Diversity in Baseball Begins in Little League
This is Shakeia Taylor’s first piece as part of her April Residency at FanGraphs. Shakeia is an avid baseball fan and baseball history enthusiast. Her main interests include the Negro Leagues and women in baseball. She has written for The Hardball Times and Complex. She hosts an annual charity bartending fundraiser for Jackie Robinson Day, all of tips and raffle proceeds of which are donated to the Jackie Robinson Foundation. Though not from Baltimore, she’s still an Elite Giant. Shakeia can also be found on Twitter (@curlyfro). She’ll be contributing here this month.
Sports, for all their faults, are important for many. They’re important in a way we sometimes don’t talk about. One of my friends recently said to me, “Playing baseball as a kid probably saved my life.” It’s been on my mind ever since he said it, because I understand the sentiment. There are kids in many cities and towns across America who would say the same.
My friend, who grew up in a tough urban neighborhood, said baseball saved his life because it gave him something to do. It gave him something to focus on; it kept him off the street. Those statements hold true for many other kids.
I had complained about the lack of diversity in baseball for a long time. I had talked about how people of color and women and girls need better representation in the sport, and I’d done so until I reached a point of exhaustion. Then one day, I decided I would stop talking and try to do something about it.
It started with a Google search for the Little League regional office for my local area. Then came an email to that office with one request:
Hi there, I am interested in helping a Chicago Little League team who may be in need of additional support in the way of equipment and monetary donations. I am hoping you can put me in touch with a coach or two in the city who could use the assistance. I’m happy to answer any and all questions. Thank you in advance!”
My email was answered by Carlton Jones.
Jones is the district administrator for the North and West parts of Chicago, as well as parts of the South side. Jones also serves as the liaison between the leagues, the Central Region Little League HQ, and the International Headquarters in Williamsport. He has been involved with Little League since 2010, but he has served as a coach, manager, or board member in youth baseball since 2003.
“I wanted children from the North Side of Chicago to have the opportunity to enjoy little league baseball and compete in the LLWS tournament, which has five phases, the last two of which are televised.”
Jones’ district, Illinois Little League District 12, or IL-12, has a large geographical footprint. Literally every neighborhood on the North Side of Chicago is serviced. For the West Side, it’s everything north of Cermak. On the South Side, it includes Englewood, Bronzeville, the South Loop, Oakwood, Kenwood, and Morgan Park.
When asked about the current state of Chicago Little League, Jones tells me that “Chicago Little League is a Special Needs league that provides baseball opportunities for players 4-18 and 19-25 that would not be able to play without special accommodations. It was part of Horner Park North-West Little League until it became large enough to be its own league.”
According to a 2015 Wall Street Journal article, 9 million kids between the ages of seven and 17 played baseball in the United States in 2002, but by 2013, that figure had dropped by more than 41%. With participation on the decline, teams and leagues have been forced to either shut down or merge, further constricting access for poorer families and making the sport whiter and more affluent. Baseball is expensive, and that expense is having an adverse effect on the participation of Black and Latino Americans. You need equipment and uniforms. You need fees. You need money for transportation. Teams in economically disadvantaged areas are often forced to apply for grants and fundraise heavily in order to support kids who want to play.
“Our Little Leagues cost anywhere from $25-$50 for basic programming up to $300 for teams that play over a 30-game season,” Carlton explained. “Your typical travel team will cost a minimum of $800, although $1,500 is closer to reality. Include private lessons and special overnight tournaments, and travel ball for a 12-and-under will easily cost in the $3,000-$5,000 range.”
The burden of that expense contributes to the ethnic and racial disparity we see in professional baseball today. The 2017 Racial and Gender Report Card for Major League Baseball reveals the game to be overwhelmingly white. Among the players present on last season’s Opening Day active rosters, 31.9% were Latino and just 7.7% were African-American or African-Canadian. And while those levels are consistent with 201 6– and while the overall participation of non-white players is at an all-time high — they represent a marked drop from the peak of African-American participation in the sport in the mid-1970s, when approximately 27% of players were African-American.
