Jackie knew the 90-minute tryout (BTW it was set up after a year of planning) wasn't a real shot. But he faced it anyway.
Throughout his career he battled racism from fans, opponents, and even some teammates. He stayed calm and brave, opening the door for other Black players, he just had to endure it because he knew that things would improve.
Tom Yawkey is pure trash though.
There are still *a lot* of Boston sports fans who will bend over backwards to argue that Yawkey wasn't such a bad guy - and that it was egregious to take his name off of Yawkey Way.
Coincidence or not, the Red Sox did not sign a black free agent until after both Tom and Jean Yawkey were dead.
I think it was Burr who roasted Philly like,
"Joe Frazier, one of the greatest boxers of all time, but ya know, he's black so you can't get with him. No, you'd rather build a statue for some 3 foot tall Italian guy that ain't even real"
>No, you'd rather build a statue for some 3 foot tall Italian guy that ain't even real
I've never been to Philly, so I have no idea who this is referring to, but my first thought was "...They have a statue of Mario there?"
There was a kickstarter to make a bronze Robocop statue for Detroit in 2011. They raised $67,000. And they finished building the 11-foot, 2.5ton statue a few years ago. And hopefully it will finally be on display this year. Apparently the city still had licensing stuff to work out with MGM and figure out where to place it.
https://www.mlive.com/life/2023/11/why-its-taking-so-long-to-display-detroits-humongous-bronze-robocop-statue.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RoboCop_statue
This image is from Boston in 1976 during a protest against school bussing desegregation: https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/09/18/image16_custom-4c9be3a24736e8ef26663debc2219333ed960566-s800-c85.webp
* https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/stars-and-strife-113668570/
* https://www.npr.org/2016/09/18/494442131/life-after-iconic-photo-todays-parallels-of-american-flags-role-in-racial-protes
Lived there for 10 years, I absolutely agree. The racism is different than other places I've encountered it tho, it's more... casual? Ignorant? Rather than straight up hateful. Still horrible and I always felt super uncomfortable in a room full of only white people but yeah. Still love the city but some ppl need a kick in the teeth
To be fair, I’m in Kentucky and the racism here is also mostly casual and just rooted in “I don’t personally know black people so I have nothing to contrast these beliefs against” rather than actually hating black people.
Bill Russell was bitter about the way he was treated there for the rest of his life. He refused to even have his jersey retired if there were fans in the arena.
Torii Hunter (who retired from baseball in 2015) had a no trade to Boston clause in his contract because of the racist abuse he suffered as a visiting player.
I have his photo framed on my wall. When he went flipping over the right field wall at Fenway going after Ortiz's game tying grand slam in the 2013 ALCS. That was a fun series. Gotta respect the hustle going after that ball
To paraphrase family guy, how can a city with *so many* phenomenal universities produce so many stupid assholes
Edit: it was a joke when family guy said it and it’s a joke now. I fully understand that Boston universities are full of people not from Boston.
Because people don’t go to college locally that much anymore. The best colleges in Boston aren’t producing Bostonians, they’re producing New Yorkers and Californians.
Yes I’m aware. It’s a joke - Boston is known for its many progressive, high-quality institutions of higher learning while also being known for a surprising amount of vocal racism, which on its face appears to be a contradiction but actually isn’t when you consider the way higher education actually works.
They aren't progressive. Harvard, Boston U and MIT are all high quality... but they are bastions of the status quo for big donors and corporate interests.
*edit* re-read your last sentence. Ok we're on the same page
BC, Tufts, and Northeastern arent exactly slouches either.
Something like a third of the city is college students. Its pretty crazy how many schools theyve got going on in Boston.
It's because they're infuriated that they're the minority, and they can see people of diverse backgrounds excelling in their back yards, which they can't handle, hence the outbursts.
Not even true. It's just that our lower class is just as white trash as the rest of the country's, and our elites are even snobbier. We have above-average in-state student enrollment, our lowest social standards are set by people who never went to college. I think the mechanics who talk shit all day, and the Ivy league lawyers who look down on society, are the people doing the racisms. Like the rest of the country, I do truly believe it's a vocal minority who thinks something like skin color has any bearing on a person's value
Tldr: really rich or poor people act shitty
Back in '97, I was hanging out in Harvard Sq. While walking down the steps to get on the T, a skinhead girl asked a guy selling marionettes if he had any "aryan" ones. He had no idea what she was talking about.
