Al Vincent: A Legacy in Baseball Coaching and Management (1906–2000)

Albert Linder “Al” Vincent was a major league baseball coach and minor league player and manager who led three different Texas League teams to championships. He was born on December 23, 1906, in Birmingham, Alabama, to John Nathaniel Vincent and Mollie Eleanor (Eager) Vincent. He was the younger brother of composer and conductor John Nathaniel Vincent, Jr. Vincent’s minor league career (he was a second baseman) began in 1928. Over six seasons, his minor league odyssey included such small-market teams as the Talladega Indians of the Georgia-Alabama League; the Kinston Eagles of the Eastern Carolina League; the Selma Cloverleafs of the Southeastern League; the Hazelton Mountaineers of the New York-Pennsylvania League; and the Pine Bluff Judges, the Vicksburg Hill Billies, and the Alexandria Reds of the Cotton States League.

In 1933 Vincent had his best year (a .328 batting average) with the Baton Rouge Solons of the Dixie League, which enabled him to sign with a Class A Texas League team, the Beaumont Exporters. This was not his first taste of the Texas League—he had played three games for the Shreveport Sports in 1931—but it was the beginning of a long relationship with the southeast Texas city of Beaumont. Vincent played for the Exporters, an affiliate of the Detroit Tigers, from 1934 to 1940, save for 1936, when he played for the Toledo Mud Hens (also an affiliate of the Tigers) of the American Association. This was the highest-ranking (Double A) league he participated in as a starting player. Vincent’s 1934 season at Beaumont was routine, but he improved to a .312 batting average in 1935, which earned him the promotion to Toledo. After his one-year sojourn in Toledo, he returned to Beaumont in 1937 as player–manager. As a player with Beaumont from 1937 to 1940, his statistics were respectable; as a manager, he was outstanding. In 1938, managing future big-league pitchers “Schoolboy” Rowe and “Dizzy” Trout, Vincent won the Texas League Championship. The Exporters lost to the Atlanta Crackers of the Southern Association in the post-season Dixie Series, but the contest introduced him to Paul Richards, the Atlanta manager, who later played a key role in his career.

Vincent moved on to manage the Buffalo Bisons (also a Detroit affiliate) of the International League in 1941. He finally made it to the big leagues, albeit not as a player, when the Tigers brought him to Detroit as a coach for the 1943 and 1944 seasons. After World War II Vincent returned to the Texas League as manager of the Dallas Rebels, who had affiliated with the Tigers after sitting out three seasons due to the war. In his first season (1946) Vincent won the league championship. Two years later he moved on to the Tulsa Oilers, also of the Texas League, and won a championship in his second year (1949) with the team. In 1952 he returned to his hometown, where he took the reins of the Birmingham Barons of the Southern Association. In 1954 he returned to the Texas League to manage the Fort Worth Cats for a year.

After 1954 Vincent returned to the big leagues as a coach. Paul Richards had been hired by the Baltimore Orioles as general manager as well as field manager. He brought Vincent back to the big leagues as a coach for the 1955 to 1959 seasons. In 1960 Vincent returned to the minors to manage the Miami Marlins of the International League for one season. The Marlins were the top farm club of the Orioles. Vincent returned to the big leagues to coach for the Philadelphia Phillies from 1961 through 1963. After serving as a scout for the Houston Colt .45s/Houston Astros in 1964 and 1965 (Richards was then the general manager), he returned to the field as a coach for the Kansas City Athletics in 1966 and 1967.

Vincent repeatedly signed on with major league teams that were in doldrums but which became more competitive by the time he left or shortly thereafter. The Orioles, previously known as the St. Louis Browns through 1953, were in their second year in Baltimore when Vincent came on board. Improvement was gradual, but the team eventually became respectable. In 1960, after five years under Vincent’s tutelage, the Orioles finished second in the American League. In his first year with the Phillies (1961), Vincent witnessed the team set a major league record—still standing in the 2020s—of twenty-three consecutive losses. Yet in 1962 they finished with a win-loss ratio above .500(81–80). When Vincent left after the 1963 season, they had improved to 87–75. The team appeared to be on target for a pennant in 1964 until they suffered a late-season collapse. Vincent served under manager Gene Mauch, then in the early stages of a distinguished but disappointing career that ended with him winning more games (1,902) than any other manager who failed to win a pennant. Kansas City finished last in 1965 before Vincent arrived the following season. They were still in last place in 1967, the team’s final year in Kansas City, but the team included a host of young players (e.g., Bert Campaneris, Rick Monday, Dick Green, Sal Bando, Reggie Jackson, Joe Rudi, Catfish Hunter, and Blue Moon Odom) who moved with the franchise to Oakland and played key roles in the Athletics’ successes of the early 1970s.

After his days as a major league coach came to an end, Vincent became involved with the Lamar University Cardinals in Beaumont, where he had enjoyed some of his best seasons as a minor league player. Beginning in 1973 Vincent served as a volunteer coach under longtime head coach Jim Gilligan. He held this position until 1989. It was actually Vincent’s second tour of duty at Lamar, as he had been an assistant football coach under future university president John Gray in 1933 and 1934. Vincent was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 1979. In 1980, while still coaching at Lamar, he was inducted into the university’s Cardinal Hall of Honor. The Al Vincent Award is bestowed every year on Lamar’s top hitter. His name is also enshrined at Lamar’s baseball field, Vincent-Beck Stadium (the latter name honors Bryan Beck, a university regent). Vincent also took up golf and became proficient enough to land a position as a golf pro in Beaumont.

Al Vincent died on December 14, 2000, in Beaumont and is buried at Magnolia Cemetery in that city. He was posthumously enshrined in the Texas League Hall of Fame in 2005. Vincent had married Alice Rose Baxter, a longtime employee of the Lamar University library, on September 2, 1935. They had three children, daughters Carol Linda and Frances Marie and son Albert Baxter.