The disparity extends to those who watch the game. As of 2013, 83% of MLB television viewers were white; just 9% were Black. Of that same group, 50% were 50 years or older. Seeing oneself reflected in the game isn’t the only reason people engage with baseball, but it creates an important, lasting link to the sport. And with the current viewing audience increasingly composed of a white and aging demographic, it is vital to the future health of the sport that kids of color and girls develop an interest the game and are able to sustain that interest.
MLB recognizes this and in 2017, along with USA Baseball, established the Dream Series. The objective of the Dream Series is not only to prepare young players for a future in baseball, but to increase diversity across the sport, particularly among pitchers and catchers. The 2017 season saw baseball’s 30 organizations opening the season with just 54 African-American pitchers and five African-American catchers in the minors. The multi-day event coincides with the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend, and players receive presentations on entering baseball out of high school and through college. Registration is free.
In recent years, the Dream Series has featured top prospects like Hunter Greene, who was taken second overall by the Reds in last year’s amateur draft. It is an important step, but it can’t serve everyone. Many of the players who are invited are well past Little League. MLB has endeavored to support youth baseball and softball in cities with its RBI Program (Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities), but the need for programming targeted at communities of color persists, especially in neighborhoods like those served by Jones’ district.
After I reached out, Jones arranged a meeting with Vanessa Munoz of the Horner Park Thundercats and Luis Medina of Amundsen Park Little League, two administrators for teams that could use a lot of help. For the 2018 season, Horner Park has about 50 softball players in the 12-and-under group, and over 200 players in the high school aged group. For the Amundsen Park team, Jones and Medina are estimating 100-150 players. Both leagues are comprised primarily of Black and Latinx children.
For the last eight weeks, I have shared the stories of these two teams on Facebook and Twitter. Each needs to raise at least $1,000 to cover their charter and insurance fees. Translating that cost into equipment is difficult, as funding to pay for fees, as well as field equipment is needed. Initially, the response was one of excitement, but that hasn’t translated into significant donations. Money has been coming in slowly, but with the season fast approaching, both teams could use an influx of cash. To make the fundraising easier for those interested in donating, Vanessa and Luis have been using the cash app. The process has underscored the challenges these teams and communities face: scattered individual efforts and determined administrators like Carlton Jones, trying to stretch resources to serve as many as children as possible.
Despite the lack of funding, Jones remains hopeful for the future of Little League baseball in Chicago. “Little League is a leadership program that uses the vehicle of baseball and softball to mold the children of today into the future leaders of tomorrow,” he says. “The pride of wearing the LL Patch, representing your park during the tourney season, and being able to play with your friends means the world to these children, as the sport is their life and refuge during the summer. For the parents and community contributing to neighborhood and having something to bond together with is tremendous. One day, one of these leagues will go far in the tournament and make the city proud.”
I hope he is right, and that these teams can find the support they need to flourish. I think about my friend, whose life was perhaps saved by a game. I think about what it means for young kids of color to be able to look up at the majors and see faces that look like theirs. I wonder how long they’ll sustain that connection if the current demographic trends continue. I wonder how long baseball can sustain itself as costs mount, and the audience at home ages. I hope others will try to get more diversity on the field. The health of baseball in the US might depend on it, and a few young lives, too.
Shakeia Taylor is a writer based in Chicago. Her work focuses on the intersection of Black culture and sport in America.
Could you post a link to help donate? It’d be great to see Fangraphs’ reader base help out.
There are links in the third to last paragraph if you click the names Vanessa or Luis.
Thanks, Moltar.
I think a huge aspect of baseball being primarily white and unappealing to minorities is its conservativism, too. It should be apparent as to why a young, athletic black man would opt out of baseball – old white men is its main clientele, and the culture of baseball can be hostile. Just look at the Anthem protests – Adam Jones said it best by it being a “white man’s sport.” The culture of baseball needs to shift.
