50 Years, Still Fears : Oh Woe Is Baseball: Few Preps Prepping

On the eve of a notable anniversary for one local African-American baseball player, another is watching his inner-city high school team practice.

The left fielder is wearing oversized jeans and a button-down shirt. The shortstop is wearing cutoffs and basketball shoes.

There is no second baseman. No first baseman. Players who forget to wear their batting helmet.

Adam Kennybrew, Locke High star quarterback and pitcher, shakes his head.

“Sometimes this is embarrassing,” he says. “My friends say, why do you do this? Why don’t you just stay with football?”

His is just one view, from a weathered bench, facing a diamond where grass grows on the basepaths but not the outfield.

Yet 50 years after Jackie Robinson broke major league baseball’s color barrier, it is an important one.

The question has been raised: Why are there 2% fewer African Americans on major league baseball rosters today than when every baseball team became integrated 38 years ago?

The answer, according to some current and former major league players, is racism.

The answer from the corner of 111th and San Pedro is something different.

From his position as former superstar and current assistant general manager in San Diego, Dave Stewart accuses baseball of “trying to weed blacks out.”

From his position of a 17-year-old soon faced with the most important decision of his life, Adam Kennybrew looks at it like this:

Upon graduation from high school next year, if he doesn’t chose baseball over football, it will not be because somebody wanted him weeded out.

It is because he wanted himself weeded out.

It will be because he, like thousands of other top African-American athletes, will prefer to play another sport.

It will be because, compared to baseball, other major sports provide the average player more quick money. More status. More education. More of the things sadly lacking in inner-cities everywhere.

From where Adam Kennybrew sits--with his 3.5 grade-point average and nightly visits to the Inglewood library for quiet study time--the comparison is sometimes no comparison.

When it comes to baseball, other major sports just make more sense.

“If baseball gives me a lot of money, sure, I’ll sign there,” he says. “But it has to be a lot of money. Otherwise, no way.”

In other words, if he is deemed to be a potential baseball superstar, he will play baseball.

If he has a chance to be just average, he won’t.

Six years from now, when somebody surveys the number of African Americans in the game, he will not be among them.

And somebody will blame it on racism.

If Jackie Robinson were alive today--Lord, how we wish--my guess is that he would properly attack major league owners for their refusal to hire more black general managers and executives.

My guess is, he would properly attack major league field personnel for their refusal to groom more black managers by not allowing blacks to hang around as extra players and clubhouse leaders--roles held by some great managers.

But would he call baseball racist for its overall lack of African American players, starters to subs? No way.

Because Robinson was the sort of person who would visit 111th and San Pedro, Locke High, former school of future Hall of Famers Eddie Murray and Ozzie Smith.

He would see what has happened to baseball in the inner city.

Few programs are in as poor shape as Locke, but the problems are shared.

Kids are wowed by more polished basketball and football role models. Hassled by peers who think baseball is only a step up from the French Club. Depressed by playing on lousy fields with poor equipment from schools that fund and value football and basketball more.

And humiliated when their local paper doesn’t even print their scores.

The Times recently stopped printing high school baseball scores because of shrinking newsprint. Bill Dwyre, sports editor, said the paper will begin printing them again during the playoffs-- and on a regular basis beginning next season--after what he called “overwhelming” reaction.

“My decision was in no way based on any thoughts of de-emphasizing high school baseball,” Dwyre says. “Sports keeps booming and I keep trying to figure out ways to get more in, while keeping newsprint consumption, a very expensive part of our business, reasonable. I constantly cut and shift and re-format. This time, I just cut the wrong thing.”

But the players received a different message.

“In high school, kids depend on the hype to decide what to do,” says Kennybrew. “Football and basketball are the hype. Baseball is not.”

Locke High is nearly 50% African American, yet the football team is almost entirely black . . . while only three of 11 varsity baseball players are black.

There are only 13 players on the junior varsity, some of whom joined the program with no previous experience.

With no middle school programs, with disappearing youth leagues and role models, baseball in inner-city Los Angeles is sometimes as foreign as lacrosse in Des Moines.

When Kennybrew is faced with his big decision next year, there is a good chance he will consult with his football coach. And E.C. Robinson knows what he will tell him.

“If you go to baseball, you’ll go somewhere in Class A and could get lost in the shuffle,” he says. “If you go to football, you’ll have four years to grow and learn. You’ll get a college education. And you’ll still have a chance to be a pro.”

Some kids can afford to spend a few years in that shuffle. Kids with easy lives can take a chance, knowing their lives will grant them a mulligan if they fail.

But Adam Kennybrew has a disabled mother and young sister at home. He has listened all his life to the talk of an education. He has looked around his neighborhood and seen what can happen without one. He has more important promises to keep than the ones to some class-A manager in Savannah.

He, like many others like him, sadly only has one chance.

“I’ll go to wherever I can get the best break,” he says.

That break will probably be football. And there’s nothing racist about it.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Jackie Robinson Salute

Dodgers vs. New York Mets

Shea Stadium

Game Time: 4:35 pm.

Highlights: The game, which will be stopped for at least 30 minutes after the Dodges bat in the top of the fifth inning, will be highlighted by President Bill Clinton’s speech. The Mets also plan to name an avenue near Shea Stadium in Robinson’s honor.