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Theodore Roosevelt Radcliffe, nicknamed Double Duty because he was a star pitcher and catcher, was the most memorable person I’ve ever met. His personality was larger-than-life, he made me laugh more than anyone I’ve ever known, and he lived for more than 103 years!
As Double Duty’s biographer, I interviewed dozens of his ex-teammates and opponents, bat boys, umpires and fans, some of whom had not seen Radcliffe in 50 or more years. But they all remembered him: the baritone voice with a lisp, the constant bragging on and off the field, his sense of humor, and his tremendous baseball talents. I’ll try to highlight why Double Duty (just plain “Duty” to his friends) is one of the most memorable players in baseball history.
Born on July 7th, 1902 in Mobile, Alabama, Duty was one of 10 children (five boys and five girls), and he and his brothers Forney and Alex were great semipro players on teams such as the Mobile Black Bears and Mobile Brooklyns, where they often teamed with Mobile resident Leroy “Satchel” Paige. In 1919, Duty and his family moved to Chicago, and he lived in basically the same neighborhood for the next 86 years!
While playing sandlot ball in Chicago, Duty was discovered and signed by the Illinois Giants, a top black traveling team, and he wouldn’t retire as a player for 36 years! In his prime, the right-handed hitter and thrower carried 210 pounds on his 5’-9” frame, threw his fastball over 90 miles per hour, and was built a lot like Kirby Puckett.
Duty was not the most loyal of employees, and when a team offered him more money than he was making he’d make a move. In 36 years, he played for more than 40 teams, as many as six in one season!
Duty played for teams you might have heard of, like the Homestead Grays, Pittsburgh Crawfords, Kansas City Monarchs, Chicago American Giants, Birmingham Black Barons and Memphis Red Sox; he also played for teams you probably haven’t heard of, such as the Harlem Globetrotters baseball team, the Claybrook Tigers, Jamestown Red Sox, Bismarck Churchills, South Bend Studebakers, Winnipeg Elmwood Giants and Rochester Aces. He also played over 20 winters in foreign countries, including Venezuela, Cuba, Mexico and Puerto Rico.
Duty had too many career highlights to recite in this small space (which is why you should go to www.pitchblackbaseball.com and buy his biography!), but here are some to chew on:
In 1934, Duty went 17-3 on the mound for the Jamestown Red Sox, batted .355, and beat a Major League All-Star team (with Jimmie Foxx, Heinie Manush, Ted Lyons, Pinky Higgins, etc.) 11-3, and ripped a double and two singles to help his own cause.
In 1935, Duty, along with Satchel Paige and Hilton Smith, won the first Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kansas with the only integrated team in the tournament, the Bismarck, North Dakota Churchills. The tournament continues to this day.
In six East-West All-Star games, three as a pitcher and three as a catcher, Duty batted .308 with a 2.35 ERA, saved the 1938 game by pitching the last four innings in relief without allowing a run, got the victory in the 1939 game with two innings of scoreless relief and a rally-starting base hit, and was the star of stars in 1944 (outshining Josh Gibson, Cool Papa Bell, Ray Dandridge, Buck Leonard and Roy Campanella, among others), by blasting a homer into the upper deck at Comiskey Park to seal the victory for his West squad.
In exhibitions against Major Leaguers, Duty batted .403 in 62 at bats, and won three games without a loss on the mound.
In 1948, Duty integrated two semipro leagues, the Southern Minny made up of small towns in southern Minnesota, and the Michigan-Indiana League, the top semipro circuit in the country. With South Bend, the 46-year-old Duty dominated teams such as the Kalamazoo Peter Pans, Fort Wayne GE Voltmen and Benton Harbor Buds, as well as top Negro League teams. Duty was South Bend’s everyday catcher, batted .312 and he led his team in homers and RBIs despite missing the first month of the season, had a .983 fielding percentage, and “called” a homerun against the Norfolk Royals.
Duty spent his last few seasons in Canada, and though he didn’t play every day, he batted .459 with a 3-0 mound record in 1951, and batted .364 with a complete game win on the mound at age 50! And the entire time he was performing these heroic feats, he was talking about it non-stop!
Teammate Joe Desiderato described Duty as talking to batters while he pitched: “Here it comes, try to hit this!”
Homestead Grays pitcher Wilmer Fields thought Duty was over 60 (he was really 44) when he took off his catcher’s gear and came to the mound to save a game for him, and he talked about it for the next half century! “Duty always says to me, ‘Fields, do you remember when I done this and done that?’” Fields recalled.
And Kansas City Monarchs’ outfielder Slick Surratt summed it up perfectly when he said, “I know he was in his late 50s and he would get back there and tell you, ‘go ahead and steal if you think you can make it.’ And he would gun you out! Now he does a lot of talking, but when you can do things like he did it ain’t bragging, it’s executing! Duty should be in the Hall of Fame!”
Duty’s most common phrase, though, was simple. He often said, “How many men do you know that can pitch AND catch like me?” The answer, of course, was zero!
Double Duty’s biography is available in audio and digital form. Visit www.pitchblackbaseball.com
-Kyle McNary
