Our final spotlight for the 1982 EL season falls upon another one of those elusive types who somehow seems to have almost slipped through a crack in the sidewalk of posterity.
Other than his statistical record on both Seamheads and BBRef, none of my sources have even a passing reference to 1930s-40s pitcher
Jesse Houston, including - most surprisingly - Jim Riley. He mentions a "Bill" Houston who looks likely to be Jesse in disguise, but this entry consists of but three lines and only mentions his time with the Grays.
What we do know of Jesse is that his birth name was Benjamin and that this birth took place in Montgomery AL on July 17, 1909. He played a couple seasons with the Cincinnati Tigers (1936-37) before moving to the American Giants for the next two, spent 1940 in Mexico with Tampico and then passed his final recorded season at Homestead, in 1941. SH has his career record at 18-15 with a nice 116 ERA+, while Eric Chalek allocates him a modest 6 WAR.
Records show he died aged 58 in Cincy.
The Eclipse League version of Jesse Houston was drafted 46th overall by the Royal Giants in 1970. Since then, in addition to the RGs he has spent time with the Grays and Black Barons along with his current club, the Cuban Stars West, for whom he is currently playing out his first season and with whom he is also contracted for 1983.
Over that span he has recorded 202 Wins against 145 Losses and an ERA of 3.43, exactly matching his IRL ERA+ of 116 and racking up a healthy 67 rWAR, give or take. He has also made two ASG appearances and was a part of the Grays' 1977 Championship team. A definite improvement on the historical.
Sadly, however, Jesse has recently picked up a rotator cuff strain that will keep him out of action for three more weeks and, with his CSW boys making a run at the playoffs, might have more consequence for both player and club than a run-of-the-mill injury.
Now in his age-35 season, Jesse is in the twilight of a fine career and, as always, we'll check in with him again before he takes his leave of us.
On the topic of which, as is tradition in this final OotS report for the year, here's an update of all the players so featured to this point.
ACTIVE PLAYERS - BATTERS
ACTIVE PLAYERS - PITCHERS
RETIRED PLAYERS - BATTERS
RETIRED PLAYERS - PITCHERS
