Jerry Charles Benjamin (November 9, 1909 – November 23, 1974) was an American

Negro league baseball The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans and, to a lesser extent, Latin Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be ...

center fielder A center fielder, abbreviated CF, is the outfielder in baseball who plays defense in center field – the baseball and softball fielding position between left field and right field. In the numbering system used to record defensive plays, the c ...

who played from 1931 to 1948. He played for the Knoxville Giants,

Memphis Red Sox The Memphis Red Sox were an American Negro league baseball team that was active from 1920 to 1959. Originally named the Barber College Baseball Club, the team was initially owned and operated by Arthur P. Martin, a local Memphis barber. In the la ...

, Indianapolis ABCs/Detroit Stars,

Birmingham Black Barons The Birmingham Black Barons were a Negro league baseball team that played from 1920 until 1960. They shared their home field of Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama, with the white Birmingham Barons, usually drawing larger crowds and equal pres ...

Homestead Grays The Homestead Grays (also known as Washington Grays or Washington Homestead Grays) were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro league baseball, Negro leagues in the United States. The team was formed in 1912 in sports, 1912 by Cumb ...

Newark Eagles The Newark Eagles were a professional Negro league baseball team which played in the Negro National League from 1936 to 1948. They were owned by Abe and Effa Manley. History Formation The Newark Eagles were formed in 1936 when the Newark Do ...

, and

New York Cubans The New York Cubans were a Negro league baseball team that played during the 1930s and from 1939 to 1950. Despite playing in the Negro leagues, the team occasionally employed white-skinned Hispanic baseball players as well, because Hispanics in ...

."Jerry Benjamin Negro League Statistics & History"
baseball-reference.com. Retrieved June 8, 2012. Benjamin was part of the famous Grays that won nine pennants in eleven years, for which Benjamin was part of eight Negro National League pennant teams along with two

Negro World Series The Negro World Series was a post-season baseball tournament that was held from 1924 to 1927 and from 1942 to 1948 between the champions of the Negro leagues, matching the mid-western winners against their east-coast counterparts. The series was a ...

championships in four Series appearances. In those contests, he batted .220 with five total runs batted in (RBI) while stealing five bases in eighteen hits. A three-time East-West All-Star, he had a .372

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average is ...

in 1943. He led the league in a variety of categories over his sixteen season career. He led the league in triples twice (1936, 1937). In 1937, he led the league in walks (thirty), stolen bases (thirteen), games (52). He led the league in stolen bases (thirteen) in 1930. He led the league in at-bats four times (1937, 1942-44). In center field, he led the league six times in games played, twice in putouts, three times in assists, and two times each in errors committed and double plays. Benjamin was born in

Montgomery, Alabama Montgomery is the capital city of the U.S. state of Alabama and the county seat of Montgomery County. Named for the Irish soldier Richard Montgomery, it stands beside the Alabama River, on the coastal Plain of the Gulf of Mexico. In the 202 ...

, and died in

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

References

External links

an
Baseball-Reference Black Baseball stats
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Seamheads
* 1909 births 1974 deaths Memphis Red Sox players Indianapolis ABCs (1931–1933) players Birmingham Black Barons players Homestead Grays players Newark Eagles players New York Cubans players Baseball players from Montgomery, Alabama Baseball outfielders Baseball players from Detroit 20th-century African-American sportspeople {{Negro-league-baseball-outfielder-stub