A Well-Paid Slave (27 page)

“Well, sir, I hate to dispute you, but I don't know full well whether it was 1949,” Robinson said.

“How about your total average?” Cooper asked.

“I am pretty sure it is around .311,” Robinson said.

“Aren't you positive of it?” Cooper asked. “I would be if I had something like that in my favor.”

With the press and public watching, Cooper fawned over Robinson, the hero of Brooklynites everywhere. Although the lawyers did not know it yet, the judge had more than good publicity in mind.

Robinson discussed his trade from the Dodgers to the Giants after the 1956 season. The Dodgers sold Robinson for $30,000 plus pitcher Dick Littlefield. Dodgers owner Walter O'Malley wanted Robinson out of the organization because Robinson adored O'Malley's nemesis, Branch Rickey, the team's former part owner and general manager. Trading Robinson to their National League rivals, the Giants, was the ultimate slap in the face. Robinson had already decided to retire and accept a $30,000 offer from Chock full o' Nuts “because, in my view, a black man had very little chance in organized baseball to go from the playing ranks to the front office to the managerial role regardless of whether he had any ability alone or not, and I had to protect my family as best as I possibly could.” After the trade, Robinson nearly changed his mind when the Giants raised their initial salary offer of $35,000 to $50,000 or more (he had never made a salary of more than $42,500 with the Dodgers and had made only $33,000 in 1956 after accepting several salary cuts). Dodgers general manager Buzzie Bavasi was angry that Robinson had kept his retirement a secret in order to sell the story to
Look
magazine. According to Robinson, Bavasi's “statement that the only thing that I was doing when I was refusing to play was trying to get more money so angered me that nothing would have kept me in baseball at that particular time.”

Robinson discussed the reserve clause with hurt, anger, and sensitivity. During his first two seasons with the Dodgers, he had been spiked, spit on, thrown at, and called every nasty racial epithet in the book, but had kept his promise to Rickey that he would not fight back. During the 1949 season, Robinson began to assert himself more. He had been fighting back on and off the field ever since.

Goldberg asked Robinson his opinion about the reserve clause. Robinson's response anchored the stories about Flood's trial in the next day's editions of the
New York Times
, the
Daily News
, and the
Post
: “[A]nything that is one-sided in this country is wrong, and I think the reserve clause is a one-sided thing in favor of the owners, and I think it certainly should at least be modified to give a player an opportunity to have some control over his destiny. Whenever you have one-sided systems, in my view, it leads to serious, serious problems, and I think that unless there is a change in the reserve clause that it is going to lead to a serious strike in terms of the ballplayers. . . . I sincerely believe that the reserve clause is so one-sided in favor of the owners that the players don't really have control over their own destinies.”

Robinson said the reserve clause harmed younger players, especially those who since 1965 had been assigned to major league teams through a leaguewide draft of the best high school and college prospects. He added that “the reserve clause does not affect the $90,000 ballplayer as much as it affects that guy who sits upon the bench.”

Robinson discussed the careers of three of his former Dodgers teammates—Don Zimmer, Eddie Miksis, and Don Hoak—who wasted many seasons on the Dodgers' bench when they could have been starters on other teams. Zimmer, Robinson said, would have been an extremely good shortstop, but for four years he was stuck behind All-Star Pee Wee Reese. Because of the reserve clause, Zimmer lost the prime of his career as the Dodgers organization's insurance policy in case Reese ever got hurt. Miksis backed up Robinson at second base and then Hoak backed up Robinson at third. Of Hoak, Robinson said the reserve clause “hurt his chances for a few years to become a better ballplayer, to become a person to make more money in the game.”

