Sporting life: the decline of baseball

Once upon a time in America, cricket was as popular as baseball. In the 19th century, British immigrants brought bat and ball games to the east coast. There the rules of baseball were first formalised, and in the 1860s the game was carried to the furthest corners of the nation by the Union army. Baseball, which was more socially open and populist than cricket, rapidly trounced its competitor and, in the decades after the civil war, took on the status of the national game. Since then, the sport has served as a metaphor for America in innumerable ways—perhaps most powerfully in its reflection of the history of immigration and assimilation.

In the 1920s and 1930s the first star players of German (Babe Ruth), Italian (Joe DiMaggio) and Jewish roots (Hank Greenberg) gave tangible proof of their communities' inclusion in the American "melting pot." In 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first black player in the sport's highest professional league: Major League Baseball (MLB). Robinson's first game for the Brooklyn Dodgers broke the colour bar that had existed for over 50 years, and it remains a defining moment in the struggle for civil rights. MLB holds a celebratory Jackie Robinson day each year and continues to trade on the episode as the moment in which baseball represented everything good and progressive about America.

African-Americans increased their presence in the sport until the 1970s. Then, for whatever reason, black athletes started opting for American football and basketball, and baseball migrated out of the cities into the suburbs. African-Americans are now underrepresented as players and among the game's fanbase.

At the same time, the presence of Latinos, both US citizens and overseas players, has soared. Dominicans alone make up around 10 per cent of the MLB and nearly 40 per cent of minor league players (See Sporting Life, July 2008). And Latino players are among the game's elite. Take the All-Star game, contested by the best players from across the major leagues (as voted for by fans, players and coaches). Of the 77 players in this year's game, 22 were Latinos from overseas. Add Americans of Latino descent like Alex Rodriguez, and almost a third of the players involved in US baseball's biggest game are Latinos of some kind.

Next year's All-Star game will be played in Phoenix, at the home of the Arizona Diamondbacks—if, that is, everyone turns up. Chicago White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen and San Diego Padres player Adrian Gonzalez are the most prominent of the many Latinos who have said that they won't take part. A petition signed by 100,000 people has been presented to MLB commissioner Bud Selig calling for the game to be moved. Protests have occurred at games played by the Diamondbacks nationwide.

The controversy is over SB 1070: an incendiary piece of legislation passed by Arizona's senate which gives the state police massively enlarged powers to enforce immigration laws. Its provisions include authorising police to make an arrest without warrant of anyone they believe is "removable from the United States." It also requires them to inquire about people's immigration status and allows them to detain anyone who does not carry proof of this status. The law is of course targeted at Latinos, who make up the large majority of illegal immigrants to the US. The day before the law was due to take effect, a judge blocked its most controversial provisions, but this is a temporary measure.

So far 0 has been at best elliptical on the issue. It has tried to play the "sport is not politics" card—but a glance at baseball's history suggests this is a laughable claim. It has also said that the location is a done deal—but there is a precedent from American football for moving it. In 1983, Arizona was scheduled to host the Super Bowl, the championship game of the National Football League (NFL). But troubled by the fact that the state legislature refused to honour Martin Luther King day, the NFL players' association voted to move the game to California. This act helped to shift opinion and Arizona finally backed the holiday in 1992; the NFL awarded a Super Bowl to the state the following year.

I think it is no coincidence that the more socially aware sport of American football has eclipsed baseball in terms of television ratings, income and a sense of being the nation's most popular game and providing its biggest sporting holiday. Baseball is holding onto its place in the national sports hierarchy by its fingertips. The All-Star game this year received its lowest-ever television ratings—only a few points ahead of the World Cup, which achieved its best-ever US television ratings and attracted a huge Latino audience.

In America, baseball trumped cricket by being open to all, and sealed its place in the nation's history by making good on the constitutional promises of equality and justice. It will be a tragedy if the sport accelerates its decline by alienating the Latino players and fans on whom it depends.