Yeah not like the racially-passive 1970’s when black participation was at its peak.
What does this culture shift need to look like? I have no idea what you are referring to. Adam Jones said it best… really? Anyone can make a comment like that about anything. Are you referring to the anthem protests that started in the NFL or the Olympics?
Of the top 50 highest paid players in Major League Baseball, 21 are black, of Latino descent, or Asian. That’s 40%.
Heck, in 2016, SEVEN of the top 10 were black or Latino (Price, Cabrera, Howard, Pujols, Sabathia, Hernandez, Fielder. If you count that Cano and Fielder made the same, it’s 8 of the top 11. And there were 27 of the top 50.
Now, obviously, I’m not going to equivocate earning potential with playing opportunity. But I find it rather comical to hear people talk about how baseball continues to have a negative culture towards blacks and Latinos… they literally pay them at comparable rates to white players. And that rate is perhaps greater than any other industry in this country.
I believe that you fund what you value. If owners and fans still hated black and Latino players to no end, trust me, owners wouldn’t be handing over monstrous paychecks to them.
Well stated.
Thank you. This is a very important issue that doesn’t get nearly the coverage it should. I’ve been trying to think of a place to park some of my fantasy baseball winnings from last season, and now I think Vanessa and Luis deserve it.
Super nice of you, Moltar.
Great work. Hope the comments are supportive.
I think they will be. Yeah, some of it was related to touchy subjects but I don’t think it was meant to be an inflammatory piece. This wasn’t meant to be divisive like some of the articles that I have seen recently. I don’t agree with all of the conclusions, but that is what exchanging ideas looks like. It was done tastefully. Just an interesting thought – what is the value of comments if they need to fit into a particular mold? I find the idea interesting that negative feedback is not welcomed. Who draws the line between objectionable and constructive? I am betting on a lack of a flame war – fingers crossed.
Hi Shakeia, I don’t have a WSJ sub…..did they take their numbers from Little League only? I ask because we have Little League as well as “youth baseball” here in the Bay Area that run in the same spots. With equal number of kids.
Very, very interesting stuff. We definitely see it here, it’s often painfully obvious even in terms of field space what we have available vs kids in inner Oakland that’s only a handful of miles away.
All too often there isn’t any easily accessible way to help, I appreciate you sharing Chicago’s story here.
One of my coworkers runs a league and coaches in Southern California. Many of the families couldn’t afford the cost without the help of the best fundraising campaign I’ve ever seen. Who wants a cheap candy bar when you can buy Super Bowl squares instead? They also run a pick-em league for weekly NFL games. For both they take a small amount off the top and everybody wins.
A friend’s kid’s band does the Super Bowl Squares too. I know of a LL team who has a bowling fundraiser. Teams are getting creative in their efforts to try to keep direct costs to families down. I think some people think the $75 (or whatever amount) registration fee is all there is; forgetting the costs of equipment and uniforms, etc.
Hi Mark, they did. I think because “youth baseball” and “rec league baseball” are so informal in comparison to LL, it’s difficult to actually track demographics and other info. It would probably be a monster task to tackle. I cannot imagine how many park districts there are in any given region. Thanks for reading!
As a Brit who’s 12 yr old son plays baseball in Canada I feel I can look at some of the costs objectively.
The constant need to travel great distances to play team’s when there are plenty nearby seems absurd, especially at a younger level. The occasional once a year trip seems fine, but multiple trips that involve hotels, travel costs etc… to effectively get maybe 10 at bats and a few innings pitching seems a waste for parents on low incomes.
Buying multiple matching outfits for every team they play for a waste. I understand they will get dirty and scuffed pants but a couple a year should suffice.
The team could pool together and buy 2 quality bats for games. If other kids can afford their own, so be it, but everyone else can share and buy a cheap one to practice with of they so choose.
Call me a thrifty Englishmen who grew up playing soccer with tennis balls and sweaters for posts at lunch, but there seems to be a lot of unnecessary expenses that will drive low income kids from the sport.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that soccer and basketball, the two lowest cost team sports are also the fastest growing.
