: The 1945 Cleveland Buckeyes (SABR, 2025), edited by Vince Guerrieri, Thomas Kern, and Bill Nowlin.

As 1945 dawned, World War II was winding down toward its conclusion – even if that wasn’t apparent as the year began. After repelling the Nazis in the Battle of the Bulge, Allied troops were moving through Europe, making their way toward Berlin – and presenting the question of how to defeat the Japanese in the Pacific Theater after Germany’s surrender.

Sports were in a precarious position as well. High-school, college, and minor-league teams suspended operations as men who would play or coach joined the service. Professional football teams merged, and although major-league baseball was deemed vital for morale in Franklin Roosevelt’s “green light letter,” a “work or fight” order – similar to the one that curtailed parts of two major-league seasons in World War I – was considered. Ultimately, the All-Star Game was canceled and travel was limited for the 1945 season.

Things were even more tenuous in the Negro leagues. If major-league baseball had a green light, the Negro leagues, formed as a place for Black ballplayers to play for largely Black crowds, had an “amber light,” according to the Call and Post, the newspaper serving Cleveland’s Black community.1

In the league’s spring meetings, travel was cut 25 percent, and expansion was limited. But it still looked as though a good season was shaping up for Cleveland’s entry into the Negro American League, the Buckeyes.

The Buckeyes had started three years earlier, and originally were scheduled to split their time between Cleveland and Cincinnati. But the team made League Park its full-time home – unlike the Indians, who were splitting time between League Park and Municipal Stadium, which had lights installed for night baseball – in 1943.

Prior to the 1945 season, the Buckeyes lured Quincy Trouppe from the Mexican League to become the team’s player-manager. Trouppe, a catcher, drew favorable comparisons to Josh Gibson, regarded as the greatest player in the Negro leagues – and probably one of the greatest in any league. “He hits the ball hard and is a fine receiver, with a true fast-throwing arm and the ability to catch and throw with lightning like speed,” said Buckeyes general manager Wilbur Hayes.2

Pittsburgh Courier sports editor Wendell Smith called the Buckeyes the American League’s most balanced team and picked them to win the pennant, writing, “On paper, Cleveland has the best team in the Western circuit.”3

The season was scheduled to begin on May 6, divided into two halves. The first half would begin with the Buckeyes playing the two-time defending NAL champions, the Birmingham Black Barons, and end on the Fourth of July, with the Buckeyes playing the Monarchs in Kansas City. The Monarchs had won four straight Negro League championships ending in 1942, and were expected to contend again, with their newest player, a former UCLA football star named Jackie Robinson, and Satchel Paige, regarded as one of the best pitchers of his day.

As the Buckeyes made their way through spring training in Oklahoma and Texas, including a doubleheader split against the New York Cubans in New Orleans on April 8, Jethroe was called to try out for the Boston Red Sox.4 Could the Buckeyes lose their best player – but to the major leagues, which was all White under a “gentlemen’s agreement”? As it turned out, the tryout was just to keep some Boston officials happy and allow the Red Sox to continue to use Fenway Park for Sunday baseball. Jethroe was never even informed by the team that he didn’t make the cut.

The Buckeyes were ready to open the season against the Barons, who the Call and Post said were feeling cocky. But the Buckeyes were feeling optimistic too. “We put up a good fight and held our own,” Hayes said after splitting a six-game preseason series in Texas with the Cuban All-Stars. “Trouppe’s great catching is making all the difference with our pitching staff.”5

Eugene Bremer (sometimes spelled Bremmer) got the nod in the first game of the season-opening twin bill at Birmingham. Closing in on age 30, the 5-foot-9 pitcher had 13 years’ experience and three all-star appearances (he would add a fourth in 1945).

A native of New Orleans, Bremer started his pro career with his hometown Crescent Stars in 1932. Three years later, he latched on with the Shreveport Giants, followed by a stint with the Cincinnati Tigers, which found a home in the Negro American League when it was founded in 1937. A year later, Bremer ended up in Memphis, where he spent three years. He sat out 1941, but split 1942 between Memphis and the newly formed Ohio Buckeyes. By 1943, the Buckeyes made Cleveland their permanent home, and Bremer continued to pitch for them, as he was turned down from the service in World War II.6

Bremer threw a shutout to open the 1945 season, but the Buckeyes didn’t fare so well in the nightcap, losing 9-3 to split. Willie Jefferson, who played for the Buckeyes with his brother George, took the loss.

