NEW YORK – Something still bothers Barry Larkin about his MVP award.
The other name engraved on the trophy: Kenesaw Mountain Landis.
“Because it is there?” said Larkin, the black shortstop voted National League MVP in 1995 with the Cincinnati Reds.
“I was always aware of his name and what it meant to slow down the color line in Major League Baseball, of the racial injustice and inequality that black players had to go through,” the Hall of Fame said this week. .
Hired in 1920 as the first sports commissioner to help clean up the rampant game, Landis and his legacy are “always a complicated story” that includes “documented racism,” said official MLB historian John Thorn.
This is true, in black and white, about the son of a Union Army medic wounded in the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain in Georgia during the Civil War: no Negro played in the Major Leagues during his quarter-century tenure; Jackie Robinson broke the barrier in April 1947, approximately 2.5 years after Landis’ death.
“Landis is part of the story, although it was a dark story,” said Houston Astros manager Dusty Baker.
The fact is, few fans realize that the Landis name is stuck on the trophies of the most valuable players. Most people just call it MVP.
But there it is, prominently displayed on every American League plate and National League MVP since 1944 – the Kenesaw Mountain Landis Memorial Baseball Award, in brilliant gold lettering, literally twice as large as the winner’s.
With a sizeable imprint on Landis’s face, too.
For some MVPs, it’s time for that 75-year career to end.
“If you’re looking to expose people in baseball history who promoted racism by continuing to close baseball doors to men of color, Kenesaw Landis would be a candidate,” said three-time National League MVP Mike Schmidt of Philadelphia.
“Looking at baseball in the early 1900s, this was the norm. However, it doesn’t make it right,” said the Hall of Fame member. “Removing his name from the MVP trophy would expose the injustice of that time. I would gladly replace the engraving on my trophies.”
1991 National League MVP Terry Pendleton of Atlanta, who is black: “This is 2020 now and things have changed around the world. It can change for the better.”
“The statues are going down, people are looking at monuments and monuments,” he said. “We need to get to the bottom of things, do the right thing. Yes, maybe it’s time to change the name.
“I’ve always thought about it, why is it still there?” Pendleton said. “MVP certainly stands on its own. It doesn’t need a name.”
Many sacred baseball trophies are adorned with the names of the greats: Robinson, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Cy Young, Willie Mays, Ted Williams, and more.
How Landis was recorded in the list is easy to trace.
A federal judge in Chicago, Landis quickly established his powerful authority as commissioner, banning Shoeless Joe Jackson and the Black Sox for pitching the 1919 World Series.
In 1931, Landis decided that members of the Baseball Writers Association of America would choose and present the MVP Awards. Before that, leagues had their own mishmash system.
Then, during the 1944 World Series, BBWAA voted to add Landis’ name to the plaque as “an acknowledgment of his relationship with the writers,” said Jack O’Connell, BBWAA secretary and treasurer.
A month later, Landis died at age 78. He was soon elected to the Hall of Fame.
“Landis is who he is. He was who he was,” Thorn said. “I fully support the movement to remove the Confederate monuments, and Landis was quite close to the Confederacy.”
Its precise role on racial issues has been debated for decades.
Landis dissolved the displays between the black and white star teams. She invited a group of Black newspaper editors to address the owners in what turned out to be a cordial but totally unsuccessful presentation.
Towards the end of his tenure, he told the owners that they were free to sign black players. But there is also no evidence that it has fueled the integration of baseball, as the status quo of segregation remained.
“If you have the Jackie Robinson Prize and the Kenesaw Mountain Landis Prize, you are at diametrically opposite poles,” said Thorn. “And it represents an enigma.”
O’Connell said that no MVP had made a complaint to him about Landis since he took office in 1994. He said Landis’s name on the plaque was neither promised nor part of the BBWAA constitution.
Any BBWAA member could raise an objection to Landis’ presence. That will normally be discussed at the organization’s next meeting, currently scheduled for December at winter meetings in Dallas. The coronavirus pandemic has put the event in jeopardy.
O’Connell said that if someone raised the issue now, they could come to the board and open up for discussion and voting. Removing the Landis name “would be a simple matter of redesigning the plaque,” he said.
For Larkin, that would remove the stain from the trophy.
Larkin recalled that shortly after being voted MVP, he received a call from two-time National League MVP Joe Morgan. Big Red Machine second base star Black Black spoke about Landis’ legacy and “said it never suited him, having that name there,” Larkin recalled.
Larkin agrees.
“Your name should not be represented on a plaque or award of honor, especially on this day and time,” he said. “If the name were removed, I would not object at all.”
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