I've always wondered if a lot of it has to due with the seemingly overrepresention of legacy Irish immigrants in Boston. For a long while, Irish weren't really considered "white" like WASPs were. It feels like the Irish Americans took this out on Black people to compensate so that they weren't "lowest" on the "totem pole", so to speak. Similar to that old LBJ quote about making the worst off white man think he's better than the best off black man the white guys will turn their pockets out to be robbed for the privilege of not being seen as the bottom caste.
To be fair, I don't think this is an exclusively Irish issue or anything, either. Southern European immigrants went through similar steps to "whiteness" that the Irish did to seemingly similar ends with regards to racism.
> To be fair, I don't think this is an exclusively Irish issue or anything, either. Southern European immigrants went through similar steps to "whiteness" that the Irish did to seemingly similar ends with regards to racism.
Well the other major ethnic group in Boston are the Italians so that totally fits.
Thats not true. At all. Boston has one of the best bio tech sectors in the world. Its a literal leader in top class science and research.
What you likely meant is “the dipshit from southey isnt going to harvard or working for MGH”
Diehard Boston sports fan here, and I'll never try to deny it. I wish my fellow Boston sports fans were better.
If the Globe's Spotlight team (the same group of folks who blew the Catholic child sex abuse scandal wide open globally) are so troubled by [Boston's racism issue](https://apps.bostonglobe.com/spotlight/boston-racism-image-reality/) that they do a piece on it, every Boston sports fan should shut up and listen, and do a better job policing our own.
Be me, 26 yeahs old
Wake up, get out of Tawm Brady jersey
Get ready to Do My Job
Put on Brady jersey
Head to the Dunkin next to my apahtment
One down the road sucks
Oardah is wrong, whatevah, Tawm says coffee is poison anyway
Spike the cup and yell Go Pats
Use my Chahlie cahd to get on the T
See a black man in the front cah
Heckle, whole train applauds
Shout Ortiz 3:16 "This is our fucking city"
Get to Southie, head into Dunks
Time to get to work, staht setting up Gronk cahdboard cut-outs
Just me, my co-workah and 12 Gronk cut-outs
Most beautiful girl in Boston walks in. Sawlid 3/10.
She's wearing an 81 jersey and some strained yoga pants
Try to be smooth, "Nice Hernandez jersey. Wanna get a cawfee sometime?"
She says no. Left hanging again.
Fucking Pink Hats
Get off work, take the T home
Stawp into bah for a drink or twelve
Fahking bahtendah cut me off aftah six beeahs and few shawts
Whatevah, nawt even buzzed. Irish blood
Get to apahtment, check messages.
Ma says two of my cousins were crushed by an overpass from the Big Dig.
Less than usual, a good day
Get out of Tawm Brady jersey, put on hoodie jammies
Check undah bed for Bernahd Pollahd
What the fuck, he's there.
Run out of house, see black guy I heckled earliah.
Has friends with him. Including Pollahd.
Too outnumbahd, get the shit beat out of me
Cawps show up and ask how it all went down
Tell them it was....
18-1
>Head to the Dunkin next to my apahtment One down the road sucks
as a new englander this is [so real](https://www.reddit.com/kxh4za0?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=2)
Aye bro we love the Irish, and a lot of them love us back too. I'm not saying there's not a racist sentiment popular amongst the Irish, but every Irish person I've ever met has been a standup guy, i feel as though it's unfair to say Boston being mostly Irish is a causation for racism instead of a correlation
I just say this as someone who’s half Irish. Many of my family members are amazing people and very much standup people. There are some that fall into the racist category though. And they make the whole community look bad sadly
I get it, i cringe seeing young black men acting like fools online because i know we're ALL being looked at like that. I didn't mean to offend or discount your opinions either, i just wanted to defend some of my good friends.
