Lame-ass PC Story of the Month

On Saturday, the Toronto Star published a jaw-droppingly racialist baseball article under the headline "White Jays."

A study by the Star has found that this year's edition of the Blue Jays had the fewest number of visible minorities on the opening-day roster of any of the 30 major-league teams. A Toronto club that boasted of its diversity in recent radio ads actually had the visible-minority players on its 25-man roster drop from 11 on opening day a year ago to only six this season. […]

That raises the issue of whether the Jays truly need to be more representative of the city they play in at a time when they are satisfying fans by winning. A less obvious issue, one bound to generate heated debate, is whether Toronto has somehow gained an advantage by bucking baseball's diversity trend ? and whether others will copy this model and change the demographics of the game. […]

Peter Donnelly, director of the Centre for Sports Policy Studies at the University of Toronto, was stunned to hear that the Jays, once hailed for diversity, now have so few minorities relative to the rest of baseball.

"You're talking about the most multicultural city in the world," Donnelly said. "In many ways, Toronto is more multicultural than New York. So, there's a responsibility there.[…]"

Reaction from the Blue Jays was not enthusiastic. "It was probably the stupidest thing I've ever seen," said first baseman Carlos Delgado, who is leading the majors in runs batted in while propelling the surprising Jays to within two games of a playoff spot. "If this city is so multicultural, if this city is so open-minded, why do we have to come up with an article that talks about racism? It doesn't make any sense." Delgado, for those of you keeping racial score at home, is a Puerto Rican with dark skin.

Comments

[Kevin]

A tip of the cap to Delgado for cutting right through the crap. If there is a profession that is truly a colorblind meritocracy, it's sports, particularly baseball. No other game boasts such a cross-section of whites, blacks and latinos playing and being compensated at the highest levels.

[holger viking]

Kudos for Toronto for being that multi-kulti. We really care. Sure. How do they arrive at this conclusion: that it's the most diverse in the world? They sound like the Copenhagen Tourism Board ("for a friggin white-bread country, we are diverse") or a North Eastern Liberal Arts College. And won't they suck next to New York Yankees and Boston Redsox?
E "HV" A

[The Lonewacko Blog]

So, most people agree this article is lame ass. Why was it printed? Why will hundreds of other articles similar to it be printed this year? That'd make a nice study.

[frank]

Diversity is crucial to the success of a free society. Those aren't my words. It's all right here in the U.S. Constitution.

Oh, Toronto's in Canada. Our Constitution doesn't apply there.

Maybe the Supreme Court should do something about that.

[amr]

The only Torontans I know are Chinese. How come they can't find a decent Chinese baseball player for their team? Heck, pick up a Japanese player, give him a Chinese name, and most people won't be able to tell the difference.

What about gender mix? Half of the Torontans I know are women, yet the number of women on the Jays is zero. Can't management find a woman for backup utility infielder or something? Maybe the article should be titled "Boy Jays."

And I'm pretty sure there are no American Indians on the Indians or the Braves. What's up with that?

[Sean]

No one in Toronto seemed to be trumpeting the multicult nature of their city during the SARS troubles.

[Anonymous]

all indigenous males living in Toronto should have intensive baseball training starting at age 2, paid for by the British government. 2 balls and they walk, 5 strikes and they are out. Errors are mistakes and they shall be allowed one do-over.

[Anonymous]

Todd, you should direct your complaints to the MLBPA.

[John Thacker]

I hope that they follow up their expose with on the startling whiteness of hockey players on teams throughout Canada. Then they can presumably move on to asking why the Raptors are almost all black.

Idiots. There certainly is a story in the decreasing number of black baseball players, but it has to do more with black kids choosing to play other sports.

[John]

Why has nobody mentioned Shaun Greene?! Are they trying to obscure the truth. Who really was responsible for letting him go to L.A. C'mon, you mean to tell me there is nothing sus-pi-sious about letting go the top power hitting Jew. People wake up!!! This is blatant anti-Semitism. How could Baker have neglected this. Unless Baker....just kidding.

Of course maybe L.A. tried to obtain Greene because of their own demographics, like Ichiro in Seattle. Of course, someone might point out that both Greene and Suzuki are great players, although extremely expensive. You know, there actually may be a real issue worth investigating here - too bad it got handled by an idiot (Baker, not Welch). Think of the incentives to acquire Japanese baseball players.