My impression from Little League in the US is that there’s a difference between the normal teams, which don’t do major trips at all and use shared bats/helmets and that sort of thing, and “travel teams” which are more serious and require significantly more time and financial commitment, I think with the assumption that only the really talented kids (and admittedly the ones with the necessary wherewithal) will join those teams.
But this distinction is getting blurred… even in my local area, 9 year olds are playing a schedule that involves routine 45 min to an hour drives… the focus seems more on elite, and if you aren’t good, it isn’t really worth playing. So quality of player is up, but volume is way down. Which in turn drives teams to travel farther and farther for “better competition” as if that is what matters.
The idea of elite 9 year olds is absurd in the first place. I have coached a lot of high school baseball and you would never know who was an awesome 9 year old. I mean, I am sure Bryce Harper was , but 90% of the kids parents are just kids taking it way too seriously. The whole thing is so ugly. 9 year old kids should be having fun… those eilte talents are not elite because of what they did when they were 9 – they would be elite if they started taking it seriously at 14. I think the driving force is the lie that gets told again and again – your kid needs to play this to have a future. The collection of great 9 year olds is largely the set of mature kids at their age – I have met so many kids that quit or become disinterested when the playing field levels as they age. Its the kids who work hard from 15 – 18 that go somewhere.
The best 9 year old when we were kids, was the biggest kid.
Meanwhile, multiple kids ended up getting paid to play (no, he isn’t one of them, dude’s an OBGYN these days)
Agreed.
Yeah, I don’t think “quality of player” has anything to do with the game getting away from kids who maybe can’t afford it. There are some kids whose families can afford it and they aren’t elite, they’re just having fun. It happens. 🙂
A healthy function local organization makes it affordable. Unfortunately, healthy local leagues are dying – it breaks my heart. It is completely realistic to have local teams play each other (like they used to) at a very low cost for all involved. It makes my skin crawl to think about the direction things have gone.
Thanks for this. Baseball is becoming more and more international, which is great and is reflected in the majors. But it is still sad to me when any community does not have access to baseball for its kids. It’s sad to me that there might be some amazing talents in baseball if they only had opportunity to play as kids.
I’m a baseball media member and I don’t have my kids play baseball. It’s primarily sedentary, it’s very hard to play pickup without 8-10 kids, it normally involves high cost and lots of travel. Basketball, soccer and football are much easier to play in the neighborhood without adults as their aren’t the same number of kids around as in the baby boomer era. Plus if you live above the Mason Dixon line the weather isn’t the best for it….
Don’t lose sleep about the lack of black kids playing baseball. They’re hopefully outside playing something vice standing on a baseball field with a bunch of adults fighting.
You can makeshift a lot of basic skill practice with limited number pickup. You just need the space to play.
My brother and I played 2v2 with another set of brothers. Self pitch, 3-outs, a runner who didn’t score (so they can make the next at bat) is out, no bunting. We used a beat up old ball so you couldn’t blast it a mile. Defense usually setup as SS/2B around the edge of the outfield.
Read the ball off the bat, run it down, throw accurate, secure bad throws, recognize where you need to be when the ball isn’t hit to you (ie: do you need to go to second for the throw or third?), run the bases quickly, hit to gaps.
Our field had enough obstacles it would make old time stadiums proud. We hit across a low/slow traffic road. First base was a down the walk way to the drive way and a telephone pole, then across the street to the edge of a gravel driveway for second, back across the road for third going down a ditch and up to a tree, and back up the front lawn to home. There was a deep ditch just past second. Edge of the property line was foul.
Of course soccer and basketball (don’t know I agree about football) as sports involve more running around overall, but there’s no reason baseball practices and games can’t be made actively involving (the best coaches do this to set a winning tempo) and the overall set of skills in baseball makes for excellent complements with, say, soccer, where hand-eye coordination is useless except for goalies … kids should play a variety of sports and baseball type games belong in any modern youth sports ecology imho
Great article. I have a currently successful businessman friend (low-income white kid growing up) and to this day he claims PAL saved his life. It kept him away from lots of the pitfalls of his contemporaries.
