Curt Flood

At 59 years old, Curt Flood has this physical status:

Curtis Charles Flood (January 18, 1938 – January 20, 1997) was an American baseball player.

He was a center fielder who played 15 seasons in the major leagues for the Cincinnati Redlegs, St. Louis Cardinals, and Washington Senators.

Flood was a three-time All-Star, a Gold Glove winner for seven consecutive seasons, and batted over .300 in six seasons.

He led the National League (NL) in hits (211) in 1964 and in singles, 1963, 1964, and 1968.

Flood also led the National League in putouts as center fielder four times and in fielding percentage as center fielder three times.

He retired with the third most games in center field (1683) in NL history, trailing Willie Mays and Richie Ashburn. Flood became one of the pivotal figures in the sport's labor history when he refused to accept a trade following the 1969 season, ultimately appealing his case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Although his legal challenge was unsuccessful, it brought about additional solidarity among players as they fought against baseball's reserve clause and sought free agency.

Early years

Born in Houston, Texas, and raised in Oakland, California, Flood played in the same outfield in West Oakland's McClymonds High School as Vada Pinson and Frank Robinson. All three would eventually sign professional contracts with the Cincinnati Reds. Flood attended McClymonds High School and transferred to Oakland Technical High School, where he graduated.

Aftermath and post-baseball life

After Flood's lawsuit failed, Flood was blackballed from baseball. There were questions similar to "Do you realize you won't be able to play in MLB ever again?" or "You realize you are going to lose your job?" Everyone Flood consulted was convinced he would be blackballed from baseball. Flood soon realized that his career was over as he later said,

Flood sat out the entire 1970 season. During this period he was bombarded with hate mail from fans, who accused him of trying to destroy baseball; his teammate Bob Gibson estimated "He got four or five death threats a day." The Cardinals sent two minor leaguers to the Phillies in compensation for Flood's refusal to report. One of them—centerfielder Willie Montañez—went on to a 14-year major league career. In November 1970, the Phillies traded Flood and four other players to the Washington Senators. He signed a $110,000 contract with Washington but played only thirteen games of the 1971 season, with a .200 batting average and lackluster play in center field. Despite manager Ted Williams's vote of confidence, Flood left the team in late April and retired. He had a lifetime batting average of .293 with 1,861 hits, 85 home runs, 851 runs, and 636 RBI. Defensively, Flood posted a .987 fielding percentage in his major-league career. Later that year Flood published a memoir entitled The Way It Is in which he spelled out in detail his argument against the reserve clause.

After his retirement, Flood purchased a bar in the resort town of Palma on the island of Majorca, where he had moved in the wake of the bankruptcy of his Curt Flood Associates business, two lawsuits, and an IRS lien on a home he bought for his mother. He returned to baseball as a member of the Oakland Athletics broadcasting team in 1978. In 1988 he was named commissioner of the short-lived Senior Professional Baseball Association. In the mid-1990s, he joined the management group of the United Baseball League (UBL), which was envisioned as a smaller alternative to MLB. While the group negotiated a long-term TV contract with Liberty Media, the deal (and the UBL) failed when Liberty was absorbed by MLB contractor Fox Sports. In his spare time, he painted; his 1989 oil portrait of Joe DiMaggio sold at auction for $9,500 in 2006.

On January 20, 1997, just two days after his 59th birthday, Flood died at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, after developing pneumonia, and was interred in Inglewood Park Cemetery in Inglewood.

Just before his death, Flood's legacy was acknowledged in Congress in 1997 via the Baseball Fans and Communities Protection Act of 1997. Numbered HR 21 (Flood's Cardinals uniform number) and introduced in the House of Representatives on the first day of the 105th Congress by Rep. John Conyers, Jr. (D–Michigan), the legislation established federal antitrust law protection for major league baseball players to the same extent as provided for other professional athletes.

Curt Flood is a nonparticipating but pivotal character in the book Our Gang by Philip Roth.

Flood's struggle for free agency was featured in Ken Burns' documentary series Baseball in 1994. He was inducted into the Baseball Reliquary's Shrine of the Eternals in 1999.

In 2020, 102 members of the U.S. Congress wrote a letter to the Baseball Hall of Fame, co-signed by Players' unions from the NFL, NHL, NBA, and MLS, asking the Hall of Fame to admit Flood.

