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Baseball: A Job African
Americans Won't Do?
By Jean Damu
Jackie
Robinson must be weeping.
Earlier this
season nationwide festivities were held
to commemorate the 60th
anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s
integration of Major League Baseball. By
and large the events left a sour taste
because it was impossible to ignore the
obvious: African- Americans are becoming
an extinct species in MLB.
Even though a
variety of reasons have been offered up
to explain this phenomena-from Black
kids playing to many video games, to the
exorbitant costs of Little League
participation-close inspection reveals
the fundamental reason Black American
youth are disappearing from the MLB
diamonds is that congress is greasing
the skids by manipulating immigration
laws that now allow massive numbers of
lowly paid overseas apprentice (minor
league, developmental) players to
legally flow into the US.
Ironically
the practice of going overseas,
specifically to the Dominican Republic
for apprentice baseball players, was
necessitated by the onset of baseball’s
free agency agreement that ushered in
skyrocketing salaries. This encouraged
teams in smaller, less lucrative markets
to find ways to cut player development
costs, costs which can run into the
hundreds of thousands of dollars per
player.
No team was
more aggressive or more successful in
recruiting lowly paid apprentice
baseball players in the Dominican
Republic than the Oakland A’s, a
perennial baseball success story that
resides in what is considered one of
MLB’s smallest, least lucrative markets.
In a 1997
Sacramento Bee story Ron Plaza , who was
then a roving instructor for the A’s
said, “When we first went to the
Dominican Republic in the 1980’s, we
signed a lot of guys because we wanted
to have our own squad because we didn’t
want to co-op with another team. A lot
of mistakes were made and we weren’t
sending the caliber of player (that was
going to be successful.) It was
unfortunate.”
In reality,
however, it didn’t really matter whether
the players made it to the major leagues
or not. Despite what they had been told
by the major league baseball scouts most
of the Dominicans are brought here to
help train those who will make it to the
big leagues.
Dick
Balderson of the Colorado Rockies
described the Dominican recruiting
strategy as the “boatload” mentality.”
Instead of signing four (American) guys
at $25,000 each, you sign 20 Dominican
guys at $5,000 each,” he said. Balderson
is currently VP in charge of baseball
operations for the Rockies.
Defending
this strategy, Sandy Alderson who was
then the longtime general manager of the
A’s and is now general manager of the
San Diego Padre’s said, “It’s a reaction
to the cost of player development in the
US. Part of that cost relates to the
escalation of free agent salaries and
increases in signing bonuses at the
amateur level.
“If you are
developing two or three players from
traditional domestic sources and you can
add just one player to that resource
pool every year, then in effect you’ve
increased your productivity,” Alderson
said.
But that was
ten years ago and the ruling class of
MLB, the owners, decided that the
immigration laws, which limited each
team to 26 visas per year was too
limiting.
In a little
unnoticed move last year Congress, which
already grants to MLB exemption from all
anti-trust legislation, passed the
“Creating Opportunities For Minor League
Professionals, Entertainers and Teams
Through Legal Entry Act of 2006.” This change
in the immigration law, passed by
Congress after heavy lobbying of the
legislators and the State Dept. by MLB,
now allows foreign born minor league
players to upgrade from H-2B visas to
P-1 Visas, which until last year had
been restricted just to major league
players.
Under the
H-2B visa program, to which most
industries must conform, each team was
only allowed 26 visas per year. By
upgrading minor league players to P-1
visas each team may now annually import
an unlimited number of minor league
players. This despite
the fact that immigration laws
specifically state these requirements
may not be implemented unless no
Americans can be found who will perform
the job.It should be
easy enough to see the meaning of all
this—that within a few years
organizations like the Milwaukee
Brewers, who have not one African
American on their roster, will become
the norm, rather than an anomaly.
Baseball
offers a clear and true allegory of the
negative effects of globalization upon
the weakest sectors of society. African
American youth are the first to be
discarded by baseball. Others will be
discarded later. In February
of this year the New York Yankees and
MLB sent a delegation to the People’s
Republic of China to contract with
Chinese Baseball Assn. to provide
equipment and training. A similar
delegation from the Mets traveled to
West Africa in MLB’s apparent drive to
develop other, cheaper sources of labor.
Questions
abound. In 20 years will Dominicans also
be discarded as too expensive? Will
white players become as expendable as
Detroit autoworkers? What does the
baseball players union have to say about
this? As the most militant of all the
professional sports unions will it react
at some point to the globalization of
its industry? Stay tuned.
