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Reid Burger

Sports Media and Pop Culture

10-19-17

Breaking the Color Barrier in Sports

Equality has been a popular topic in the sports world recently, with Colin

Kaepernick starting to silent protest during the national anthem by kneeling. In

class, this was one of the main topics we talked about. We talked about why he

started to do it, what the purpose was for it, and how it is looked at and how it will

be viewed moving forward. This isn’t the first time that equality has been discussed

in sports or has been an issue in the sports world. Before the 1940s, professional

sports were intended for only white people with African Americans having their

own leagues in sports such as the Negro Baseball League. White people back then

didn’t see any reason why African Americans should be allowed to compete with

them in any sport, but African Americans believed they should be able to play in the

same leagues as white people because they were fighting for racial equality. In the

1940s, professional sports had its first glimpse of racial equality with the emergence

of Jackie Robinson, an African American baseball player. This is when racial equality

in professional sports began to change from segregated leagues to leagues with both

African American athletes and white athletes. The movement for racial equality in

professional sports started with baseball.

Before he started his professional baseball career Jackie Robinson was a big

believer in equal rights and stood up for his beliefs. Jackie was a phenomenal

athlete, in college Jackie lettered in four sports at UCLA, which included baseball,
football, basketball, and track (Jackie). After dropping out from UCLA because of

financial problems at home, Jackie was drafted into the Army in 1942 where he was

granted an honorable discharge after he disobeyed a white bus drivers order to

move to the back of the bus. After he was discharged from the Army, Jackie started

his professional baseball career in the Negro Leagues with the Kansas City Monarchs

in 1945. Once Jackie joined the Kansas City Monarchs, the Monarchs shortstop was

moved to second base so that Jackie could play shortstop. Although Jackie excelled

on the field, he didn’t like the traveling they did and having to put up with all the

racism they had to deal with and all the Jim Crow laws that they encountered while

traveling to different cities (Swaine). Having to deal with all this racism on the road

and not overreacting to it helped Jackie with the next opportunity that came

knocking on his door.

Jackie only played one season with the Kansas City Monarchs before he got

his next opportunity. The next opportunity Jackie got would change his life and the

game of baseball forever. The president, general manager, and a part owner of the

Brooklyn Dodgers, Branch Ricky, was looking to revolutionize professional baseball

in a way that nobody saw coming. Ricky wanted to break the color barrier in

baseball by signing the first African American baseball player to give him the chance

to become the first African American to play in professional baseball, which

consisted of only white players during the time. Ricky was the general manager of

the St. Louis Cardinals when he got the idea of revolutionizing baseball but because

St. Louis was a segregated city, it didn’t seem like it would work while in St. Louis so

when he left and joined the Brooklyn Dodgers he decided that it was the right time
to put his plan of breaking the color barrier in baseball into action (Oshinsky).

Although Jackie had problems listening to white authority while in the military, he

seemed like a good candidate for what Ricky wanted to do for the game of baseball

(Swaine). Ricky believed that Jackie could handle anything that was thrown at him;

Ricky knew it would be a tough road for Jackie but felt like he could handle

everything without fighting back because he had already experienced so much in his

life dealing with racism (Kahn).

On October 23, 1945, Jackie Robinson signed a contract to play professional

baseball for the Brooklyn Dodgers. In 1946, Jackie played his first year of

professional baseball for the Brooklyn Dodgers AAA team the Montreal Royals.

