Ryan: As numbers of Latino players rise, Latino managers vanish
From Shannon Ryan at the Chicago Tribune on September 23, 2016, with mention of SABR members Adrian Burgos Jr., Mark Armour, Dan Levitt, and Tyrone Brooks:
At this year’s All-Star Game, five of the American League starters and three of the National League starters were either born in Latin America or were children of Latin Americans.
It made sense given the strong representation of Latino players in MLB, currently at 28.5 percent, according to the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.
But there is not a similar correlation between the amount of Latino players and Latino managers.
With Fredi Gonzalez fired from the Braves in May this season, it left MLB without a Hispanic manager for the first time since 1991. With only two managers of color (Dusty Baker, who is African-American with the Nationals, and Dave Roberts, who is black and Japanese, with the Dodgers), that highlights a significant drop from the peak of 10 minority managers in 2002 and 2009.
“I don’t know if necessarily it’s is bias one way or the other,” said Rick Renteria, who was the Cubs manager in 2014 and now works as a bench coach for the White Sox. “Hopefully the numbers aren’t necessarily an indication of being limited in how they view us. We’re all pretty intelligent people.”
Read the full article here: http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/ct-managers-black-baseball-spt-0925-20160923-story.html
Originally published: September 28, 2016. Last Updated: September 28, 2016.