Life, Views
Changing color of baseball
I am a baseball fan. That will come as no surprise to many of you. My heroes are Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron, JR Richard, Bob Gibson, Brooks Robinson, Frank Robinson, Andre Dawson, Jim Rice, Dale Murphy, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and Mark Wohlers (the last because he was the only Democratic ballplayer I knew during the 2000s). Seven of those 12 names were black players. I mean, black, as in African-American, not Latino-American.
I went to a late-season Braves-Marlins game, and I was talking to a friend. She mentioned that she liked Garrett Anderson; I don’t. I think Garrett Anderson doesn’t, as they say in the stupid world of sports talk, “give 100 percent.” He doesn’t take the extra base, doesn’t move runners over, isn’t a wiz in the field.
But as we were talking, it occurred to me: Garrett Anderson was the ONLY black player on the team.
What has happened to baseball? There are few black players, with the exception of black Latino players, whom anyone would consider “stars” nowadays. Why is that?
Is it, as my baseball-fan husband says, because young black athletes are now focusing on basketball and football? Maybe. If so, why?
Is it because they can play one or two or NO years in college and make it in the NBA or NFL, but not in MLB? I doubt it. For every LeBron James, you have hundreds, maybe thousands, of black stars who played three or four years in college. In 1975, 27 percent of Major League baseball players were black; by 2007, the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s entry into the game, that number was down to 8.4 percent and dropping. African-Americans comprise about 13 percent of the US population.
Contrast that with the NFL (70 percent) and the NBA (82 percent).
So what happened? Gerald Early, a black culture expert at Washington University in St. Louis, a consultant to Ken Burns on his documentary about baseball and a member of the Board of Governors for the Negro Leagues Museum in Kansas City (which, if you haven’t gone to, you really should) says it’s simple:
“Black Americans don’t play baseball because they don’t want to.”
He goes further by saying that baseball’s marketing itself as the sports keeper of the “traditional” or the “nostalgic” is off-putting to blacks, for whom the “good ol’ days” of baseball meant not being able to stay at the team hotel, dodging fastballs to the head and enduring racist taunts around the league. Baseball itself has a long right-wing history. Remember when Baseball Hall of Fame President Dale Petroskey “disinvited” Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins to a 15th anniversary commemoration of the movie, Bull Durham? (Petroskey ended up resigning over the controversy, but still…)
Baseball, with its storied history of being anti-union, is also one of two industries in the country – the other being the health insurance industry (timely, huh?) that enjoys an exemption from anti-trust laws. That exemption, which has been upheld numerous times by the US Supreme Court on the grounds that “baseball is special,” keeps new leagues out of the business and prevents owners from pulling a Bob Irsay and moving his team from, say, Baltimore to Indianapolis.
You can argue that’s a good thing, but it ain’t free enterprise. And I say this as someone who was seriously pissed off when the Colts snuck off to the Midwest under cover of night, like some 14-year-old kid who was caught rolling his neighbor’s yard.
Anyway, baseball has a hell of a lot of nerve expecting us to love it because of some misbegotten nostalgia for the way things were.
But that doesn’t answer the question, does it?
Is it, then, because inner-city land has become so precious that there is no room for baseball fields? There are still fields where kids play football and, more and more, lacrosse in the inner cities. Is it because football and lacrosse, with their uniforms and helmets, seem somehow “cooler?” Maybe. Or maybe, it’s the action. The “manliness” of those sports (even though girls play both).
Maybe it’s like George Carlin said,
“Baseball is a 19th Century pastoral game. Football is a 20th Century technological struggle. In football, you wear a helmet. In baseball, you wear a cap. Football is concerned with DOWNS. What down is it? Baseball is concerned with ups. Who’s up? In football, you receive a penalty. In baseball, you make an error. Football has hitting, clipping, spearing, piling on, late hitting and personal fouls. Baseball has the sacrifice. Baseball has the seventh-inning stretch. Football has the two-minute warning. In football, the object is for the quarterback, otherwise known as the Field General, to be on target with his aerial assault, riddling the defense by hitting his receivers with deadly accuracy in spite of the blitz, even if he has to use the shotgun. With short bullet passes and long bombs, he marches his troops into enemy territory, balancing this aerial assault with a sustained ground attack that punches holes in the wall of the enemy’s defensive line. In baseball, the object is to go home. And to be safe.”
Sheesh. You put it that way, why would any self-respecting macho guy want to play baseball?
Still, in 1995, when the Braves won the series, they had, at some point on their roster, seven black players (Terrell Wade, Fred McGriff, Mike Sharperson, Marquis Grissom, David Justice, Mike Kelly and Dwight Smith.) By 2005, the last year of the 14-straight division titles, they were down to Andruw Jones and Brian Jordan. This year, Garrett Anderson. (Brandon Jones made it to the bigs for a cup of coffee before being sent back to the minors.)