Personal life and health

Flood was married twice and had five children. His first marriage was to Beverly Collins from 1959 until 1966, and together they had five children; Debbie, Gary, Shelly, Scott, and Curt Flood, Jr. Flood later married actress Judy Pace in 1986, whom he had met and dated previously from 1966 until 1970. They remained married until his death. Diagnosed with throat cancer in 1995, Flood was initially given a 90–95 percent chance of survival. He underwent radiation treatments, chemotherapy, and throat surgery, which left him unable to speak.

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MLB career

Flooding appeared with the Cincinnati Reds in 1956 and 1957, making just a few appearances for the team from 1956 to 1957. However, with upcoming centerfielder Vada Pinson expected to be promoted to the majors, flood was considered expendable. In December 1957, he was traded to the St. Louis Cardinals. He became a staple for St. Louis center field from 1958 to 1960, and his defensive abilities were apparent. After Johnny Keane took over as boss in 1961, he had a breakthrough year at the plate: he batted.322 and.296 in 1962 with 11 home runs. He continued to improve offensively in 1963, hitting.302 and scoring a career-high 112 runs, third-most in the NL; he also set new records in doubles (34), triples (9) and stolen bases (17) and totaled 200 hits in an NL-leading 662 at bats; he also set career highs in doubles (34), while others (36) and stole bases (17) and had career bests in doubles (35), with career He won the first of his seven consecutive Gold Gloves in that year.

In 1964, he was the first All-Star selection. He batted.311. His 679 at-bats led the NL to their fifth-highest total in league history to that point, beating Taylor Douthit's 1930 total of 664; Lou Brock broke the team's record by 689. With 211, he tied for top hits with the Pittsburgh Pirates' Roberto Clemente. In the World Series against the New York Yankees, he was only.200 but was instrumental in three of the Cardinal victories as the team won in seven games for the first time since 1946. When he was hitting.310 in 1965, Flood had his highest power output with 11 home runs and 83 runs batted in. He made the All-Star squad again in 1966, a season in which he did not make a single mistake in the outfield; his unbeaten streak of 226 games (NL record for an outfielder) and 568 total chances (major league record) spanned from September 3, 1965 to June 4, 1967.

He had his best batting average in 1967, with a.335 average (though his other batting totals dropped off from previous years), assisting the Cardinals in another championship. He made a bad.179 in the World Series against the Boston Red Sox, but he made some vital contributions. He advanced Brock to third base twice in game 1, putting him in a 2–1 win; in game 3, he drove Brock in for the first run of a 5–2 victory. He had his best year as a co-captain (with Tim McCarver) in 1968, winning his third All-Star pick and finishing fourth in the MVP polls (won by teammate Bob Gibson) on the strength of a.301 batting average and 186 base hits. Flood was one of the first back-to-back no-hitters in major league history against the San Francisco Giants this year. He dropped out in the final out of Gaylord Perry's 1–0 gem on September 17. Willie McCovey's fly ball for the final out of Ray Washburn's 2–0 no-hitter on Sunday. The Cardinals might have won their third championship of the decade if he hadn't momentarily lost his footing in chase of a Jim Northrup fly ball (ruled a triple) with two out in game 7 of the World Series against the Detroit Tigers; Detroit scored twice on the play, with Northrup taking the lead after the game, 4–1. Despite having to deal with personal issues at home, Flood had been enjoying the best sequence of his career, winning.286 with three steals.

Flooding was dissatisfied with the Cardinals' president Gussie Busch, the CEO of Team owner Anheuser-Busch, who received only a $5,000 compensation after his stellar regular season. Busch, with whom he had previously enjoyed a close personal relationship, was clearly expressing his dissatisfaction with a decision that would have almost cost the team the Series. Although Busch eventually relented, Flood blamed the team out after most players withdrew spring training before the 1969 season ended, accusing players of forgetting that supporters were what kept the game alive (though he did not mention any player by name).

Flooding's batting average dropped to.285. Despite the lower pitching mound's that season, which saw a general increase in batting average league-wide. During the season, his brother was arrested. He sluggishly chastised the team for reorganizing before they were officially dismissed late in the season. He earned his seventh Gold Glove of the season, just as other events in his career began to impact the entire game. In a major league regular-season game in Canada, floods were the first to strike. In the first inning of the Expos' inaugural home game on April 14, he doubled off Montreal Expos pitcher Larry Jaster. (Jaster, a Cardinal teammate of Flood's the year before, had been chosen by the Expos in the expansion draft).

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