Editing Rickey Henderson (section)

==Early life==
Henderson was born on December 25, 1958, in Chicago in the back seat of an [[Oldsmobile]] on the way to the hospital. Henderson later joked, "I was already fast. I couldn't wait."<ref name="Rickey Henderson 2009">Rickey Henderson: Leadoff Legend, 2009, MLB Network</ref> The son of John L. Henley and Bobbie Henley, he was named Rickey Nelson Henley, after singer-actor [[Ricky Nelson]].<ref name=rockin>{{cite web|url=http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070721&content_id=2100450&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb|title=Notes: Henderson's rockin' past|access-date=August 16, 2008|last=Noble|first=Marty|date=July 21, 2007|work=MLB.com}}</ref> When he was two years old, his father moved to [[Oakland, California]]. Rickey lived with his grandmother in [[Pine Bluff, Arkansas]], from when he was two until he was seven, when he migrated to Oakland with his family. His father died in an automobile accident 10 years after leaving home.<ref>{{cite book|last=Henderson|first=Rickey|author2=John Shea|title=Off Base: Confessions of a Thief|pages=[https://archive.org/details/offbaseconfessio00hend_0/page/22 22–23]|publisher=HarperCollins|date=June 1992|isbn=0-06-017975-9|url=https://archive.org/details/offbaseconfessio00hend_0/page/22}}</ref> His mother married Paul Henderson in Rickey Henley's junior year of high school and the family adopted the Henderson surname.<ref name=rockin/> 

As a child in Oakland, Henderson learned to bat right-handed although he was a naturally left-handed thrower—a rare combination for baseball players, especially non-[[pitcher]]s.<ref>{{cite news|title=Zounds! Sox have 2 righty-lefty ballplayers|work=[[Worcester Telegram & Gazette]]|date=March 5, 2002}}</ref> Through the 2008 season, only 57 position players are known to have batted right and thrown left in the Major Leagues. Henderson is by far the most successful (and the only one inducted into the [[Baseball Hall of Fame|Hall of Fame]]).<ref>{{cite web |last1=Treder |first1=Steve |title=Bats right, throws left: The best players in major league history |url=https://tht.fangraphs.com/bats-right-throws-left-the-best-players-in-major-league-history/ |website=The Hardball Times |publisher=[[FanGraphs]] |date=10 February 2009}}</ref> Henderson later said, "All my friends were right-handed and swung from the right side, so I thought that's the way it was supposed to be done."<ref name="ReferenceA">Henderson et al, ''Off Base: Confessions of a Thief'', pp. 52–53.</ref>

In 1976, Henderson graduated from [[Oakland Technical High School]] in [[Oakland, California]], where he played baseball, basketball and [[American football|football]], and was an [[All-America]]n [[running back]] with two 1,000-yard rushing seasons. He also ran [[track and field|track]], but did not stay with the team as the schedule conflicted with baseball.<ref name=herald>{{cite news|first=Steve|last=Wilstein|title=Stop, Thief! Rickey Henderson Is Stealing Everything He Can Get His Hands And Feet On|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=bkUsAAAAIBAJ&sjid=qs0EAAAAIBAJ&pg=6563,1574058|work=[[Spartanburg Herald-Journal]]|date=August 8, 1982|page=B4}}</ref> Henderson received over a dozen scholarship offers to play football. Despite a childhood dream to play for the [[Oakland Raiders]], he turned down the scholarships on the advice of his mother, who argued that football players had shorter careers.<ref name=herald/><ref name=NYDN>{{cite web|url=http://articles.nydailynews.com/2009-07-26/sports/17928690_1_rickey-henderson-major-league-steals|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120814044444/http://articles.nydailynews.com/2009-07-26/sports/17928690_1_rickey-henderson-major-league-steals|url-status=dead|archive-date=August 14, 2012|title=Former Yankees, Mets outfielder Rickey Henderson, Red Sox great Jim Rice lead Hall of Fame class|date=July 26, 2009|work=New York Daily News|access-date=December 16, 2011}}</ref>