Curtis Pride was diagnosed as profoundly deaf at six months old, yet he went on to play parts of 11 seasons in Major League Baseball, one of only a handful of deaf players ever to reach the sport's top level. Now 57 and living in Florida, Pride spends much of his time answering letters from children with disabilities who see something of themselves in his story.
Pride's path to the majors was anything but direct. According to the Los Angeles Times, he endured years grinding through the minor leagues, batting just .227 in Double-A ball for Harrisburg and striking out 110 times in fewer than 400 at-bats along the way. The frustration got bad enough that he stepped away from the sport entirely and took a job working with students in the special education program at John F. Kennedy High School in Maryland, where he'd once been a star athlete himself.
It was Kennedy High students, per the same account, who talked him into giving baseball another shot. He returned to professional ball and eventually made his major league debut with the Montreal Expos in September 1993 — reaching second base in his second big-league at-bat at Montreal's Olympic Stadium and going on to hit .444 with three extra-base hits and five RBIs in just nine at-bats that year. The Expos gave him 63 more at-bats before releasing him two years later.
From Detroit Breakout to a Career Built on Persistence
Pride's best season came in 1996 with the Detroit Tigers, when he hit .300 with 10 home runs and 11 stolen bases across a career-high 95 games, the Los Angeles Times reports. That performance earned him the Tony Conigliaro Award from Major League Baseball and the Boston Baseball Writers' Association, an honor given annually to a player who overcomes adversity through spirit and determination, according to the Society for American Baseball Research.
He also batted .252 in 70 games for Atlanta in 1998. He homered in his first game for the Boston Red Sox, though the team later released him. By the time he retired, Pride had appeared in 421 games for six teams, batting .250 across parts of 11 major league seasons and 23 professional seasons overall.
Following in the Footsteps of Billy Hoy and Dick Sipek
Pride wasn't the first deaf player to make the majors. Billy “Dummy” Hoy debuted for the Washington Nationals in 1888. Pride was the first deaf player to reach the majors since Dick Sipek in 1945.
Decades before Pride, Dick Sipek became the first deaf player in MLB since Hoy when he appeared in 82 games for the Cincinnati Reds in 1945, according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Sipek had been coached at the Illinois School for the Deaf by Luther “Dummy” Taylor, a deaf pitcher who won 116 games for John McGraw's New York Giants between 1900 and 1908, according to the Society for American Baseball Research. Other deaf players have played in the majors since Hoy.
A Multi-Sport Prodigy Long Before the Majors
Baseball wasn't even Pride's first sport. He was an elite youth soccer player, and at age 16 he scored two of the United States' three goals — including the game-winner against Bolivia — at the 1985 FIFA U-16 World Championship in China, according to Kiddle.
He also starred on the basketball court, playing four years as the starting point guard for the William & Mary Tribe from 1986 to 1990 on a basketball scholarship, according to Gallaudet University Athletics. He graduated with a finance degree in 1990. In high school, he earned a 3.6 GPA. The New York Mets selected him in the 10th round of the 1986 amateur draft.
Building a Gallaudet Program From Nothing
After his playing career ended following a final season with the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs in 2008, Pride became head coach at Gallaudet University, the world's premier institution for deaf higher education.
Gallaudet dropped its baseball program in 2024, two years before the Los Angeles Times published its profile of Pride. The closure came around the same time Major League Baseball scaled back much of its inclusion programming, roughly two months into the second Trump administration, according to the same report — a contrast that underscores how uneven long-term institutional support for athletes with disabilities can be.
A Foundation, a Memoir, and Letters From Kids
Pride co-founded the Together With Pride Foundation with his wife Lisa, which has been associated with hearing-aid and scholarship work, according to the Washingtonian. He also worked as MLB's Inclusion Ambassador, was appointed to the President's Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition, and represented the United States at the 2012 Olympics closing ceremony in London, the Los Angeles Times reports. He now coaches part-time for the Louisville Slugger Warriors, an amputee and limb-difference baseball team.
Pride wrote a memoir, I Felt the Cheers: The Remarkable Silent Life of Curtis Pride, co-written with Doug Ward. He communicates today using lip reading and real-time captions, per the Los Angeles Times. Former big-league manager Mike Scioscia has said Pride was an inspiration.
Pride receives hundreds of letters annually from children with disabilities and makes a point of answering every one, according to the Los Angeles Times. One letter came from Amanda, a blind elementary-school student who joined a tee-ball league in the 1980s after Pride inspired her to play. Pride's own children have followed a similar path of overcoming challenges: his daughter Noelle, 22, attends Ohio State and has bilateral cochlear implants, while his son Colten, 19, attends the University of Central Florida and has hearing loss in his left ear. Both appeared in the 2024 film Rally Caps. Pride's message to deaf and hard-of-hearing youth, per the Los Angeles Times, is simple: never quit, and disabilities should not stop anyone from pursuing their dreams.
