page_title: Nig Clarke
section_title: Cleveland Naps
hierarchical_section_title: Nig Clarke / Professional baseball / Cleveland Naps
caption_attribution_description: English: Nig Clarke in　1909-10
context_page_description: Jay Justin "Nig" Clarke was a Canadian professional baseball player. A catcher, Clarke played in Major League Baseball for nine seasons with the Detroit Tigers, Cleveland Naps, St. Louis Browns, Philadelphia Phillies, and Pittsburgh Pirates. In 506 career games, Clarke recorded a batting average of .254 and accumulated 20 triples, six home runs, and 127 runs batted in.
  Born in Canada and raised in Michigan, Clarke began his baseball career in 1902, when he reportedly hit eight home runs in one game while playing for the Corsicana Oil Citys of the Texas League. From there, he spent two more seasons in the minor leagues before the Cleveland Naps signed him to a contract. Aside from a loan to the Detroit Tigers, he played for the Naps for six seasons. Clarke was then traded to the St. Louis Browns, where he played for one season. After several years in the minor leagues, Clarke joined the United States Marine Corps. He returned to the major leagues and played there until 1920, then continued playing for minor league teams until 1927. Clarke then retired from the game, rejoined the Marines, and moved to River Rouge, Michigan, where he lived until his death in 1949.
context_section_description: At the end of the 1904 season, the Cleveland Naps purchased Clarke from Atlanta. The plan was for Clarke to be the third catcher on the roster behind Harry Bemis and Fritz Buelow, and as a result, he only played in a few games during the first half of the season. In August 1905, Clarke briefly joined the Detroit Tigers after the Cleveland team traveled to Boston without him. He was loaned to Detroit with the understanding that the Naps could reclaim him on one day's notice. Clarke appeared in only three games for Detroit, compiling a .429 batting average and a home run before being recalled by the Naps. In 45 games between both teams on the season, he had a .208 batting average.
  Clarke began the 1906 season as the third string catcher. A month into the season, Naps manager Nap Lajoie changed the roster around partially due to Clarke's hitting, which had improved greatly from last season. To end the year, Clarke compiled a career high batting average of .358, tying him with George Stone for the American League batting championship. However, Stone was recognized as the batting champion because Clarke had only appeared in only 57 games with 195 plate appearances. Clarke began to wear shin guards early in his career, and was one of the first ballplayers to adopt this layer of protection.
  After spending the offseason playing winter baseball in Florida with several other major leaguers, Clarke became the everyday catcher for the 1907 season. He started off hitting well, and had a batting average of .381 through the first month of the league, which was second in the American League. He started nearly every game for the Naps until his finger was hit by a foul ball in a game in June, causing him to miss two weeks. By the end of the season, he had stopped playing well, finishing the season with a .269 batting average and six triples in 120 games, as well as a league-leading 25 passed balls.  During the offseason, Clarke played winter baseball in Cuba, then returned to Cleveland in March.
  Clarke spent the 1908 season splitting time at the catcher position with Bemis, as both struggled in spring practice. In September, Clarke sustained an injury in a game against Detroit when the bone of a finger on his right hand was split and he was unable to grow a nail. On October 2, he caught a perfect game thrown by Addie Joss, which was only the fourth perfect game in MLB history. He finished the year with a .241 batting average and six triples in 97 games. On Thanksgiving night in 1908, Clarke was married to Mary A. Smith at the home of the bride's parents in Sandwich, Ontario, Canada. His wife did not like the "Nig" nickname that sports reporters used, and wanted them to simply call him Jay in newspapers.
  The signing of Ted Easterly and Grover Land gave the Naps four catchers entering spring training. Easterly became the starting catcher and Bemis the backup due to Clarke's "lack of ambition", which led to speculation that he could be traded during the season. He finished the season with a .274 batting average in 55 games. During the offseason, St. Louis Browns player-manager Jack O'Connor attempted to trade for Clarke, but a deal never materialized. Clarke saw little playing time in 1910 due to a bout of typhoid fever, which landed him in the hospital for most of the season. He played 21 games that season, batting .155.
caption: Baseball card of Clarke
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