He's in the Hall of Fame, which is appropriate for many reasons. No pitcher was more famous than the one and only Satchel.

Paige owed much of his fame to his supreme self-confidence and his self-promotion. He was not the most reliable teammate in the Negro leagues because he often cut himself a better deal somewhere else, even if it were just for a special, one-game appearance.

His Negro league statistics are good (123 wins, 79 losses, 26 shutouts), but he was probably better known for performances against barnstorming major leaguers who spread the word that Paige was special.

The down side of his fame is that it took away attention from other fine Negro league pitchers, such as Bill Foster, Chet Brewer, Ray Brown, Bullet Joe Rogan, William Bell and Andy Cooper.

He began his professional career in 1942 with the Boston Red Sox organization and had a 15-5 record with Class C teams in Canton and Oneonta. He was in the Army in 1943, but soon discharged because of a leg injury he had suffered in a football game years earlier. He was back playing baseball in 1944, winning 16 games in the American Association. He made one pitching appearance with the Red Sox, but was dealt to the St. Louis Cardinals, who brought him up to the National League in 1945. He made eight appearances, but had no wins or losses. His major league statistics included 18 bases on balls in only 14-1/3 innings.

He went back to the minors, pitched two more seasons, then retired. He went on to become coach and athletic director at Sewickley Academy near Pittsburgh. The school's Hall of Fame is now located in the Stanwood Partenheimer Room.

Partenheimer's father, Steve, was an infielder who reached the major leagues long enough to play one game at third base for Detroit in 1913.

All four of Stan Parteinheimer's children were athletes, though soccer seemed to be their sport of choice.

In 1946 he was player-manager for New Orleans in the Southern Association.

Obvious Bermanism: Johnny "Struts Like a" Peacock.

However, the Reds parted company with Pena in 2005. He moved to the Boston Red Sox, but was on the disabled list much of the 2006 season. He spent most of 2007 with the Red Sox, but felt underused, and in mid-August was dealt back to the National League, this time with Washington. He missed much of the 2008 season because of a shoulder injury and spent last year (2009) with Buffalo of the International League.

Pena has a unique name, though I'd like it better if Wily were pronounced the way it is spelled and not as though it contains two L's.

At five-foot-eight, Pennington was not a dominating pitcher, though he did hang around for many years in the minor leagues, afterward settling in Newark, New Jersey, where he had pitched for its Bears, an International League affiliate of the New York Yankees. Later he became manager of Bankers Indemnity Insurance Company of Newark.

I'm not sure about the nickname, which probably comes from Kewpie Doll, suggesting a reference to Pennington's size, appearance or his age when he had that first big league tryout.

Though he was 25 years old as a rookie, Pezzullo had pitched only one season in the minors, posting a fine 16-4 record with Richmond of the Piedmont League. In 1938 he had his best year as a professional, winning 26 games with Savannah of the South Atlantic League (aka Sally League). His career minor league record was 91-65.

I found nothing to explain his nickname. Perhaps it had something to do with the way he curled his body when he pitched, maybe it was all in the interests of alliteration.

Pike played for and managed the Troy (New York) Haymakers in the first professional league, the National Association, in 1871. He was 5-foot-8, weighed about 160 pounds, but was the most noted slugger of his era. His combination of power and speed made him the league's home run champion four times. (In most parks, a ball hit over the fence wasn't automatically a home run; an outfielder could retrieve the ball, which forced hitters to run the bases full speed.)

Pike used his footspeed to earn money in unusual ways, such as the time he raced a trotter in a 100-yard dash and won.

He played outfield with the St. Louis Brown Stockings during the first National League season and bounced to four other teams over the next five years. His brother, Jay, played one National League game in 1877. Lip Pike's unusual enough, but he also carried this nickname: The Iron Batter.

Check out Lip Pike's biography at http://bioproj.sabr.org

No word on just how he picked up his nickname, though Pinky wasn't all that unusual in his time. Pinky Hargrave and Pinky Higgins come to mind.

After two losing seasons, he was traded to the Phillies, bouncing back in 1905 to win 23 games. Shoulder problems limited his appearances the next two seasons and he left the major leagues in the fall of 1907.

Pittinger was tall and lean (six-foot-two, 175 pounds) and he was usually among the league leaders in strikeouts. Unfortunately, he also was wild, three times leading the league in bases on balls.

He died in 1909 of Bright's disease, a kidney ailment. He was only 37.

The six-foot-five-inch Plunk was a pitcher drafted by the New York Yankees in 1981, but when he arrived in the major leagues five years later he was with the Oakland Athletics, bearing a perfect name for a guy who had trouble throwing strikes. As a rookie he walked 102 batters in 120 innings, plunking five hitters along the way. He settled down and enjoyed a 14-season major league career, appearing in 714 games, most of them in relief.

And I should acknowledge a bit of an inconsistency here, for if Eric Plunk is on my list, why not Eddie Plank? No good reason. I grew up knowing about Plank, a Hall of Famer who won 326 games, most of them for the Philadelphia Athletics. He was a great, great pitcher.

Until recently I didn't know there also was a pitcher named Ed Plank, who spent some time with the San Francisco Giants in 1978 and '79, though he had no wins or losses. His best years (1975-77) were with Phoenix, then in the Pacifi Coast League.