The Newark Eagles in 1936, as seen in The League (Yale University Art Gallery/Magnolia Pictures)

As he’s achieved in previous documentaries like MLK/FBI and Citizen Ashe, director Sam Pollard recounts important aspects of African American history in his new, thoroughly engaging, but occasionally enraging look at the Negro baseball leagues, which spawned many of the 20th century’s greatest baseball players.

Pollard provides a thorough background of the Negro leagues’ genesis: There were several leagues based mainly in the Eastern and Midwest states from the early 1900s until 1960, when the final league disbanded after the majors had signed away the best Black players. This necessary context may offer a corrective for casual fans who may think of the Negro Leagues as an innocuous Black alternative to major league baseball. The League points out that the Negro leagues came into existence in the aftermath of World War I. Though thousands of Black men fought in Europe, upon their return to the States, they were still second-class citizens who were often the victims of racist violence at home, sometimes being killed or lynched while still wearing their army uniforms.

Through the informative contributions of various historians and journalists, Pollard underlines the fact that the Negro leagues’ formation was another way for Black America to have a “separate but equal” community (as a result of the 1896 Supreme Court decision, in Plessy v. Ferguson, which enshrined segregation as the law of the land). Since Black players could not play in the majors, leagues gave them the opportunity to play regularly.

It’s not a revelation that Black players were blocked from playing in the major leagues by racist baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis, and it wasn’t until his death in 1944 that the tide turned and Jackie Robinson was signed to the Brooklyn Dodgers, winning the 1947 rookie of the year award. However, it’s less well known that Dodgers owner Branch Rickey had no compunctions about filching Robinson, along with other Black stars, from the Negro leagues with absolutely no monetary compensation to the owners of those cash-strapped teams. In one of the most eye-opening assertions, from Newark Eagles owner Effa Manley—the first woman owner of any professional team, and who is rightfully given her due by Pollard—Manley felt Rickey “raped” the Black team owners by signing away so many good players for free.

As Manley’s frank quote reveals, The League is at its best when we hear stories from the participants themselves, including priceless archival interviews with such greats as Satchel Paige, Hank Aaron, and Larry Doby. Along with Robinson’s fraught first season facing the racists taunts from spectators and competing teams, there are also somber accounts about ballplayers such as Josh Gibson, a slugger on par with Babe Ruth who never got the chance to play in the majors. He died, nearly forgotten, after a brain tumor and stroke, at age 35. Decades later, in 1972, Gibson was the second Black player to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame for his contributions to the Negro leagues.

Pollard himself voices the words of Bob Motley, an umpire in the leagues for decades, whose thoughts and impressions are heard throughout. Along with the voluminous vintage footage and photographs he has unearthed to bring this era to vivid life, Pollard also uses Graig Kreindler’s striking portraits of unsung players, many taken from Kreindler’s 2022 book of his artwork, Black Baseball in Living Color.

An essential journey through a significant chapter of sports history, The League is also, as a talking-head historian mentions, a chronicle of men who didn’t realize they were making history. They just wanted to play ball.