Burnis "Wild Bill" Wright (June 6, 1914 – August 3, 1996) was a

professional baseball Professional baseball is organized baseball in which players are selected for their talents and are paid to play for a specific team or club system. It is played in leagues and associated farm teams throughout the world. Modern professional ...

player 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 ...

and the

Mexican League The Mexican League (, ) is a professional baseball league based in Mexico and the oldest running professional league in the country. The league has 18 teams organized in two divisions, North and South. Teams play 114 games each season. Five te ...

. Primarily an

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 c ...

, he played from 1932 to 1956.

Baseball career

Wright was born in

Milan, Tennessee Milan () is the second largest city after Humboldt in Gibson County, Tennessee and the largest entirely within the county. It is home to the Milan Army Ammunition Plant, the West Tennessee Agricultural Museum and several historical sites listed ...

in 1914. He played baseball for the high school team in Gibson County. Wright first came into prominence due to receiving the nickname "Wild Bill" because of his problem with control, as he hurt his arm throwing too hard while trying to pitch in cold weather. He was thus shifted into playing center field, which he would do over the course of 25 years in two countries. He started with the Nashville Elite Giants and prevailed as a switch-hitter with a considerable frame at 6'4 and 220 pounds, and he later earned the nickname of being the "Black DiMaggio" The team (who had moved to Cleveland for 1931) would end their second tenure in Nashville in 1934 in favor of Columbus in 1935 and Washington for 1936-37 before settling in Baltimore for 1938, and Wright would play for the team in each of its incarnations that generally competed well with the other teams in the league (the one title Wright was a part of was the 1939 season, in which the Negro National League held a playoff between the four best teams that resulted in Baltimore winning the championship cup). Wright played ten years in the Negro leagues, with nine in the Negro National League (II) and one in the Negro Southern League. He played in 363 games from the age of 18 to 31, leading the Negro leagues in triples in 1936 (5) and 1937 (11) while batting .300 in eight years (albeit with a varying amount of games played, having played 50 games in 1942 and 1945 while playing just 25 in 1939). In 1940, he moved to the

. He played ten years in Mexico over separate stints (1940–41, 1943–44, 1946–56). He batted .300 in Mexico eight times while winning the Triple Crown (batting average, home runs and runs batted in) in 1943 while batting .366 with thirteen home runs and 70 RBIs. His last year of play was in 1956 (at the age of 42), and he ultimately batted .335 in the country lifetime.

Post career and legacy

From his retirement until his death, Wright lived in

Aguascalientes City (''Virtue in the Water, Fidelity in the Heart'') , image_skyline = AGUASCALIENTES CITY.jpg , imagesize = , image_caption = Clockwise from top: San Antonio de Padua Church, La Exedra (main square), Aguascal ...

where he owned a hamburger restaurant, deciding to reside in the country permanently in 1958 and not returning to the United States until a Negro Leagues reunion 32 years later. He died in August 1996 at the age of 82. In 2005, he was one of 39 Negro Leaguers selected as the final ballot for the National Baseball Hall of Fame, with Wright falling short while 17 players were selected. He was inducted into the Salón de la Fama del Beisbol Profesional de México (Mexico's Baseball Hall of Fame) in 1982 and the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame in 2017.

References

External links

an
Seamheads
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wright, Bill 1914 births 1996 deaths African-American baseball players American expatriate baseball players in Mexico Algodoneros de Torreón players Baltimore Elite Giants players Baseball outfielders Baseball players from Tennessee Diablos Rojos del México players Gallos de Santa Rosa players Industriales de Monterrey players Mexican Baseball Hall of Fame inductees Nashville Elite Giants players People from Milan, Tennessee Rieleros de Aguascalientes players Sportspeople from Aguascalientes Tecolotes de Nuevo Laredo players Washington Elite Giants players 20th-century African-American sportspeople