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I think the issue of less African American players in the league has very little to do with the stereotypical answer of that I hear of too few Black fathers around to teach their kids baseball. I think this is a smack in the face of fathers in the Black community to even entertain this sentiment.
This issue is related in most cases to economics on more than one level.
1) To play baseball you need bats, balls, and gloves (bases can made from anything). This is an expense most inner city children, black, white, or other cannot afford. So you gravitate to games that you can play that do not require a lot of money to expend. Kids can get together on a vacant lot and use an old shirt as a football and limit the game to only a running game. Basketball on needs a ball and something that can be designated as a goal. This can be a simple box drawn on a wall to represent a shot being made.
2) To play baseball you need space where you will not break a window. Space to create a diamond and decent left, center, right field areas. It is hard to find this in the inner city environment and too many public schools no longer build fields or maintain them. You can play one-on-one basketball in the backyard or the driveway with a makeshift hoop or a cheap store bought one. Football only needs minimal space and when you are little kid a little space is seems big anyway.
3) The sports industry has exploded and become a career option for many black players since black males are encourage to be more athletic than educated. So unfortunately, being a professional athlete seen as the only way out of the ghetto and its accompanying poverty. With this in mind then you have a quicker pathway to this dream in football and basketball than you do in baseball. Here a player could be drafted but start first in a farm team that is either a single A to triple A YEARS before making it to the pros. So, the chance of earning a living that could benefit yourself and family greatly and quickly is a lot less likely.
4) Endorsements with sports apparel companies (shoes) appear to be much more prevalent and lucrative in football and basketball than in baseball. These types of contracts exploded on the industry with players like Michael Jordan and Deion Sanders who showed that even if you didn't have the big salary you could make up for it with big sports apparel deal.
5) Baseball does not do a good job of marketing itself to the community. Every year how many "camps" do hear of and see being sponsored by a professional basketball team or a pro-athlete from one of these teams. The commercials and the outreach they do is not at all matched by baseball.
Therefore, I think the number of African-American players will change and go up when you can at least raise the visibility of the sport in urban areas, address accessibility to the game, and streamlining pathways to the pros. I don't think the latter should be done just to get more black players but better and younger players sooner, if you can get younger players interested in the pre-teens ages.
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493
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(5 of 5)
Re: Why African American players are declining in the league
Sep 10, 2008 12:11 PM
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It's hard to idolize anyone these days either, because you start to and find out they were juiced up - and this transcends all races, but it seems to be hitting baseball the hardest even though it happens in all sports.
So, I think with cuts in programs and as Steve pointed out, other sports are creating bigger stars, baseball just isn't getting the attention as a street sport it once did.
When I was a kid, we had 40 kids on our block of 15 houses and our street ended in a church parking lot. There wasn't a day during the summer or after school until the snow started to fly that you wouldn't find a group of us playing baseball.
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~Susan
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944
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(4 of 5)
Re: Why African American players are declining in the league
Sep 6, 2008 9:12 AM
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I think part of it is because other sports such as basketball have players that stand out larger than life to children and they just have a bigger interest in that sport or football. There aren't as many programs being offered for baseball in certain areas either. Anytime you pass a park you see everyone around the basketball court. I think there needs to be some proactive measures by rolemodels or other types of community programs available to get children more interested in the sport. I also think another factor is that kids in general don't seem as creative as they used to especially in this country. You go to other countries like the Dominican Republic, and the kids will make balls out of anything as well as their gloves, and even their bats, there are just other places that are more passionate about the sport and they find a way to play it.
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666
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1/17/08
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(3 of 5)
Re: Why African American players are declining in the league
Aug 7, 2008 5:12 PM
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Very good point Donna. There is not much stress on sports or the arts in many schools anymore, because of funding cuts. To me, these are important, not just for scholarships, or future stars, but to teach kids leadership and teamwork and about winning and losing. How to work with others. It also teaches responsibility.
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400
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Re: Why African American players are declining in the league
Aug 2, 2008 3:11 PM
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Not only that, but many communities and schools faced with federal funding cuts, first cut after-school team sports and arts programs from their offerings. Very sad, because our children are losing out on a lot.
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1
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7/16/08
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Why African American players are declining in the league
Jul 16, 2008 11:56 PM
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I think the issue of less African American players in the league has very little to do with the stereotypical answer of that I hear of too few Black fathers around to teach their kids baseball. I think this is a smack in the face of fathers in the Black community to even entertain this sentiment.
This issue is related in most cases to economics on more than one level.
1) To play baseball you need bats, balls, and gloves (bases can made from anything). This is an expense most inner city children, black, white, or other cannot afford. So you gravitate to games that you can play that do not require a lot of money to expend. Kids can get together on a vacant lot and use an old shirt as a football and limit the game to only a running game. Basketball on needs a ball and something that can be designated as a goal. This can be a simple box drawn on a wall to represent a shot being made.
2) To play baseball you need space where you will not break a window. Space to create a diamond and decent left, center, right field areas. It is hard to find this in the inner city environment and too many public schools no longer build fields or maintain them. You can play one-on-one basketball in the backyard or the driveway with a makeshift hoop or a cheap store bought one. Football only needs minimal space and when you are little kid a little space is seems big anyway.
3) The sports industry has exploded and become a career option for many black players since black males are encourage to be more athletic than educated. So unfortunately, being a professional athlete seen as the only way out of the ghetto and its accompanying poverty. With this in mind then you have a quicker pathway to this dream in football and basketball than you do in baseball. Here a player could be drafted but start first in a farm team that is either a single A to triple A YEARS before making it to the pros. So, the chance of earning a living that could benefit yourself and family greatly and quickly is a lot less likely.
4) Endorsements with sports apparel companies (shoes) appear to be much more prevalent and lucrative in football and basketball than in baseball. These types of contracts exploded on the industry with players like Michael Jordan and Deion Sanders who showed that even if you didn't have the big salary you could make up for it with big sports apparel deal.
5) Baseball does not do a good job of marketing itself to the community. Every year how many "camps" do hear of and see being sponsored by a professional basketball team or a pro-athlete from one of these teams. The commercials and the outreach they do is not at all matched by baseball.
Therefore, I think the number of African-American players will change and go up when you can at least raise the visibility of the sport in urban areas, address accessibility to the game, and streamlining pathways to the pros. I don't think the latter should be done just to get more black players but better and younger players sooner, if you can get younger players interested in the pre-teens ages.
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