Daring Play: How a Courageous Jackie Robinson Transformed Baseball

Daring Play: How a Courageous Jackie Robinson Transformed Baseball — page 9
club Like Robinson Fowler was a skilled infielder The first black player known to play regularly in a major league was Moses Fleetwood Walker a catcher He played for Toledo which joined one of the first major leagues the American Association in 1884 Soon after however the color line returned to baseball Historians place much of the blame on Adrian Cap Anson the manager and star player of the National League team in Chicago now called the Cubs Anson had strong racist views and refused to allow his team to play against Walker’s team or any other team with an African-American player By the end of the century no blacks played in the major leagues or for the top minor league teams Robinson’s success with the Brooklyn Dodgers answered any questions about whether African-Americans deserved to be in the major leagues Honest baseball players and fans had known the answer for some time White stars often played against stars of the Negro Leagues teams made up of African-American players White players and fans saw that the talents of the top black players matched or exceeded those of many white major leaguers Even so most major league clubs were slow to sign black players By 1952 only five other teams had joined the Dodgers in integrating their rosters the Cleveland Indians St Louis Browns New York Giants Boston Braves and Chicago White Sox Even when teams did sign black players they might have just one though by 1949 the Dodgers had three black stars Joining Robinson were pitcher Don Newcombe and catcher Roy Campanella The last team to integrate was the Boston Red Sox which did not have a black player on its roster until 1959 The percentage of African-American players held steady from the early 1970s to the mid-1990s at from 16 to 19 percent Since then it has fallen to about 7 percent At the same time the percentage of Latino players has risen to about 27 percent Roy Campanella from left and Don Newcombe joined Robinson as stars of the Brooklyn Dodgers