The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings was a 1976 film about a team of enterprising ex-Negro League baseball players in the era of racial segregation. It starred Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones and Richard Pryor.

Synopsis

Tired of being treated like a slave by team owner Sallison Potter (Ted Ross), charismatic star pitcher Bingo Long (partially based on Satchel Paige and played by Billy Dee Williams) steals a bunch of Negro League players away from their teams, including Leon Carter (James Earl Jones portraying a Josh Gibson-like slugger) and Charlie Snow (aka Carlos Nevada and Chief Takahoma, played by Richard Pryor, as a player forever trying to break into the segregated Major League baseball of the 1930's by masquerading as first a Cuban, then a Native American). They take to the road, barnstorming through small Midwestern towns, playing the local teams to make ends meet. One of the opposing players, 'Esquire' Joe Callaway (Stan Shaw), is so good that they recruit him.

Bingo's team becomes so outlandishly entertaining and successful, it begins to cut into the attendance of the established Negro League teams. Finally, Bingo's nemesis Potter is forced to propose a winner-take-all game: if Bingo's team can beat a bunch of all-stars, it can join the league, but if it loses, the players will return to their old teams. Potter has two of his goons kidnap Leon prior to the game as insurance, but he escapes and keys his side's victory.

Ironically, there is a Major League scout in the audience. After the game, he offers Esquire Joe (a thinly-veiled Jackie Robinson) a chance to break the color barrier; with Bingo's permission, he accepts. Leon foresees the decline of the Negro League as more players follow Esquire Joe's lead, but Bingo, ever the optimist, cheers him up by describing the wild promotional stunts he intends to stage to bring in the paying customers.

External link

1976 films | Baseball films