If you didn’t grow up in Pittsburgh (which boasted rival baseball greats the Homestead Grays and the Pittsburgh Crawfords) or watch Episode 5 of the 1994 Ken Burns docu-series “Baseball,” you may not know much about the Negro Leagues. That’s about to change.
Sam Pollard’s “The League” is an eye-opening slice of American baseball’s 154-year history. In fact, the recent rule changes imposed on the Majors by Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred were inspired in part by the practices of the Negro Leagues: while Babe Ruth focused on home runs (like many players today), these extraordinary Black athletes favored a fast, hit-and-run, base-stealing game.
“If you watch footage of Jackie Robinson from the ’40s and the ’50s, his style of play, his aggressiveness, all came from the Negro Leagues,” Oscar-nominated documentary director Pollard told IndieWire during a recent interview. “If you watch the players who integrated Major League Baseball,...
Sam Pollard’s “The League” is an eye-opening slice of American baseball’s 154-year history. In fact, the recent rule changes imposed on the Majors by Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred were inspired in part by the practices of the Negro Leagues: while Babe Ruth focused on home runs (like many players today), these extraordinary Black athletes favored a fast, hit-and-run, base-stealing game.
“If you watch footage of Jackie Robinson from the ’40s and the ’50s, his style of play, his aggressiveness, all came from the Negro Leagues,” Oscar-nominated documentary director Pollard told IndieWire during a recent interview. “If you watch the players who integrated Major League Baseball,...
- 7/13/2023
- by Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
Sam Pollard’s “The League” Is Not Your Typical Baseball Doc.
The documentary filmmaker grew up in the 1960s watching the St. Louis Cardinals, whose roster of players included Black or Latino players including Bill White, Curt Flood, Orlando Cepeda and Lou Brock, but did not know much about the Negro Leagues that existed when the sport was still segregated.
“I knew who Jackie Robinson was and that it was because of him Blacks had integrated the Major Leagues in 1947,” says Pollard. “But what I did not know much about in 1964 at the age of 14 was that he had come out of the Negro Leagues and that the Negro Leagues had been home to Black and Latino ballplayers who had to play segregated baseball during the height of the Jim Crow era.”
While some segregation in the sport always existed, the color line in baseball was not rigidly enforced until...
The documentary filmmaker grew up in the 1960s watching the St. Louis Cardinals, whose roster of players included Black or Latino players including Bill White, Curt Flood, Orlando Cepeda and Lou Brock, but did not know much about the Negro Leagues that existed when the sport was still segregated.
“I knew who Jackie Robinson was and that it was because of him Blacks had integrated the Major Leagues in 1947,” says Pollard. “But what I did not know much about in 1964 at the age of 14 was that he had come out of the Negro Leagues and that the Negro Leagues had been home to Black and Latino ballplayers who had to play segregated baseball during the height of the Jim Crow era.”
While some segregation in the sport always existed, the color line in baseball was not rigidly enforced until...
- 7/7/2023
- by Addie Morfoot
- Variety Film + TV
In eye-opening documentary The League, director Sam Pollard tells a fully-rounded tale of how Black baseball used to thrive
Sam Pollard inherited his love for baseball from his father, a fan of the St Louis Cardinals – Black America’s team in the 1960s. Growing up in New York just made it a long-distance affair. “They had some phenomenal players,” Pollard recalls to the Guardian. “Lou Brock, Curt Flood, Bob Gibson, Bill White. And then when I got to be 14, 15 years old, I really wanted to understand their lineage. Where did they come from?”
Decades later, the director retraces that Black baseball genealogy in The League – a new Questlove-produced documentary on the rise, fall and last impact of the Negro Leagues, the professional baseball association that sprang up in the long shadow of Jim Crow. It’s a history famously touched on in Ken Burns’s seminal docuseries Baseball. But in The League,...
Sam Pollard inherited his love for baseball from his father, a fan of the St Louis Cardinals – Black America’s team in the 1960s. Growing up in New York just made it a long-distance affair. “They had some phenomenal players,” Pollard recalls to the Guardian. “Lou Brock, Curt Flood, Bob Gibson, Bill White. And then when I got to be 14, 15 years old, I really wanted to understand their lineage. Where did they come from?”
Decades later, the director retraces that Black baseball genealogy in The League – a new Questlove-produced documentary on the rise, fall and last impact of the Negro Leagues, the professional baseball association that sprang up in the long shadow of Jim Crow. It’s a history famously touched on in Ken Burns’s seminal docuseries Baseball. But in The League,...
- 7/5/2023
- by Andrew Lawrence
- The Guardian - Film News
If you are a fan of classic Hollywood movie musicals, there is a strong chance you have probably had the debate: Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire? It's a silly debate, obviously, but pitting the two premiere tap-dancing leading men of some of the most loved films of all time against each other is a classic cinephile's version of, "Who would win in a fight, Superman or Wonder Woman?" If I have to choose, I choose Gene, but I have nothing against Fred. Despite their unparalleled hoofing skills, I go to the two men for completely different things. When I want athleticism and relatability, I go for Gene. When I want precision in both movement and story, I go for Fred.
Fred Astaire is undeniably Hollywood legend, thanks in large part to his on-screen chemistry with the equally delightful Ginger Rogers, but his path to stardom was not an obvious one.
Fred Astaire is undeniably Hollywood legend, thanks in large part to his on-screen chemistry with the equally delightful Ginger Rogers, but his path to stardom was not an obvious one.
- 8/15/2022
- by Mike Shutt
- Slash Film
Joe Morgan, the Hall of Fame second baseman and sparkplug of the Cincinnati Reds’ Big Red Machine who went on to spend more than two decades as a baseball broadcaster, has died. He was 77.
Morgan died at his home Sunday in Danville, California, family spokesman James Davis said in statement Monday. He was suffering from a nerve condition, a form of polyneuropathy.
His death marked the latest among major league greats this year: Whitey Ford, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Tom Seaver and Al Kaline.
Morgan was a two-time Nl Most Valuable Player, a 10-time All-Star and a winner of ...
Morgan died at his home Sunday in Danville, California, family spokesman James Davis said in statement Monday. He was suffering from a nerve condition, a form of polyneuropathy.
His death marked the latest among major league greats this year: Whitey Ford, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Tom Seaver and Al Kaline.
Morgan was a two-time Nl Most Valuable Player, a 10-time All-Star and a winner of ...
- 10/12/2020
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
Joe Morgan, the Hall of Fame second baseman and sparkplug of the Cincinnati Reds’ Big Red Machine who went on to spend more than two decades as a baseball broadcaster, has died. He was 77.
Morgan died at his home Sunday in Danville, California, family spokesman James Davis said in statement Monday. He was suffering from a nerve condition, a form of polyneuropathy.
His death marked the latest among major league greats this year: Whitey Ford, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Tom Seaver and Al Kaline.
Morgan was a two-time Nl Most Valuable Player, a 10-time All-Star and a winner of ...
Morgan died at his home Sunday in Danville, California, family spokesman James Davis said in statement Monday. He was suffering from a nerve condition, a form of polyneuropathy.
His death marked the latest among major league greats this year: Whitey Ford, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Tom Seaver and Al Kaline.
Morgan was a two-time Nl Most Valuable Player, a 10-time All-Star and a winner of ...
- 10/12/2020
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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