Major League Mentor

A PRO IN THE SHOW

But that was just the tip of the iceberg for Pride’s athletic achievements. Drafted out of high school by baseball’s New York Mets, Pride spent his college summers in the minor leagues. After playing hoops at William & Mary, he was able to devote himself to baseball full time and broke into the major leagues on Sept. 11, 1993, signing with the Montreal Expos.

When he got his first hit in the major leagues — a double against the Phillies on Sept. 17, 1993 — the crowd of 45,757 fans at Olympic Stadium in Montreal gave him a standing ovation for about five minutes.

“Just days earlier, most of the fans in attendance had never heard of me,” Pride writes in his new memoir, “I Felt the Cheers: The Remarkable Silent Life of Curtis Pride.”

“I was a young African American whose minor league exploits had largely gone unnoticed,” he writes. “But word had spread quickly there was something unique about me, and the Montreal fans were responding to me as one of their own.”

Pride, an outfielder, would go on to play in 421 MLB games for the Expos, Detroit Tigers, Boston Red Sox, Atlanta Braves, New York Yankees and Los Angeles Angels through 2006. In doing so, he became the first deaf player in the majors since Dick Sipek in 1945.

One of his Angels teammates in 2005 was Paul Byrd, a pitcher who won 109 games in the majors from 1995 to 2009.

“There are people who bring good energy to the locker room and when they step in the batters’ box, and Curtis was one of those guys,” Byrd says. “He is just a really good person on and off the field. I always knew I was in a dogfight when he stepped in the batter’s box; he was so fast. But what stands out to me is the kind of person he was. He never looked at his loss of hearing as a weakness. He never used that to get anybody to feel sorry for him. He was one of us, he has a really good sense of humor. I don’t remember Curtis’ stats. I remember him as a person.”

A ROLE MODEL

After his playing career, Pride became the head baseball coach at Division III Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C.

While there, he served as a mentor and role model for many of his players — most of whom had some form of deafness.

“When I was growing up as a kid, I remember seeing coach Pride playing on TV with the Angels,” former Gallaudet outfielder Kyle Gumm says. “My father explained to me that coach Pride was deaf. It was a great experience that coach Pride was able to coach me.”

Gallaudet, citing a lack of players, canceled its 2024 baseball season and later dropped the program, along with women’s soccer. Pride had a record of 161-358-2 in 15 seasons with the Gallaudet Bison.

Pride writes in his memoir that while Gallaudet was the last place he expected to wind up, it turned out to be the right place for him: “During my 16 years as Gallaudet’s head baseball coach, I spent the better part of my days working with kids facing the same challenges I overcame to play baseball, on a field where we sometimes had to shovel snow.”

Sports are still a big part of Pride’s family life. In 2016, he was named “MLB’s Ambassador of Inclusion,” and he has made several appearances on behalf of Major League Baseball.

Pride, 56, plans to appear at several book signings and speaking engagements around the country this year to promote his memoir, co-authored by Doug Ward, former publications manager for the Angels. Baseball Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr. wrote the foreword to the 283-page book, released Feb. 25 by Kensington Publishing Corp.

Pride’s wife, Lisa, is a veteran broadcaster who does radio play-by-play commentary of minor league baseball in Florida. They met when she was reporting a story about a young student who was writing a paper about Pride.

Their daughter, Noelle, takes part in club rowing at The Ohio State University while their son, Colten, a senior baseball player at Wellington High in Florida this spring, hopes to be a walk-on player at a Division I school with a strong academic focus.