We Need More Black Baseball Players says...
by buddahead9 on Apr 30, 2007 2:38 PM PDT
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PrintFrom an Internet article.
"Lots of people have paid lip service to the diminishing presence of African-Americans in baseball. Now a group of former big-leaguers is committing itself to helping end the trend.
Dennis "Oil Can" Boyd, Marquis Grissom and Delino DeShields are putting together a barnstorming tour-dubbed "Oil Can Boyd's Traveling All-Stars"-of exhibition games this spring and summer through America and Canada. They're also in the early stages of trying to put together a new independent league, tentatively called the Urban Baseball League, to start play next year."
"I'm sick of the rhetoric," DeShields told the Boston Globe. "If we want more black kids playing baseball, if we want more black people in the stands, if we want more black people running baseball teams and in positions of power, then we have to go after it ourselves. We have do something about it, and not just talk about it. Oil Can, Marquis and I are going after it. We're trying to change things as businessmen and as baseball players."
The hope is the UBL will have franchises in cities with large African-American populations, preferably with prominent African-Americans in ownership positions, and will help sell and teach the game to inner-city kids. Chicago seems a natural for the league, although the saturation of pro teams in the area creates a challenge for a new enterprise.
Derek Bell and Sam Horn are among the former big-leaguers who have committed for the this summer's tour. The organizers are hoping to land Carl Everett, Pokey Reese and Bernard Gilkey, among others.
Do they really think an Independent League is going to help?
There are hundreds of professional baseball teams scattered across the land. (A list of Major League affiliated teams. Link.) If that doesn't give you enough baseball, then there are a handful of independent leagues oh and whole lotta college teams to boot.
If your city is big enough to collect money to build a ball field, it probably already has baseball in it.
It's not like there is a movement to get more white people into the NBA, more asians into the NHL or latinos into the NFL, etc.
If someone doesn't have the desire to get into a sport, watching a bunch of semi-professionals that happen to have the same skin color as them probably isn't going to help.
A travelling exhibition of all-stars over the spring and summer...When is MLB baseball played? In the spring and summer... So where would the best baseball players be during the spring and summer? Probably playing for a MLB team (or in our case on the DL of a Major League Baseball team). Once again watching "passed their prime" and "never quite hit their prime" players play baseball...probably won't inspire many kids to pick up a bat and glove at their local Wal-Mart.
Maybe they should try some media blitz and spend millions of dollars on a poster boy MLB athlete and slap his face on every thing that may be marketed towards young african-american males. That has a better chance of succeeding than another independent baseball league that features mostly African-American players.
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You wanna know why there's less black players?
Because they have a lot of sporting options, and no diamonds to play on.
Think about it - let's say you're a city planner and you have a little space to put up a recreational facility. For every baseball diamond you can throw out there, you could put up a dozen basketball courts.
And now think about if you were a kid with a little time to kill: are you going to get 15 friends together and play baseball, or are you going to grab a basketball and find a hoop?
Baseball doesn't lend itself to urban areas. You just can't throw pitches against a wall all afternoon the same way you can throw 3-pointers down.
And when Little League is dominated by Southern California teams coached by ex-Major Leaguers and financed by SUV-driving parents who can fork out hundreds of bucks to take their kids on yearly tournament tours, it ain't a wonder that the demographics have changed.
Location, location, location.
Even inside San Francisco, I think that the baseball fields are away from the traditional black neighborhoods. That might be my lack of familiarity tho. And not many vacant lots, and street baseball is not sane here.
While some of that is obviously true ...
at least in Oakland, the kind of inner city neighborhoods that we're discussing are not subject to the whims of present day city planners. They were developed decades ago and include a decent number of baseball parks.
Where I grew up, in the flats (off Coolidge about half way between MacArthur and Foothill for any locals who are curious), I had at least 4 parks/schools with baseball fields within easy walking distance.
Of course, we mostly played ball in the middle of the street -- 1 on 1, 2 on 2, whatever we had.
I know that area
I grew up near 35th & MacArthur - to the east.
But in the inner city, you also have to worry about safety, sadly.
Safety was a bit of a concern ...
but I definitely felt safer at a baseball park than a basketball court.
Tough to work on your hitting approach...
I applaud their efforts ...
but shouldn't it be called Oil Can Boyd's Travelling All-Star plus Delino DeShields?
Too much persecution in baseball...
yeah! I said it. Exhibit A: Barry Bonds. Exhibit B: A-Rod. Persecution for no damn reason.
Is it me or...
can only a White non-athletic former player like John Kruk get a job on ESPN? What happened to Harold Reynolds? This whole thing stinks!
There are other non white baseball players
on ESPN.
I'm also sure you're aware that there are plenty of non white athletes from other sports on ESPN.
Harold got fired
for sexual harrassment. What gets me is that he was the guy carrying the show. I like Kruk ok, but Harold made the show fun. Now that I think about it, they made for a good pairing with their bantering.
It doesn't boil down to any one factor
Among those factors, though, is the fact that many kids, including African-American kids, see baseball as a slow, boring sport for geezers. (Pick up any issue of Slam magazine and you're almost sure to see a dig at baseball along these lines.)
All the same, I'd like to think that this effort will help open doors -- or, viewed another way, point to where those doors already were. And I'd like to think that most kids would be inspired to learn about the awe-inspiring history of African-Americans in baseball.
Should not even be an issue.
