Baseball off-base in way it perceives race

Major League Baseball will pat itself on the back Saturday night (or will it behave like a true ballplayer and give itself a pat on the rump?), giving itself praise for some of the great African-American ballplayers who have thrilled us throughout the years with their athletic skills.

From Jackie Robinson to Willie Mays and running to the present of Ken Griffey (Sr. & Jr.) and Dontrelle Willis, we may even get to hear the saga of the Hairston family – one of only three in which three different generations (grandpa, pa and son) all played baseball for major league teams.

FOR TONIGHT IS the Civil Rights Game, at AutoZone Park in Memphis, Tenn., which is becoming a pre-season tradition where two teams get to play an exhibition game that is dressed up with ceremonies commemorating the contributions of black ballplayers.

But when our very own Chicago White Sox take the field tonight against the New York Mets in their last pre-season game before heading for Cleveland to begin their regular season on the road with a series against the Indians, we ought to think seriously about the role professional baseball has played in the culture of our country, and realize that much of the pablum we’ll be fed tonight is a crock.

I have lost count of the number of times people come up with statistics that show baseball, our “national pastime” and truly one of the great ballgames in existence, just doesn’t have much appeal to people in the United States who are not white.

It does continue to appeal in a very big way to people outside the United States, particularly those from Latin American countries. It is often the growing presence of Spanish-speaking ballplayers (roughly one in four major leaguers comes from a Latin American country, and two in five is Hispanic), combined with the growing number of Asians, who are giving this game its feel of diversity.

IF NOT FOR the foreign elements to Major League Baseball, the professional game in this country would be even whiter than it was in the days prior to 1946 – the year Robinson played his one season of minor league ball prior to joining the Brooklyn Dodgers.

To me, the World Series in 2005 is memorable for several reasons – from watching Roger Clemens fizzle out after just two innings to seeing White Sox shortstop Juan Uribe make a diving catch into the stands on a foul ball that helped preserve a 1-0 White Sox victory in Game 4 to that game that felt like it would never end (Game 3, at 14 innings, lasted until just after 1 a.m. – and remains the longest World Series game ever).

That is all memorable on-field activity. But there’s one other factor that is memorable about the World Series that year. The National League champion Houston Astros didn’t have a single U.S.-born black player on their roster.

Not that the White Sox were much better that year. Outfielder (and Series MVP) Jermaine Dye and designated hitter Carl Everett were the sole African-Americans on the team that year (long-time White Sox star Frank Thomas would have been a third, had he not suffered a nearly season-long injury that kept him from playing in the World Series).

SADLY ENOUGH, THIS is not some extreme situation.

It is common for most of the melanin complexion on a ball club to come from players who were born in other countries, and to whom the United States is a place where they work during the summers before returning to their home countries for the winter months (where some insist on playing in the professional baseball leagues scattered throughout Latin American countries).

Some people want to downplay this fact by claiming that many of the Latin American players themselves are very dark-skinned and obviously have African ethnic origins in their genetics. That is true, but it doesn’t mean that baseball is doing itself or society any favors by replacing the number of black ballplayers with Latino ballplayers.

Perhaps it is appropriate that the White Sox are one of the participants in Saturday’s exhibition. The very question, “Who was the first black ballplayer ever for the White Sox?” highlights the confusion.

THE FIRST BLATANTLY dark-skinned Sox player was Orestes “Minnie” Miñoso, the Cuban who joined the team in May 1951 and became one of the White Sox’ top players for the 1950s. Three months later, a second dark-skinned player, Mississippi native Sam Hairston, joined the team.

Hairston was a catcher who only played part of that one season in the major leagues, and hung around the minor leagues for several more years hoping to get another shot at playing ball. He didn’t, but he went on to become a talent scout who had two sons and two grandsons who all played major league ball.

I’d argue that Hairston is the first African-American player for the White Sox, noting that Miñoso wasn’t even the first Latino ballplayer with the team. That doesn’t take away from his skills.

But this type of debate (which I have read way too much of on various web sites trying to discuss the racial makeup of modern-day professional baseball) reeks too much of a mentality of there being “white” ballplayers and “other” ballplayers, as some fans don't like having to acknowledge any difference between dark-skinned Latin Americans and African-Americans. That attitude, in and of itself, can make many promising African-American athletes look to other sports.

WHY SHOULD THEY play something that tries to make them feel like an outsider, or that wants them to believe they should be grateful anyone is even allowing them to play?

It is true that many athletes who once may have thought of playing baseball now turn to sports like basketball or football, both of which use major college athletics as their developing ground for talent – compared to baseball which still relies on minor leagues that are located primarily in the rural south.

The thought of a college scholarship (which makes it sound like the person is going off to be a student, even if some of them will never open a textbook during their time on campus) can sound much more promising to a young black man than the chance to play (and fail) for the Bluefield (W.Va.) Orioles in the Appalachian League.

I often wonder myself if a Jackie Robinson these days would even want to play baseball professionally. After all, he was a college football star (UCLA), and conceivably was a good enough athlete that the National Football League might be an option.

NOW PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL in this country is taking a step in the right direction with its RBI program, which tries to run camps in inner-city neighborhoods to show youngsters the intricacies of baseball. On a certain level, baseball views its Civil Rights Game as yet another chance to show off the history of athleticism amongst African-American ballplayers.

Yet I could see how such action would go against the game. Reminding people of the players who once took the field for various teams in the old Negro leagues is a nice gesture. Paying attention to the contributions of Jackie Robinson and Hank Aaron is interesting.

But it has the potential to make baseball appear to young black people to be a game that grandpa once played. It doesn’t do much of anything to show off the current talent and make the African-American youth realize baseball is a game that can use their talents as well.

It also doesn’t help that so many baseball fans want to dump the single-season and career home run records set by star slugger Barry Bonds, and seem particularly gleeful that he is having trouble finding a ball club interested in using his hitting talents this season.

STEROID-LADEN OR not, he still managed to hit all those home runs. Unless baseball is prepared to start nullifying its past decade of existence (which would seem too much like bitter griping against a black athlete), it is going to have to accept his accomplishments.

Now some are going to note that the person who is now beloved for the home run record – Hank Aaron – is also African-American. But back when Aaron approached the record in 1973, he was subjected to so much hate mail that the perception exists that baseball fans are just bitter cranks whenever a black man comes close to a record-setting achievement.

This is the attitude that needs to be dealt with and changed if baseball is truly interested in gaining more fan support from African-American people.

This is where baseball commissioner Bug Selig ought to be focusing his attention Saturday night in Memphis, instead of getting caught up in hero worship for his boyhood idol Aaron – who despite his past greatness is now little more than just another ex-athlete.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Major League Baseball is determined to pay tribute to the Civil Rights movement (http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/events/civil_rights_game/y2008/index.jsp) with an annual exhibition game in the same city where the National Civil Rights Museum (http://www.civilrightsmuseum.org/) is located.

Sam Hairston is not only the first African-American to play for the Chicago White Sox, he also is the head of one of only three families (the Boones and the Bells are the other two) in which (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B07EFDF1239F93AA35752C1A961958260) three generations played major league baseball.