Robinson ran afoul of Judge Cooper only one time on direct examination. Goldberg asked Robinson whether baseball as a sport would be affected if the reserve clause was modified. “I would like to say first—I don't know whether this is in the rules—I don't consider baseball a sport,” Robinson said. “I think it is a big business, first of all.” Hughes objected to the answer as “unresponsive.” Cooper asked if Hughes moved to strike it. Hughes said yes, and Cooper struck the answer about baseball being big business because “that is the issue that I must resolve.” The Supreme Court had never created a distinction between professional sports and other for-profit businesses; it had simply decided that the business of baseball was exempt from the antitrust laws. And Cooper, whether he was willing to admit it or not, was bound by those decisions.

On cross-examination, Hughes predictably asked Robinson if he had testified in 1958 before a Senate subcommittee. Robinson said he could not remember; he had testified before the Senate many times. Hughes then read one sentence on page 295 of Robinson's 1958 testimony in which Robinson had said: “I am highly in favor of the reserve clause.” Robinson said he could not remember saying it. Nor did the rereading of the sentence refresh his recollection. Hughes kept badgering Robinson about his prior testimony. The most he could get Robinson to admit was that “I could have said that.” Robinson was as stubborn on the witness stand as he had been on the ball field.

Goldberg finally objected that Robinson had been asked and answered the question. Goldberg suggested putting the entire testimony into the record. Hughes evaded the suggestion. Robinson indicated that he had made additional comments before the Senate, but Goldberg failed to follow up on this line of questioning on redirect.

Two witnesses and a lunch recess later, Goldberg realized that he should have read the entire paragraph into the record. Robinson's testimony on page 295, which Goldberg read aloud for the court after lunch, said:
Hughes, who had been guilty of taking Robinson's statement completely out of context, could only muster: “Could I have the book, please.”

Goldberg's failure to catch the mistake at the time of Robinson's testimony was another result of his not doing enough trial preparation and thus not being as quick on his feet as a trial lawyer should be. Read in its entirety, Robinson's 1958 Senate testimony was consistent with his testimony at Flood's trial. Robinson had testified before the Senate that the reserve clause hurt bench players on stronger teams because those players could be starters on weaker teams. “So I believe that after five, six years, or so, that a player should have the right to express himself and perhaps go to some other club,” Robinson had told the Senate.

Not even Goldberg could prevent Robinson from enrapturing the courtroom during cross-examination and on redirect. Hughes asked Robinson what the reserve clause meant to him. “It means to me that a player is tied to a ballclub for life,” Robinson said. “That's all it means to me.” On redirect, Goldberg asked Robinson about the type of reserve clause modification that he favored. Robinson said that a player should be able to ask for the chance to improve his condition with a new team “after a certain number of years.”

Robinson concluded his testimony with a ringing endorsement of Flood: “It takes a tremendous amount of courage for any individual— and that's why I admire Mr. Flood so much for what he is doing—to stand up against something that is appalling to him, and I think that they ought to give a player the chance to be able to be a man in situations like this, and I don't believe this is what has happened. Give the players the opportunity to be able to say to themselves, ‘I have a certain value and I can place it on myself.' ”

For Flood, Robinson's “soliloquy . . . sent chills up and down my spine.” His hero had just stood up for him in open court for taking on the baseball establishment just as Robinson had done 23 years earlier. Flood had endured similar things in the southern minor leagues that Robinson had endured with the Dodgers. He had overcome racism in the Reds organization and with Solly Hemus to become an All-Star and Gold Glove center fielder. He had experienced the thrill of winning two World Series. He had ascended to the upper levels of baseball's salary scale. Now it was Flood's turn to take what Robinson had taught him over the years and to stand up and be counted. Robinson had just given Flood the encouragement he needed to fight on.

Flood was not the only one inspired by Robinson's testimony. As soon as he excused Robinson from the witness stand, Judge Cooper called for a short recess and brought lawyers from both sides into his chambers. He invited Kuhn, Feeney, and Cronin. He also invited Robinson. The defense thought that Cooper had a problem with Robinson's testimony. Instead, Cooper requested both sides' permission to ask Robinson for an autograph for his grandson. No one objected, and the starstruck Cooper received Robinson's signature. Robinson was not the last celebrity in the courtroom that day.

