Taye Diggs would love to bring the Negro Leagues to life. This past weekend, the All American actor joined Negro Leagues Baseball Museum President Bob Kendrick in a virtual conversation about the Negro Leagues, and both agreed a TV series could be done based on the success of the museum. Diggs knows all about a successful TV series as he’s a regular on All American, which has been renewed for a fourth season.
“From working in television, you are able to go deeper into all of the stories, all the characters,” Diggs said, as reported by MLB.com. “With this rich history, you don’t want to try to shove it into a two-hour [movie]. This is a series that could go on for years. We need that and now we are in the position to really do it.” Kendrick said he’s “confident” a writer is going to come to the museum and write a story good enough to hit the small screen.
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“The Negro Leagues are entertaining in its own right,” Kendrick said. “I tell people all the time, some great writer is going to come to Kansas City. [He or she] is going to take some of these stories that are just jumping off the wall and we are going to get that TV series done. I have every confidence that it is going to happen. I sure hope they make old Bob the executive producer.”
The Negro Leagues are starting to get more recognition for what they meant from the game of baseball. In December it was announced the Negro Leagues were elevated to “major league” status, meaning they are now part of the MLB.
“All of us who love baseball have long known that the Negro Leagues produced many of our game’s best players, innovations and triumphs against a backdrop of injustice,” MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement. “We are now grateful to count the players of the Negro Leagues where they belong: as Major Leaguers within the official historical record.”
The Negro Leagues consisted of seven leagues including the Negro National League (I) (1920-31), the Eastern Colored League (1923-28), the American Negro League (1929), the East-West League (1932), the Negro Southern League (1932), the Negro National League (II) (1933-48) and the Negro American League (1937-48). Some of the most notable players from the Negro Leagues were Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson and MLB legends Ernie Banks, Jackson Robinson, Willie Mays and Hank Aaron, who recently passed away at the age of 86.