The Buckeyes then made their way north, playing a doubleheader the following Sunday, May 13, against the Chicago American Giants – in two different states. Cleveland beat Chicago 9-8 in a game in Dayton, Ohio, behind home runs by Jethroe and Avelino Cañizares, then crossed the state line to win the nightcap 14-2 in Indianapolis, sparked by a nine-run fifth inning. General manager Wilbur Hayes said the team drew 2,500 in Dayton and 5,000 in Indianapolis.7

Cleveland Call and Post, May 26, 1945

The Buckeyes then embarked on an arduous tour leading up to the May 27 home opener. They played a doubleheader against the Cincinnati-Indianapolis Clowns on May 20, met them again for an exhibition game at Red Bird Stadium (later known as Cooper Stadium) in Columbus two days later, and played the Fremont Green Sox at Swayne Field in Toledo two days after that.8 The Buckeyes split the Sunday twin bill with the Clowns to roll into Cleveland tied for first place with Memphis, at 4-2.

Meanwhile, rumors were circulating about Black players in the White major leagues. Washington Senators owner Clark Griffith was accusing Branch Rickey of setting himself up as “the guiding light behind a new colored U.S. League,” issuing an ultimatum to the Negro American and Negro National Leagues to join a new league or else. “Mr. Rickey is attempting to destroy two well organized leagues which have been in existence for some time and in which colored people of this country have faith and confidence,” Griffith said.9

Nearly 10,000 fans crammed into League Park at East 66th Street and Lexington Avenue on May 27 for the home opener for the Buckeyes, to play the Memphis Red Sox in a doubleheader. The two teams were tied atop the standings of the Negro American League.

Led by player-manager Larry Brown, the Red Sox, like their major-league namesakes of the same time, were always regarded as long on talent but short on results. (They were also one of the few Negro League teams to have their own ballpark, Martin Park.)

Almost immediately, Buckeye fans were given excitement. Cañizares hit an inside-the-park home run, and Parnell Woods stole home for another run as the Buckeyes won the first game 3-1. George Jefferson started for the Buckeyes in the first game, but he gave way to brother Willie. The Buckeyes were able to turn a pair of double plays, a testament to the improved fundamentals player-manager Trouppe had been pushing since spring training dawned. The Buckeyes exploded for five runs in the fifth inning of the second game to gain a 6-2 win and a sweep of the doubleheader.

Three days later, the teams met for a Decoration Day doubleheader on Wednesday, May 30.10 Again, the Buckeyes swept the Red Sox. The Buckeyes won the first game handily, 14-2, but were down two runs in the second game and down to their last out, when Avelino Cañizares laced a two-run single to tie the game. In the 10th, Woods tripled, and was singled home with the winning run by Archie Ware.

The Buckeyes had won four straight from the Red Sox, and were now sitting alone atop the standings, two games up in the loss column over the perpetual power Kansas City Monarchs.

As June dawned, Call and Post sports editor Bob Williams was completely sold on the Buckeyes. “They are quite a ball club, fortified in all departments,” he said.11

Williams gave most of that credit to owner Ernie Wright, who was more than willing to spend for a championship, and one of Wright’s key acquisitions, player-manager Quincy Trouppe. Williams’s column in the June 2 edition of the weekly newspaper exhorted fans to support the team. “Cleveland fans will help get that championship team by their support and attendance at the home games,” he wrote.12

The Clowns were scheduled to come to Cleveland the following weekend, but rain washed out the scheduled doubleheader on June 3. The Buckeyes then took to the road, with games in Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. They won three of four from the Clowns, losing to them in Buffalo on June 10, and six of eight from the Red Sox, who were quickly becoming the team’s punching bag. The Buckeyes also beat the Kansas City Monarchs 5-0 in Belleville, Illinois, on June 8, coming within one hit of a perfect game. The Buckeyes were up two games on the Monarchs in the loss column in the Negro American League when they returned to Cleveland for a doubleheader against the Chicago American Giants on June 17, “drunk with recent successes” with “blood in their collective eyes and a yen for bear,” according to the Call and Post.13 But the Buckeyes were only able to split the twin bill against the American Giants – and might not have even done that were it not for a controversial call.

The first game seemed interminable, locked in a tie going into the 13th inning. Cañizares walloped a double to lead off the home half of the inning. Ducky Davenport hit a comebacker to the pitcher, Gready McKinnis, who tried unsuccessfully to take Cañizares out at third. Davenport was safe at first, and the winning run was 90 feet away from home. An intentional walk loaded the bases, and Parnell Woods was up to bat.

With the infield pulled in, Woods hit a chopper to short. The shortstop threw home. It was a bang-bang play, and catcher Tommie Dukes missed the tag on Cañizares. Umpire Harry Walker called the runner safe, winning the game for the Buckeyes. Walker was immediately besieged by Chicago players and manager Candy Jim Taylor, who had come to Chicago after leading the Homestead Grays to back-to-back Negro World Series. Police had to separate the umpire from the American Giants.

Walker later said that Dukes missed the tag, and his foot was off home plate, so Cañizares was safe at home.

The second game started without incident, and the American Giants beat the Buckeyes 6-1. The two teams met for another doubleheader the following weekend – after games in Dayton, Indianapolis, Muncie, Indiana, and Toledo – as the end of the first half of the season drew near.

