Detroit Western High School's David Rodriguez slides safely into first past U-D Jesuit's Arthur Middlebrooks. Public School League teams like Western must provide their own money for nonleague games.Changing Face of Baseball: Part 2
Out of step: The pace of baseball is partly to blame
Tigers players Craig Monroe, left, and Carlos Pena sign autographs. When the Major League Baseball season opened, one in 10 players was African-American, down from one in four during the 1970s.
"Black kids like games that move," says Tigers designated hitter Dmitri Young. "Basketball and football, not baseball. It doesn't hold their attention."
Comment on this story
Kids have neither the time nor patience to learn a slower game -- for baseball indeed is that. Some see the beauty in it, others can't be bothered. Compared with other sports vying for the young athlete's attention, baseball can be very slow.
"It's boring to them. Kids want action. They want 'Star Trek.' They don't want Fred Flintstone," Washington said.
"Basketball is so exciting. You go to Cobo Arena (for the Public School League playoffs). You hear the crowds. That's exciting."
And baseball is not very glamorous. Years can be spent in the anonymity of the minors.
Tigers designated hitter Dmitri Young was in his sixth season of pro ball before he made his major-league debut. He didn't play a complete year in the majors until his eighth season, when he was 24.
By contrast, LeBron James steps from high school to the NBA and makes millions while becoming a household name. "Baseball is a different game, a slower game," said former Tigers infielder Lou Whitaker. "Black kids like games that move. Basketball and football, not baseball. It doesn't hold their attention."
Though only 47, it's not overly nostalgic to think that Whitaker grew up in a different time. Baseball reigned supreme in his hometown of Martinsville, Va. He played the game all day.
"Today in Martinsville, no black kids play baseball. We played seven days a week. We didn't miss a day. We'd have 30 kids out there; now you can't find five. It makes me sad. Yes, it does."
Peer pressure
Black athletes also encounter peer pressure to play something other than baseball.
Thomas Gates, a 15-year-old sophomore at Detroit Henry Ford, said he prefers baseball, but most of his friends play football and basketball.
"Most African-Americans like to play basketball or football," Gates said. "They like the physical sports. They like the attention. They think baseball is a soft sport."
That's an experience shared by Young.
"When I was growing up" in California, said Young, 31, "baseball was perceived as a white man's game. You know, only white guys play baseball and black guys play basketball and football.
"Those two are fast-paced action. With baseball, it's a thinking man's game, very slow, lot of standing around and people get bored with it."
Even some players who've made a career of baseball acknowledge they came to the sport begrudgingly.
"I tried my best to play basketball," said Tigers prospect Curtis Granderson. "That was my top goal. I love the excitement of basketball, the creativity. I love watching it.
"It took me until my sophomore year in college to realize I was a better baseball player."
Tigers outfielder Rondell White didn't want to play, either. For him, though, it was a matter of style. He just didn't want to put on the uniform.
"I didn't want to wear no tight white pants like a ballerina," White said. "I never would have played it at all if it hadn't been for my neighbor. We went to a field and started hitting tennis balls, but we knew so little about the game, we ran to third base instead of to first.
"It wasn't until some guy yelled, 'You're running the wrong way,' that we changed. Once we started playing, I learned it was fun and fell in love with it, but I was 11 years old, man, I just didn't want to wear those pants."
Learning the skills
Baseball is a simple game, but it's not easy.
"Baseball is a skills sport. Just because you're athletic, you're not going to be given just anything. You have to go out and earn it," said Bruce Fields, hitting coach of the Tigers and father of two baseball-playing sons.
But to persevere, it helps to play the game well. You need good coaches to help you do that.
"We're not doing a good job of teaching at a young age," said former Detroit Southwestern coach Leon McKissic. "We're losing the concept of teaching."
With some coaches, it's simply a matter of not knowing the game well enough.
"I applaud the guys who give of their time and effort to put a team together," Fields said. "But too many of them don't have the knowledge to make a player significantly better."
Horton is adamant about the need for better coaching.
"My dream is that one day, we'll be able to upgrade the coaches so they can bring out the natural ability in kids," he said. "I'm not saying the coaching is bad, because any time people put in with kids is good, but if I had my wish, we would start a coaches' school."
Grass-roots effort
In 1989, John Young, who played two games at first base for the Tigers in 1971, started a youth baseball program in his native South Central Los Angeles with a familiar baseball acronym: RBI -- Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities.
Young's program aligned with the Boys and Girls Clubs of America and went national. Major League Baseball quickly adopted it, first by providing financing, then assuming administrative responsibility in 1991.
Today, there are RBI leagues in 185 communities and an enrollment of more than 120,000 -- 55 percent of it black.
In 1997, the RBI program was brought to Detroit and allied with Think Detroit.
Think Detroit received funding and the means to begin attacking baseball's core obstacles.
Baseball fields would get a face-lift, none more dramatic than the Harris-Gentry complex at Connor near Jefferson, where $1 million provided a clean field, dugouts, diamonds and outfield fences.
"I see more people putting time into" baseball in Detroit, said Norm Taylor, a baseball coach in the PSL for 16 seasons, including the last four at Martin Luther King.
Sheryl and William Weir became involved in Think Detroit seven years ago when they moved from Milwaukee and sought a place for their sons, Ade and Iman, to play.
"Our fields when we first started were atrocious," Sheryl Weir said. "Either kids weren't playing because the fields were awful, or because kids weren't playing baseball, the facilities declined. It's a chicken and egg thing."
It's a start, "but it's still bad," Young said.
"RBI is a great program, but it's not enough. Baseball as a whole doesn't reach the inner city as much as it should. Look at the NBA, look at the NFL, they reach everybody, the inner-city kid, the suburban kid. You don't even know who's under the helmet, but the kids can tell you.
"Baseball? You can bring me and Pudge (Rodriguez) over to some spot in the city, and they may know who I am and they only probably know who Pudge is. That goes to marketing."
Beyond losing the black athlete, Young has an awareness of the game having lost the black spectator, too.
"We look up into the stands, and wow, all the black people in the ballpark are workers," he said. "It would be nice to see some of our own people."
The greater popularity of basketball and football among blacks can't be questioned.
But neither can the harmony of the warm evenings Whitaker remembers.
"We had a community in which all ages up to grown men and down to kids played ball," said the former Tigers second baseman. "You just got out and played. It might have been just two guys playing catch to begin with. Then suddenly two more came.
"Before you knew it, the adults would start getting off work around 4 o'clock, so we'd play adults against the kids. If it was summertime, and the game was getting good, we'd go on through the night.
"It was a happy time, with good people."
A time of black athletes playing baseball -- a time nearly gone.
Detroit News Staff Writers Fred Girard, Tom Markowski, Lynn Henning and Rob Parker contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2005
The Detroit News.
Use of this site indicates your agreement to the Terms of Service (updated 12/19/2002).