Race and Sports

Gary Sheffield of the Detroit Tigers had this gem to offer when asked by GQ why there are not more blacks playing baseball. I'll cut him some slack that when he talks about 'his race' he really means African Americans and not necessarily Africans from Mozambique.

He was responding to the 'crisis' in baseball that there are so few African Americans playing the game. I blogged about this earlier, so I won't go into my arguments again. But Sheff brings up a point worth exploring. Are big league teams more interested in controlling their players than having the best ones out there? Is this control issue limited to baseball, or does it apply to other sports as well? If it applies to all sports, does this mean that we'll be seeing more Latin Americans (or Europeans or Asians) and fewer African Americans in the NBA?

Where his argument breaks down is when he says that if an African American and a Latino player are of the same ability the Latino player will make the team because, and these are Sheff's thoughts, the African American players give management too much shit. No kidding? Hm...two guys who play equally well, but this guy's a pain in the ass. Who should I keep? That's not racism, that's avoiding problems. Gary's got to put himself in management's position for a second.

Now, if the African American players are being treated worse and and rebelling against it, that's a different story. But, he's not saying that. Rather, he's implying that black players play the 'disrespect' card faster than Latin players. And, if that's the case it's a shame. Sports is one of the true meritocracies in our society. There is too much at stake for a team to reject someone for a reason other than his playing ability. I'm thinking if I saw a guy get cut/sent down instead of another guy of equal ability because he was running his mouth, I'd shut my pie-hole. I guess Sheffield has a different view.