The Buckeyes chased Lefty McKinnis from the mound in the fourth inning, and then four innings later, battered Sug Cornelius. The Buckeyes batted around in the eighth inning, scoring eight runs on the way to a 17-2 win that saw every Buckeye player get a hit and score a run. George Jefferson got the win on the mound for Cleveland. There was still offense to come in the second game, a 10-1 win for the Buckeyes. Sam Jethroe went 7-for-9 at the plate in the doubleheader, 3-for-5 in the first game, and 4-for-4 in the nightcap, including an inside-the-park home run.

As June drew to a close, the Buckeyes were 27-9, with a three-game lead over the second-place Birmingham Black Barons and 11 games up on the Kansas City Monarchs. Jethroe was leading the league in hits, total bases, triples (with Trouppe), and home runs. Buckeyes teammates Archie Ware and Parnell Woods led the league in RBIs and stolen bases respectively.

The next stop was Ruppert Stadium in Kansas City, where the Buckeyes played the Monarchs – four games in as many days – a doubleheader on July 1, and another twin bill on Independence Day. The Buckeyes swept the first doubleheader, coming from behind in both games, and won the holiday doubleheader as well.

Cleveland Call and Post, July 7, 1945

The Buckeyes then swept the Cubans in a July 8 exhibition doubleheader, including a win over Luis Tiant Sr., and returned home as first-half champions, with a record of 31-9.

The Buckeyes beat the Atlanta Black Crackers, 9-1 in an exhibition July 12,14 before opening the second half, like the first half, against the Birmingham Black Barons. They first played a doubleheader in Louisville on July 15, and then the next day returned to Cleveland, not to League Park on the city’s east side, but 60 blocks west to Municipal Stadium, on the lakefront in downtown Cleveland, which had more than double the seating capacity – and lights. It was the first home night game of the season for the Buckeyes, who had a significant lead on the Barons, in part because the Barons played a fuller exhibition schedule on the East Coast.

The game was to benefit the Future Outlook League, an organization founded a decade earlier to get jobs for African Americans.15 Combating the prejudice of the era with tactics like rent strikes and boycotts (one slogan was “Don’t buy where you can’t work”), the league was able to find work for many African Americans.16 American entry into World War II led to increased employment opportunities for everyone, including African Americans, and the league was starting to refocus as the war drew to an end.

The game was part of a $150,000 fundraising campaign for a recreation center (ultimately, never built as the league’s power continued to dissipate into the 1950s), and a crowd of more than 15,000 was anticipated – including, rumor had it, major-league scouts who were evaluating the Negro League talent, which the Buckeyes and Barons had in abundance.

For the Buckeyes, not only did George Jefferson have a record of 7-1 pitching, but he was batting .433, 31 points ahead of Ed Steele, the Birmingham outfielder in second place. Jefferson’s teammate with the Buckeyes, Sam Jethroe, was hitting .394, and led the league with 31 runs, 56 hits, and 84 total bases. Parnell Woods led the league with 30 RBIs. Overall, the Buckeyes led the league with a .313 batting average, 213 runs scored, and 8 home runs. Defensively, they had a .965 fielding percentage, nine points over Kansas City, in second place. And as good as the Buckeyes were, they were getting better. They added Duro Davis from the Indianapolis Clowns.

The game was expected not just to be an event, but a pitched battle between two of the best teams in the Negro Leagues. And it was a battle – just not the kind that was envisioned.

In the bottom of the third, umpire James Thompson called the Buckeyes’ Avelino Cañizares safe in a bang-bang play at first. Words were exchanged, and Thompson found himself in a confrontation with several Barons players. Home-plate umpire Harry Walker threw out the Barons’ Lorenzo Davis, nicknamed Piper for his hometown in Alabama. Piper Davis, a foot taller and about 60 pounds heavier than Thompson, sucker-punched the umpire, who “fell over backwards like an obedient ten-pin, without even buckling in the knees.”17

The crowd turned instantly. Fans were enraged, and “had the shameful incident occurred at League Park, where the fans are closer to the playing field, serious consequences might have developed.”18 Davis left under a police escort and Thompson swore out a complaint for assault and battery.19 The Buckeyes won 6-2, almost as an afterthought.

After a game against the Barons the next day in Columbus, the Buckeyes’ next opponent was the Clowns, the team that was trying to supplant the Buckeyes in Cincinnati. The Clowns began as an independent barnstorming team, the Ethiopian Clowns. They then split their time between Cincinnati and Indianapolis (ultimately making Indianapolis their full-time home starting in 1946). And after the debacle in the night game the previous week at Municipal Stadium between the Buckeyes and the Birmingham Black Barons, the Clowns lost to the Buckeyes in a game in St. Marys, Ohio, on July 21, and then played a doubleheader at League Park the following day.

