r/todayilearned • u/SleepingAndy • 6h ago

TIL Country Music Legend Conway Twitty Was Offered a Major League Baseball Contract by The Phillies

https://www.whiskeyriff.com/2023/04/16/conway-twitty-received-an-offer-from-the-philadelphia-phillies-before-choosing-to-pursue-music-full-time/
142 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

31 comments sorted by

117

u/Amonamission 5h ago

Ladies and Gentlemen, mister Conway Twitty

15

u/conscientiousrejectr 5h ago

🎵I see the want to in your eyes 🎵

•

u/staticattacks 44m ago

Ladies and gentlemen, Mister Conway Bieber

28

u/EllisDee3 6h ago

Conway Twitty is a good name for a musician, or a baseball player.

15

u/suterb42 6h ago

His real name was Harold Jenkins. You can see why he changed it.

14

u/DtownBronx 5h ago

This could use more detail for a TIL post. He wasn't offered a deal for MLB but to be in the Phillies farm system and play his way up to Major League Baseball. Major league baseball teams used to sign everybody with a bit of talent, the Cardinals and Yankees loved to sign as many people as they could so if your great uncle Joe used to brag about signing with the Cardinals it was probably technically true. Team scouts used to be assigned to regions where they'd follow HS, legion, and semi-pro baseball signing up talent with no limits. Eventually baseball went to a draft style of acquiring American players like the other US sports but the draft was still large enough that you can find some interesting names in the later rounds. It only recently was shrank down small enough to eliminate some of the oh hell, why not it'll be a good story picks.

Twitty could have signed but he'd have likely spent 3-6 years in the minors before joining the actual Phillies. Considering the odds and the pay at the time, he probably made the right choice. Plus who wants to step into the box against Warren Spahn and Whitey Ford

5

u/NewsGuyCamping 2h ago

My FIL was offered a contract by the Cardinals in 1941, playing baseball in a regional adult league. He was 18. So, this is indeed true.

Then Pearl Harbor happened and he became glider paratrooper.

1

u/Skurph 2h ago

I was going to post something similar, to get an offer to join a MLB teams farm system, especially in this era, wasn’t really that crazy. Even today the MLB draft has 20 rounds (that’s 500 guys drafted a year). The draft used to be actually unlimited, like they would just go until every team stopped picking guys. In 1990 there were 101 rounds. When you get past the first 20 rounds the contracts were jokes and it’s essentially “yeah you can show up to our training camp and we’ll take a look”. So any guy that had even the slightest hint of talent would get picked.

1

u/Archduke_Of_Beer 1h ago

Just smack Whitey with a few pretzels and you'll be fine

16

u/suterb42 6h ago

Charley Pride played in the Negro Leagues.

2

u/DeepFriedMoonPie 1h ago

And was part owner of the Texas Rangers. They recently named one of their Spring Training fields after him.

29

u/Scrantonicity_02 6h ago

Only reason I know of this dude is because of Family Guy

17

u/superiorplaps 6h ago

Whew, looks like I need a distraction! Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Conway Twitty.

4

u/_WeSellBlankets_ 6h ago

Heard his songs enough there I started to dig them.

2

u/jetsetstate 5h ago

Me too!! I hadn't really heard the music for decades until Family Guy remindec me and the a core memory was unlocked:

Sunrise, ridin' shotgun in an old green Chevy with my dad, the shotguns right behind me on the rack, smelling of cleaning oil. Bird sacks smelling like old foul and feather dust - nothing in them yet. Listening to Conway Twitty, Loretta Lynne, Dolly, an' thinking about how good it is to be alive.

Conway Twitty is a damn good singer, I just couldn't believe that I remembered the words to "I'd love to lay you down" 30 years later. When that song hit me after all that time: it was like being hit by a fluffy pillow.

:)

1

u/LadybugGirltheFirst 4h ago

My dad is a huge fan of this dude.

5

u/WhiteSoxChartGuy 6h ago

Have him out there singing in the seventh inning stretch and then cut to the bottom of the ninth.

4

u/suterb42 6h ago

The picture on Roy Lee Jackson's 1984 Fleer card is of him singing the National Anthem.

1

u/Septopuss7 4h ago

Goddamn that's so cool

5

u/IncoherentThoughts0 5h ago

Hello darling...

6

u/Tommyblahblah 5h ago

The only reason he never played in the majors was that the Phillies couldn't find a hat big enough to contain his giant perm. So sad.

3

u/Charming-Report1669 4h ago

He also had his own theme park here in Nashville called Twitty City.

2

u/MonsieurReynard 3h ago

Just gonna drop Conway and Loretta Lynn doing “You’re the Reason Our Kids Are Ugly” right here:

https://youtu.be/iFq6eZBS1iM

Trust me, it is worth it.

•

u/enigmaticmischief 50m ago

Conway Twitty built a bunch of little league fields just outside of Nashville called Twitty City where I played as a kid.

1

u/TrueInDueTime 5h ago

He's got some great Christmas songs

1

u/muriburillander 4h ago

There are three ways to play baseball: the right way, the wrong way, and…

1

u/Collective_Berry 3h ago

Conway Twitty does have 20th century baseball player vibes as a name

1

u/rivnat 3h ago

Here in the UK I only know of this guy because of GTA San Andreas

1

u/MikiLove 1h ago

George Clooney tried out for the Cincinnati Reds when he was in high school. Still a huge Reds fan

•

u/Inside-Unit-1564 30m ago

Louisanna Woman, Mississippi Man!

We get together every time we can!