And while you can certianly donate above (which is completely worthy), keep in mind this story is most likely repeating itself in your community. Do what Shakeia did. Call someone locally and ask how to help.
If you think baseball is expensive, then take a look at many other sports. Baseball is relatively affordable outside of the travel circuit which is a beast of its own. I don’t think travel baseball is what turns people away… initially at least. Its more like the ugly reality that you discover a few years in.
I think the real barrier for inner-city baseball is real estate. Baseball fields take up a lot of space and require a great deal of maintenance to be realistically playable. With the value of urban real estate, there are usually not going to be enough fields for every interested kid to play. Many of the fields that I see in large cities are not really playable as they are not maintained adequately – there is simply not many places to play, which makes it not an option. The only access that kids have to fields is through teams, which is a lot different than something like a basketball court – even throwing around a football is something you can do in the street or any patch of grass. The fun part of baseball is hitting and you can’t do that in many places. I get why kids growing up in dense urban populations don’t choose baseball – and its not because of money. I would imagine that participation is relatively uniform (proportionally) given access to fields and well-structured programs. All sports, except football (I think), get expensive as players climb the ladder. Football remains affordable because it runs through school districts. I don’t know if youth football is affordable – I would imagine that it is not. Long story short, I think it is opportunity and personal choice rather than player fees at the root of the problem. Those are my thoughts on lack of diversity in baseball.
The author discusses actual costs of playing little league in the article, so I don’t know how you are saying you think costs aren’t an issue. Joining a team being the only way for kids to play IS an economic issue because it means the only way to be able to play is to join a team, which costs money. You said it yourself that it’s easier for kids to play basketball or football without having to join a league and pay those costs.
I have a hard time believing that you don’t know what I am saying. Joining a local league is not any more cost prohibitive than any other recreational activity that a child would do – most cost a lot more. Most sports teams have minimal costs associated with them, which is what little league fees generally look like or as the author states, as little as 25 – 50 dollars for a summer. I doubt they would be as low as $25 often, but probably more like $100. Check with your local LL organization – mine costs kids $100. Just because it isn’t free, doesn’t make it cost prohibitive, unless you want to say that about everything – which some people do. In my experience, there are usually structures in place for kids whose families can’t come up with that money. What activity doesn’t have expenses associated with it? Little league does a pretty good job of making things affordable and accessible. Tons of people generally volunteer their time for free – it is about the best value a kid can find for a structured, supervised environment. I can’t say the same things about travel ball.
I don’t think you’re understanding what Maggie25 is getting at, even though the point was made in the final sentence. It’s incredibly easy to play a pickup game of basketball or football. It’s much more difficult to do so with baseball, hence why basketball and football are considered cheaper.
I get that. I mention it in my initial post, which you probably didn’t read – and I don’t blame you. The comment section can be tedious. Pretending that it is a barrier is a different thing than talking about expenses. If you want to call throwing around a football, “football”, then baseball is even lower cost. As I have said a few times now, kids don’t choose baseball in urban environments for a variety of reasons and I don’t think $$$ is at the front of that list.
i play wiffle ball in my neighborhood
How is diversity determined here? Out of all the professional North American sports leagues, MLB has the largest participation of Latino and Asian players. It’s true that African-Americans are underrepresented and it’s wonderful that people are trying to remedy that, but to say baseball is not “diverse” is not a correct statement.
It is as correct as your determination and definition of diversity – which is completely subjective. If you want to say that MLB is predominantly white, well it is (I think, really just making that up). You make a good point though.
The source that the article references states (racial report card) states that, “the game has reached unprecedented levels of diversity (42.33%) on non-DL active Opening Day rosters.”
The article lacks consistency throughout as it touches on interesting points but it is not particularly cohesive. I know I had a hard time writing a reply as it was hard to pin down exactly what this piece is pointing at. I took the simple message that youth baseball is dying off and participation in urban areas is probably probably feeling it the most.
