Editing Rube Foster (section)

==Early years==
Foster was born in [[La Grange, Texas]],<ref name="birthplace"/> on September 17, 1879. His father, also named Andrew, was a minister and elder of the local African Methodist Episcopal Church.<ref>Cottrell, 7</ref> Foster started his professional career with the Waco Yellow Jackets, an independent black team, in 1897 and played for the [[Hot Springs Arlingtons]] in 1901.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://arkbaseball.com/tiki-index.php?page=Hot+Springs+Arlingtons|title=Arkansas Baseball Encyclopedia &#124; Hot Springs Arlingtons|website=Arkansas Baseball Encyclopedia}}</ref> Over the next few years he gradually built up a reputation among white and black fans alike, until he was signed by [[Frank Leland]]'s [[Chicago Union Giants]], a team in the top ranks of black baseball, in 1902. He was released after a slump and signed with a white semipro team based in Otsego, Michigan—[[George Bardeen|Bardeen's]] [[Otsego Independents]]. According to Phil Dixon's American Baseball Chronicles: Great Teams, The 1905 Philadelphia Giants, Volume III: "In completing the summer of 1902 with Otsego's multi-ethnic team—the only multi-race team with which he would ever regularly perform—Foster is reported to have pitched twelve games. He finished with a documented record of eight wins and four losses along with eighty-two documented strikeouts. Ironically, strikeout totals for five games in which he appeared were not recorded. If found, the totals would likely show that Foster struck out more than one-hundred batters for Otsego. In the seven games where details exist, Foster averaged eleven strikeouts per outing." Toward the end of the season, he joined the [[Cuban X-Giants]] of Philadelphia, perhaps the best team in black baseball. The 1903 season saw Foster establish himself as the X-Giants' pitching star. In a postseason series for the eastern black championship, the X-Giants defeated [[Sol White]]'s [[Philadelphia Giants]] five games to two, with Foster himself winning four games.

According to various accounts, including his own, Foster acquired the nickname "Rube" after defeating star [[Philadelphia Athletics]] left-hander [[Rube Waddell]] in a postseason exhibition game played sometime between 1902 and 1905.<ref>Holway 1988, 11.</ref><ref>Riley, 290.</ref><ref>Cottrell, 19.</ref> A newspaper story in the Trenton (NJ) ''Times'' from July 26, 1904, contains the earliest known example of Foster being referred to as "Rube," indicating that the supposed meeting with Waddell must have taken place earlier than that. Recent research has uncovered a game played on August 2, 1903, in which Foster met and defeated Waddell while the latter was playing under an assumed name for a semipro team in New York City.<ref>{{cite web | last=Ashwill | first=Gary | title=Rube vs. Rube | date=March 23, 2012 | url=http://agatetype.typepad.com/agate_type/2012/03/rube-vs-rube.html | access-date=March 23, 2012 }}</ref>

Foster, now a star, jumped to the Philadelphia Giants for the 1904 season. Legend has it that [[John McGraw]], manager of the [[New York Giants (NL)|New York Giants]], hired Foster to teach the young [[Christy Mathewson]] the "fadeaway", or [[screwball]], though historians have cast doubt on this story. During the 1904 season, Foster won 20 games against all competition (including two no-hitters) and lost six. In a rematch with Foster's old team, the Cuban X-Giants, he won two games and batted .400 in leading the Philadelphia Giants to the black championship.

In 1905, Foster—by his own account several years later—compiled a fantastic record of 51–4 (though recent research has confirmed only a 25–3 record) and led the Giants to another series championship, this time over the [[Brooklyn Royal Giants]]. The ''Philadelphia Telegraph'' wrote that "Foster has never been equalled in a pitcher's box." The following season, the Philadelphia Giants helped form the International League of Independent Professional Ball Players, composed of both all-black and all-white teams in the Philadelphia and Wilmington, Delaware, areas.