It would be their first trip to Cleveland that season, and the Buckeyes took both games. The game was also notable for an appearance by James Thompson, who had been sucker-punched by the Barons’ Piper Davis a week earlier. Davis, in addition to facing a criminal charge of assault and battery, had been suspended by Barons owner Abe Saperstein (who also owned the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team – which Davis played for as well).

Up next for the Buckeyes, on July 24, was probably the most famous Negro League team of all time: the Kansas City Monarchs. The big draw – and he would definitely take the mound against the Buckeyes – was ace pitcher Leroy “Satchel” Paige. Satch, who would find himself in front of Cleveland baseball fans again just three years later in an Indians uniform, was an ageless wonder who could seemingly pitch every day. He was already nearly 20 years into a career that saw him pitch across the Western Hemisphere, in the Negro Leagues (including, briefly in Cleveland for the 1931 Cleveland Cubs), on barnstorming tours, and in Central and South America (occasionally, as he’d tell it, at the point of a gun).20

The Monarchs were a dynasty in the Negro Leagues in the early 1940s, thanks in no small part to Paige. But they also featured a fierce competitor and all-around athlete named Jack Roosevelt Robinson. Jackie Robinson was an Army veteran and lettered in four sports at UCLA. He had never played professional baseball and was coaching (and occasionally playing) college basketball at Samuel Houston College in Austin, Texas, when the Monarchs came calling.

And Robinson stepped into the batter’s box against Eugene Bremer in the top of the ninth at League Park, with the Monarchs down 3-0. He hit a long fly ball more than 400 feet down the left-field line, and it cleared the fence – just inches outside the foul line, under the watchful eye of third-base umpire James Thompson, making his return to umpiring after his knockout at the hands of Piper Davis a little more than a week earlier at Municipal Stadium. Robinson then stepped back into the batter’s box and hit another drive, not as long, but long enough down the right-field line to end the shutout with a solo home run.

John Scott then hit a comebacker to Bremer for the first out. Lee Moody singled to right, and then advanced to second on a groundout by pinch-hitter Hilton Smith. Chester Gray came in to pinch-run and scored on a double by Jack Matchett. It was now a one-run game with the tying run at second and two outs. Pinch-hitter Jim LaMarque flied out to end the game.

Cleveland Call and Post, July 28, 1945

The pennant was within reach for the Buckeyes, but first came the year’s biggest showcase: the East-West Game, the Negro League all-star game.

The East-West All-Star Game started in the same year as the major-league-baseball All-Star Game, 1933. In fact, both were played at Comiskey Park in their first year.

The major league All-Star Game was originally conceived as a one-off by Chicago Tribune sports editor Arch Ward to coincide with the Century of Progress World’s Fair of 1933, but became an annual tradition, for decades providing the only opportunity outside of exhibitions and the World Series where players from the National and American Leagues would meet.

The East-West Game was divided not by leagues but by geographic regions, with Pittsburgh serving as the westernmost point to be considered part of the “East.” The game was created to be a moneymaker for owners of Negro League teams, who were subject not just to the Depression, but to the prejudices of the day – which could also take a toll on their pocketbooks.

By 1945, the game had become an event unto itself, even regularly outdrawing the mainstream All-Star Game – a trend that would continue by default that year, as wartime travel restrictions eliminated the All-Star Game, replacing it with a series of exhibitions.

While the White All-Star Game had become a moveable feast, traveling to different cities, the East-West Game stayed on the South Side of Chicago, and became a social event for African Americans, with celebrities like Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, and Joe Louis in attendance. In fact, historian Larry Lester has written that the East-West Game was the biggest event in African American culture except for a fight by the Brown Bomber, Joe Louis.21

In 1945, four Cleveland Buckeye players were selected for the game: catcher-manager Quincy Trouppe, first baseman Archie Ware, pitcher Eugene Bremer, and outfielder Buddy Armour as a reserve. The East-West Game was more democratic than the All-Star Game. Although fans selected the lineups for the first two midsummer classics, for the following 11 years, teams were selected by the managers. The East-West Game lineup was voted on by fans, not at ballparks, but through African American newspapers like the Pittsburgh Courier and the Chicago Defender.

But two of the biggest Negro League stars were not at the game. Josh Gibson had been suspended by his team, the Homestead Grays, for violations of team rules. Satchel Paige refused to play because of a dispute with ownership over how much he’d get paid (as the most popular player in the Negro Leagues, Paige had the kind of leverage that eluded many players; in fact, it was only the year previous that players started receiving a stipend of $200 for playing in the game).22

The 1945 East-West Game, on July 29, was the poorest attended since 1939 – still drawing more than 31,000 fans – thanks in part to scalpers who were asking particularly outlandish prices. The West struck first in the second. The Memphis Red Sox’ Neal Robinson legged out an infield hit. The Indianapolis Clowns’ Alex Radcliffe hit a screamer to right field, ostensibly within reach of Wild Bill Wright of the Baltimore Elite Giants. But Wright didn’t have his sunglasses, and lost the ball in the sun, letting Robinson take third. Robinson and Radcliffe both scored on Ware’s hit into center field. Ware was then caught trying to steal second by Baltimore catcher Roy Campanella.

