by Brad Snyder
For Flood’s legal team, the key to changing public opinion was to find powerful witnesses. No current players would dare testify. And most former players were equally reluctant. But one former player immediately jumped to the minds of Flood’s legal team: Ned Garver. A former pitcher, Garver accounted for 20 of the last-place St. Louis Browns’ 52 victories in 1951. The previous season, he had led the American League with 22 complete games but suffered 18 losses. He toiled for the Browns for nearly five seasons before being traded to the Detroit Tigers near the end of the 1952 season. He never made more than $30,000. “If ever there was a guy who had been victimized by the reserve clause, it was Ned Garver,” Iverson said. In response to questions from a House subcommittee in 1951, Garver had written that baseball “could not exist” without the reserve clause, but he had suggested modifications to allow an underpaid player on a second-division club to get paid what he was worth or switch teams. Garver, however, rejected Iverson’s invitation to testify on Flood’s behalf.
Flood’s witness list was shrouded in secrecy. The Associated Press reported shortly before trial that Satchel Paige, the great Negro league pitcher, might testify for Flood. Paige had made his major league debut in 1948 at age 42 with the Indians, had pitched for the St. Louis Browns until he was 47, and became the oldest pitcher in major league history by throwing three scoreless innings in 1965 for the Kansas City Athletics at age 59. The owners, in recent labor negotiations, had refused to make players free agents at age 65. The Athletics had granted Paige his unconditional release after the 1965 season, but technically they could have owned him for the rest of his life. Flood’s lawyers, however, were looking for former players with more gravitas than Paige.
Goldberg, Topkis, Miller, Gitter, and Iverson all spent time tracking down obvious witnesses—great players on bad teams like Ned Garver who did not get paid very much. None of them wanted to testify. A huge Brooklyn Dodgers fan growing up in upstate New York, Iverson decided to start calling the people he most wanted to see in court—the mid- 1950s Dodgers. Iverson called almost every Dodger except Roy Campanella, the catcher who had been paralyzed in an automobile accident. Iverson did not want to bother Campanella; nor was Campanella one to speak out on racial or social issues. Iverson talked to all the heroes of his youth: Sandy Amoros, Billy Cox, Carl Furillo, Junior Gilliam, and Duke Snider. “None of them wanted to testify,” Iverson said, “but my reaction was, ‘Hey, I’m getting paid for this.’ ” There were, however, a few notable exceptions. The media was alerted that when the trial resumed May 21, several former players would be testifying on Flood’s behalf.
CHAPTER TEN
Flood’s trial resumed at 10:15 a.m. on May 21. Goldberg an- nounced that he had a few more questions for Marvin Miller, but first he would like to call a special witness.
Goldberg called Jack R. Robinson to the witness stand.
White-haired, diabetic, and going blind, Jackie Robinson looked like the oldest 51-year-old man on the planet. He had suffered a mild heart attack a few years earlier. Diabetes had destroyed the circulation in his legs. His doctor had given him only two to three years to live. Robinson walked in his distinctive pigeon-toed gait down the center aisle of Judge Cooper’s crowded courtroom with the help of a cane. To Flood, however, Robinson may as well have been Superman. As he made his way down the aisle, Robinson stopped at the table for plaintiff’s counsel. He shook Flood’s hand and whispered words of encouragement into Flood’s ear. Tears welled in Flood’s eyes.
Flood knew that he was doing the right thing. It all seemed worth it now—giving up his baseball career, turning his back on more than $90,000, the hate mail at home, and the humiliation two days earlier on the witness stand. It all seemed worth it because his hero had come to testify on his behalf, to help Flood make professional athletes more free than they had been in Robinson’s day.
A hush fell over the courtroom as Robinson approached the witness stand. Aside from his 1962 Hall of Fame induction and a stint as a color commentator for ABC television in 1965, Robinson had exiled himself from baseball. He railed against the game’s refusal to hire black coaches and managers. He criticized Frank Robinson and Willie Mays for refusing to speak out on racial issues. He clashed with Bob Feller during the game’s centennial celebration at the 1969 All-Star Game in Washington over the lack of minorities in baseball management. The racism in base-ball that Robinson had experienced beginning in 1946 had taken on new forms, and he saw no one willing to confront them. “I don’t know if anyone could get me back into baseball today, where I would have to deal with the kind of people that I feel are associated with baseball,” Robinson said in 1966. “I think there is a narrow-minded, bigoted group of people who believe that the only way the Negro should get opportunities is if he is willing to go along with what they say—‘Don’t rock the boat.’ ”
Robinson admired boat rockers such as Flood and his former Cardinals teammate Bill White because “when there’s an issue Curt Flood is ready; Bill White is ready. But there are not enough Curt Floods and Bill Whites.” In the February 15 issue of Jet, Robinson had spoken out on Flood’s behalf: “I think Curt is doing a service to all players in the leagues, especially for the younger players coming up who are not superstars. All he is asking for is the right to negotiate. It doesn’t surprise me that he had the courage to do it. He’s a very sensitive man concerned about the rights of everybody. We need men of integrity like Curt Flood and Bill Russell who are involved in the area of civil rights and who are not willing to sit back and let Mr. Charlie dictate their needs and wants for them or spread the message for them.”