In 1981, I went to Fenway Park for the first time. My practice husband (before I got it right) and I were doing Baseball up the Eastern Seaboard for our honeymoon. We were sitting in fairly good seats, lower level between the plate and first base. The Red Sox were trailing, 8-4, to the White Sox late in the game when the woman sitting behind us turned and said to her husband, “You know what’s wrong with this team? There’s too many [n-words] on this team.”
I couldn’t help it. I turned around and, with a politeness I did not feel, I said, “Lady, all your runs came on homers by black guys.” (Jim Rice and Tony Perez, the latter not counting in my definition for this piece’s purposes.)
Wonder if the old bitch is happy now?
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Dallas says: Good eye. And a thoughtful piece with a good kicker. I suspect the issue you raise has something to do with TV and exposure to the game. I go to bed early and without staying up late, I can choose from 5 or 6 football games on a weekend, a couple of soccer matches from somewhere in the world, and assorted golf and tennis tournaments. Those sports saturate the airwaves. Baseball? All us kids are in bed by the top of the 4th – unless it’s the playoffs.
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I enjoyed your article, and have had similar thoughts. I did not know about Mark Wohlers’ politics, which make me like him more. I was sad when he lost his fastball. I wonder where he is now.
The M-Braves do have the promising Jason Heywood coming along in right field. I live in the Jackson area and get out to some games. We moved here in 1992 from Decatur but are native Mississippians. We started following the Braves closely during the ’91 season. -
jack wilkinson says: Janny: this calls for another bottle of Tattinger with Bob Gibson and the Commish (note to readers: not selig). wonderfully writ, dear. and now? “Let’s go Phillies!”
glad you got it right,
your baseball-fan husband -
Melinda Ennis says: I actually worked with a wonderful ad agency who had done a project with the St. Louis Cardinals with the goal of making baseball more appealing to an African-American audience. The agency was minority owned (and terrific)and the two principals were baseball lovers themselves. Their research said many of the things you mentioned—-basketball dominates because you can have a net on any playground or backyard (in fact, almost anywhere) and is probably the most accessible sport there is. They also mentioned the catch-22 aspect—the audience is majority white, which is off-putting to young people growing up, and the cycle continues. And, as you mentioned, the infamous legacy of racist players such as Ty Cobb doesn’t help either. I agree it’s a shame. I am not a sports fan, but I do love baseball— I guess because I am the daughter of the world’s most devoted Cardinals’ fan. When we were kids, we had to recite the line-up at the dinner table before eating. At 81, my dad still has an autographed picture of Stan Musial in his office, along with a cornicopia of Cards memorabilia that he treasures. And, BTW, he is very proud of the fact that Stan walked up and shook hands to welcome Jackie to the big leagues the first time the Dodgers played the Cards—–although many of the southern players with the Cards were threatening a strike. According to Dad, Jackie always spoke lovingly of Stan.
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Janet says: Melinda,
I remember that about your dad. Wasn’t he a Smoltz fan, as well? I do love Musial because he was, as my dad would say, “a fine fella,” and also because he had 1,815 hits on the road and 1,815 hits at home, and I think that’s a very cool stat. -
Chris Wohlwend says: Janet,
Well said. A few years back, when I started regularly attending UT baseball games, I was surprised at the lack of black players in the college ranks, but thought it was probably because most were signing right out of high school (I wasn’t paying much attention to MLB then). But it was more of an issue than I thought. And it should be addressed.
My Stan Musial memory: The first MLB game I saw was in Los Angeles, Koufax vs. Gibson. Musial was in the twilight of his career. During warm-ups my cousin and I leaned over the rail and jawed with Musial, who had plenty of time for a couple of kids. -
Terri Evans says: Janet, so glad to see you here (again). Really, really enjoyable story. Naturally, I don’t know the answer but you asked a very good question. I also enjoyed Melinda’s comments and more background on the subject.
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Janet says:
Jan,
True. But he is not Hispanic, so, for purposes of this piece, he counts. -
Wouldn’t you have to count Jair Jurjens along with Garrett Anderson then?
I’m with Jack: “Go Phillies!”
Unfortunately I have a perfect record of being for the losers in this post season though. -
Gib Ennis says: I loved the comments by my daughter (Melinda) about my longstanding appreciation of the greatest Cardinal of them all, Stan Musial. Second comes Red Schoendiest, and then Ozzie Smith.
Janet Ward is included with others who have a concern about the seeming demise of African-Americans in big league baseball. Among these is superb baseball commentator, and Hall-of-Fame second baseman, Joe Morgan. Joe has written about this, and voiced it several times.
There would seem to be no great mystery about this. Let’s look at some pertinent facts:. At one time baseball was head & shoulders the number one team sport in the United States. But even then the seasonal aspects did not make it a truly major sport for high school or college. Many high schools that had spring football didn’t have a varsity baseball team. Baseball was a summer game made up of determined organizers, or semi-pro.
