What’s the Purpose of Renaming the Cy Young?
By Mike Silva ~ June 21st, 2009. Filed under: Mike Silva.
Gorden Edes of Yahoo Sports wrote a piece this weekend proposing that MLB rename the Cy Young Award after Satchel Paige. My answer to this is, why? How about spending time embracing potential African American ballplayers in a way that is productive versus symbolic.
I am not diminishing everything that Satchel Paige did in his career. It was the ultimate act of short sidedness that MLB owners prevented individuals from competing due to the color of their skin. If Satchel Paige was able to compete he might just well have gone down as the best pitcher in baseball history. That is my point; he “might have gone down”. Reality states that Paige finished with a career record of 28-31. That, of course, was done when he finally got a chance to play in professional baseball at the age of 41.
Baseball has gone out of its way to honor the stars of the Negro Leagues. From the civil rights game, retiring Jackie Robinson’s number 42, and creating the MLB RBI program. I understand there is an issue with their recruitment of young African American players. No one can deny that, but it’s more the product of baseball becoming international than denying opportunity or honoring past legends.
In my opinion, some of the things that baseball has done is more about apologizing for its past than learning from it. If you retire Jackie Robinson’s 42, why not Babe Ruth’s number 3? He has as much, if not more, to do with the success of baseball. If not for the Babe, baseball could have collapsed after the 1919 Black Sox scandal. Renaming the Cy Young Award would just be another example of patronizing African American’s rather than working towards marketing the game to the youth.
You have tons of great African American icons in today’s game. Ryan Howard, Curtis Granderson, Jimmy Rollins, the Upton brothers, and Carl Crawford all come to mind. These should be examples of not only great ballplayers, but individuals that set an example off the field. Who would you rather your kids grow up to be? Ryan Howard or Kobe Bryant? I say Howard, but based baseball doesn’t nearly do a good enough job of marketing the Phillies slugger as the NBA does with Bryant.
If baseball wants to connect with the African American community they need to market their stars better. If you couple that, with some of the community oriented programs, you wouldn’t have to bother talking about renaming an award, but rather about the great African American individual’s on the ball field.
Sean Gibson, president of the Josh Gibson Foundation, joined me back in January to discuss the issue of African American’s in baseball. To listen to the replay click here.
June 22nd, 2009 at 1:03 pm
You just don`t have a clue on the history of the Negro Leagues the cover ups when the African-American players dominated the white All-Star teams with Satchel Paige pitching and then cut them off from embarassment.Satchel Paige they say was possibly in his mid to late 50`s when he played in the major leagues.It`s called opportunity which they never had. Babe Ruth the Josh Gibson clone got that opportunity!
June 26th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
I’m black myself, but I’m sick of the liberal guilt over racism that permeated the country all those years ago.
Re-naming the award after Paige is not going to change the fact that Paige (and hundreds of players like him) were barred from playing in the “major” leagues during the prime of their careers. It’s not Cy Young’s fault that baseball owners were racists.
I have a proposal which should make everyone happy:
1) Keep the Cy Young Award, and award it to the best white pitcher each year
2) Create the Satchel Paige Award, and give it to the best black pitcher each year
3) Also, create the “Juan Marichal Award” and award it to the best Latino pitcher each year
4) And finally, award the “Dice-K Award” to the best Asian pitcher each year.
I think that should make everyone happy.
And those of us who aren’t racists can continue to just enjoy the games.