BLACK DIAMOND KINGS

From Satchel Paige to Norman “Turkey” Stearnes, a dozen stars who spent all or most of their careers in the Negro Leagues strut their stuff.

Smith’s verse tributes catch his subjects in action. Here’s third baseman Ray Dandridge, for example: “Hooks on the hot corner / moving like a cat, / pouncing and leaping / at the crack of the bat.” Most of the rhythms are quick and urgent, though some entries offer a change of pace, like the sonnet for Willie Wells—“So long as hands can clap and eyes can see, / Willie, the Shakespeare of shortstops, is thee”—and a series of riffs on the legendary speed of “Cool Papa” Bell, “so fast, he scored from first off a sacrifice bunt.” Echoing the visual gravity of the illustrations in Kadir Nelson’s classic We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball (2008), Brandon follows suit with on-field images of long-limbed, sometimes exaggeratedly lanky athletes in balletic poses interspersed with close-ups of chiseled figures with imposing game faces. Closing player notes underscore the greatness of each of these players; Smith acknowledges that these Negro League career statistics were finally and properly, in 2024, added to Major League records.

Strong words and pictures add up to a sweet double play.