negro southern league
Negro Southern League (NSL) 1920-1936
The Negro Southern League (NSL) was one of several Negro Leagues created during the time professional baseball in the United Stated was strictly segregated.
The stated purpose of the Negro Southern League (NSL) was to act as a minor league system for the Negro Leagues at large.
It was organized in 1920, coinciding with the creation and demise of the Negro National League I, (NNLI) which lasted until its dissolution in 1936.
It was organized as a Negro Minor League by former player Tom Wilson in 1920.
However, it was considered a major league for one season in 1932, as it was also the only organized league to finish its full schedule that season due primarily to effects of the Great Depression.
Prior to the 1933 season, several of the teams had joined the Negro Southern League (NSL) migrating mainly from the freshly collapsed parent league, the Negro National League I (NNLI).
As was the case with the NSL, leagues created in the Southern district of the United States during the depths of the great depression were far less organized and much less profitable than those located in the Northern United States.
The economics of the game for Southern franchises was wrought with disadvantages, including much smaller fanbases, attributed to market size and population disparities, as well as lower standards of living.
The one consistency for the Negro Southern League (NSL) was that at most times it was operating on an irregular basis and truncated basis.
However, this would prove to be the strength og the league rather than its weakness. Its lack of cohesion was lent itself well to black professional baseball, which needed pliability at times during its existence.
In the NSL each season's schedule was heavily depended upon the availability of the most prominent team owners, who effectively controlled the schedule creation process.
In addition to using their influence to manipulate scheduling, the League's proprietors were also on the look out for larger and more profitable avenues to sustain the league wherever and whenever possible.
A totally treasonous act for the NSL, who maintained.
For example, the Negro Southern League (NSL) failed to organize a schedule for the 1924 season.
The League also failed to organize a coherent schedule for the following season as well in 1925.
After two years of not having a full or organized league schedule, the NSL would face yet another issue testing its survivability under disorganization.
The NSL would face major league challenges in the 1928 season.
This was due in part to its two best teams - the Birmingham Black Barons and the Memphis Red Sox, unilaterally decided to announce they were leaving the NSL, and they would now be joining the Negro National League I (NNLI) for one season. or possibly longer, leaving the league an open ended commitment to games that left the league schedule in complete disarray.
There is no doubt that a power broker of some sort was causing these movements from the Negro Southern League to the Negro National League I (NNLI).
Wrangling behind the scene by Rube Foster was likely at play in this move for more team control.
For the next two seasons, the Negro Southern League switched to playing independent schedules, and adopted a policy of doing so in years with major league disruptions.
This is what gave the league flexibility and strength to last through times of complete despair.
For examples, the very next season in 1929, attendance was so poor that individual teams struggled to complete their independent schedules they had set before the season.
In 1929, the Birmingham Black Barons and the Memphis Red Sox again chose not to participate in scheduling league games, forcing the NSL and its teams back into survival mode, organizing their own independent schedules.
For the 1930 season, the Nashville Elite Giants and Louisville Black Caps also made the decision to leave the Negro Southern League to play in the Negro National League I.
Rube Foster was no doubt working over time.
The continued absence of the Black Barons and Memphis Red Sox, led to the cancellation of the Negro Southern League’s 1930 season mid-year. [2]
The remaining teams left in the Negro Southern League played out independent schedules to finish the season.
For its entire existence (except 1932), the Negro Southern League functioned and was treated as a subservient to the entirety of the Negro Leagues Professional Baseball.
So the Negro Minor League (NSL) emulated the Minor Leagues (MiLB) of Major League Baseball (MLB) in this way; it provided teams all throughout black professional baseball with a steady stream of talented players.
Investments and money were to be made for the NSL team owners, scouting, buying and later selling the contracts of successful players to the more profitable and popular teams, in the professional Negro Leagues.
The most notable example was the Monroe Monarchs, an example of a team that acted exclusively as a farm team for the Kansas City Monarchs.
Trouble began to show in the economics of the Negro National League I (NNLI) and it had formally collapsed for reals after the 1931 season.
This paved the way for the NSL as the only survivinbg league for the 1932 season. Many of the teams in the Negro National League I who had left soon returned, migrating back to the Negro Southern League (NSL).
During this time, The Great Depression had all but decimated the profits of most of the struggling franchise within the Negro Leagues, and only a handful of organizations were able to claim survival.
However, those that did would go on to form the East-West League (EWL), a short lived league that folded before it got off the ground in 1932.
At the conclusion of the 1932 season the NSL was considered to be the highest quality surviving Negro League and therefore, it became the de facto Negro Major Leagues for the 1932 season.
That year the NSL had no problem organizing a full schedule of league games.
However, the spotlight was short lived for the NSL, with the creation of the Negro National League II (NNLII) in 1933.
Many teams began again began to flee the NSL for the second iteration of the Negro National League, the Negro National League II..
From that moment forward the significance, influence and profitability of the league slowly faded into obscurity.
For the rest of its existence it would be widely referred to as a the Negro Minor Leagues.
When the NSL did finally collapse after the 1936 season, some of its founding member teams folded as well.
All but a handful of teams from the Negro Southern League (NSL) continued on playing in the Negro Leagues.
The surviving franchises included the Nashville Elite Giants who excelled in the Negro National League II (NNLII) for years.
Both the Memphis Red Sox and Birmingham Black Barons would go on to play in the Negro National League II, eventually leaving for the newly formed Negro American League (NAL), organized in the 1937 season.
That off-season the Negro American League (NAL) absorbed large portions of talent from the Negro Southern League, accelerating its demise.
