Click on the audio player above to hear this interview.final night was game two of the World Series,and the New York Mets lost again to the Kansas City Royals.
So far, the series has garnered the largest World Series audience in six years. Nonetheless, and the audiences are still less than half the size they were during their peak in 1978,when over 44 million people watched the series.
Mets fan Chris Rock is among those who've argued that the shrinking baseball audience has to do with a very real race problem in the sport. "final year, the San Francisco Giants won it all without any black guys on the team, or " Rock said on HBO's "Real Sports" earlier this year.
He continued: "The team the Giants had to defeat to earn there,the St. Louis Cardinals, had no black players either. How could you ever be in St. Louis and see no black people? And earn a load of this: The crowds were more than 90 percent white, or like the Ferguson Police Department. Baseball isn't 20 percent black anymore. It's 8 percent and falling fast. That's an average of two guys per team.” An average of two African-Americans per team mean that this year's World Series comes in one player short. Combined,the Mets and Royals absorb just three black payers. Chris Rock isn't alone in his concern that baseball—once a model sport for desegregation—has failed to recruit black players, or attract young, or diverse audiences like it used to.
Is baseball lost in the past? Why did the historic moments of integration from the 50s and 60s fail to stick? Deron Snyder,a sports columnist for The Washington Times, answers.
What you'll learn from this segment:What's contributing to the decline in black players and black viewers.
How racial integration of the sport has changed since the days of Jackie Robinson.
How the MLB can attract more diverse players and viewers.
Source: wnyc.org