Bring that up to date and multiply it several times over. Football & basketball have risen in popularity, and along with it more glamour and prestige. That’s where more and more kids are going to go; and there is no mystery about it.
. The impact of Latin players in the game have made a dramatic influence on major league lineups. Several Latin American countries play baseball twelve months of the year. The brand of baseball is excellent, with a talent pool that has made a home for major league scouts. Add the Japanese players, and some Canadians, and you cut drastically into the percentages of any ethnic group.
. While they are extremely rare in baseball, football & basketball offers a Mecca for the really large, or oversized athlete. The average baseball player today is 6′ 1″, and weighs l86 pounds. This is not a small size, but one relegated to the defensive backfield in football, and a comparative midget for basketball.
It may be the dexterity required in baseball that deters really big athletes, because the money is there and an opportunity for a much longer career. What ever the case, men grow larger today, and they do not gravitate to baseball.
. Janet Ward points out that African-Americans make up 13% of our population, and questions why they are only 9% of major league baseball. Is this really so bad when she seems to answer her own questions by stating that they are 70% of the NFL, and 82% of the NBA. They go where they prefer, and where they are best fitted.
Janet is obviously a great baseball fan. (One that every true fan should marry)
She must have had her tongue in cheek when she wonders why a real man would want to play baseball.
Baseball today is what it had always been: A hard-nosed game with complete individuality in a team sport. A pitcher can get away with his strong arm, but every position player must be able to think, run, hit, field his position, and above all… throw. Throwing is something too much taken for granted in baseball. There is simply no position in major league baseball for a player who does not have a strong and accurate throwing arm. Most errors even in the majors are throwing errors.
Ability has everything to do with the game that produced Hank Aaron, Jackie Robinson, or Frank Robinson, Ozzie Smith, and many other great African-American players. The athletes today simply go elsewhere; or their percentage in the game are being cut by forces outside. -
Janet Ward says:
Hey, Gib! Thanks for commenting. You know, I forgot Ozzie in my list of heroes. I remember that home run (you know the one I am talking about) so well. That would have made my list even more lop-sided in favor of blacks.
I am not as big a fan as you are of Joe Morgan as an announcer, but I sure did love him when he played.
Question remains: Weren’t you a Smoltz fan? Seems I remember getting you a ball. And you will truly love this: Jack’s reference was to a day when I was on business in St. Louis. The Commish is long-time St. Louis baseball writer Rick Hummel (whom we went to Cooperstown to see inducted into the HoF, Jack’s first trip there, my third). Rick called me at my hotel and asked if I would like to be his guest at Al Hrabosky’s 50th birthday party at Mike Shannon’s. (As an aside, I believe this was the day that JFK, Jr’s, plane disappeared!).
So, of course, I said, “of course!” The party was in a back room at Shannon’s, and, at some point, everyone disappeared. The only people left were me, the Commish, some radio guy and BOBFREAKIN’ GIBSON. We were all sitting at a table against the wall. Gibson was ordering bottle after bottle of Taittinger champagne and talking about pitching.
I felt like I was the coolest person in the universe.
At one point, I asked him if there was anyone in the Majors then who reminded him of him. Not knowing where I was from, he answered, “Well, there’s that guy in Atlanta — Smoltz.”
Another story you may like: I was in grade school at a Catholic School in Tampa back in the good ol’ days when World Series games were played in the daytime. For reasons I cannot fathom, except that that was back when I was an Orioles fan, I was pulling for the AL team — Detroit. The only games I pulled for the Cards were the ones that Gibson pitched. This may have had something to do with the fact that when I was a kid, I played softball on a very good AFB team that we named “The Rat Patrol.” I pitched and played third. At some point, I heard our next door neighbor tell my dad, “She gets off the mound just like Bob Gibson.”
That school day, I had a transistor radio strung up through my plaid skirt and white blouse into my ear. I must have not heard the Sister Mary Richard call on me. Next thing I know, she is whacking my desk with a yardstick (swear to God). She ratted me out to my mom, who worked at the school for our tuition. My mom defended me with seven short words: “Well, Sister, it IS the World Series.”
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Janet Ward says:
And, Jan, you are right. I completely forgot Jair Jurrjens.
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Cliff Green says: Janet, I think it has to do with money.
A kid can learn basketball in his mama’s kitchen. At the age of two, he can figure out that if you drop a ball on the floor, it will come back up. Soon, a dribble is perfected. The NBA until the last year or so allowed a high school kid to sign a zillion dollar contract that would solidify his and his family’s financial future forever. Why not go for the quick killing?
There are no minor leagues for the NFL, so the league employs kids who honed their skills on a college scholarship. The NFL loves this system, because it does not have to pay for the kid’s training. And young men with football skills (read: brawn) love it, too. What guy wouldn’t go for beer and babes?
