Valentín Dreke (June 21, 1898 – September 25, 1929) was a Cuban

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

outfielder An outfielder is a person playing in one of the three defensive positions in baseball or softball, farthest from the batter. These defenders are the left fielder, the center fielder, and the right fielder. As an outfielder, their duty is to catch ...

in the

Negro leagues The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relativel ...

. He played from 1919 to 1927, doing so with the

Cuban Stars (East) The Cuban Stars were a professional baseball team that competed in the Negro leagues in the eastern United States from 1916 to 1933. The team was largely composed of professional baseball players from Cuba and other Latin American countries. The ...

and

Cuban Stars (West) The Cuban Stars were a team of Baseball in Cuba, Cuban professional baseball players that competed in the History of baseball in the United States, United States Negro league baseball, Negro leagues from 1907 to 1930. The team was also sometime ...

. He also played winter ball with the famed Almendares team on three occasions. He led the Negro National League in batting average in 1924, hitting .389 in 46 games played. In his eight years of Negro league ball, he batted at least .296 in each season. He died of

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

in 1929.''Early Exits: The Premature Endings of Baseball Careers''
/ref> He was elected to the

Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame The Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame (''Salón de la Fama del Béisbol Cubano'') is a hall of fame that honors eminent baseball players from Cuban baseball. Established in 1939 to honor players, managers, and umpires in the pre-revolution Cuban League ...

in 1945.

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an
Baseball-Reference Black Baseball stats
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1898 births 1929 deaths 20th-century Cuban sportsmen 20th-century deaths from tuberculosis Almendares (baseball) players Baseball outfielders Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame inductees Cuban baseball players Cuban expatriate baseball players in the United States Cuban Stars (East) players Cuban Stars (West) players Negro league baseball players from Cuba Baseball players from Matanzas Province Tuberculosis deaths in Cuba {{negro-league-baseball-outfielder-stub