1947 will always be known as the year that barriers were broken in sports.
Jackie Robinson ran out onto Ebbets Field in mid-April of that year and covered first base as the first player of color to play in the Major Leagues.
A little over a few months later, in the inaugural draft for the BAA league (which later became the NBA), the New York Knicks picked Japanese American Wataru Misaka. He became the first player of non-white descent to be drafted into the league.
It is now 63 years later, and the issue of race and color continues to blemish the world of sports and appears in no way of ever fading away.
In an interview with CNN, new Miami Heat star Lebron James discusses the backlash of his decision and spins it upon the concept of race.
While the validity of James’ comments would be difficult to assess, there is a bigger issue that remains a plague in American sports: that race will always be a hot topic in all of sports.
On one hand, sports have the luxury of being able to break the quintessential issues concerning race. Players from all walks of life can participate in sports with no focus on the color of their skin.
NBA games feature players from a variety of backgrounds such as Yao Ming, Pau Gasol, Dwight Howard and Leandro Barbosa. NFL fans flock to stadiums to watch Brett Favre, Hines Ward, Troy Polamalu and Tony Gonzalez play one another. MLB players like Pablo Sandoval, Ichiro Suzuki, David Price and Roy Halladay face each other everyday.
No other industry or medium in America have the diversity that these sports leagues showcase daily to the public.
Despite the variety of color on the baseball diamonds, hardwood courts and grassy fields, race swims freely in other areas of sports.
In the 1999 movie “Any Given Sunday”, Jamie Foxx plays an eccentric, loose-cannon African American quarterback named Willie Beamen. At one point in the movie, Beamen is being interviewed about the issue of diversity in sports. He answers by comparing race both on and off the field.
“How many black football players are there? A lot,” he answers his own question with a serious look on his usual playful face. “But how many black owners do we have? Very few.”
As fictional as the film is, there is truth to the character’s viewpoint regarding racial diversity among sports in ownership.
According to the 2009 racial and gender report card study by the University of Central Florida, people of color represent less than five percent of majority owners in all three major sports.
Latin American Arturo Moreno is the majority owner of the Angels and Michael Jordan is the only owner of color in the NBA (he owns the Bobcats). The NFL currently doesn’t have an owner of color.
Going down the sliding scale of power in sports, there is still a discrepancy with race among coaches in sports. The study reports that the NBA has the highest percentage with coaches of color at 40%, while the MLB comes in at 26% and the NFL follows after at 19%.
All these numbers pale in comparison to the percentages with the players of color in all three sports. While the MLB has the lowest percentage (less than 40%) of colored players, other professional sports have a majority (the NBA has over 80% and the NFL at nearly 70%) of colored athletes.
With owners and coaches of color the minority and players of color the majority, racial tension will always be hovering around sports.
There is a sad underlying concept with James’ interview on CNN is that although athletes of color have benefited from what Robinson and Misaka were able to accomplish, racial tension will always be prominent in sports. James has made that obvious with his feelings on the aftermath of his decision.
While race may or may not have been a big influence on the backlash of his decision, it will forever remain in a concern in sports that will never be blind.
Why Color Will Never Be Blind In American Sports
