(Akiit.com) Over 50 years ago, Jackie Robinson’s recruitment into major league baseball marked the beginning of what might be called a Golden Era for African Americans in professional sports. Over the last decade, however, that era appears to be coming to an end.

Later, I’ll touch on why this seems to be the case, but first, here are a few observations on recent news stories that, primarily because of their wide and ongoing coverage — and the fact that African-Americans are so often stereotyped — the stories are somewhat symbolic of that decline.

Of course, the big news in baseball is Barry Bonds. Despite breaking Hank Aaron’s homerun record (and the beloved Babe Ruth’s in the bargain), Bonds’ home plate bombs may not count for much in the annals of the sport. In fact, due to his alleged steroid use, many fans and sports officials question whether or not he should ever be admitted into baseball’s Hall of Fame.

In the larger picture, however, African-Americans are slowly disappearing from major league baseball. In 1975, the numbers of African-American players on major league rosters reached a highpoint of 175. Their numbers have been steadily declining since. Today, there are only 90 African-Americans in the major leagues, while the number of Hispanics and other people of color more than doubles that.

In pro football, Atlanta Falcons’ star quarterback, Michael Vick, has dug a pit he may never be able to climb out of. As most know, Vick has confessed to financing vicious dog fighting matches and, in so doing, has all but guaranteed that his next uniform will be a striped one.
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(Akiit.com) Dear young, black men:

Today, many of you are angry. You are angry at a society that has swiftly and vigilantly punished a superstar quarterback for dogfighting, but often looks the other way as a grotesque number of black men die in the streets. You are angry at the NFL, which has punishments some of you feel unfairly targets those who look like you. You are angry at Michael Vick’s buddies and criminal cohorts for “snitching” on Vick, noting that trainer Greg Anderson, a white man, sits in federal prison with his lips sealed, protecting Barry Bonds and refusing to cooperate with authorities.

Michael Vick heightened the stereotypes of black men instead of eroding them.
You are feeling a lot of things — some possessing merit — but I caution you not to make Vick a martyr. Do not applaud him for taking his comeuppance like some modern-day gangster. Do not blame others for Vick’s predicament when he alone should be held accountable for his actions.

Let this historic unraveling be a wake-up call for the young, black men caught up in the same lifestyle that claimed Vick. Let his prison sentence send the message that a continued allegiance to street culture successfully keeps young, black men frighteningly behind in American society.

As the Vick case shows, millions of dollars are little protection if a certain mentality remains. Until now, Vick was considered one of the lucky ones. He rose out of poverty to become one of the most mesmerizing athletes of our time. He went from nothing to millions. He wasn’t the American dream, but the American reality. He had the support of a city, of a people and he struck a chord with many young, black men because they saw themselves in him — rebellious, strong and heroic.
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(Akiit.com) When I was about 11 or 12 years old, every kid in my neighborhood used to look up to this guy called Baby Daryl.

Baby Daryl was a bona fide drug-dealing, gun-toting gangsta on the west side of Detroit. While grown-ups would cross the street when they saw him coming, my friends and I would run up to Baby D with open arms because he would hook us up with watermelon-flavored Now and Laters and handfuls of Bazooka gum. He looked after us, taught us how to ball and talked to us about sex.

I won’t say what it was but let’s just say Baby Daryl gave me my first job. One day I was on my way to the “office” to find out it was closed. Apparently Baby Daryl was shot in the head the night before.

You would think that was enough to set me on the straight and narrow.

It wasn’t.

I fell in with another bad group of guys, and another, and another. All the way through high school I constantly toyed with my own mortality and I have a small lump on the back of my head — courtesy of a baseball bat — to remind me how close I came to following in Baby Daryl’s shoes.
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(Akiit.com) On Sunday, when more than 200 Major League Baseball players wear No. 42 jerseys to honor the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in the national pastime, it will be a reminder of past promises and a troubling present.

The commemoration of Robinson’s historic debut will recall an elaborate ceremony 10 years ago, when MLB retired Robinson’s number across the majors and Commissioner Bud Selig emphasized baseball’s push to hire more minorities.

Sunday’s tributes also will put a spotlight on an uncomfortable question for baseball: Is Robinson’s legacy within the game fading?

The percentage of African-Americans in the majors has dropped sharply during the last decade and now is the lowest it has been since the 1960s — 8.3%, or 72 players on opening-day rosters, according to a USA TODAY study that includes injured players.

The percentage of blacks in key front-office, managing and coaching positions hasn’t increased during the last decade. Even MLB’s central office, with about 470 employees mostly in New York, has a smaller percentage of blacks than it did in 1997. However, two of MLB’s five executive vice presidents — positions created since 1997 — are black.

Robinson, who kept crusading for equal opportunity for the disadvantaged after his playing career ended in 1956, probably would not accept this situation, his widow says.

“He was always impatient for change and a fighter for change,” Rachel Robinson says. “He would think the struggle is still on, and he would not be satisfied with where we are.”

“Are we where we should be? No. We’ve got a lot of work to do,” says Jimmie Lee Solomon, MLB executive vice president for baseball operations and an African-American. “Are we working on it? Yeah, we’re working hard on it.”

MLB is trying to boost blacks’ participation with urban initiatives on several fronts, including its Diverse Business Partners Program and Reviving Baseball in the Inner Cities (RBI), a youth program that helped lead current big-leaguers Dontrelle Willis of the Florida Marlins and Coco Crisp of the Boston Red Sox to pro careers.

But the efforts are not gaining much traction in addressing a range of problems, particularly baseball’s growing disconnect with African-American youths and sports fans, who continue to be more interested in football and basketball.

A Harris Interactive survey released in January found only 7% of African-American adults said baseball was their favorite sport. This comes at a time of growth for other minorities on the field; nearly one in three MLB players is Latino or Asian. Their increased presence has pushed the overall percentage of minority players to 40.5% this year, the highest ever.

But as the number of African-American players dwindles, the effect eventually could reverse gains made in increasing blacks’ presence in front office and coaching positions in baseball.

“I don’t doubt that opportunities will be provided,” says Chicago White Sox senior vice president-general manager Ken Williams, the majors’ only African-American GM. “But my concern is with the dwindling number of participants on the African-American front. As we move forward in future years, there will be fewer people in the pipeline. So how will those numbers grow? … Where are the candidates going to come from?”

Baseball has made significant progress in its overall diversity in the last 10 years. It received its highest marks ever in the recently released 2006 Major League Baseball Racial and Gender Report Card from the University of Central Florida’s Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport, which annually examines the racial and gender composition of pro and college personnel in various sports.

But MLB’s scorecard for African-Americans shows no home runs:

The percentage of African-American players has continued to decline, dropping by 50% since 1997, according to the Institute’s report. The overall figure was about 27% in 1975 and 17% in 1997.

There are two African-American managers this year (the New York Mets’ Willie Randolph and the Texas Rangers’ Ron Washington). That’s one fewer than in 1997, although during the last 10 years, there have been as many as eight in one season (2002). The percentage of African-American coaches is essentially the same, 14%-18% in 1996-97, 16% in 2006. Representation in the general manager’s office is unchanged: one (Bob Watson of the New York Yankees was the lone black GM in 1997).
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(Akiit.com) The Rutgers’ women’s basketball team and coach C. Vivian Stringer were scheduled to appear on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” Thursday as furor continues over remarks made about the team by radio host Don Imus.

Stringer and the 10 team members will appear live via satellite, a spokeswoman for Harpo Productions Inc. said Wednesday night.

Imus triggered an uproar April 4 when he referred to the mostly black Rutgers team as “nappy-headed hos” on his nationally syndicated radio show.
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