Important Dates for the Negro Southern League (NSL):
- 1920 – Formation of the Negro Southern League consisting of 8 member teams: Montgomery Grey Sox, Atlanta Black Crackers, New Orleans Caulfield Ads, Knoxville Giants, Birmingham Black Barons, Nashville White Sox, Pensacola Giants and Jacksonville Stars.
- 1921 – Dropped: Nashville White Sox, Pensacola Giants and Jacksonville Stars; Added: Nashville Elite Giants, Memphis Red Sox and Chattanooga Tigers.
- 1922 – Dropped: Atlanta Black Crackers, Birmingham Black Barons and New Orleans Caulfield Ads (mid-June); Added: Louisville Stars and New Orleans Crescent Stars (mid-June).
- 1923 – Dropped: Knoxville Giants, Louisville Stars, Montgomery Grey Sox and Chattanooga Tigers; Added: Birmingham Black Barons.
- 1924 – no schedule played.
- 1925 – no schedule played.
- 1926 – Dropped: New Orleans Crescent Stars; Added: New Orleans Caulfield Ads, Albany Giants, Montgomery Grey Sox, Atlanta Black Crackers and Chattanooga Black Lookouts.
- 1927 – Dropped: Birmingham Black Barons, Memphis Red Sox, Albany Giants, Montgomery Grey Sox and New Orleans Caulfield Ads; Added: Evansville Louis Reichert Giants, Bessemer Grey Sox, Hopkinsville Athletics and Jackson Cubs.
- 1928 – no schedule played.
- 1929 – Dropped: Bessemer Grey Sox, Hopkinsville Athletics and Jackson Cubs; Added: Louisville Black Caps and New Orleans Caulfield Ads.
- 1930 – no schedule played.
- 1931 – Dropped: Evansville Louis Reichert Giants, Atlanta Black Crackers, Louisville Black Caps and New Orleans Caulfield Ads; Added: Birmingham Black Barons, Memphis Red Sox, Knoxville Giants and Montgomery Grey Sox.
- 1932 – Dropped: Chattanooga Black Lookouts and Knoxville Giants; Added: Cole's American Giants, Monroe Monarchs, Little Rock Grays, Louisville Black Caps, Indianapolis ABC's, Atlanta Black Crackers and Cleveland Cubs.
- 1933 – Dropped: Cole's American Giants, Nashville Elite Giants, Little Rock Grays, Louisville Black Caps, Indianapolis ABC's, Birmingham Black Barons, Atlanta Black Crackers and Cleveland Cubs; Added: Little Rock Stars, New Orleans Crescent Stars, Shreveport Cubs, Algiers Giants, Jackson Senators and Alexandria Lincoln Giants.
- 1934 – Dropped: Little Rock Stars, Shreveport Cubs, Algiers Giants, Jackson Senators and Alexandria Lincoln Giants. Added: Cincinnati Tigers, Birmingham Black Barons and Louisville Caps.
- 1935 – Dropped: Monroe Monarchs, Louisville Caps, Cincinnati Tigers and New Orleans Crescent Stars; Added: Claybrook Tigers, New Orleans Caulfield Ads, Atlanta Black Crackers, Chattanooga Black Lookouts and Montgomery Grey Sox.
- 1936 – Dropped: Claybrook Tigers and New Orleans Caulfield Ads; Added: Cincinnati Tigers, Nashville Black Vols and Hopkinsville Athletics. League fell apart before second-half ended.
Eight franchises competed in the league in 1932;
- Louisville Black Caps; who moved to Columbus and became the Columbus Turfs during the 1932 season
On the eve of imminent integration in 1945, a new Negro Minor League was organized with teams in the South; it assumed the name of the old league and called itself the Negro Southern League II (NSLII).
This second and continued version of the original Negro Southern League lasted until 1951.
leagues
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the oldest major professional sports league in the world. Major League Baseball is composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League and the American League.
Negro National League
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
The Negro National League I was the first of two iterations of the NNL. The NNLI was founded by player/manager, Rube Foster, installing himself as League President and Commissioner.
Negro Southern League
Major League Baseball
Eastern Colored League
The Negro Southern League (NSL) was a professional baseball league organized as a minor league for player development in service to the Negro National League I in 1920 and lasted until 1936.
Eastern Colored League
Eastern Colored League
Eastern Colored League
The Mutual Association of Eastern Colored Clubs, known as the Eastern Colored League (ECL) was one of the several Negro Leagues, operating during the time organized baseball in the United States was racially segregated.
American Negro League
Eastern Colored League
East-West Negro League
The American Negro League, (ANL) not to be confused with the Negro American League (NAL) was one of several Negro leagues established during segregation, operating on the East Coast of the United States for one season in 1929.
East-West Negro League
Eastern Colored League
East-West Negro League
The East–West League was a professional baseball league formed during the period when baseball in the U.S. was segregated. The league was conceived 0f by Cum Posey in 1932. However, it didn't last the full year and folded in June of that year.
Negro National League II
Negro National League II
Negro National League II
The second Negro National League II (NNLII) was founded in 1933 by Gus Greenlee as the second iteration to the former Negro National League I (NNLI), The Negro National League II (NNLII) enjoyed much broader success, lasting until integration.
Negro American League
Negro National League II
Negro National League II
The Negro American League (NAL) not to be confused with the American Negro League (ANL) was one of several Negro leagues established during segregation, operating on the East Coast of the United States for one season in 1929.
LIGA MEXICANA DE BÉISBOL
Negro National League II
FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
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FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
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United States League
FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
Nippon Professional League
The United States Baseball League (USL), was one of the several leagues created during the time organized baseball was segregated. The league was specifically organized as a minor league by Branch Rickey to serve as a platform for outstanding African American talent.
Nippon Professional League
FEDERACION CUBANA DE BÉISBOL
Nippon Professional League
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