Pythias Russ

Pythias Russ (April 7, 1904 – August 9, 1930) was an American catcher, shortstop, and right-handed batter in the Negro leagues whose career and life were cut short by illness.

Russ was a star college athlete in baseball, basketball, and track and field. He was named an All-American football player in 1924. Candy Jim Taylor signed him to play for the Memphis Red Sox for the 1925 season, where he split catching duties with Larry Brown and hit .327. He moved to the Chicago American Giants in 1926 and hit .268 that season. In 1927, Russ batted .350 and was 8 for 35 in the 1927 Colored World Series.

Russ switched to shortstop in 1928 and hit .405 to win the NNL batting title, and hit .407 in the postseason to help Chicago to the league championship. In 1929, he hit .386 to finish second in that category, and hit 11 triples. He fell ill with tuberculosis early in 1930 and died in August of that year. His lifetime batting average in the Negro leagues was .350.

• List of baseball players who died during their careers

• Ashwill, Gary (October 25, 2007). "Pythias Russ" . Retrieved July 16, 2013.
• Holway, John B. (2001), The Complete Book of Baseball's Negro Leagues: The Other Half of Baseball History, Fern Park, FL: Hastings House Publishers, ISBN 0-8038-2007-0
• Riley, James A. (1994), The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, New York: Carroll & Graf, ISBN 0-7867-0959-6

• Career statistics from MLB, or Baseball Reference and Seamheads

• 1904 births
• 1930 deaths
• People from Cynthiana, Kentucky
• Baseball players from Kentucky
• Memphis Red Sox players
• Chicago American Giants players
• 20th-century deaths from tuberculosis
• Tuberculosis deaths in Kentucky
• 20th-century African-American sportsmen
• 20th-century American sportsmen
• American baseball catcher, 1900s birth stubs

• Articles with short description
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