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Baseball Commemorates 60th Anniversary Of Integration
By Administrator | April 15, 2007
Major League Baseball will honor Jack Roosevelt Robinson today… the 60th anniversary of the day he put on a Brooklyn Dodgers uniform in a regular-season game for the first time, thus re-integrating Major League Baseball forever.
‘Jackie’ will be honored in each of the 15 ballparks where games will be played today.
Ten years after declaring his number 42 permanently retired, Commissioner Bud Selig issued a proclamation that will allow players to honor Robinson by wearing his number if they so desire… for this one day. The idea was conceived by Cincinnati’s Ken Griffey Jr., who personally petitioned the Commissioner for the opportunity to wear number 42 — just for today: “It’s just my way of giving that man his due respect. I just called Bud and asked him if I could do it. He made a couple of phone calls and said, ‘Yeah’. We had a good conversation. It was about wearing it (today) — and only (today)”.
Selig liked the idea so much that he opened it up to all teams… ruling that every club was free to have at least one player join in.
The Los Angeles Dodgers — every one of them — will be wearing No. 42 this evening at Dodger Stadium… in homage to one of their own. The Pirates and Cardinals, likewise, will all wear the number 42 on their jerseys. Barry Bonds of the Giants, Torii Hunter of the Twins, Jermaine Dye of the White Sox, Derrek Lee of the Cubs and Gary Sheffield of the Tigers are among the players who will also wear Number 42 today (Coco Crisp will wear it in Boston).
A commemorating ceremony will be held at Chavez Ravine (home of the Dodgers) at 8 PM (EST) and will be carried live on ESPN… among those scheduled to be in attendance are Commissioner Bud Selig and Robinson’s widow, Rachel.
MLB.TV and BaseballChannel.TV will broadcast a 90-minute pregame show, beginning at 6:30 PM.
The Yankees’ Mariano Rivera has worn No. 42 since he joined the Yankees in 1995. He was one of a handful of players grandfathered in when Selig retired Robinson’s number in 1997. He is the only remaining active player who still wears the number. He said: “As a minority, I feel honored wearing the number 42 and carry on the legacy that Jackie Robinson left. I wear it with good pride… all the guys (who were grandfathered) either retired or left, and I’m still carrying the number. I feel blessed for that”.
After this evening, all of the number 42 jerseys will be auctioned off… with the proceeds going to the Jackie Robinson Foundation.
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I have read many commemorative articles over the course of the last couple of days in honor of Jackie Robinson… and without diminishing his accomplishments in any way I would also like to pay my respects to another man who, in addition to Jackie, deserves recognition on THIS day.
The other guy’s name is Branch Rickey… and in my mind, no proper recognition of the significance of this day in baseball history can occur without some mention of Branch Rickey.
Branch Rickey was the General Manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers… and he made it his mission to desegregate baseball.
Some of his Rickey’s critics support the notion that wanted to do so solely as a business opportunist (they assert that he wanted to corner the market on black players and black patrons). And while it is without question that Rickey was a shrewd and innovative businessman — and any objective observer would have to ackowledge that the business aspect of the decision was not lost on Rickey — that same objective observer must also acknowledge that Rickey’s motivation was as much personal idealism as it was business acumen.
It was an idealism rooted in an incident years earlier when an African-American player on one of his minor league teams was publicly humiliated when he was refused a hotel accommodation because of his race. Rickey bristled at the incident… and vowed to someday correct it.
Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis was the Commissioner at the time… and he was an avowed racist (as were many of the owners themselves). And Landis had set himself up as (possibly) the most powerful commissioner in the history of the game… thus, Rickey was in no position to challenge him — especially on the issue of integration.
But when Landis died in 1944, Rickey moved quickly to integrate the game… he and his closest advisors began assessing black players with regard to their skill on a baseball diamond AND their personal character. Rickey knew he might get only one chance to make this work… so the player he chose had to be supremely skilled as a ballplayer and imbued with the personal qualities that would enable him to withstand the pressures of being “the first”.
Robinson was chosen. He was signed by Rickey in 1945… and the rest is history.
Topics: Around Baseball, MLB History |
