MOMENTS, MEMORIES AND MADNESS: Rocking the boat with Satchel Paige

Can’t beat an afternoon fishing.

Um, let me be honest and amend that, because I’m not really a guy who can throw a line in the water and lie down on a bank somewhere.

I don’t have the patience for it.

But one of the best days of my life did, indeed, involve several hours in a boat, baiting hooks (uselessly) and ignoring the blistering humidity of the Midwest.

“We jes’ feedin’ the fish,” announced my companion, Satchel Paige.

“We’re out here to put our minds at ease, and keep our thoughts from roilin’ to where you can become truly ill.”

Leroy ‘Satchel’ Paige was one of the most colorful characters in the history of baseball — and also right there in any argument about the best pitcher who ever lived.

He was all of that.

Joe DiMaggio faced Paige in an exhibition game before the major leagues were integrated, and said, “Satch threw one past me and I looked in the catcher’s mitt, expecting to see a pile of ashes.”

A YEAR after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947, Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck — who had made piles of money sponsoring games and tours involving big-name major leaguers and several of the better-known Negro League all-stars — seriously needed pitching help with his Cleveland team involved in a tough American League pennant race against the Philadelphia Athletics.

Veeck signed Paige in July of 1948, when Satch was at least 42 years old.

We’ll return to that subject of Paige’s age when we get out in the fishing boat, because Satch never actually fessed up to an actual age, and there was considerable question about his Alabama birth certificate (which noted his birthdate as July 7, 1906).

Veeck, who wasn’t above embellishing a story himself, claimed that he rang up Paige’s mother to get the correct birthdate for the Indians’ records.

“The problem, Mr. Veeck,” he recalls hearing Satchel’s mother Lula say, “I can’t rightfully recall if Leroy is my first son or my 14th.”

Great story from Veeck the showman, but in fact, Satchel’s mother knew by then that her son was enjoying the mystery surrounding his age.

As late as 1959, Lula Paige claimed her son was older than the numbers on what she claimed was a miswritten birth certificate, and she was sure because she’d written it in her Bible.

Satch himself sometimes claimed to be younger, particularly when he was hustling women in several countries — or older when he wanted to embarrass strapping kids who believed they were going to knock around an old geezer.

Satchel’s response when asked about his age became famous, and it has a ring of truth for all of us.

“How old would you be,” he’d ask, “if you really didn’t know?”

SO HOW did I wind up in a boat with the legendary Satchel Paige?

Well, there was a stretch in the 1970s when the Kansas City Royals — whom I was covering — were managed by Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Lemon.

Lemon and Paige had been teammates on that ’48 Cleveland team that won the World Series.

No matter what his age, by the way, it’s official that Paige went 6-1 for the Indians that year with two shutouts and a 2.48 ERA.

Besides setting up my day on the lake, Lemon offered up several stories about Satch.

“To start with, he called everybody Jim,” Lemon said, “Because Jim Hegan was our catcher and he knew that name for sure.”

So the pitchers and reserve guys would be shagging balls in the outfield. Satch would find a young guy who didn’t really know who he was, and say: ‘Hey, Jim, I’ll bet you 10 bucks that I can throw a pitch over a chewing gum wrapper 10 times in a row — all strikes over that little wrapper.’

“Every time, the kid would go for it — you’re talking one of those Juicy Fruit wrappers that’s about 3 inches wide.

“Satch would pace off 60 feet in the outfield, no mound, no support to pitch from, and he’d nail that wrapper over and over. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life, and Satch could do it every day.

“With the control and variations and the pitches he had, plus he was throwing about a hundred when he was younger, he had to be just about the best that ever picked up a baseball.”

SO WE make it to the boat, although Satchel’s directions — like his life — had a lot of curves and misdirections.

Before we set off, though, Satch said: “Hey, I’ll bet you I can throw 10 straight strikes over that little rock there.”

At this point, Satchel Paige was somewhere between 65 and 80, depending on the person (and document) you wanted to believe.

No bet, I told him. I knew his gig.

“Aw, Jim’s been stealin’ my stuff,” Satch said, referring to Bob Lemon.

Anyhow, as Satch predicted, we caught nothing.

But as he said: “What’s the point in tryin’ hard? You might get all worked up.”

So I asked questions, and Satch took the chance in between to tell some of his favorite tales.

“Naw, that story about Cool Papa Bell bein’ so fast that he could flip the light switch and get into bed before the room got dark, that ain’t quite honest,” he said.

“But he could get halfway.”

And so it went.

Some of his stories, particularly about the offseason barnstorming tours that he took leading the Satchel Paige All-Stars — playing against major league heroes led by Hall of Famers Bob Feller or Dizzy Dean — were new and fascinating.

“One day in Los Angeles (it could have San Diego or Mexico City, as Satch tended to ignore geography), we’re in a nothin’-nothin’ game in the seventh or eighth inning.

“Diz (Dean) hit me for a triple to lead off. I let him do it, so the crowd could see a show. He got to third, and hollered, ‘Satch, you in trouble now.’

“I yelled back, ‘No, Diz, it’s YOU in trouble.’ And nine strikes later, the side was retired. See, you have to entertain the fans.”

I NEVER did get Satch to surrender his actual age.

“Mister Veeck got a copy of a birth certificate and it’s printed in my book (his autobiography). It says I was born in ’06,” he said, “but I fixed that up with Mama Lula to give him my brother’s birthday.

“The day I was born started with 18, not a 19.”

True?

No?

Satch cackled as only he could.

Nevertheless, even if you take the MLB version, he pitched in the 1948 World Series at age 42, made the American League All-Star teams in 1952 and ’53 — all this after throwing what everyone agrees was thousands of innings in the Negro Leagues, or in exhibitions were people turned out just to see him.

A couple of club owners “rented” him out to other teams, just to grab one huge crowd.

It’s also on record that Satch pitched three scoreless innings for the Kansas City Athletics against Boston in 1965 (age 59, minimum).

The whole thing was just one more promotion from owner Charles O. Finley, but Satch was deadly serious and blanked the Sox on one hit — a double by Carl Yastrzemski.

There are plenty of fuzzy areas in Satch’s life, and I wanted to clear up one of them.

“OK,” I asked him, “everybody tells me a different story. Were you married twice, or three times with maybe one of them illegal?”

He paused, laughed, and said: “Ask Buck.”

He was referring to another Hall of Famer, Negro League player and manager Buck O’Neil. Buck was still a Royals scout whom I saw almost every night.

“You’re stalling,” I said, “Because you know Buck will make up some story.”

Satch was laughing so hard, our little bass boat was rocking.

“When I was with Cleveland,” he said, “Mr. Veeck come to me and said, ‘Satch, are you married? Every game, there are two tickets for Mrs. Paige, and there’s a different beautiful woman sitting there each night.’

“I told him, ‘No, Mr. Veeck. I ain’t married, but I’m in great demand.’”

Satch cackled again, noticed we were near the dock, and said to me: “This was fun, but we’d better get tied up.

“I need my sleep these days, Jim.”

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns for The Press appear on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He also contributes the “Zags Tracker” package on Gonzaga basketball each Tuesday.

Steve’s various tales from several decades in sports — “Moments, Memories and Madness” — run on Sundays.