Trouppe was walked – the first of three free passes for the day – so pitcher Tom Glover could face pitcher Verdell Mathis of Memphis. He singled to left and Trouppe took third. Glover was then relieved by Bill Ricks of Philadelphia, who faced the Monarchs’ Jesse Williams. Williams hit a long drive to right, and Wright – still without his shades – lost what turned into a triple to score Mathis and Trouppe. The West added four more runs in the third for what turned out to be an insurmountable lead. The East put up five runs in the top of the ninth, but their comeback came up short in a 9-6 win for the West, their third triumph in a row.

Ware ended up with two hits and three RBIs. Trouppe got a hit in his only official at-bat. While Trouppe, Ware, Bremer, and Armour were in Chicago, the rest of the Buckeyes were playing the New York Cubans at the Polo Grounds on July 29, dropping both ends of a doubleheader.

There was little more than a month left in the regular season after the East-West All-Star Game, and the Buckeyes, already winners of the first half of the season, had designs on taking the second half as well – and a date in the Negro World Series.

The Buckeyes didn’t have the star power of some other teams – the Homestead Grays had Josh Gibson, regarded as the best power hitter in the Negro leagues (and possibly all of baseball), and the Monarchs had Satchel Paige and Jackie Robinson – but they played well together and had more than their fair share of talent. The entire lineup was hitting over .300, led by Sam Jethroe, who had raised his batting average to a robust .409 and led the league with 16 stolen bases and eight triples. Buddy Armour was fourth in the league with a .360 average, and Archie Ware led the league with 36 RBIs.23

The Buckeyes then went to Detroit, making their first appearance at Briggs Stadium, with an August 5 doubleheader against the Chicago American Giants. The Buckeyes cruised to a win in the first game, 7-3, behind the solid pitching of George Jefferson, and were leading 3-2 after five innings of the second game when Detroit Tigers groundskeeper Neil Conway insisted that the game be called due to inclement weather. Conway was rushed by Chicago players and sought police protection. The next day, he protested to stadium management. “The question of whether to continue the use of the stadium to Negro ball clubs is now being studied,” wrote the Chicago Defender.24

In exhibition on August 7 in South Bend, the Buckeyes clobbered the Hoosier Beers 13-0 on 21 hits.25

Controversy continued to follow the Buckeyes, who won an exhibition game by forfeit on August 8 in Harrisburg against the Elite Giants. Phelbert Lawson was brought on in relief for the Buckeyes in the bottom of the ninth in a game tied, 5-5. Lawson was accused of doctoring the ball, and Henry Kimbro refused to step into the batter’s box unless a new ball was put in play, despite being ordered to do so by umpire Sonny Arp. Kimbro was called out, and further protestations led to Arp’s awarding the game to the Buckeyes by forfeit.

The Buckeyes went to Newark to play an exhibition twin bill against the Eagles on August 12. In the first game, they faced a pitcher who within a few years became part of a major-league organization. Don Newcombe would be signed by the Dodgers the following year and was with the parent club in 1949. Newcombe shut out the Buckeyes in a 4-0 win.

And it appeared that the Buckeyes were going to be swept in the doubleheader, down 3-2 in the top of the seventh, when Cañizares – who’d booted a key grounder in the first game – smashed a triple to center field. He came around to score when Ware – who also allowed an unearned run in the first game with an error – singled, and the game was tied.

In the top of the ninth, Buddy Armour walked and took second on a sacrifice by Earl Ashby. Up stepped Cañizares, who lifted a single into left field, driving in what turned out to be the game-winning run.

The next stop was Birmingham, where the Buckeyes played a doubleheader against the Barons on August 19, beating them once and tying them in the nightcap.

The Buckeyes played the Barons throughout the South, as well as a weeklong series against the Red Sox, with five games in Memphis before returning to Cleveland for a four-game set with the Red Sox, including a twilight-night doubleheader at Municipal Stadium on August 30, to benefit the Future Outlook League. A huge crowd was expected, to celebrate the Buckeyes as well as the end of World War II – and the accompanying lifting of wartime travel restrictions.

The Buckeyes won the first game handily, 7-2, as George Jefferson got his 11th win of the year. Quincy Trouppe homered for the Buckeyes. George’s brother Willie Jefferson pitched the second game, and Buddy Armour hit a home run to tie the game at 4-4. The game ended in a tie, called on account of darkness.

The second half of the season ended with a doubleheader at League Park on September 2 against the Chicago American Giants. Team general manager Wilbur Hayes was honored with a new car to replace the Chevrolet he had used to travel with the team – racking up more than 250,000 miles. The gift took on added significance since cars were hard to come by. (There were no new cars made for the 1943-45 model years, as auto companies had switched to wartime production.) The Buckeyes then swept Chicago and appeared to win the second-half crown as well to serve as the undisputed league champions, with a total record of 72-30, including a regular-season record of 53-15.26

Cleveland Call and Post, September 8, 1945

The Buckeyes would meet the Homestead Grays in the Negro World Series.