[The_Cynic]

This may be a precedent. A major media outlet is now accusing a team of winning by hoarding white guys. Where is Spike Lee with the "black men can't pitch" angle. Oh Michael, where art thou?

[Luca Brasi]

This isn't an original thought, so sorry, but with the Jay's GM being a devout Jamesian, i doubt you are going to see many players from the DR playing for the Jays. As the saying goes, "You can't walk your way off the island." With an emphasis on plate discipline, the free swingers from the islands are in a word, fucked.

[Brad S]

If I wasn't a Carlos Delgado fan before, I am now. He summed up the patent absurdity of the whole "diversity" issue in one short sentence. I can't believe that supporters of the broad diversity agenda can't see the irony - diversity, which strives to rid us of racism, is racist in and of itself.

[Russ D]

The real pointlessness about this column is the fact that it doesn't even mention last year's World Series champs who had even fewer minorities that the Blue Jays.

It also neglects to mention that there are going to be fewer minority (read: non-US-&-CANADA) players on lower budgeted teams because foreign players are not subject to the MLB amateur draft and therefore can negotiate with all 30 teams (hence Suzuki and Matsui wind up with the deeper pocketed teams).

And why aren't the Raptors and the Maple Leafs more representative of the Toronto population?

[Brad S]

Russ D - more generally, why does any professional sports team (or any other organization, for that matter) have to be racially "representative" of anything?

I wonder what these diversity pushers are going to do in a few generations when races are so mixed that no one can really tell who's who or what's what. I mean, seriously. Are they still going to be saying, "Well, the population consists of 5% people who are equal parts Black/Latino/Irish/Chinese, so if you employ 100 people, you need to have 5 employees who are Black/Lation/Irish/Chinese in equal proportions. The population also consists of 2% people who are 50% Black, 25% Irish and 25% Chinese, so if you employ 100 people, you need to have 2 people who are 50% Black, 25% Irish, and 25% Chinese."

[Anonymous]

Toronto has a baseball team?

[fucking pissed]

I will buy a lifetime subscription to the first major publication that runs a story about the dearth of white New York Knicks.

[Matt Welch]

Don't miss Toronto Star columnist Richard Griffin's whiny, don't-shoot-the-messenger column, in which he argues that A) the Star didn't imply that anyone was racist, and B) if the baseball "new-wavers" (yes, he used that term) had their way, Jackie Robinson might not have ever broken the color barrier. No, seriously:

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&call_pageid=971358637177&c=Article&cid=1056838209959

Good response here:

http://www.ericmcerlain.com/offwingopinion/archives/002218.php#002218

[Luca Brasi]

This just in: Billy Beane hates negreos.

[Pedro]

This is pretty par for the course for the Toronto Star. They scream about the oppressed minorities daily, while the Toronto Sun tries to counter with sad stories about the white male.

[Todd]

I'd argue that that baseball might be the least merit-based of any major American sport for the simple reason that none of the others maintain data-rich, tiered minor league systems. There may well be a pool excellent football and basketball players capable of displacing current NFL and NBA players, but we'll never know that. However, we do know that there are dozens of baseball players in Double and Triple A ball who are more than capable of playing major league ball this instant, but can't because of guaranteed contracts given to marginal players already in the league and other considerations.

[Brian]

If baseball teams are supposed to be representative of the "representative of the city they play in", shouldn't the Expos be mostly Frenchies? Just asking...

[Brian]

uhh...sorry for the bad editing there...

[Brad S]

Todd - it's very difficult to make the jump from AA or AAA ball to the majors. Any general manager will tell you that the hardest step for any player to make in his career is the step from AAA to the majors. Most teams will give players plenty of time to mature and hone their skills at the AA and AAA level before bringing them up, lest their confidence be destroyed. Players who are brought up too soon often never recover. There are probably dozens of players in AA and AAA ball who will be ready for the majors eventually, but I'm not sure there are dozens who are ready right this instant, as you claim.

Also, the NFL and the NBA have their own de facto minor league systems, courtesy of the NCAA. Not to mention other leagues like NFL Europe and the CFL for football, and the CBA and various European leagues for basketball, to name a few.

[Sean E]

If they want the team to be representative of Torontonians, maybe they need to consider how many are actually Canadians. I think they need to stop dropping non-Canadians from the roster. Sorry Carlos.

And I like that this is only an issue when they are "satisfying fans by winning". I guess no one wants to be associated with a losing team.