Take Note, Ty Cobb Fans

[Topnotchsy]

Originally Posted by Hankphenom

It seems to me that to say that the Negro Leagues (and certainly Puerto Rico and Cuban teams) were on a par with the white leagues ignores the tremendous differential in the demographic pools they were drawn from. I just don't understand how this is possible when the population was 90% white and less than 10% black, unless you want to take it a step much further to say that blacks were inherently or genetically much better ball players. I have no doubt that there were many terrific black players who would have excelled in the majors as they did when integration came, or that a black all-star team at any time probably could have beaten the white champions, but those leagues on a par generally speaking, I don't think so. It is undoubtedly also true that Josh Gibson and many others from the NL would hold MLB records today if they had been allowed to compete equally among white players, but I don't see how you can invent those records from what they did do in their separate leagues. I say keep the histories separate, as they were in their time, and don't try to pretend that it was all one big happy family playing together. It wasn't, it will forever be a stain on baseball that it wasn't, and no amount of imaginary numbers juggling will make that fact any prettier.

If I understand you correctly, you are arguing as follows:

Given the enormous size difference in the white and black populations, it seems highly unlikely that a black league would have had the depth that a white league had, even if the best in one league would have been on par or better than the best in other leagues.

Am I understanding it correctly?

Here are my thoughts:

1) I don't think that as a starting point, there is anything wrong with raising this question. But it certainly is not a question that has no answer. To give one example... In low-income areas and among certain populations, a career in pro sports (or entertainment) is often viewed as one of the few options that children see as a way to escape their conditions, and therefore in these populations, the focus on sport is often far more widespread than in other communities. Such an approach shifts the math.

2) The arguments that the leagues were equal are from many different data points including black players who played afterwards, many, many barnstorming games, observers etc. While the question you raise does make one pause, once it is combined with empirical evidence, the question needs to change to, "given that black population was far smaller than the white population in the United States during that time, how is it that evidence points to the black baseball leagues being on par with white leagues?

3) The black leagues were a few teams smaller than the white leagues and so it is possible that the leagues in fact would not have had the depth, but because they were smaller, fewer Major League caliber players were needed.

4) I'm also not sure why you would assume that there is no statistical issue with saying that the best black team could stand up against the best white team. While it is not an identical question, it would seem that the smaller available pool would also impact the number of truly great players.

5) Whatever the reasons are, we see that the vast majority of elite athletes today are black. I don't know or care whether that is because they focus in this area more, if there are genetic components etc. but the question you asked could equally be asked about today's NBA and NFL. The fact that we find examples in modern times of a level of talent disprortionately coming from a black population means that some combination of factors makes this possible.

I think that the disparity in the available pool of players raises a question, and there are indications that the leagues may