Monarchs stalwart Andy Cooper is immortalized in Cooperstown ... home state of Texas next?

If an athlete was a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., wouldn’t logic dictate that he is also a member of his respective home state’s sports hall of fame?

Well, maybe not, at least in the case of Negro Leagues star pitcher Andy Cooper.

The lefty with pinpoint control and encyclopedic knowledge of hitters enjoyed a career at the top levels of professional African-American baseball, as both a player and manager, for roughly two decades in the 1920s and ’30s. That included roughly 10 years with the famed Kansas City Monarchs, whom he helped lead to multiple league titles and the status one of the greatest dynasties in hardball history.

Upon Cooper’s death 75 years ago, journalist Russ Cowans eulogized the Monarchs great and Texas native.

“... Cooper ... not only won glory on the hurling mound but also won the respect and praise of the fans through his deportment off the field.

“Andy, as he was familiarly called by his intimates, never possessed the fine assortment of curves held in the supple arms of other pitchers. However, he did have what so many pitchers lack — sterling control. Cooper could almost put the ball any place he wanted it to go ...

“In addition, Cooper had a keen knowledge of batters. He knew the weakness of every batter in the league and would pitch to that weakness when he was on the mound.”

Society for American Baseball Research member, author and Texas native Bill Staples Jr. compared Cooper’s mound artistry to that of fellow Hall of Famer and modern-day hurler Greg Maddux. However, Staples added, Cooper’s comportment included greater size — he was a looming 6-foot-2, 220 pounds — as well as an unusually potent bat.

For his efforts, Cooper, a native of Waco, Texas, was inducted into the hallowed halls of Cooperstown in 2006. However, despite such a lofty national honor, Cooper has yet to be ushered into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame — which, ironically, is based in his hometown of Waco.

But that could change this year. Cooper has been placed on the nominee ballot for the TSHOF’s 2016 induction class, which will be chosen by the hall’s selection committee June 7.

The date also roughly coincides with another key milestone in Cooper’s saga — June 3 marks the 75th anniversary of Cooper’s death at the age of only 43.

With both that landmark date and the TSHOF’s imminent inductee election, Negro Leagues historians and fans are hoping the Lone Star State finally recognizes one of its native sons. Such hopes, for example, emanate from Kansas City, where Dr. Ray Doswell, the curator of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, believes Texas owes nothing less to one of its greatest baseball products.

“Texas has such a great athletic history,” Doswell said. “That long history provides for players to be rediscovered. Cooper is no exception. Although known by historians of the Negro Leagues, his exploits were so long ago that many won’t have context for how good he was. He was born 120 years ago, died 75 years ago and rediscovered after his Hall of Fame induction in 2006. I would encourage Texans to explore his contributions deeply and share them.”

TSHOF vice president of museum operations Jay Black said Cooper was on the institution’s induction ballot last year but ultimately wasn’t chosen. Black said the fact that Cooper played and died so long ago naturally prevents the selection committee members and public as a whole from witnessing his talent and achievements first-hand.

In addition, he noted, because Texas is a large state with so many deserving candidates from a wide variety of sports that each have their own storied histories, that, too, makes it tough for the TSHOF to induct all worthy nominees at any given time.

“It’s just a numbers game,” Black said. “There’s just so many (nominees) because we try to be a big tent and be all-inclusive, but when you do that, a lot of qualified candidates who are already in other halls of fame get left out. It just takes time.”

But, he added, Cooper’s omission from the 2015 TSHOF’s induction class contributed to the selection committee’s ensuing decision to take a survey of many national sports halls of fame and compile a slate of inductees in those institutions who have yet to be ushered into the Texas hall.

Black said that the selection committee will now scrutinize that list, which includes Cooper, and attempt to elect as many of them as possible in 2016 and forward.

“The committee will take a good, hard look at them,” he said.

Author Staples said Cooper, as well as other Negro Leagues greats, has a key factor working against his legacy — a distinct difficulty in pinning down the particulars of his life and career.

“It’s very difficult, for a variety of reasons,” Staples said. “First, misinformation about Negro Leagues ballplayers and their personal lives is often repeated without being verified. Second, to verify details, not all pertinent records are easily accessible. Throw into the mix that occasionally Texas Negro League players did not play under their legal names, making it difficult to locate them in box scores or articles.

“Finally, at the present time most newspaper archives reflect the white press, and white newspapers rarely covered Negro Leagues games. All of this combined makes it difficult to paint an accurate picture of most TNL player’s early careers, not just Andy Cooper’s.”