The Grays were a dynasty, the two-time defending World Series champs and winners of the last nine Negro National League pennants. The 1945 team had no fewer than five future Hall of Famers: Cool Papa Bell, Ray Brown, Josh Gibson, Buck Leonard, and Jud Wilson. But Cleveland Call and Post sports editor Bob Williams – who would serve as one of three commissioners for the World Series, with legendary Pittsburgh Courier sports editor Wendell Smith and Afro-American Newspapers sports editor Art Carter – liked the Buckeyes’ chances.

“They have made every team in the league look like a bunch of amateurs this season,” he wrote. “And if they fail to cop the title it will be the greatest upset imaginable.”27

Playing baseball in the Negro Leagues was a nomadic existence. It wasn’t uncommon for a team to play on multiple home fields in the same season. The Buckeyes started as a team dividing its time between Cleveland and Cincinnati. The Clowns divided their schedule between Cincinnati and Indianapolis, and the Homestead Grays – started in their eponymous city outside of Pittsburgh – played most of their home games at Griffith Stadium in Washington.

It also entailed numerous exhibitions (although in the days before a strong players’ union, the same thing occurred in the White major leagues as well). So it wasn’t too out of the ordinary to see the Buckeyes take on the Chattanooga Choo Choos in an exhibition on September 9, four days before they were slated to take on the Grays in the Negro World Series.

The Buckeyes beat the Choo Choos 14-5 in a perfect tune-up before more than 5,000 fans at League Park, which hadn’t hosted a World Series game since the Indians beat the Brooklyn Robins in the 1920 fall classic. But while the Buckeyes hosted the first game of the World Series, it wasn’t at League Park. It was under the lights at Municipal Stadium.

It was a long trip for the Buckeyes, who were likened to a team of scrubs just three years earlier. Call and Post sports editor Bob Williams said that Indians owner Alva Bradley, general manager Roger Peckinpaugh, and manager Lou Boudreau attended a game “and went away laughing because of the sloppy, untrained players who cavorted like second-rate sandlotters across the diamond.”28

Willie Jefferson got the nod for the Buckeyes in the series opener on September 13, while Leroy “Lefty” Welmaker started for the Grays. The pitchers traded goose eggs for the first 6½ innings, but in the bottom of the seventh, Quincy Trouppe tripled to deep center, and after Buddy Armour struck out swinging, Johnnie Cowan hit a fly ball to left field that was deep enough to score Trouppe. The Buckeyes were on the board.

In the next inning, Archie Ware hit a screaming line-drive single to left field and advanced to second when Parnell Woods walked. Willie Grace hit a high fly ball to right field, which dropped in for a hit, giving Jefferson an insurance run – which he would need.

In the top of the ninth, Dave Hoskins singled to center with one out, took second on a walk to Buck Leonard and scored on Josh’s Gibson single. Jefferson got Sammy Bankhead to ground into a double play to end the game and give the Buckeyes their first World Series winning game ever.

The second game of the Negro World Series was played three days later, allowing the Buckeyes time to play an exhibition game in Dayton, Ohio, against the Kittyhawks, a team from Wright Field, home to a US Army Air Corps base. The Buckeyes blanked the Kittyhawks, 7-0, handing them their second defeat of the year. (The only other loss was to the Great Lakes Naval Training Station, a team populated with ringers from the White major leagues.)

Eugene Bremer got the nod to start for the Buckeyes, against the Grays’ Johnny Wright. The Grays scratched across a run in the fourth and another in the fifth, but the Buckeyes tied the game in the bottom of the seventh when Willie Grace hit a home run over the towering right-field fence at League Park. Buddy Armour then doubled to right field and scored when Bremer’s grounder to second was booted by Jelly Jackson.

In the bottom of the ninth of the tie game, Trouppe doubled to right and took third on a passed ball by Gibson (who by then was suffering from frequent headaches brought on by the brain tumor that would kill him within 18 months). Wright walked the next two batters to pitch to Bremer, who stroked the game-winning hit to right field.

The Buckeyes had a two-games-to-none lead in the World Series. The Grays won an exhibition in Dayton on September 14. Then the World Series headed to Forbes Field in Pittsburgh for Game Three.

“The 1945 World Series program should turn out to be a corker,” Williams wrote in the Call and Post before the road trip started.29

Cleveland Call and Post, September 15, 1945

The Buckeyes had taken that commanding lead with them into Pittsburgh, but the talent of the Grays, who fielded five future Hall of Famers, made no lead insurmountable. They had won the previous eight Negro National League pennants and two Negro League World Series. They hadn’t been shut out in four years.