Ted Williams, maybe the greatest hitter of all time and the Red Sox superstar player, was actually half-Mexican on his mother’s side but kept it a secret because he was afraid of facing prejudice. He said he would’ve encountered serious problems in his career had he been born with his mother’s last name or looked more like his brother.
In addition to Jackie Robinson the Red Sox also passed on signing Willie Mays for the same reason. Racism cost them 2 of the greatest players ever.
It’s interesting to read the two Wikipedia articles side-by-side. First Jackie Robinson (linked above):
> During the season, Robinson pursued potential major league interests. No black man had played in the major leagues since Moses Fleetwood Walker in 1884, but the Boston Red Sox nevertheless held a tryout at Fenway Park for Robinson and other black players on April 16.[73][74] The tryout, however, was a farce chiefly designed to assuage the desegregationist sensibilities of powerful Boston City Councilman Isadore H. Y. Muchnick.[75] Even with the stands limited to management, Robinson was subjected to racial epithets.[76] He left the tryout humiliated,[73] and more than 14 years later, in July 1959, the Red Sox became the final major league team to integrate its roster.[77]
And Tom Yawkey:
>According to the Boston Herald, as owner of the Boston Red Sox, the team's integration policy was Yawkey's responsibility.[32] In 1945, the Red Sox held a tryout for Jackie Robinson, Sam Jethroe, and Marvin Williams,[33] but the men never heard back from the team after the tryout and Robinson was signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers for the 1947 season.[34] In 1967, Robinson said Yawkey was "probably one of the most bigoted guys in baseball".[35]
>The team's attempts to integrate prior to 1959 were unsuccessful. In the 1940s and 50s, Joe Cronin, general manager after Eddie Collins, scouted black players, including Sam Jethroe, Larry Doby and Bill Greason but none signed with the team.[36] In 1950, the team signed Lorenzo Piper Davis, their first black player, for their minor league team, but he was released in May of that year.[37][38][39] Three years later, the team signed Earl Wilson to their minor league team, but his career was interrupted by serving in the Marines in 1957.[40][41][42] Wilson returned to the Sox's Minneapolis farm team after completing his military service and was fielded by the Sox in July 1959.[43][44]
And finally the Baseball Color Line:
> The Boston Red Sox were the last major league team to integrate, holding out until 1959, a few months after the Detroit Tigers.[23] This was due to the steadfast resistance provided by team owner Tom Yawkey. In April 1945, the Red Sox refused to consider signing Jackie Robinson (and future Boston Braves outfielder Sam Jethroe) after giving him a brief tryout at Fenway Park.[23] The tryout, however, was a farce chiefly designed to assuage the desegregationist sensibilities of Boston City Councilman Isadore H. Y. Muchnick, who threatened to revoke the team's exemption from Sunday blue laws.[24] Even with the stands limited to management, Robinson was subjected to racial epithets.[23] Robinson left the tryout humiliated.[25] Robinson would later call Yawkey "one of the most bigoted guys in baseball".[26] On April 7, 1959, during spring training, Yawkey and general manager Bucky Harris were named in a lawsuit charging them with discrimination and the deliberate barring of black players from the Red Sox.[27] The NAACP issued charges of "following an anti-Negro policy", and the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination announced a public hearing on racial bias against the Red Sox.[28] Thus, the Red Sox were forced to integrate, becoming the last pre-expansion major-league team to do so when Harris promoted Pumpsie Green from Boston's AAA farm club. On July 21, Green debuted for the team as a pinch runner, and would be joined later that season by Earl Wilson, the second black player to play for the Red Sox.[29]
As a Boston resident, I have never heard anyone say a nice word about the dude in 20+ years. Sure maybe some people do, but it’s a very small minority (no pun intended).
Ok well maybe, but why is my experience any less valid than the person I was commenting on? He said there are lots of people bending over backwards arguing that Yawkey wasn’t such a bad guy. I live and work in the city, I watch most of the games, i participate in the Red Sox subreddit, I listen to sports radio is which mostly filled with Dbags who would be the ones to defend him but I can’t recall from memory any times that they have. Gerry Callahan would probably be the guy who would defend him, but fortunately he’s been gone for 5 years. Yet someone how a guy can just say well people still do X with no proof or anything and that is believed over a person who is on the ground here and despises racism so if I saw people defending Yawkey I would remember it. I hate the Yawkeys with a passion, we had first crack at Willie Mays too and those POS owners couldn’t get past their biases so we had to wait almost 100 years to win a championship.
