If Martin Luther King Jr. played baseball: starting pitcher, rated 90

Martin Luther King Jr. as a baseball player: scouting report

Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the great speakers of the twentieth century, and great speaking is mostly about timing: when to build, when to pause, when to land the line the whole room is waiting for. That is how an ace pitches. He would take the ball every fifth day and set the tempo of the game, changing speeds the way his sermons rose and settled. Pitching is among the best marks on his card, and his eye, the strongest of all, lets him read a hitter's plan before the first pitch.

He entered Morehouse College at fifteen and went on to earn a doctorate from Boston University, and that preparation would show up in the scouting notes he kept on every lineup. His contact is excellent too, so if he ever has to hit he will put the ball in play. His fielding grades out well and his arm is strong, which means bunts and comebackers do not rattle him. The March on Washington in 1963 drew around a quarter of a million people to hear him speak, and few starters have ever shown that kind of poise in front of a crowd.

Power is the soft spot on his card, the one thing he does not bring to the plate, and it barely matters for a starter. Second base is his next best position and catcher is right behind it, where his feel for the game would make any pitching staff better. He received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, and drafters should treat him the way a club treats a true ace: take him early, build the rotation around him and pair him with a catcher who simply lets him work.

Plays like An ace who commands the game and every count in it

Put Martin Luther King Jr. in your lineup

12 rolls, nine hitters and a rotation, 162 games. Can you win 117? Free, no account.