Oliver Marcell (June 21, 1895 – June 12, 1949), nicknamed "Ghost", was an American

third baseman A third baseman, abbreviated 3B, is the player in baseball or softball whose responsibility is to defend the area nearest to third base — the third of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. In the scoring system us ...

in the

Negro leagues 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 ...

for a number of teams around the league from 1918-1931. He also played

shortstop Shortstop, abbreviated SS, is the baseball or softball fielding position between second and third base, which is considered to be among the most demanding defensive positions. Historically the position was assigned to defensive specialists who ...

. A Creole born in

Thibodaux, Louisiana Thibodaux ( ) is a city in, and the parish seat of, Lafourche Parish, Louisiana, United States, along the banks of Bayou Lafourche in the northwestern part of the parish. The population was 15,948 at the 2020 census. Thibodaux is a principal city ...

, he batted and threw right-handed. While the Negro leagues had many statistics recorded in the 1920s, Marcell put up outstanding numbers. In

1922 Events January * January 7 – Dáil Éireann (Irish Republic), Dáil Éireann, the parliament of the Irish Republic, ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by 64–57 votes. * January 10 – Arthur Griffith is elected President of Dáil Éirean ...

with the

Bacharach Giants The Bacharach Giants were a Negro league baseball team that played in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Founding The club was founded when two African-American politicians moved the Duval Giants of Jacksonville, Florida, to Atlantic City in 1916 an ...

, he posted a .379

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 ...

. Again in

1924 Events January * January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after. * January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China hol ...

, he hit well, putting up a .352 average for Bacharach and the

New York Lincoln Giants The Lincoln Giants were a Negro league baseball team based in New York City from 1911 through 1930. Founding The Lincoln Giants can trace their origins back to the Nebraska Indians, of Lincoln, Nebraska, from the 1890s. According to Sol White ...

. Although "Ghost" was a top-class hitting infielder, his defensive skills took center stage by comparison. He was considered by most to be the greatest fielding third basemen in the league throughout the 1920s and possibly of all time.

Baseball Hall of Fame The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a history museum and hall of fame in Cooperstown, New York, operated by private interests. It serves as the central point of the history of baseball in the United States and displays baseball-r ...

Judy Johnson William Julius "Judy" Johnson (October 26, 1899 – June 15, 1989) was an American professional third baseman and manager whose career in Negro league baseball spanned 17 seasons, from 1921 to 1937. Slight of build, Johnson never developed as ...

once admitted that Marcell was a better defensive player than himself. During that time, he and shortstop Dick Lundy made up one of the best left-side infields ever. Marcell was known for a terrible temper, with

umpires An umpire is an official in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The term derives from the Old French nonper, ''non'', "not" and ''per'', ...

and opponents commonly drawn into arguments with him, and even teammates sometimes fighting him. There is a story that Marcell once hit

Oscar Charleston Oscar McKinley Charleston (October 14, 1896 – October 5, 1954) was an American center fielder and manager in Negro league baseball. Over his 43-year baseball career, Charleston played or managed with more than a dozen teams, including the Home ...

in the head with a

bat Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera.''cheir'', "hand" and πτερόν''pteron'', "wing". With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most bi ...

. He participated in 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 ...

, both for the Bacharach Giants. He put up fairly good numbers during one of them (.293, six

RBIs A run batted in (RBI; plural RBIs ) is a statistic in baseball and softball that credits a batter for making a play that allows a run to be scored (except in certain situations such as when an error is made on the play). For example, if the bat ...

in 11 games). In the other, he posted a .235 average with 2 RBIs in 9 games. However, he did much better than that when he got his chance against white competition. He went 23-for-63, good for a .365 average, in 17 exhibition contests against white players. Marcell was rated ahead of Hall of Famers Judy Johnson and

Ray Dandridge Raymond Emmitt Dandridge (August 31, 1913 – February 12, 1994), nicknamed "Hooks" and "Squat", was an American third baseman in baseball's Negro leagues. Dandridge excelled as a third baseman and he hit for a high batting average. By the time th ...

in the renowned 1952 ''

Pittsburgh Courier The ''Pittsburgh Courier'' was an African-American weekly newspaper published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1907 until October 22, 1966. By the 1930s, the ''Courier'' was one of the leading black newspapers in the United States. It was acqu ...

'' player-voted poll of the Negro leagues' best players."1952 Pittsburgh Courier Poll of Greatest Black Players"
/ref> In a strange incident in the late 1920s, Marcell's teammate

Frank Warfield Francis Xavier Warfield (April 26, 1897 – July 24, 1932) was an infielder and manager in the Negro leagues. Career Standing at just 5'7", Warfield was known primarily for his fielding and baserunning excellence, but he also had several good yea ...

reportedly bit Marcell's

nose A nose is a protuberance in vertebrates that houses the nostrils, or nares, which receive and expel air for respiration alongside the mouth. Behind the nose are the olfactory mucosa and the sinuses. Behind the nasal cavity, air next passes th ...

off after the two got into a fight, when both men were playing in the

Cuban Winter League The Cuban League was one of the earliest and longest lasting professional baseball leagues outside the United States, operating in Cuba from 1878 to 1961. The schedule usually operated during the winter months, so the league was sometimes known a ...

Bill Yancey William James Yancey (April 2, 1902 – April 13, 1971) was an American baseball shortstop in the Negro leagues. He played from 1927 to 1936. He also played for the New York Renaissance, an all-black professional basketball team. Yancey also serve ...

, another teammate of Marcell's, said, "What got arcellout of baseball, he and eammateFrank Warfield had a fight in Cuba robably in the winter of 1927-28, over a dice gameand Warfield bit his nose off. He was a proud, handsome guy, you know, and then he used to wear a black patch across his nose and he got so he couldn't play baseball anymore." Marcell had been a staple of the Cuban Winter League throughout the decade. In the 1923-24 season, he batted .393 to lead the league. He ended with an overall .305 average in Cuba. After some time with the

Detroit Stars The Detroit Stars were an American baseball team in the Negro leagues and played at historic Mack Park. The Stars had winning seasons every year but two, but were never able to secure any championships. Among their best players was Baseball Hall of ...

, Marcell didn't play very much longer. His final career average was supposedly around .315 with 11

home run In baseball, a home run (abbreviated HR) is scored when the ball is hit in such a way that the batter is able to circle the bases and reach home plate safely in one play without any errors being committed by the defensive team. A home run i ...

s. Marcell died in poverty in 1949 in

Denver, Colorado Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

and was buried in an unmarked grave in Riverside Cemetery.

References

External links

an
Baseball-Reference Black Baseball stats
an
Seamheads
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Marcell, Oliver 1895 births 1949 deaths Bacharach Giants players Baltimore Black Sox players Brooklyn Royal Giants players Hilldale Club players Leopardos de Santa Clara players Lincoln Giants players Sportspeople from Thibodaux, Louisiana American expatriate baseball players in Cuba Almendares (baseball) players 20th-century African-American sportspeople