They author correctly points out the lack of participation from African-American youth and all the prohibitive things that prevent participation. And all of that is true and it’s important that this is talked about.
For the sake of transparency I will state that my parents were Korean immigrants and I grew up in Latino neighborhoods in Los Angeles. The love of the Dodgers and baseball runs deep in our community. Where the author loses me is when she talks about how “white” baseball is and the lack of people of color. She links to data showing that whites make up 59% of MLB rosters which is lower than the population of whites in the general population yet baseball is described as “overwhelmingly” white. She links to an Atlantic article showing that 80% of MLB viewers are white but the people behind that report did not bother to include Asian-Americans, and all the bars in Koreatown during the World Series weren’t filled with white people.
I would say MLB is way more diverse than the NFL or NHL . I understand given the fraught history of this country why the focus is on African-American when it comes to diversity. But this is Fangraphs and we believe in data, the data shows MLB is diverse.
I agree with your point. Those three misguided paragraphs near the middle are pretty problematic – I just don’t enjoy fanning the flames. If those three middle paragraphs (the ones without stats) were absent, this would be a lot more solid. In my initial post I was going to take some shots at that part, but I decided not to as I thought it would be more of what the author did which is go some place that doen’t need to be visited in he scope of this discussion. Interestingly the focus of this article is not African-Americans in baseball… I am sure there is rationale to that – I imagine pt II is coming. To your last point, data is not agnostic. You can use whatever data you like to tell whatever stories you want. Here we are talking about poor application of data, but the article still exists.
While there’s certainly a lot of diversity in MLB, how much of it is from the US? How many Asians from the US? How many Latinos from the US if we exclude Puerto Rico?
“Diversity” typically means too many white people. I do not see anything wrong with the diversity of baseball. The NFL, NBA and possibly NHL on the other hand have very little diversity. Although playing hockey is really expensive, ice time and the equipment is cost prohibitive for many people. You can’t really share hockey equipment unlike baseball.
I have lived my entire life on the south side of Chicago, family has been here for over 100 years. My family and most of their neighbors were poor. We didn’t have much in the late 80’s and early 90’s either but we still found ways to play. We would go down 34th street next to Comiskey Park and find baseballs to play with that left the park as foul balls. We shared gloves and bats. We played little league, in parking lots and fast pitch against walls. We played soccer, basketball and tackle football without equipment several times a week. Travelling teams are a completely different story.
Chicago is first of all a Bears town but that doesn’t equate to city youth sports where basketball is king. Youth park district football teams to public high schools have had trouble fielding football teams in the city for some time now. I almost never see pickup games of football or baseball anymore at local parks. It has been that way for about 20 years. Maybe part of it is the decline in population as people flee Chicago, but parks were not as empty when I was a kid. Although there are plenty on the basketball courts particularly in the summer.
My daughter is going to start her 3rd year of t-ball next month here on the south side. Her league is huge. Between t ball and little league I believe there were 32 teams last year. It cost less than a hundred dollars, no travelling and the fee comes with a $20 raffle ticket that you can keep or sell. Most people, even here on the south side of Chicago can come up with $25 or even $100. Many have money for nice clothes, expensive shoes, smart phones and what used to kill me, the projects with satellite dishes on them.
The other issue is the almost complete lack of father figures in some of these neighborhoods. Over 70% of black children grow up in single parent homes and in some areas that number is well over 80%. The single parent is almost always a mother, aunt or grandma. I also would not want to spend too much time out in the open in some of these parks in Austin, Garfield Park, North Lawndale, Englewood etc. Stray bullets are a real issue.
If fundraising is sluggish, it’s because the people who have the excess cash to donate and like the sport are…old and white. I’ve raised plenty of dough over the past few years, online. You want money, you have to make the concept appeal to old white men. Sounds like it needs better marketing. It’s not like taxes where the money is gotten first. I’m not against the idea, but I see where it’s struggling – audience.