An ardent civil rights advocate, Robinson had raised money for the NAACP and the SCLC, participated in the March on Washington, and marched in Birmingham. He was an integrationist who clashed publicly with younger, more militant black activists including Malcolm X. A registered independent, he often supported Republican candidates because he believed blacks should be represented in both political parties. He had campaigned for Richard Nixon during the 1960 presidential election and again two years later when Nixon ran for governor of California. He had served as one of six deputy directors of Nelson Rockefeller’s presidential campaign in 1964, worked on Rockefeller’s reelection campaign for governor in 1966, and that same year was appointed the governor’s special assistant for community affairs. Robinson had come to regret his earlier support of Nixon, who was not as progressive on civil rights issues as Robinson had been led to believe. After Rockefeller lost the 1968 Republican presidential nomination to Nixon, Robinson endorsed Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey. In politics, as in life, Jackie Robinson was his own man.
Robinson also was active in business, with mixed results. For seven years after his playing career ended, he had worked for Chock full o’ Nuts as a vice president and director of personnel. Robinson’s main function for the coffee shop chain was to serve as an intermediary to prevent its employees from unionizing. He had helped start a black-controlled bank, Freedom National Bank, and the Jackie Robinson Construction Corporation that built low- and middle-income housing. Nonetheless, he and his wife, Rachel, a psychiatric nurse, struggled to make ends meet.
After meeting with Marvin Miller, Robinson agreed to see Iverson at his office at Proteus Foods, Inc. Iverson thought the cramped office in a grimy building was not befitting a man of Robinson’s stature. Although nominally a vice president, Robinson had no decision-making authority. His job was to encourage people to invest in fish and seafood fast-food restaurants in low-income neighborhoods. He was paid $10,000 a year plus some small stock options and a $500 bonus for each franchise he sold through personal contacts. In July, the company fired him a few months before it filed for bankruptcy. “It had seemed clear that he didn’t have a whole lot to do. . . . It was kind of sad that this was what he was doing now,” Iverson said. “And frankly, because of the system, he had to do it to make a living he needed to make.”
Robinson showed no fear of alienating the Lords of Baseball.
He had retired after the 1956 season when the Dodgers sent him to the Giants. He understood the injustice of the reserve clause but did not purport to be an expert on reserve clause issues. He had agreed to testify, he told Miller, because he “thought Flood was a courageous young man.” Miller knew that Robinson’s testimony came with some baggage. He reminded Robinson that he had told a 1958 Senate subcommittee, “I am highly in favor of the reserve clause.” The owners, Miller said, would use Robinson’s prior testimony to discredit him. Robinson was unfazed. “I was young and ignorant at the time,” he told Miller. “That is what they told me, and that is what I said. But I know differently now, and I won’t hesitate to say so.”
Robinson spoke in a nasal, high-pitched voice. His white hair, self-confidence, and emotion gave him tremendous stage presence. The courtroom hung on his every word. Even lawyers sitting at the defense table listened in awe.
Robinson discussed his career with the Dodgers: his $600-a-month salary in 1946 with the Montreal Royals, the Dodgers’ Triple-A farm club; his $5,000 salary his first year with the Dodgers in 1947; his 1949 Most Valuable Player Award; his .311 lifetime batting average; his six World Series appearances; and his 1962 induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Yet he was not certain that his lifetime batting average was .311 or that his highest single-season batting average of .342 came in 1949.
“You don’t have one of those little cards?” Goldberg asked.
“No,” Robinson replied as he fidgeted with a pair of glasses in his hands.
Judge Cooper tried to get the court reporter to strike the words “I think” about his .311 career average and .342 average in 1949. Robinson interrupted him.
“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.”
I think they should in some way be able to express themselves as to whether or not they do want to play for a certain ball club. I am highly in favor of the reserve clause. I do not want to get this out that I don’t believe there should be some control. But on the other hand, I don’t think the owners
should have all of the control. I think that there should be something that a ballplayer himself could say that would have some effect upon his particular position with a ballclub.
As it stands now, the players, in my opinion, don’t really have the opportunity to express themselves in a way they should be able to.
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.’ ”