That changed with Game Three of the 1945 Negro World Series, on September 18, 1945. Rain forced the cancellation of the game in Pittsburgh at Forbes Field, so the teams traveled on to Washington. Griffith Stadium – the other “home field” for the Grays – was to host Game Four, but instead, it hosted Game Three. In fact, the field didn’t get much of a breather, hosting the Washington Senators and Detroit Tigers that day and the Buckeyes and Grays that night.

Before the game Buckeyes general manager Hayes got a telegram from Harold Burton, the former mayor of Cleveland, then serving as a Republican in the US Senate. (One of his former colleagues, Harry Truman, had just become president, and a day after Game Three, Truman would nominate Burton to the US Supreme Court as a bipartisan gesture. Burton was approved by voice vote – and would be one of the behind-the-scenes forces in 1954 for Brown vs. Board of Education, the Supreme Court decision striking down school segregation.)

George Jefferson got the nod for the Buckeyes, and he was firing bullets, giving up just three hits in his 17th win of the season. He was also the beneficiary of sparkling defense behind him. Second baseman Johnny Cowan did the baseball equivalent of standing on his head, with five fine fielding plays – including one throw from his knees in the third, and a leaping snare of a liner by Buck Leonard. A.B. “Happy” Chandler, the US senator from Kentucky recently appointed baseball commissioner, was said to have remarked to George Preston Marshall, “That was the best play I’ve ever seen in my life.” (Chandler’s presence at the game isn’t surprising. Marshall’s, on the other hand, was; the longtime owner of the NFL’s Washington Redskins might have been the biggest racist in sports.30) Jefferson was staked to a 3-0 lead in the third inning. Willie Grace sacrificed home the first run of the game, and a bases-loaded single by Buddy Armour scored two more runs. The Buckeyes tacked on an insurance run in the ninth and won 4-0. They were one win away from toppling the Grays from atop the Negro Leagues.

Game Four was at Shibe Park in Philadelphia on September 20. The Buckeyes got on the board in the top of the first thanks to a bases-loaded error by Jelly Jackson that scored two runs. It was all starting pitcher Frank Carswell would need.

Carswell picked up right where George Jefferson led off, piling up goose eggs. He got into a little jam in the third inning, hitting Jud Wilson with a pitch. Sam Bankhead erased the runner with a double play, but Ray Brown walked and then took third on a single by Jerry Benjamin. Carswell walked Cool Papa Bell to load the bases, then Dave Hoskins hit a chopper to second, forcing Bell out to end the inning.

The Buckeyes tacked on a run in the fourth on a fly ball by Johnnie Cowan, and two more in the seventh on a two-run single by Sam Jethroe. By then, the outcome of the game wasn’t in doubt.

The Buckeyes won the game, 5-0, their second straight shutout of the Grays, to sweep the World Series. “A betting man with a mad crazy hunch could have gotten rich, literally rich off that series,” wrote Bob Williams in the Call and Post. “Nobody with a grain of reason power would have conceded that Buckeyes four straight victories over the Grays.”

Having followed the team all year, Williams knew they were special. But even he had no idea what they were capable of. “These fellows were great, and we hadn’t really known them at all!”31

The Buckeyes’ Negro League championship was a big deal – to the Black community. Although the team was covered regularly by the Call and Post, it received little notice in the mainstream press. But it wasn’t long before Black baseball players were the toast of Cleveland – although not with the Buckeyes.

Integration was at hand. In its October 29 edition – while the paper was still running sports features on the Buckeyes’ championship – the front page of the Call and Post proclaimed that Jackie Robinson had been signed by the Dodgers organization, and would play the following year for Montreal.

Meanwhile, Bill Veeck, son of the former Cubs executive, had gotten into baseball himself, buying the minor-league Milwaukee Brewers in 1942. After service in the war – where he’d lost part of a leg – he bought the Cleveland Indians in 1946.

In July 1947 Veeck signed Larry Doby, who had played against the Buckeyes with the Newark Eagles. By that time, the National League had already been integrated, by Jackie Robinson – another former Buckeye opponent, with the Kansas City Monarchs. After playing in Montreal in 1946, Robinson made his major-league debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, 1947.

Also by 1947, the Buckeyes were alone as tenants of League Park. Veeck realized that he was leaving money on the table with every game played at East 66th and Lexington, and made Municipal Stadium the Indians’ full-time home. League Park was also home to an NFL team, the Cleveland Rams, but they decamped for Los Angeles after their 1945 season – which also ended in a championship. The new football team in town, the Browns of the All-America Football Conference, practiced at League Park, but used Municipal Stadium for games.

After a lackluster 1946 season in which they finished third in the NAL, the Buckeyes won the pennant in 1947 but lost the World Series to the New York Cubans. By then, the writing was on the wall for them and for Negro League teams. The last Negro World Series was the following year, a win by the Homestead Grays. That same year, the Indians won the World Series – aided in large part by contributions from Black players Doby and Satchel Paige, whose signing was decried in some corners as a publicity stunt. (Paige went 6-1 for a team that was tied on the last day of the regular season, so every victory counted.)