I don't really know why people even care that much. People play the sports they want to play. This exhibition will certainly not help matters any. Why should people even care? Do some think that, because so few blacks play baseball that it is somehow not a legitimate sport? In the sports I follow (baseball, hockey, football), I don't give a damn about the race of the players, coaches or fans. I only care about the excitement of the sport and how my teams perform.
by PatMo on Apr 30, 2007 10:58 PM PDT reply actions
Well, if you're a baseball fan
wouldn't you want the best athletes in the world, regardless of race, to be playing baseball?
Yes it should -- IF
black children are not playing baseball not because they'd rather play basketball or the cello but because opportunities to do so don't exist for them.
spot on
The approach to the "problem" is wrong
What they need to be looking at is the percent of Blacks in all of professional sports, not any one individual sport. I haven't looked at it, but I'm pretty sure that the percentage of all "minority" races have steadily increased since Jackie Robinson. Just because baseball has become less popular for Blacks to play and therefore the number who play in the MLB is decreasing isn't necessarily a problem or even an issue. Basketball & Football specifically have huge percentages of Blacks.
So what's the real problem? Last I checked there's not that many playing hockey but I don't hear much about that at all. Maybe a little bit, but not much, about golf, tennis or cycling. If young Blacks want to play the game, hey, awesome. The more fans the merrier. But there's no reason to panic because more are choosing other sports over baseball.
Now, if you want to discuss representation in the upper hierachy of baseball & professional sports in general. Then you certainly could make a case. While the numbers are growing, they certainly aren't very impactful. Especially considering there's interested & qualified Blacks wanting those roles.
Why is it wrong
I don't believe anyone's panicking. Just acting on what in their opinion is a problem.
Put it this way, wouldn't it be in the best interests of baseball that the best athletes in the world, regardless of race, prefer to play baseball, instead of some other sport? Would it be better for baseball if a significant population group of potential athletes showed no interest in baseball?
Now, if you're a fan of multiple sports, this isn't a problem, of course.
Pretty sure you're reading more into this
than I meant. There's nothing wrong with what they're doing. I never once discussed anything about kids who are interested in playing the game and helping support them, regardless of race, towards making the majors. Hell, there's nothing wrong with these players getting together and starting a program in order to encourage more interest and participation in the game. Quite the contrary, helping to promote the game will help keep interest in the sport in the long run. Maybe I'm the one reading into it more than I should, but from what I've read and heard from Black players/former players is that there's a bit of a panic because the numbers of players in the majors is dropping. While there's nothing wrong with trying to do something about it or promote awareness of the sport, IMO, because the percentage of Blacks in professional sports in general has been a healthly number, there's little reason to try to specifically cause a panic over baseball.
Specifically cause a panic?
The players in the article are starting a league in a bid to generate more interest, and earn money, of course. They aren't asking MLB to have a quota for African-American players.
I don't believe that the declining number of African-American players in baseball is a problem, since I'm a fan of other sports besides baseball. OTOH, neither do I have a problem with attempts to rectify the decline.
Why baseball is now so white
C.W. Nevius had a piece in the S.F. Chronicle by that title on April 22, 2007:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...
In a nutshell, kids without personal professional instructors and/or who don't participate in summer traveling teams (read: their parents spend a lot of money) rarely make it onto the radar of MLB teams.
Also see this piece from April 13, 2007 by Bruce Jenkins (also with the S.F. Chronicle):
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...
I think just about anything that increases interest in, and access to, baseball for kids is a good thing, regardless of race.
But the growing pay-to-play system for youth baseball strikes me as terribly exclusionary. Maybe MLB and ex-players need to pony up some serious scholarship money so that 1,000's of talented poor kids across the county (of any race) can play on summer traveling teams. Give their local youth and school teams the same top quality equipment and infrastructure that wealthy districts and leagues have.
Give those kids the same tools, training and exposure, and let's see what happens.
Scholarships = Great Idea
That's a great idea
I don't know if MLB would ever institute anything like that, but I feel that it is at least possible because they really milked that Jackie Robinson anniversary for more than it was worth.
I thought the video segments by Spike Lee of CC Sabathia's holding Jackie's jerseys in his hands and looking forlorn, in front of a black background, were really a bit overdone. After all, I don't think that anyone thinks that lack of participation in pro sports is what is hurting the African-American community.
That said, I think an idea like yours could work if a group of players signed on to donate a certain portion of their salary to urban outreach scholarships. I believe it could catch on in the same way that Griffey's jersey idea did, where players like Garret Anderson were stigmatized if they didn't go along with it, and everybody else got enough support and attention from participating to make it attractive to them.
Yes those wealthy Dominicans are so fortunate.
How can Americans possibly compete with their financial advantages?
by WaddellCanseco on May 1, 2007 10:11 AM PDT up reply actions
By not having to compete with them -- obviously
Dominican players come from a completely seperate talent pool than American players. They have completely different scouts evaluating them and they take a completely different path into the organization.
Yeah we need more black players
by Mulderfan on May 1, 2007 12:45 PM PDT reply actions
my god, is this true:
"Being an A's fan people have accused me of being racist, because the A's have a majority of white players."
the depths of stupidity of some folk never cease to astound me.
and if you believe the a's "hired" stewart and or bradley becasue of some distorted affirmative action cause, well, you might be misreading the teams purpose.
Unpopular opinion man says....
The US population is around 12-13% black and the MLB is about 8%...its not that far off from representing the real world numbers. Guess I'm not sure what the proper percentages should be, should MLB be trying to discourage latino players from other countries to help out? Or just less whiteys?
I think it is a problem that the numbers are dwindling, but its not that huge of an issue, IMO.
Theres a ton of factors involved, everyone can pick whatever sport they want to play, thats what makes this country great with so many options.
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