Andrew (Andy) Lewis Cooper was born on this date in
Waco, Texas; 1898. Whereas many of the
best hurlers in Negro League baseball had nicknames to describe the power and
speed of their pitches, “Smokey”, Bullet”, “Cannonball”, “Strong Armed”, etc.; Cooper was
different. Nicknamed “Lefty”, he threw
with his left hand, Cooper used a variety of pitches (curve ball, change up,
screwball) at different speeds to get batters out. From
1920 – 1927, Cooper was the pitching ace of the Detroit Stars. Traded to the Kansas City Monarchs in 1927,
he helped them win the 1929 Negro National League pennant. Later, with Cooper as the team’s manager,
the Monarch’s won four straight Negro American League pennants (1937 –
1940). Andy Cooper was inducted into the
National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006.
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