Aaron's #715 - To The Moon!

This week marked the 40^th anniversary of Hank Aaron’s record setting 715^th home run.  To a kid growing up in the 70’s, this event was as big it got, “The Thrilla in Manilla”, Evel Knievel jumping Snake Canyon, Bobby Riggs and Billy Jean King’s “Battle of the Sexes” throw down all rolled into one gigantic super-hyped inevitability. How big? I was 13 at the time and remember being in the car with my parents and hearing the call on the car radio…I remember it was a Monday night.  We usually only use tragedies to mark those handful of times in life when we remember exactly where we were when something historic happened, but this one was different, transcendent in ways a 13 year old simply couldn’t grasp. Growing up in Massachusetts, I wasn’t completely oblivious to race issues – the Boston busing crisis was in our consciousness – but again, I was just a 13 year old fan so for me, number 715 was just a

baseball thing. I didn’t realize at the time it was another moon landing, man overcoming all the obstacles to go somewhere new! I want to say it’s hard to grasp that some people considered Aaron’s accomplishment itself a tragedy – a black man eclipsing the record of a white icon – but sadly there was still plenty of hatred to go around following the era’s civil rights progress.  Aaron personified grace under pressure in his quest for the record and is a true American sports hero!

So as we honor Hammerin' Hank, let’s fast forward to this coming Tuesday, MLB’s annual Jackie Robinson day – making 65 years since baseball’s integration.  Can you imagine if the baseball record were whitewashed of the accomplishments of African-Americans during this time? This is something I cannot grasp.  No Hank? No Willie? No Reggie? It’s a crime to even begin to name names - a disservice to any African-American alumni not mentioned.  As we look back, the impact of African-Americans on baseball is profound of course, but a look forward is troubling because fewer and fewer minority kids are pursuing baseball at a time when MLB is attracting players from all over the world.  Overall in America, the numbers of kids playing baseball is down for a variety of reasons, but the number of kids involved in baseball as a year-round sport is up.  The problem is that this level of immersion is time consuming and expensive.  When I was a kid, if you had a place to play - a school yard, a lot behind the Elk's club, even an empty parcel within a nearby cemetery if they weren't mowing that day - all you needed was a nail-repaired wood bat and a ratty ball, but it's different today.  I see the travel ball teams arrive at their weekly tourneys with personal bats, and equipment bags stuffed to the gills with all sorts of accessories that didn’t exist when I was a kid.  Baseball has become expensive and as a result has left a lot of kids out of the mix.  

To counter this trend, MLB has announced a three part plan to foster diversity growth in baseball and address the talent pipeline, with special emphasis on African-Americans. The three initiatives include expanding baseball’s existing programs, like the RBI program (Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities), implementing programs aimed at improving the quality of coaching as a way to attract the best athletes, and lastly, an MLB direct marketing program intended to boost the profile of current and former big leaguers.  You can read the complete MLB announcement by clicking HERE.

I applaud baseball for taking these steps to involve more kids in the game.  America has always been the land of opportunity and baseball has always been it's emblematic national pastime.  It's a developing tragedy if every kid who wants to play baseball can't. That's not baseball! That's not us!

Jim Tosches is an amateur umpire and blogger in Encinitas, Ca and author of the book, "The Rules Abide: The Thinking Fan's Guide to Baseball Rules (With History, Humor and a Few Big Words)"

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BONUS SNARK - In my "What does opening day mean to you" piece a few weeks ago, I took a shot at all the bad football movies out there v. the great baseball ones.  Voila, a new cnn piece lamenting the bad movies.  Where did he get that idea? See the article by CLICKING HERE.