How FDR saved ⚾ baseball 80 years ago

The “Green Light Letter” written by Roosevelt. B-49.56 (via the National Baseball Hall of Fame Library).If you buy something from an SB Nation link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement.

With spring training just weeks away, the start of baseball’s season was in doubt early in 1942. The United States had just entered World War II and able-bodied American men would be needed to fight.

Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis reached out to President Franklin D. Roosevelt for guidance. “The time is approaching when, in ordinary conditions, our teams would be heading for spring training camps,” he told FDR in a handwritten letter on Jan. 14, less than six weeks after…