Playing to Win

This week the nation is celebrating the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s debut on a major league baseball team. Robinson integrated the sport by entering a professional baseball league that had previously been off limits to Blacks. Baseball teams and fans across the country are holding ceremonies to honor an athlete who broke color barriers and opened doors of opportunity for other Black athletes.

This pioneering moment in our history, which paved the way for Black athletes in all sports, also proved to the nation that Blacks were not in any way “inferior” to Whites in athletic ability. Robinson’s success as a worthy competitor and his achievement in baseball destroyed myths about Blacks and revealed a dark force at work behind the scenes that kept Black athletes out of the major leagues for so long: institutional racism.

And, despite the vast achievements that have been made in the world of sports by athletes and coaches of all races, if we look closely enough at some of the most popular, frequently broadcast, and highest paying sports today—tennis, basketball, golf and yes, even baseball—we will see that there is still an ugly, racist thread running through them:

• America is still reeling over disparaging, racial comments made by radio announcer Don Imus about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team, a team demonstrated extraordinary athletic prowess to overcome great odds and compete in the NCAA national championship game.
• Record-breaking tennis champion, Serena Williams, endured verbally abusive heckling recently from a spectator that crossed the line, shouting hate words and racial epithets at the veteran tennis player.
• Although we are also celebrating the 10th Anniversary this week of Tiger Woods’ first Masters victory in golf, Woods remains one of only a few minority golfers on the PGA Tour.
• On Super Bowl Sunday this year, football fans cheered on as two Black coaches battled for the highest title in the NFL. But it took many years for Lovie Smith and Tony Dungy to claim their well deserved place in the big bowl game, and the NFL was criticized for its historical tendency to promote White coaches over Black ones.

Despite the so-called progress we’ve made in the 60 years since a Black man first swung his bat on a major league baseball diamond, we are still sorely lacking when it comes to diversity in sports overall. Latinos, Asian-Americans, and African-Americans are still missing from many of the teams we cheer on from the stands, and certainly they are missing from leadership positions and ownership. Still, the sacrifices and struggles that Jackie Robinson made, at a time in history when Blacks were not welcomed with open arms into the major league, were not in vain. The legacy of Jackie Robinson is evident that change is possible, but only if we keep playing to win and dismantle the racism that is deeply embedded in the infrastructure of professional sports.