torii, the media, and a badly chosen word

The firestorm around the Angels today revolves around the beloved and media friendly Torii and a eyebrow-raising quote.

"Fans look down from their seats onto the baseball field, see dark-colored skin and might assume they are African-American players. But increasingly, the players instead hail from the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico or Venezuela.

"People see dark faces out there, and the perception is that they're African American," Los Angeles Angels center fielder Torii Hunter says. "They're not us. They're impostors.

"Even people I know come up and say, 'Hey, what color is Vladimir Guerrero? Is he a black player?' I say, 'Come on, he's Dominican. He's not black.' "

"As African-American players, we have a theory that baseball can go get an imitator and pass them off as us," Hunter says. "It's like they had to get some kind of dark faces, so they go to the Dominican or Venezuela because you can get them cheaper. It's like, 'Why should I get this kid from the South Side of Chicago and have Scott Boras represent him and pay him $5 million when you can get a Dominican guy for a bag of chips?'

"I'm telling you, it's sad."

My guess to what started this controversy was Craig Calcaterra's response.

Now, I like Torii (what Angels's fan doesn't?). I also like Craig Calcaterra (his blog posts are often insightful and funny). But really, I think this is all being blown outta porportion.

I admit, when I first saw reports on this story, I paused and thought, "This doesn't sound like something Torii would say," while simultaneously knowing that this was gonna unleash something ugly. A comment on Halosheaven got me to go back and read the full USA Today article.

Rather than talking in strickly racial terms, Torii was talking about the lack of support from MLB to cultivate and promote baseball for African-Americans. The article explains the difficulties of attracting inner-city kids to baseball, especially the problem of transporting the kids to and from practice. Furthermore, there are less opportunities for baseball players for scholarships, compared to other sports that might attract other would-be African-American baseball players, such as football or basketball. It's also noted that scouts rarely visit poor or crime-ridden communities, like the one Torii grew up in. Finally, it points out the desparate amount of resources that MLB and the teams spend on internationally and domestically. Torii has always been a big supporter of cultivating more African-American baseball players and advocating for more MLB support in domenstic programs, like their RBI program, and this article is another instance of that.

So keeping that in mind, you'd see that Calcaterra disputes that African-American players should be given special attention. He writes, "that if there's a meritocracy anywhere in this country, it's in professional sports." And most of all, he takes exception to Torii's suggestion that MLB is using dark Domincans to "pass off" as African-American to give the semblance of diversity.

"...the fact that baseball has spent millions to develop Latin American talent [doesn't] mean that the sport has turned its back on U.S.-born blacks. And while, like Hunter, I'd like to see more U.S. blacks playing the game, to suggest, as he does, that Major League Baseball has some plot to overlook them in favor of international players is plain dumb. If anything baseball would love to have it the opposite way. After all, U.S.-born blacks are subject to the draft and can be paid peanuts for years. Dominican or Venezuelan players get big signing bonuses. At least the good ones do."

I think Calcaterra makes a good point on this. I find Torii's speculation of a MLB conspiracy somewhat far-fetched and his reasoning that Latin players can be paid "a bag of chips" as shaky. But a lot of Calcaterra's thoughtful analysis is overwhelmed with his indignation of Torii's separation of Dominican from the classification "black."

Okay, technically, yeah, Dominicans are decended from African-American slaves. But what Torii was referring to was the fact that culturally, African-Americans are different than African-Dominicans. His blog post explaining this also addresses his use of the word "imposter," which I felt was a very wrong word choice. But the thing is, in the article, Torii was talking about cultivating African-American ballplayers in the US and discussing the cultural factors that discourage African-Americans from pursuing baseball. For him to distinguish between African-Americans and Dominicans, is valid. His example of Vlad as a Dominican, not "black" is simply to show that most people are unaware of the lack of African-Americans in baseball. For Calcaterra to accuse Torii of "immaturity when it comes to race," I think is unfair and counterproductive to the point Calcaterra was trying to make.

No doubt, Torii made a mistake by using the word "imposters," but I don't think he should have to defend himself from a "racist" label. We all know enough about Torii to give him the benefit of the doubt.

One of the tragedies of this media storm is that the real issue that Torii was trying to promote - encouraging African Americans to play baseball - is being overshadowed. I think it's a valid cause. I'm a woman in engineering, a male-dominated field, and there are tons of programs, scholarships, etc. to encourage women to go into science and engineering. These things allow for exposure and opportunity into the field. Now, how is that different than providing programs and scholarships to encourage African Americans to pursue baseball?

UPDATE: A much better explaination of what Torii meant. via True Grinch