Rosenthal: The African-American talent pool remains a troubling problem for baseball

From Ken Rosenthal at FoxSports.com on April 14, 2017, with mention of SABR member Mark Armour:

A few weeks back, in casual conversation, a player agent told me that he had learned something shocking.

One of his clients, the agent said, was the only African-American pitcher in his team’s entire farm system.

“This is crazy,” said the agent, who requested anonymity for both he and his client. “It’s terrifying.” 

I responded that the situation almost certainly was not unique, that every other major-league club probably was experiencing a similar void.

So, I contacted all 30 clubs, asking them to disclose the number of African-American pitchers in their respective farm systems. I also asked each to reveal the number of African-American catchers in its organization, knowing that such players were in rarer supply.

Read the full article here: http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/story/the-african-american-talent-pool-remains-a-troubling-problem-for-baseball-041417



Originally published: April 14, 2017. Last Updated: April 14, 2017.