In a news release on May 13, 2025, MLB announced that Commissioner Robert D. Manfred Jr. had “issued a policy decision regarding the status of individuals who have passed away while on the permanently ineligible list.”
According to ESPN, the players’ removal from that list now opens the possibility of their induction into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame.
As news broke that Shoeless Joe Jackson and Pete Rose are now eligible for the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame after being removed from the permanently ineligible list, some people wondered why Shoeless Joe Jackson was ever banned from baseball.
According to Shoeless Joe Jackson.org, “In response to suspicions that the White Sox were under the influence of sports bookies, Joe Jackson and seven other White Sox players were accused of conspiring to throw the 1919 World Series.”
According to Britannica, Shoeless Joe Jackson was one of the greatest baseball players of all time. He was ultimately banned from the game because of his involvement in the 1919 Black Sox Scandal.”
Britannica says Shoeless Joe and seven other members of the Chicago White Sox took bribes to throw the game. Joe allegedly admitted it. However, Britannica says the evidence is conflicting.
Jackson, “who was promised $20,000 for throwing the series (more than three times his $6,000 annual salary), received only $5,000 in the end. However, the degree of his complicity in the scandal has always been puzzling. Although he never returned the bribe, he hit an outstanding .375 for the series while playing errorless ball in the field,” Britannica reported.
But was that the story? There is a very different version at Shoeless Joe Jackson dot org.
The Dispute That Lasted Over a Century
Whether Joe Jackson really helped fix the 1919 World Series has remained a point of dispute for over a century. Joe played nearly flawless baseball during the game. He hit .375 for the series, the highest on either team. He had twelve hits (a World Series record which stood for nearly 50 years before it was broken). He collected six RBIs and accounted for 11 of the 20 White Sox runs. He didn’t commit a single error in the field in the eight games, and he threw out five Reds baserunners from the outfield. Oh, and he hit the only home run in the series, for either team.
Joe told The Sporting News in 1942:
“Regardless of what anybody says, I was innocent of any wrongdoing. I gave baseball all I had. The Supreme Being is the only one to whom I’ve got to answer. If I had been out there booting balls and looking foolish at bat against the Reds, there might have been some grounds for suspicion. I think my record in the 1919 World Series will stand up against that of any other man in that series or any other World Series in all history.”
From Flint Man to the Greatest Baseball Player of All Time
Joe grew up very poor in the south and had to work in the mill as a flint man, a pejorative, as a child. There was never time for school, and he couldn’t read or write.
At an early age, Joe showed signs of greatness at bat and in the field. By the time he was 13 years old, he was playing on the Brandon Mill men’s baseball team. Folks said they could be blindfolded and still know when Joe hit the ball because they heard that special ‘crack!’ When he’d hit a home run or make a great defensive play in the field, his brothers would scatter through the crowd, passing their hats for tips. They would sometimes make as much as $25.00 in a single game.
Joe’s home runs were known as “Saturday Specials.” His line drives were “Blue Darters.” His glove was “The place where triples go to die.” And he could throw the ball around 400 feet on the fly. Crowds cheered at just the sight of Joe coming to the on-deck circle.
Many years later, the great Ty Cobb told Joe: “Whenever I got the idea I was a good hitter, I’d stop and take a look at you. Then I knew I could stand some improvement.”
How He Became Shoeless Joe
In 1908, Joe was playing semi-pro ball with the independent Greenville Spinners. During the game on June 6 against the Anderson Electricians, Jackson’s brand new cleats quickly wore painful blisters on his feet. Halfway through the game, Joe took off his spikes to… ease his pain. In the bottom of the 7th, Joe hit the longest home run in the history of Memminger Street Park, the home field of the Spinners. In just his socks. As he rounded third base on his home run trot, a fan of the opposing team shouted, “You shoeless son-of-a-gun!” It was the only time Joe played ‘shoeless’ in a game, but he was tagged with the moniker “Shoeless Joe,” and the name stuck.
It didn’t take long for word of Jackson’s quick instincts and precise skills on the baseball field to reach the professional leagues. Connie Mack signed him with the Philadelphia Athletics in August of 1908. In 1910, Mack traded him to Cleveland. The following year, in his first full season in the majors, Joe batted .408, the highest batting average ever recorded by a rookie.
In response to suspicions that the White Sox were under the influence of gamblers, Jackson and seven other White Sox players were accused of conspiring to throw the 1919 World Series.
The headline, “WHITE SOX INDICTED!” stunned baseball fans. At the trial in 1921, however, it took only two hours for a Chicago jury to render a verdict of not guilty on all counts.
The Court Found Him Not Guilty
Despite acquittal in a court of law, and without conducting an investigation, baseball’s newly appointed commissioner, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, banned Jackson and seven other White Sox from playing professional baseball, sending a no-tolerance message regarding gambling in baseball.
After being banished from baseball, he and his wife moved to Savannah, GA, in 1922 and opened a successful dry cleaning business. 2 locations. They moved to Greenville to care for Joe’s mom when she became ill in 1932. They opened a BBQ restaurant on Augusta St. until prohibition ended. Later, they opened a liquor store on Pendleton Street near the Brandon mill, where they grew up. Joe played with semi-pro teams throughout the South and sometimes even with teams in the North. He died at age 63 from coronary thrombosis in 1951.
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