Jean Damu is a
former member of the International Brotherhood of
Sleeping Car Porters, taught Black Studies at the
University of New Mexico, has traveled and written
extensively in Cuba and Africa and currently serves as a
member of the Steering Committee of the Black Alliance
for Just Immigration. Email him at
jdamu2@yahoo.com.
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Immigrants,
Minorities and Race Relations
A
Bibliography of Theses and Dissertations
Presented at British and Irish
Universities, 1900-1981
By Victor F. Gilbert and Darshan
Singh Tatla
* *
* * *
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People's History of Sports in the United
States
250 Years of
Politics, Protest, People, and Play
By Dave Zirin
Zirin (What's My Name, Fool!), writer of
a politically minded online sports
column, examines the intersection of
sports and politics, chronicling the
struggles of America's oppressed,
starting with Choctaws playing lacrosse
and slaves in the South, and reaching
all the way to a critique of Michael
Jordan as an apolitical athlete. There
are many worthy and deserving stories of
courage and conscience in this vast
canvas; however, the telling suffers
from Zirin's term paper–like prose that
relies far too much on overly long
quotes from source material. For
example, three pages about NFL player
Dave Meggyesy has a short introductory
paragraph by Zirin and then excerpts
Meggyesy's autobiography for the bulk of
the section. This book would have been
more engaging and logically organized as
a reference book with entries on each
athlete or group, rather than a linear
historical narrative of sports.—Amazon |
The Greatest, My Own Story
(Muhammad Ali)
Shrovetide in Old New Orleans (Ishmael
Reed) /
Airing Dirty Laundry (Ishmael Reed)
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The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball
Leagues
Edited by James A. Riley, Monte Irvin (Foreword)
EditorRiley is an
accomplished writer and a recognized authority on the
Negro leagues, having published numerous books on the
subject (e.g.,
Too Dark for the Hall, T.K. Pubs., 1991). His
comprehensive reference book documents the careers of
4000 players on teams of major league caliber between
1872 and 1950. Notable Hall of Famers included are Hank
Aaron, Satchel Paige, Ernie Banks, and Jackie Robinson.
Arranged alphabetically, the citations contain a variety
of biographical and statistical information.
This
valuable compilation also provides illustrations, team
histories, an appendix on players, plus an exhaustive
bibliography detailing books, periodicals, booklets, and newpaper articles. Public libraries should purchase
where demand warrants.—Library Journal
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Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in
America
By Melissa V.
Harris-Perry
According to the
author, this society has historically exerted
considerable pressure on black females to fit into one
of a handful of stereotypes, primarily, the Mammy, the
Matriarch or the Jezebel. The selfless
Mammy’s behavior is marked by a slavish devotion to
white folks’ domestic concerns, often at the expense of
those of her own family’s needs. By contrast, the
relatively-hedonistic Jezebel is a sexually-insatiable
temptress. And the Matriarch is generally thought of as
an emasculating figure who denigrates black men, ala the
characters Sapphire and Aunt Esther on the television
shows Amos and Andy and Sanford and Son, respectively.
Professor Perry
points out how the propagation of these harmful myths
have served the mainstream culture well. For instance,
the Mammy suggests that it is almost second nature for
black females to feel a maternal instinct towards
Caucasian babies.
As for the source
of the Jezebel, black women had no control over their
own bodies during slavery given that they were being
auctioned off and bred to maximize profits. Nonetheless,
it was in the interest of plantation owners to propagate
the lie that sisters were sluts inclined to mate
indiscriminately.
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Sex at the Margins
Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry
By Laura María Agustín
This book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work, that migrants who sell sex are passive victims and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agustín makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label 'trafficked' does not accurately describe migrants' lives and that the 'rescue industry' serves to disempower them. Based on extensive research amongst both migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agustin, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry, and although they are treated like a marginalised group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice. "Sex at the Margins rips apart distinctions between migrants, service work and sexual labour and reveals the utter complexity of the contemporary sex industry. This book is set to be a trailblazer in the study of sexuality."—Lisa Adkins, University of London |
* * * * *
The White Masters of the
World
From
The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois’
Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization
(Fletcher)
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Ancient African Nations
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If you like this page consider making a donation
* * * * *
Negro Digest /
Black World
Browse all issues
1950
1960
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
____ 2005
Enjoy!
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The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan
/
The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll
/
Only a Pawn in Their Game
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for
Slavery /
George Jackson /
Hurricane Carter
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The Journal of Negro History issues at Project Gutenberg
The
Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804
/
January 1, 1804 -- The Founding of
Haiti
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Jean Damu is a member of the Black alliance
for Just Immigration. He can be reached
at
jdamu2@yahoo.com
updated 24 February 2008
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