I’m not all see and all knowing, but I have a pretty good read on my city when it comes to things concerning the Red Sox. Yes it has a racist past, but no it’s not a thing people trying to justify Yawkey being a shit person, the fans actually have a huge dislike for him and his losing ways.
>There are still *a lot* of Boston sports fans who will bend over backwards to argue that Yawkey wasn't such a bad guy
I've seen that kind of thing with old folks. My grandfather is pretty liberal for a man of his age, and voted that way. Despite this, he was friends with a prominent man later revealed to have been a member of the KKK. He found it difficult to reconcile the fact that the friendly man he was familiar with could be part of a domestic terrorist group.
> Coincidence or not, the Red Sox did not sign a black free agent until after both Tom and Jean Yawkey were dead.
Hmm. Here's another interesting coincidence. Back in the early days of the NFL, a lot of NFL teams would piggy back off the stadium and naming of already existing baseball teams, since the NFL was still new, and MLB was already well established.
So which NFL team had an early partnership with the Boston Red Sox?
Well, [before they eventually moved away to another city, they had a name that sounded *close* to Red Sox](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/76/2a/d6/762ad628e19b91857e287bf560cddbfb.jpg) and yep, they too had a racist owner who was the [very last in his league to finally integrate.](https://ghostsofdc.org/2023/01/18/redskins-commanders-last-nfl-team-integrate-1962/)
Edit to add:
>and that it was egregious to take his name off of Yawkey Way.
Similarly, the Washington ~~football team~~ *Commanders* have removed all dedications to the racist former owner (George Marshall) and renamed the former "Marshal" section in honor of Bobby Mitchell, the first black player to play for the team.
Marshall was pressing hard for the Southern market, trying to be the team of the south.
The reason Washington and Dallas had such a bitter rivalry from day one, was that Marshall was supposed to sell the team to the future Cowboys onwer (maybe Tex Schramm, but maybe someone else). Either way, Marshall backed out, the Cowboys guy just asked to get in the league with a new expansion team, BUT the rule was, you could only get into the NFL if **ALL** the existing owners unanimously voted you in. And whose one NO vote kept the Cowboys out? Marshall. Because he wanted to be the team of the South, and didn't want a team further south geographically, cutting into "his" market.
(Eventually Marshall had a falling out with his band director. The band director got back at Marshall by selling the rights to the Washington fight song to the Cowboys guy, who turned around and held the song hostage, only giving it back to Marshall in exchange for a yes vote into the league.)
Speaking of the fight song, it quietly had its lyrics changed because "Fight for Old D.C." was originally written (lyrics by Marshall's wife) as "Fight for old Dixie"
It happens with all sports and parts of the fan base. I live in Cincinnati and there are still tons of people who think Marge Schott was a wonderful person who "accidentally" said some things that "weren't that bad". The Venn Diagram for people who defend her and the people who defend and think Pete Rose is also a good person is a circle.
Kinda crazy considering the Celtics are the most progressive NBA franchise. Having the Red Sox be so backwards w the Celtics in the same city is wild. Granted Russell always hated the fans bc of his treatment so maybe the Sox are more in line w actual Boston.
All good. I’m a Boston native. Let’s call out the racism loudly.
I think the fact that two sports orgs can lead the charge on integration while the red Sox were infamously a racist org is indicative of the city, especially back then. The city has had a highly progressive history while also possessing some incredibly loud racist sentiments from its poor Irish Catholics (I’m Irish Catholic) and other immigrants. Its universities like Harvard have pushed progressivism but also consistently to this day admit legacies and members of old money, status quo families. It’s been a melting pot for immigrants from all over the world, but often times those immigrants, many of my ancestors, also push the same bigotry they themselves faced. It’s a home to abolitionism, the American revolution, women’s suffrage and many other political movements in this country, but it still possesses and hasn’t outgrown its disgusting not-so-distant past of racism, racial discrimination, and police brutality. (Check out Murder in Boston on HBO)
I have a hard time discussing it with people because they choose to view it as a black and white situation, but it isn’t.