As soon as they returned from the impromptu autograph session, Cooper ordered people to be seated and called for the next witness.

“Mr. Greenberg will be our next witness,” Goldberg said.

Hank Greenberg knew about discrimination. The 6-foot-4
¹
⁄2 - inch Detroit Tigers slugger battled anti-Semitism his entire career, particularly in 1938 when he chased Babe Ruth's single-season home run record and finished two shy of Ruth's mark with 58. Despite losing more than four seasons to military service in World War II, he finished his 13-year career with 331 home runs and 1,276 RBIs. Before anyone had ever heard of Sandy Koufax, Greenberg had been baseball's most legendary Jewish player. In 1947, Greenberg's last season and Jackie Robinson's first, Robinson collided with the big Pittsburgh Pirates first baseman on a close play at first. During Robinson's next time on base, Greenberg asked Robinson if he was okay and told him to ignore Greenberg's stupid, racist teammates. “Stick in there,” Greenberg said. “You're doing fine. Keep your chin up.” He even invited Robinson to dinner. “Class tells,” Robinson said at the time. “It sticks out all over Mr. Greenberg.”

Greenberg also knew about the evils of the reserve clause. He had been in the Tigers organization since 1930 and came back in his first full season after World War II to lead the American League in home runs (44) and RBIs (127) in 1946. But the Tigers no longer wanted to pay Greenberg's $75,000 salary in 1947, so they put him on waivers. They refused to allow any of their American League rivals to claim him and then sold him for the $10,000 waiver price to the Pirates. Greenberg heard about the sale on the radio and then received a one-paragraph telegram making it official. The 36-year-old Greenberg informed Pirates owner John Galbreath that he was retiring. Galbreath talked Greenberg out of it by agreeing to the following conditions: (1) moving in the left-field fences at Forbes Field to 335 feet; (2) allowing Greenberg to fly instead of take trains and to have his own room on the road; and (3) raising Greenberg's salary from $75,000 to $100,000. Greenberg agreed to play for just one more season, provided the Pirates agreed to release him at the end of the year. “Mr. Galbreath,” Greenberg said, “I'm never going to go through the shock of being traded or sold like a piece of merchandise like what just happened to me with Detroit.”

True to his word, Greenberg retired after one season in Pittsburgh. Unlike Jackie Robinson, he was welcomed into management. Bill Veeck, the maverick owner of the Cleveland Indians, made Greenberg the team's vice president in 1948, farm director in 1949, general manager in 1950, and part owner and director in 1955. Greenberg sold his interest in the Indians in 1958 and the following year was part of Veeck's group that bought the Chicago White Sox. Greenberg worked as the team's general manager until 1961. Two years later, he left the White Sox and baseball. In 1956, he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Greenberg lived a good life. He had married Caral Gimbel, whose family owned the Gimbel Brothers and Saks Fifth Avenue department stores. After they divorced, Greenberg remarried and moved to Southern California. His son, Stephen, became the deputy commissioner of base-ball under Fay Vincent.

Greenberg, knowing that it meant the end of his ties to Major League Baseball, had been reluctant to testify for Flood. “Greenberg said he agrees with our position on the reserve clause, but he had some qualms about testifying, and asked to think it over,” Max Gitter and Topkis wrote in a May 7 memo to Goldberg. “Perhaps a phone call from you would resolve his doubts in our favor.” Goldberg called Greenberg. Whatever Goldberg said to one of the other most prominent Jewish-American figures of the 20th century, it must have worked.

Healthy, tanned, and with dark, slicked-back hair, Greenberg was a physically imposing yet soft-spoken witness. As emotional as Robinson was on the witness stand, Greenberg, speaking in the thick Bronx accent of his boyhood, was calm, reserved, and almost aloof. He discussed his career with the Tigers, the telegram he received announcing his trade to the Pirates, and his part ownership of the Indians and the White Sox.