Making it appealing to old white men (I’m sure old white ladies aren’t baseball fans) is the way to go? Is this fund raising going to be conducted door to door or via telemarketing? Are old white men really the only people in the USA with discretionary money to spend?
The best way to fund/campaign something now days is to get it to trend or even sponsor ads on Facebook or Twitter. There are plenty of people who will donate an extra $5-10 if they see it shared across their social media, especially if they can share it after and socially signal to all their friends that they donated to a cause.
You wasted more time on the reply than that bot did on the comment.
Insightful gibberish!
I hope no one is low enough of a person to actually spend time thinking of ways to solicit old white men for money. More fathers are indeed needed to teach people from a young age that it’s better to develop your own skills and in turn, make money. As opposed to finding ways to get other people to pay for things for you. A little self-respect IS a positive thing.
Thank you for the article and thanks for stepping up and doing something. Having had two boys who played LL through State finals I’ve experienced what many commenters have talked about. Two points. One many parents and charters waaaay over spend on lessons, travel and equipment- it doesn’t make the kids “elite.” Two the key to any successful charter is parents (or adult volunteers) willing to coach, mentor, develop, and deal with parents (or lack there of.) Continued success in attempting to bring baseball to underserved areas.
“With participation on the decline, teams and leagues have been forced to either shut down or merge, further constricting access for poorer families and making the sport whiter and more affluent.”
While I can see why only having baseball available to affluent people is a shame and should be addressed, why would it ever be okay for someone to think that raising the percentage of white baseball players is a bad thing? Let’s switch the word with “white” with “black” and watch the outrage to that same comment.
This is why those that push “diversity” will lose in the end. It is mostly used as thinly veiled hate for white people being the majority in anything. I applaud anyone trying to help bring baseball to poor communities. However, trying to reduce the percentage of white people in any activity, is evil at its roots and needs to be called out more when people make these comments or a campaign is started with this goal in mind, such as school districts employ in many districts to enjoy more free gibs and receive extra money.
Donations and fundraising are a great way to help pay for expenses. If enough people in a given community want to have baseball and are willing to make a small sacrifice to bring it to their area, they can. Not having money has absolutely nothing to do with being black or latino in this country. Not having money affects people of all colors. You don’t need to try and force any race based agendas on to this issue. Forced diversity is a failure, and so is having any goals of reducing the “white” percentage of baseball players.
If kids wont play non organized baseball on their own, there is little chance that free access to organized games will help with “diversity”.
Though, I do see a future for kids to go pro with e-baseball.
You have to explain what e-baseball is… Is it fantasy baseball or The Show 2025?
a video baseball game. The NBA started their own e-league this week. Players get 35k for 6 months plus room and board.
If they did the timing right, minor league baseball players could join and make a reasonable annual income.
Technically speaking, diversity does not equate to increasing the number of sexes, races, nor ethnicities into whatever is considered the inclusive group. The notion of increasing diversity meaning “we need more women and minorities,” for example, is inherently sexist/racist – not in a prejudice sense – but in this idea’s inherent assumption that peoples of a certain group think/act in the same or similar manner. Technically speaking, diversity refers to a group comprised of differing individual temperaments and subjective experiences.
I spent my (recent) childhood playing baseball on the South Side, specifically with the Hyde Park-Kenwood Legends. There was an incredible density of talent in that small league, but what drew most kids away from baseball wasn’t money, but rather the allure of other sports, especially football or basketball.
One particular team I was on, when I was 7 or 8, stands out in my mind. Of the 12 kids on the team, three now have football scholarships, two basketball, one soccer, and one track.
HPK Legends is now a dying league due to lack of players. I don’t really know how to solve that issue, but it’s beginning even earlier than Little League.
I’m a big cheerleader for this article’s perspective. Still, it badly needed an editor. Two things kept me from ever finding the flow:
— 7th graf is an unattributed quote. One presumes that Carlton Jones is speaking, but there’s no specific lead-in to what he says (such as a question).