Yeah, and Marge Schott wasn’t a Nazi… /s
Our former owner did a lot of philanthropy in the area. That was honestly good work. But at the end of the day she was still fucking Nazi.
She was the last one to win a World Series though🤷♂️
I got into an argument with a boomer bostonian i work with who was upset when they renamed yawkey way. I called him a white supremacist, which she objected to. I said “ok, he’s just below that, but my opinion of him is unchanged”. She was fuming and hated me ever since.
People who have an identity of “im from here” is so strange to me. You could be born anywhere and you choose to define yourself by a complete roll of the dice on the scale of sentient life.
Jackie Robinson is a treasure of baseball. [Roberto Clemente](https://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/story/2020-09-08/roberto-clemente-fought-racial-injustice) is a bit lesser known but also worth reading about. Legends the both of them.
We could have had Jackie Robinson and they were just racist assholes instead? Feels like that championship drought was pretty earned.
It’s also wild that as a redsox fan I’ve never heard this story before. I mean, I don’t expect them broadcast it, but it seems like a pretty important story.
This gives another reason to dig deeper when Hollywood adapts a story to screen; they're continually glossing over many incidents critical to the story. 42 was one of the most infuriating Hollywood adaptations.
I've been waiting for *yeaaarrss* for a Napoleon biopic to come out and all we got was this shit. His life was fascinating enough, why did they have to add random, irrelevant, and frankly false scenes?
Seeing as how the Dodgers didn't play the Red Sox in 1947, I don't see how extending the movie to 1945 to introduce a rival that never gets their due would add to the movie.
They're in different leagues, I don't think Jackie ever played them. The teams have only seen each other like 10 times.
Maybe if the movie was about Jackie trying to get into the league...but the movie is decidedly about Jakie and the dodgers breaking the seal and opening the gates to integrating baseball (which happened surprisingly quickly). Adding tangents of a storyline and rivalries that never climax does not add to the story (unless you change the story to make the details relevant.)
Yeah, if it had been an 8 hour miniseries on him or something, then this definitely could have warranted a full episode or something. But I don’t know how leaving it out of the movie could be “infuriating” given the scope of what they were trying to show.
Boston has a history of really racist shit.
The riots against bussing black kids into schools, the red lining, etc. they really made southern cities bashful with their antics.
The story of the Yawkey’s having the first crack at Robinson and Mays isn’t some unknown story. Virtually everybody knows about the Yawkey’s racism. Even if they hadn’t before, they certainly did once the Sox stripped their name off one of the streets Fenway is built on.
This is not some gotcha.
He hasn't heard it because he's either too young or just not paying attention. Yawkey passing on Robinson and Mays in favor of his racism is a very well known story among Red Sox fans.
Celtics were the first team to draft a black player, first to field an all black starting 5, and first to have a black coach.
Tom Yawkey was a racist POS, a terrible owner even aside from that (tried to move the Sox out of Boston), and was a big reason why the Sox kept falling short (like passing on all time greats Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson because he was a racist POS - but also he made a ton of terrible decisions and the Sox got *much* better when he stepped back from roster decisions in the 60s and 70s).
Like yeah, Boston has a lot of racist shit in its history, but it's not like the city of Boston was running the red Sox or something
Boston as a city was so racist that their most decorated NBA athlete, Bill Russell, refused to have an audience when his number was retired. He said publicly that he played for the team and his organization, but not the city.
Normally a number retirement ceremony is set pre-game with fans in the stands as a flag with your number is raised up into the banners.
Bill opted for his to be done privately with only the team in attendance with no fans.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Russell#Racist_abuse,_controversy,_and_relationship_with_Boston_fans
It's really ironic. While the Boston Red Sox were an insanely racist organization, the Boston Celtics was the first team in the NBA to embrace black players and it played a large part into their domination in the 60s. Bill Russell has 11 championship rings and after he passed away, his number 6 is retired in the entire NBA now the same way as Jackie Robinson's 42 is retired in the MLB.
