Biscuits open homestand by honoring Negro Leagues in Rickwood Classic
By TIM GAYLE
The Montgomery Biscuits will be turning back the clock this week to honor a piece of the city’s baseball history by honoring the often overlooked Montgomery Gray Sox this week in the team’s series with the Birmingham Barons.
The Gray Sox were part of the eight-team Negro Southern League from 1920 to 1932, playing their games at Southside Park on South Holt Street, approximately a block south of Mill Street in the Washington Park area between Fairview Avenue and the interstate interchange.
The week will start with the Biscuits playing the Barons in the Rickwood Classic. The game is slated for Tuesday at 6 p.m. at the old Rickwood Field in Birmingham. It will be followed later in the week by the Major League Baseball game featuring the San Francisco Giants and the St. Louis Cardinals. The game will be televised on Fox while the MiLB game will be on the MLB Network. Both will honor the Negro Leagues.
“The Biscuits and Barons will play as the Montgomery Gray Sox and the Birmingham Black Barons,” Biscuits general manager Mike Murphy said. “It’s going to be a part of a week long celebration of Negro League Baseball at Rickwood Field. We will be honoring the Montgomery Grey Sox. At Rickwood, we will be wearing throwback uniforms that look like they would have in the 1920s. The rest of the week, when we come back to Riverwalk Stadium, we’re going to wear a modernized version of it. We’ve created jerseys that we’ll wear on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday of that week.
“It’s a really great event not only for the fans but the players as well.”
The Rickwood Classic, or the game between the Giants and the Cardinals on Thursday, is the start of a week that was planned by the Biscuits before Major League Baseball got involved.
“It’s pretty exciting for our guys,” Biscuits manager Kevin Boles said. “I know they’re looking forward to it, too. All of the Hall of Famers that have gone through there. You think about what we do for a living, player development, and all those players that have been developed on those fields. We’re lucky to have this opportunity. It’s an honor. These are special games and we’re looking forward to the challenge.”
It’s a teaching moment for the players as well as they learn a part of baseball history.
“We always talk about these players and how they don’t know the game and something that we’ve implemented here is we’ll post bios and statistics on the wall,” Boles said. “The other day, it was Willie Stargell. We show them the significance of their career. We had Roger Clemens one day and Miguel Cabrera. They need to be informed as far as the history of what’s happened.”
Biscuits outfielder Chandler Simpson, an Atlanta native who once played at UAB, is excited to participate in the week long celebration of the Gray Sox.
“It’s an honor to play (at Rickwood), honestly, because of the people before me that have paved the way for me and my peers that are African American,” Simpson said, “that they would honor them in a great way and put on a great show and make them proud.”
The celebration then moves to Riverwalk for the remainder of the week.
“All week long, we’ve created this modernized version of the Gray Sox and on June 19 we’ll be debuting those jerseys for our Juneteenth celebration,” Murphy said. “On Thursday, we have a tank top giveaway with that logo on it. On Friday, we have an adult replica jersey giveaway presented by the Montgomery Regional Airport. And on Sunday, we have a kids’ replica jersey giveaway presented by Hyundai Motor Manufacturing. So it’s a huge weekend. We’re really trying to do everything we can to honor and celebrate the Montgomery Gray Sox and create something that we’ll be able to do year after year.”