Baseball is different. Each team has to finance a huge minor league system, which means a prospect has to sign for a lot less money. Then, he has to spend years riding buses from Rome, GA to Myrtle Beach, SC to Jackson, MS to God-knows-where, until someone he has never met decides he is good enough to play baseball in the big leagues. Afterwards, he has to produce in the Big Show for several seasons before he can sign the real big-money contract. If a player gets hurt in the meantime, tough shit.
For an athlete. it may come down to the fact that for his family’s sake, baseball is just not worth it. -
Gib Ennis says:
No, Janet, I was not a Smoltz fan. Why?? Because he used to drum my beloved Cardinals mercilessly. He is with us now. I just wish he was 32, instead of 42. Everything about him is to be admired. He is intelligent, articulate……..did you know he is a minus two golfer?
That’s good enough to play on the senior’s tour.
Two of my favorite baseball stories.
. Curt Flood once asked Stan Musial how he managed to hit the curve ball so well. Stan thought, and said, “Well, I just wait on it, and then knock the shit out of it.”
. The old Yankee pitcher, Goofy Gomez, was at bat against Bob Feller, who could wing it around one hundred miles per hour. Gomez stood there with the bat on his shoulder when the ump said “strike one” The same thing on strike two. When the ump said “strike three,” Gomez turned and said, “Wait a minute, that last one “sounded” a little low to me.
Another: Joe Medwick was called out on a third strike. Furious, he threw his bat high in the air. The umpire said, “If dat bat comes down, you’re out of duh game. “ -
Will Cantrell says: Janet:
Thanks for a great read. I am a life-long baseball fan and can actually remember baseball in Atlanta in the days before the Braves. These were the days of the Atlanta Crackers with players like Angel Scull and John Glenn (not the spaceman, although he would make history about the same time, 1963.) There were several future major leaguers on that team such as Tim McCarver and Ray Sadeki and Mike Shannon. These were also the days when the NBA was a largely white league, Lester Maddox was king of the Pickrick and there were many folks in Dixie who thought that Birmingham, not Atlanta, might end up being the capital of the South.
A LOT has changed in the world since those days including the fact that the number of African-American ballplayers is at an anemic levels. In those days of Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Ernie Banks very few people could look forward and even dream that the numbers of African-Americans in baseball would be non-existent. (I know that I didn’t). Janet, I am sure that there are a number of reasons for development there is one that I have thought about for a long, long time. It may, at first seem counter intuitive, but I swear I think it to be true: the rise of (organized) Little League ball.
When I was a child growing up in Philadelphia and then later Atlanta, I can remember playing sand-lot baseball forever in the days of summer and on Saturdays and Sundays otherwise. We played endless innings with cracked wooden bats and taped up baseballs. We played in blue jeans and dungarees and shorts and anything that was otherwise known as ‘play’ or ‘old’ clothes. Some of us had baseball caps but it was to keep the sun out of our eyes and if we could assure ourselves —and our mothers—that Johnny didn’t have ringworm, we might even share a cap with Johnny when it was his turn to be in the field and our turn to bat. While real baseball games were 9 innings long, ours might have lasted 900 ‘frames’. (I suspect that one of our games might still going on somewhere in Atlanta if Moms had not demanded that we come home for dinner. We played endless innings in the sandlot at the end of Fair Street. We kids had a lot of at bats and saw a lot of pitches…dozens…maybe even hundreds in a single summer week. Then our church decided to civilize us Baby Boomers by bringing in Little League.
My AT BATS dwindled when “just a bunch of kids playing ball” and trying our best to imitate Aaron or Mays or Ernie Banks (I was No.7 Mickey Mantle) were organized into Fair St. Red Arrows. To be sure, the uniforms nice but our games became official and shorter and well…organized. We parents had to drive us to different neighborhoods to play. Parents also had to pay for uniforms and equipment and some folks just couldn’t. Maybe more importantly if you were a good player you got to play…a lot. If you were a mediocre but coachable player you mainly rooted your teammates on from the bench unless the Red Arrows were way ahead or way behind…something that just never seemed to occur. I suspect that this same scenario played out at a bunch of ‘Fair Streets’ all over the country. I think a lot of kids just got discouraged from lack of playing time. “Kid baseball” is even more organized today. Little League produces some great players…just not in my neighborhood.
By the way, my baseball heroes included Aaron and Fred McGriff and Terry Pendleton and Felipe Alou. There was absolutely something ‘regal’ about the way that Crime Dog played and approached the game. In 1991, Pendleton defined the word clutch and when I was a young adolescent, with the possible exception of Mickey Mantle, you couldn’t tell me that Felipe Alou, the older brother of Matty and Jesus who played centerfield for the Braves was the greatest baseball player who ever lived.
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