The World Series between the Houston Astros & the Philadelphia Phillies starts Friday. It is shaping up to be a thrilling fight for baseball’s most prestigious trophy. The Astros were the highest seed in the American League and have not lost a single game in this postseason. The Phillies were the lowest in the National League and won less than 90 regular season games. However, they have had a thrilling postseason full of thrilling finishes and upsets.
The Associated Press (AP), however, has chosen to focus on a subplot in the series that, unless one is obsessed with race, isn’t worth mentioning.
The Associated Press noted that the Fall Classic will be the first time since 1950 that there are no U.S.-born Black athletes on either team’s roster. The AP felt that this fact was worthy for a 1,000-word article.
“That is eye-opening,” Bob Kendrick, president and founder of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, Kansas City, Missouri said. “It’s quite startling that in two cities with high African American populations, there isn’t one Black player.”
It’s amazing to see how blind Kendrick must have been when assessing the demographic makeup these two squads.
Both rosters offer plenty of variety for those who believe that a roster is better if it has more melatonin-producing players or that the origins of the players make a difference in how entertaining some baseball games can be.
15 of the 26-man Astros ALCS roster were born abroad. Many of them are black. (See designated hitter Yordan Avarez and shortstop Jeremy Pena). Good news for people who are obsessed with race: The Houston roster for the postseason finale will largely be the same. Dusty Baker, the Houston manager — one of baseball’s most respected men — is black.
Although the Phillies aren’t as diverse as the Astros’, Philadelphia’s NLCS roster still includes six players who were born abroad and/or are of African descent. This roster, like Houston, is largely expected be the same for World Series.
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Kendrick, Pena, and anyone else who views the World Series rosters as they do are either ignorant or racist. Who cares about facts when you’re trying prove a point?
The AP could have stayed focused on many other things when writing the preview for the series. There are many storylines that make the series interesting: whether the Astros can win a title with no sign-stealing scandal, whether Bryce Harper can lead his team to success on the big screen, or if the Phillies pitching is capable of containing a deadly Astros lineup.
The progressive media must remember that race must be the main focus, even if it makes them look stupid.