— Travel ball is mentioned too early and too prominently for an article about Little League. They are very different issues. Increasing diversity in Little League would increase diversity all the way up the ladder, even without addressing the high cost of travel ball.
Great article. Youth baseball is an investment in dollars (relative to income level and location), but a lot of commenters who are downplaying the dollar figures aren’t factoring in the time commitment.
I have one kid. He’s 9 and plays in a pretty typical Little League. Games and practices are usually within 15-20 minutes of home, up to three times per week. By the time you factor travel and arriving early for parking and warm-ups, it’s 3+ hours per event and up to 10 per week. That’s without any extra practice at home one-on-one. I don’t know how the parents with multiple kids do it, let alone the ones who also pour extra time into coaching. And here’s the thing: my wife only works half-time. We consider that to be a bit of a sacrifice and a bit of a luxury at the same time. How much harder is it for families with both parents working full time? What about single parent families? What about parents who work non-traditional schedules and aren’t free to take their kids to practice at 5:30 on a Tuesday or games at 11 AM on Saturday?
Now take your household income and cut it in half. Are you going to take three kids to baseball practice, or are you going to take those 10 hours of standing around and get a second job that pays $12/hr but helps keep you solvent? You certainly aren’t going to pay a babysitter to take a kid to practice when you’re asked to stay late at work and you can’t afford $30 when it’s your turn for team snacks.
I’m wondering if the author or any commenters have practical ideas on how to address the time and transportation angle. If you can afford to make it all work, chances are most of your friends and neighbors can as well. They probably don’t need you. But you can’t just walk into a less prosperous neighborhood and offer to shuttle a stranger’s nine-year old to practice. That’s creepy. How do we extend opportunities to kids who otherwise wouldn’t play? It’s probably a lot easier to give someone $200 for dues and equipment than it is to provide transportation to 20+ games and practices.
I can’t imagine that the problems you described are significantly greater for baseball than for the other youth sports. Basketball and football both have time commitments for practices and games.
I think the article and many of the comments have cause and effect reversed. Baseball isn’t faring poorly against basketball and football because young people aren’t getting the opportunity to play in suitable leagues, they aren’t playing in LL and the rest because, for whatever reason, baseball just isn’t as popular. No amount of money being thrown at the problem will fix that because it isn’t a money issue. The families have the money and time, they’re just spending it on other youth sports.
There is also, and it goes unmentioned in the article and I think only one commenter alludes to it, Little League (and other youth sports leagues) are, fundamentally, entertainment. What people have been spending their entertainment dollars on has changed dramatically in the past couple decades. The kids of middling athletic ability and interest who used to fill out the rosters of youth leagues are no longer being forced by their parents to sign-up for something. They’re now spending that time and money playing Overwatch, PUBG, or whatever else has becomes “hot” since I started writing this comment.
While I didn’t compare baseball to football or basketball (that happened in the comments), I agree that “throwing money” at a problem does not make it go away. I do think that helping kids who *are* interested and *do* want to play be able to do so, is just fine. Thanks for reading and commenting!
I started watching baseball in 1976 when the game had tons of African-American superstar players. It’s kind of sad to think that we may have seen the last of the African-American superstar ballplayer. The following major leaguers were born between 1953-69.
Jim Rice
Andre Dawson
Eddie Murray
Ozzie Smith
Rickey Henderson
Tim Raines
Tony Gwynn
Kirby Puckett
Eric Davis
Daryl Strawberry
Cecil Fielder
Fred McGriff
Barry Bonds
Albert Belle
Frank Thomas
Mo Vaughn
Gary Sheffield
Ken Griffey, Jr.
That is a RIDICULOUS amount of elite baseball talent. That’s 10 HoFers with 4 other with good/great HoF cases.
Now contrast that to all the black ballplayers born between 1978-1994. As of right now the only black player born between 1978-94 with any kind of HoF case is C.C. Sabathia. His case is borderline right now and he was born in 1980.