Illegal Foreign Object

Charley Pride is best known for a singing career that resulted in thirty #1 hits and a 2000 induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame, but he was also a baseball lifer.

“Every kid has a dream, and mine was to be a Major Leaguer,” Charley Pride once said in an interview with MLB.com. “When I saw Jackie Robinson go to the big leagues (in 1947), I knew that was my way of getting out of the cotton fields.”

In 1952, Charley, then 18, joined the Memphis Red Sox of the Negro Leagues. In ’53, he signed with the New York Yankees and joined its Minor League affiliate in Boise. Later that same year, pitching for the Louisville Clippers, Pride and teammate Jesse Mitchell were traded to the Birmingham Black Barons for a team bus. You read that correctly. A BUS!

After playing part of 1955 with the Nogales Yanquis, Pride spent a few years in the Army (during which time he played on an All-Army Champions team). In 1958, he returned to Memphis to resume his baseball career, but an injury to his throwing arm hindered his growth. After failed attempts at a comeback with farm teams for the Cincinnati Reds, California Angels, and New York Mets, Pride retired from pro baseball in 1962.

Pride had spent the last two years working construction in Helena, Montana, but the East Helena Smelterites recruited Charley to pitch for its semipro team after being laid off. The manager kept 18 positions open at the Asarco lead smelting factory specifically for good baseball players with whom he stocked the team.

In his first season, Pride hit .444, but when his manager overheard him singing, he offered to pay Charley an extra $10 to perform for 15 minutes for the fans before game time. Pride had sung in front of a crowd before — he played various clubs and even recorded a few songs at the famed Sun Studios in 1958 after the Reds (country artists Red Foley and Red Sovine) told him to try country music. He jumped at the opportunity to perform before the games. Singing in front of those baseball fans, Charley found his true calling (while simultaneously building a fanbase).

Pride recorded a demo, which the legendary Chet Atkins heard, offering him a record deal. Charley signed with RCA Records in 1966, leaving his dangerous 11 a.m.-7 p.m. smelting job in his rearview.

Between 1966 and 1987, Charley Pride recorded fifty-two Top 10 singles. Only one artist in the history of RCA Records was a bigger hitmaker: some Elvis Presley guy.

Needing a centrally located airport to make it to all his shows, Pride moved his family from Montana to Texas in 1969. In 1972, when the Washington Senators relocated to Arlington, Texas, and rebranded as the Texas Rangers, Pride embraced the team as his own, routinely attending games and singing the National Anthem. He also enjoyed showing up to Spring Training and singing for the players in the clubhouse. During one such trip, I had the honor of meeting Charley. I was probably 9, consumed with chasing autographs around the park, and noticed my dad and family friend (and Rangers catcher) Geno Petralli talking to Pride. I wandered over and was introduced to Charley, then immediately stuck my foot in my mouth by telling him I loved his song, “Baby’s Got Her Blue Jeans On”. He gently corrected me, saying, “That’s my buddy Mel McDaniel’s song, but I like it too”. I felt like a goof, and my dad apologized on my behalf — Charley wouldn’t hear of it. He was a kind man with a gentle smile, and I have never forgotten how he shook my hand and spoke to me like he’d known me for years. I was a kid — a nobody — but Charley Pride was just that kind of person.

In his 1994 autobiography, Pride revealed that he suffered from manic depression for much of his life. Knowing this gives me a further understanding of why he went out of his way to be kind to strangers.

Since his passing in 2020, the Texas Rangers have continued to honor the life and memory of Charley Pride. In 2021, the team named of its Spring Training fields after the country music legend. That same year, the team partnered with Charley’s wife and son to create the Charley Pride Fellowship, a paid internship program designed to give five students from diverse backgrounds (and with an interest in gaining experience in a baseball front office) the opportunity to see and work for the Rangers organization for the summer.