Check this link out, written by Matthew Yglesias.
He explains the deep roots of racism in the South and makes a comparison to the Boston Red Sox’s refusal to integrate a black player until too late.
One line I’d like to mention here…
The Boston Red Sox were the last team in pro baseball to integrate. And for their belief in the grand purity of the Great White Race, they sacrificed a shot at Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, and probably a World Series or two. White racism rewarded them with decades of heartbreak
Hat tip to QueenAlpo.
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1 comment
June 14, 2008 at 6:41 pm
joeticket
I agree the Sox missed the boat. Yawkey was a generous kind old southern gent,- if you were white..He treated Yaz like a son but he couldn’t help the pervasive prejudiceness that infected not just him but genrations and generations going way way back. They also could have Aaron, Roy Campenella and many, many more great black ballplayers, really any of them as Yawkey had plenty of money. Oh how my dad who loved both the Boston Brave and the Red Sox equally would have marvelled at the skills of the Say Hey kid patrolling center field in Fenway..Oh well you can’t rewrite history , just learn from it. Rascism was a fact of life back then, it was a disgrace and in some ways baseball is getting its payback as most all of the good young black athletes are choosing other sports to play for a number of reasons , economics mostly but none the less, there are but a handful of great black players performing now league wide and thats a shame as baseball in its purest form its such a beautiful color blind game.