A Big Deal

Today is the 60th anniversary of the day when Jackie Robinson first played in a major league game. He was the first African-American to play in the major leagues.

Major League Baseball is pulling out all the stops to honor him, declaring today Jackie Robinson Day. His number 42 has already been retired by every major league team. Today, over 200 players are wearing number 42, including several entire teams.

ESPN has been promoting this non-stop for a week. Normally, I believe ESPN blows everything way out of proportion. I get really sick of their hype machine. But, I really don't mind this. This sea of acclaim is coming about 35 years too late.

Jackie Robinson paved the way for African-Americans to play and excel, not just in baseball, but in the NFL and NBA as well. Baseball was a really big deal in 1947, and race relations were not good. Jackie Robinson broke a lot of stereotypes and took a lot of heat as a pioneer.

This is a big deal.

Two addendums: This ceremony at Dodger Stadium is becoming a circus. First, they have a black church choir sing a re-written version of the gospel song "O Happy Day". Instead of saying "when Jesus washed my sins away", they sang a line about Jackie playing baseball. It's not necessarily sacreligious, but it sounded really cheesy.

And, Jesse Jackson is there tonight in his role as President of Black America. I'm sure Jason Whitlock is happy about that.