Born in Gatun Lake, Panama, Scantlebury threw and batted left-handed, stood 6 feet 1 inch (1.85 m) tall and weighed 180 pounds (82 kg).

Scantlebury's record[2] begins at age 26 in 1944 in the Negro leagues, when he was considered Panama's first professional baseball star on foreign soil.

[4] Five days later, against the Cardinals at Busch Stadium, he started for his second and final time, working four innings and allowing three runs on a homer by Ken Boyer; they were enough to pin the 5–3 defeat on Scantlebury,[5] his only MLB decision.

He pitched in four other games in relief for the 1956 Redlegs through August, and spent part of the year with their Seattle Rainiers affiliate in the Open-Classification Pacific Coast League.

In his one-season, six-game MLB trial, Scantlebury allowed 24 hits (including five homers), 14 runs (all earned), and five bases on balls in 19 total innings pitched.