By 1949, the Buckeyes had moved their home base to Louisville, limped through that season, and moved back to Cleveland for the 1950 season but then disbanded.

Although the White major leagues suddenly found themselves stocked with Negro leagues talent, only two of the players from the 1945 Buckeyes made it to the major leagues. Sam Jethroe was named National League Rookie of the Year in 1950 for the Boston Braves. (He remains the oldest player ever to win the honor, at 33.) Quincy Trouppe played for one year for the Indians as well. The title of his autobiography? Twenty Years Too Soon.

VINCE GUERRIERI is a journalist and author in the Cleveland area. He’s the secretary-treasurer of the Jack Graney SABR Chapter and has contributed to the SABR BioProject, the SABR Games Project, and several SABR anthologies. Additionally, he’s written about baseball history for a variety of publications, including Ohio Magazine, Cleveland Magazine, Smithsonian, and Defector. He can be reached at vaguerrieri@gmail.com, or found on Twitter @vinceguerrieri.

Notes

1 “Negro American League Season Begins May 6,” Cleveland Call and Post, March 17, 1945: 6B.

2 “Buckeyes Split Two with Cubans, Good Spring Games,” Cleveland Call and Post, April 14, 1945: 19.

3 Wendell Smith, “The Sports Beat,” Pittsburgh Courier, May 5, 1945: 16.

4 Jackie Robinson was also invited. Further reading: https://sabr.org/journal/article/jackie-robinson-in-1945-from-boston-tryout-to-a-negro-leagues-star/.

5 “Bucks Play Cubans, ‘Rounding Out Nicely,’” Cleveland Call and Post, April 21, 1945: 18.

6 James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues (New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1994), 104. The book doesn’t specify why Bremer was rejected for military service, but notes that he suffered a concussion and skull fracture in a 1942 car wreck near Geneva, Ohio, in which two of his teammates were killed.

7 “Bucks Set to Play in Cleveland May 27,” Cleveland Call and Post, May 19, 1945: 6B.

8 These Green Sox appear to have been a local semipro team. Prior to US involvement in World War II, the Green Sox were a team in the Class-D Ohio State League. Managers included Luke Sewell and Slim Caldwell.

9 Art Flynn, “Griff Says B.R. Would Be Czar of Negro Loops,” The Sporting News, May 24, 1945: 2.

10 Decoration Day, the forerunner to Memorial Day, was annually commemorated on that date; it wasn’t until the 1968 passage of the Uniform Monday Holiday Act that it took its place as the last Monday in May.

11 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call and Post, June 2, 1945: 6B.

12 “Sports Rambler,” June 2, 1945.

13 Bob Williams, “Buckeyes Leading League; Play Chicago American Giants Here Sunday,” Cleveland Call and Post, June 16, 1945: 6B.

14 Joel W. Smith, “Cleveland Buckeyes Top Black Crax, 9-1,” Atlanta Daily World, July 13, 1945: 5.

15 “Future Outlook League Night Game to Feature League-Leading Bucks,” Cleveland Call and Post, July 7, 1945: 7B.

16 https://case.edu/ech/articles/f/future-outlook-league.

17 Bob Williams, “Attack on Umpire Mars Ball Classic,” Cleveland Call and Post, July 21, 1945: 1A.

18 “Attack on Umpire Mars Ball Classic.”

19 Davis ended up being fined $250 by the league, and was on the hook for an additional $230 in court costs and medical bills.

20 https://nlbm.mlblogs.com/ciudad-trujillo-the-best-baseball-team-youve-never-heard-of-e548db6b98f9.

21 Larry Lester, Black Baseball’s National Showcase: The East-West All-Star Game, 1933-1953 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 1.

22 Black Baseball’s National Showcase, 269.

23 “Jethroe Retains Am. League Batting Lead,” Atlanta Daily World, August 16, 1945: 3.

24 “Bucks Defeat Chicago Twice; Calling of Second Creates Trouble,” Chicago Defender (national edition), August 11, 1945: 7.

25 Bob Overaker, “Beers Lose; Host to Memphis Thursday,” South Bend Tribune, August 8, 1945: 16.

26 Like many teams in the Negro Leagues, the Buckeyes played many games that didn’t count in the standings.

27 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call and Post, September 8, 1945: 6B.

28 “Sports Rambler,” September 8, 1945.

29 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call and Post, September 22, 1945: 6B.

30 Marshall famously owned the last team in the NFL to integrate, doing so reluctantly to play at the new D.C. Stadium, and when he died in 1969, his will established a charity, the Redskin Foundation, specifying that it “shall never use, contribute or apply any money or property for any purpose which supports or employs the principle of racial integration in any form.” 

31 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call and Post, September 29, 1945: 6B.