Curt Flood

Baseball Player

• Born: January 18, 1938
• Birthplace: Houston, Texas
• Died: January 20, 1997
• Place of death: Los Angeles, California

Sport: Baseball

Early Life

Curtis Charles Flood was born to Herman and Laura Flood in Houston, Texas, on January 18, 1938. The youngest of six children, Curt moved with his family to Oakland, California, when he was two years old. Both parents worked at low-paying hospital jobs; Curt’s mother also mended parachutes. Curt began playing baseball in early childhood but also developed another lifelong passion—art. His father, despite limited financial resources, purchased sketch pads for the children, and Curt started refining skills that later made him an accomplished portrait painter.

The Road to Excellence

Curt signed his first professional contract with the Cincinnati Redlegs (Reds) right out of Oakland Technical High School. Assigned to High Point-Thomasville in the Carolina League for 1956, Curt was dismayed by the overt racism and Jim Crow segregation of North Carolina but excelled as a player. He batted .340 in 154 games with 190 hits, 133 runs scored, 29 home runs, and 128 RBI.

The following summer, at Savannah in the South Atlantic League, Curt suffered through another year of segregated living—not permitted even to dress with white players—but had a productive season, hitting .299 with 170 hits, 14 home runs, and 82 RBI. Near the end of both seasons, he was brought up for a short stint with the Redlegs. Curt’s experiences with racism in these years contributed to his commitment to justice later, manifested in his legal assault on baseball’s reserve system.

Curt hoped to play the outfield in Cincinnati with boyhood teammates Frank Robinson and Vada Pinson, but on December 5, 1957, he was traded to the St. Louis Cardinals organization. After batting .340 in fifteen games with Omaha, Nebraska, in the American Association, Curt was promoted to the Cardinals. He quickly established his defensive credentials, becoming one of the game’s great center fielders, but he struggled at bat in his first three years.

The Emerging Champion

Midway through the 1961 season, a managerial change brought Johnny Keane to the helm of the Cardinals. Keane installed Curt as his starting center fielder, the young outfielder hit .322, and the Cardinals had a star for the rest of the decade. In the same year, Bob Gibson, one of Curt’s closest friends, established himself as a leading pitcher, and the stage was set for the Cardinals’ championship years of the 1960’s.

Continuing the Story

Curt batted better than .300 five more times, with a high of .335 in 1967. He accumulated at least 200 hits in a season twice. Between 1962 and 1969, he had at least 167 hits in each season. He won Gold Glove Awards for defensive excellence seven years in a row, from 1963 to 1969. From June, 1965 to June, 1967, he established a record by playing in 226 consecutive games without an error, handling 396 chances—putouts and assists—without an error in 1966. He made the all-star team three times, in 1964, 1966, 1968. At the conclusion of his playing career, he had a lifetime batting average of .293 with 1,861 total hits.

Curt was a major contributor to three National League pennants and two World Series Championships for the Cardinals. St. Louis defeated the New York Yankees in the 1964 World Series and the Boston Red Sox in the 1967 World Series. The 1968 World Series, against the Detroit Tigers and thirty-one-game-winner Denny McLain, was Curt’s best, except for one play. He batted .286 against Detroit and stole 3 bases. However, in the seventh inning of the final contest, the game scoreless with two runners on and two outs, Curt misplayed a drive to center by Jim Northrup. The ball went over his head for a triple, with both runners scoring. The Tigers eventually won the game 4-1.

After the Cardinals dropped to fourth place in 1969, Curt was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies. After he had contributed so much to the Cardinals, Curt was shocked by the trade and felt like a piece of property. Curt decided not to report to Philadelphia and sued commissioner Bowie Kuhn and Major League Baseball for his freedom. At the heart of the case were the reserve system that bound a player for life to the team that owned his contract, or until the team traded or released him, and baseball’s exemption from federal antitrust legislation. Represented by former U.S. Supreme Court justice Arthur Goldberg, Curt took his case all the way to the Supreme Court. Although he lost, the narrow 5-3 Supreme Court decision could not be ignored. The decision provoked substantial changes in the reserve system by the mid-1970’s, enabling players to change teams and greatly increase their earning power.

Curt returned to play part of the 1971 season with the Washington Senators after sitting out the previous season in order not to prejudice his legal case. He played in only thirteen more games before retiring. During his years as a player, he also became a professional artist, painting portraits of, among many others, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Cardinals owner August A. Busch, Jr. Curt was even featured on the Today show with a selection of his artwork. After retiring as a player, Curt continued to paint; he also worked with youth in the Oakland area, heading Oakland’s Little League for about ten years. Additionally, he led a senior league in 1989 and 1990. He died on January 20, 1997, at the UCLA Medical Center, after suffering from throat cancer and pneumonia.

Summary

Curt Flood was both an outstanding baseball player—known especially for his defensive skills—and a talented portrait artist. However, he achieved his greatest impact off the baseball field. His legal suit to overturn baseball’s reserve system failed before the Supreme Court but was the harbinger of eventual changes in baseball’s reserve clause and antitrust status. Every player since then was indebted to Curt, whose lonely heroism helped usher in a new day of freedom and wealth for major-league players.

Bibliography

Abrams, Roger I. Legal Bases: Baseball and the Law. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1998.

Belth, Alex. Stepping Up: The Story of Curt Flood and His Fight for Baseball Players’ Rights. New York: Persea Books, 2006.

Edmonds, Edmund P., and William H. Manz. Baseball and Antitrust: The Legislative History of the Curt Flood Act of 1998, Public Law No. 105-297, 112 Stat. 2824. Buffalo, N.Y.: W. S. Hein, 2001.

Flynn, Neil F. Baseball’s Reserve System: The Case and Trial of Curt Flood Versus Major League Baseball. Springfield, Ill.: Walnut Park Group, 2006.

Freedman, Lew. African American Pioneers of Baseball: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2007.

Snyder, Brad. A Well-Paid Slave: Curt Flood’s Fight for Free Agency in Professional Sports. New York: Viking, 2006.

Weiss, Stuart L. The Curt Flood Story: The Man Behind the Myth. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2007.