Jackie found great success in his first year of professional baseball in the white mans

league, in 124 games Jackie had an impressive batting average of .349 and stole 40

bases. Since Jackie performed so well for the Montreal Royals in 1946, it helped him

earn a quick promotion to the Brooklyn Dodgers for the 1947 season. Once Jackie

made it to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947 that is where he would stay at for the

remainder of his career as a professional baseball player. Jackie’s first two years

with the Brooklyn Dodgers he batted .297 and .296, for the next six seasons he

batted over .300, then for his last two season he batted below .300 (Jackie). His hard

work and success on the field proved to everyone that he belonged in professional

baseball with white baseball players. By ignoring and resisting to fight back to all

the racial slurs and racism that was thrown at him he showed other African

American players that even though it was tough to be done that they could also do it

and have the chance to play professional baseball in the white mans league.
Jackie was one of the most iconic and influential baseball players in history

because of his success on the field and the outlook he had on baseball and life in

general. Jackie once said, “A life is not important except in the impact it has on other

lives.” (Kahn). Sports movies are very popular in today’s world and can help people

learn about or experience things that have happened in sports in the past (Kennedy

pg. 33). In 2013, Warner Bros produced the movie 42, which told the story of an

African American baseball player by the name of Jackie Robinson who broke the

color barrier in professional baseball. 42 was about Jackie’s baseball career, it left

out what had happened prior to him playing baseball, it started with him playing in

the Negro Leagues and continued through his baseball career with the Brooklyn

Dodgers. It showed all of his success on the field but it also showed all of the

hardships of racism that he went through on and off the field. My favorite part of

the movie was when Pee Wee Reese put his arm around Jackie before a game and

said thank you to Jackie showing him his support and said, “maybe one day we’ll all

wear the number 42.”

Along with sports movies, sports magazines are very popular with sports

fans around the world (Kennedy pg. 95). One of the most popular sports magazines

is Sports Illustrated. Sports Illustrated covers a variety of different sports and has

many articles in it that are related to sports and athletes. These articles can talk

about many different things such as something an athlete has done or accomplished,

a story of what an athlete has gone through, and much more. Jackie Robinson has

been featured in Sports Illustrated many times, with the articles covering many
different things about Jackie’s life and what he went through and did for the game of

baseball.

Sports museums can be fascinating to anyone but especially to sports fans, it

doesn’t matter what sport you like, you can be intrigued by any type of sports

museum (Kennedy pg. 135). Not every athlete will make it into a sports museum;

athletes who make it into sports museums are seen as some of the greatest players

in their sport. Athletes who make it in usually had outstanding careers and had

great success in their sport by producing stats that exceeded the average player.

Sports museums show the history of the player and all of the accomplishments they

had during their professional career. Jackie Robinson was one of those athletes who

made it into a baseball museum; he in fact made it into two baseball museums, the

Negro Leagues Baseball museum and the Baseball Hall Of Fame. He was able to do

so because of his success on the field and also everything he went through with

helping break the color barrier in professional baseball.

In conclusion, I think that there will always be an equality issue in our

country and it will be shown in all sports. I believe that what Jackie Robinson and

Branch Ricky did for baseball by breaking the color barrier will always be

remembered as one of the most iconic things in sports history. It showed that

people should forget about race because everyone should have equal rights when

doing something because we’re all humans no matter what our skin color is. I think

that when people start to question racial equality it would be a good thing for them

to look back on the positive impact Jackie Robinson had on sports and this country

by breaking the color barrier in professional baseball.


Works Cited

Swaine, Rick. “Jackie Robinson.” Jackie Robinson | Society for American

Baseball Research, Society for American Baseball Research,

sabr.org/bioproj/person/bb9e2490.

Oshinsky, David. “The Man Who Hired Jackie Robinson.” The New York Times,

The New York Times, 26 Mar. 2011.

Kahn, Roger. “Jackie Robinson.” Baseball Hall of Fame, National Baseball Hall

of Fame, baseballhall.org/hof/robinson-jackie.

“Jackie Robinson Negro & Minor Leagues Statistics & History.” Baseball-

Reference.com, Baseball Reference.

“Jackie Robinson.” Negro Leagues Baseball eMuseum: Personal Profiles: Jackie

Robinson, Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and Kansas State University College of

Education, 2006, coe.k-

state.edu/annex/nlbemuseum/history/players/robinsonj.html.

Kennedy, Eileen, and Laura Hills. Sport, Media and Society. Berg Editorial

Offices, 2009.

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