However, Staples added, Cooper has more intangible qualities working in his favor, namely his personality — by all contemporary accounts, Cooper was an easy-going, fun-loving, likable guy who displayed a quiet, confident style of leadership that helped his teams achieve success.

Regardless of whether Cooper makes the TSHOF, there’s no questioning Cooper’s deep roots in the Lone Star State. Born in Washington County, Texas, in the late 1890s — different records state various birth years, but his death certificate says April 24, 1898 — to Robert and Emma Cooper, Andy moved to Waco with his family as a youth and attended segregated A.J. Moore High School before heading to Paul Quinn College, which at the time was located in Waco but has since moved to Dallas.

Around that time, Cooper began his paid professional baseball career, lacing up the spikes for such teams as the Waco Black Navigators and Dallas Black Giants. In April 1919, for example, the Dallas Express newspaper listed Cooper on the Black Giants’ roster, along with fellow Texas native and National Baseball Hall of Famer Biz Mackey, a catcher.

Cooper’s exploits in Texas earned him a spot with the Negro National League’s Detroit Stars, with whom the southpaw continued his rise to blackball fame. The Kansas City Monarchs, in fact, traded five players to Detroit to obtain Cooper’s hurling services, where he developed into the premier left-handed pitcher in black baseball, both as a starter and an occasional reliever.

Cooper became the Monarchs’ player-manager in 1937 and promptly led the squad to three Negro American League crowns in five years.

It was during his stint as KC’s pilot that the team returned to Texas on barnstorming and exhibition trips, a fact that didn’t go unnoticed by newspapers in the state. For example, when the Monarchs pulled into Waco’s Katy Park in April 28 to play a spring exhibition with the Chicago American Giants, the Waco News-Tribune stated that Cooper “is a former Waco negro baseball star, pitching for Moore High school back in 1918 before joining professional ranks.”

Sadly, just three years later, Cooper — who was still helming the Monarchs — suffered a reported stroke in April 1941, prompting him to return home to Waco to nurse himself back to health.

The move was too little, too late. Cooper’s health worsened while in Waco, and he died on June 3, 1941, 75 years ago, at the age of 43. The blackball community — from Monarchs teammates to league executives to journalists — lamented the tragic demise.

“Cooper started ailing last fall but refused to take the advice of Kansas City friends to take a rest,” reported the June 14, 1941, Chicago Defender. “This spring it was announced he suffered a breakdown and did not accompany the Monarchs on (their) spring training jaunt.

“Several weeks ago,” the paper continued, “he came here, believing that the climate would help him. He grew steadily worse.”

Over the decades that followed, Cooper gradually became forgotten in baseball circles, partially because of the passage of time, but largely because he, like his African-American contemporaries, were forced to ply their trade under the unjust shadow of segregation. Cooper’s relegation to history’s dustbin included his legacy in Texas.

“I think Cooper and his fellow Texas Negro Leagues peers have been overlooked and not celebrated to the extent that they deserve” Staples said. “But I don’t think that the lack of appreciation is intentionally malicious or rooted in racism. Instead, I think it’s probably due to a blend of complex reasons, like the culture of Texas, economics and marketing.

“Another reason why Texas Negro Leaguers are not properly recognized today is because of education,” he added, “specifically the lack of information and awareness about these once-great leagues and the men who competed in them.”

However, Cooper’s importance to the hardball saga came to life in 2006, when he was enshrined in Cooperstown, and an ensuing uptick in historical research into his life has steadily revealed more and more about Cooper’s life and legacy.

But, up until now, that newfound, albeit posthumous, fame hasn’t yet translated to recognition by his home state’s sports hall of fame. Whether that slight will be rectified when the TSHOF’s selection committee meets June 7 remains to be seen. But there are many supporters and enthusiasts who believed such an honor is long overdue, for Cooper and for many other Texas baseball legends, regardless of race or era.

“I think Cooper and his fellow Texas Negro Leagues peers have been overlooked and not celebrated to the extent that they deserve” Staples said. “But I don’t think that the lack of appreciation is intentionally malicious or rooted in racism. Instead, I think it’s probably due to a blend of complex reasons, like the culture of Texas, economics and marketing.

“Another reason why Texas Negro Leaguers are not properly recognized today is because of education,” he added, “specifically the lack of information and awareness about these once-great leagues and the men who competed in them.”

This story was originally published May 27, 2016 at 4:24 PM with the headline "Monarchs stalwart Andy Cooper is immortalized in Cooperstown ... home state of Texas next?."