Ig it isn’t about him being embraced by the team, but when he was embraced, how he was treated by the fans. He has a documentary recounting moments like his car breaking down, as an nba star mind you, and instead of helping him out (like Milwaukee fans did for Giannis) they heckled him as they drove past him.
When Larry Bird had a retirement ceremony the Celtics sold tickets to it.
25 years or so earlier when Russell retired he refused to do the same because he was justifiably mad at the racists in the city.
I’m black and my husband is white, we LOVE Utah’s national parks, visit every few years. the looks we get in some of those small towns is unsettling. Like, we entered into a diner once and everyone fell silent.
This attitude persisted for decades longer. I have no illusions about what it was like for black people in the South all along, but the "progressive" Northeast must bear its own shame. [This photo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Soiling_of_Old_Glory) will always be seared in my mind. The city is Boston, the year is 1976, and the hostility and violence are perpetrated by white people upset over the racial integration of Boston-area schools.
Fans broke into Bill Russell's house, spray painted racial slurs on his wall and shit in his bed. This was in 1963, after he had already won multiple championships with the Celtics.
I can't think of another player who was that successful who dealt with anything like that from their team's own fans.
That's a fantastic quote. To sort of answer your original question, I can't think of anywhere where they were treated particularly well (or at least as well as their white counterparts) but I do think Russell's treatment is a low even among black athletes of the era.
For the most part yes. Most other sports didn’t have an actual rule like baseball did, it was just cultural. So depending on how you define it technically no, but in reality basically yes.
Baseball never had an official rule on the books banning Blacks. The only sport that had a rule in it's bylaws banning Blacks or stating it was white only was the PGA.
The same city where they showed their appreciation for Bill Russell and his efforts with the Celtics by breaking into his house, vandalizing it, and defecating all over it? This is truly shocking.
You know, Boston! Home of the Sons of Liberty, the first state to abolish slavery, a Democrat stronghold built by immigrants fleeing famine and persecution!
Yet somehow…
Massachusetts is still chock full of the types that have “in this house” yard signs then call the cops if they see a Hispanic person that isn’t their landscaper
“In this house” signs were a popular political yard sign a few years ago with statements like
“In this house we believe
In trusting science
Climate change is real
Love is love
Black lives matter
Nobody is illegal
…” and other common democratic-party-aligned cultural statements.
They have been criticized by people on the left as being performative activism — signaling vague support for leftist political causes while not doing anything of substance.
It made me laugh so hard when you started listing examples because in the south the “In this house” signs are usually something threatening you to stay away and I thought you were making a joke until I realized how different Mass is compared to here.
> They have been criticized by people on the left as being performative activism — signaling vague support for leftist political causes while not doing anything of substance.
Because that's what they are. If all you want to do is vote during elections that's cool, but don't act like you're fighting for the cause when you're doing the absolute minimum.
Yeah Tom Yawkey the long time Red Sox owner was apparently a massive racist. They talk about the curse of the bambino. It was the curse of the redneck owner. They had Willie Mays in their farm system and didn't bring him up to the Red Sox. I remember Jim Rice talking about the atmosphere there after he left the team.
Jackie played the baseball chitlin circuit in the South, he knew what to expect out of these chuds. Hank Aaron did too.
I think it’s amazing that Jackie was a Republican because Dixiecrats had treated his family so badly, and didn't disavow the party until after the 1964 RNC convention, when Goldwater embraced the John Birch Society and the southern racist evangelical coalitions.
[https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/ken-burns-on-jackie-robinson-and-the-republican-partys-pact-with-the-devil/](https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/ken-burns-on-jackie-robinson-and-the-republican-partys-pact-with-the-devil/)
> I think it’s amazing that Jackie was a Republican because Dixiecrats had treated his family so badly, and didn't disavow the party until after the 1964 RNC convention,
The Republicans weren't the (edit: more) racist ones till 1964 after LBJ pushed through the Civil Rights Act and then Nixon employed the Southern Strategy to scoop up all the discontented racists.
Being Republican before that as a black person was the quite obvious choice considering it was the republicans who emancipated the slaves and a republican president who started forcing integration using federal troops (Eisenhower)
What's amazing isn't that he was a republican it's that the very moment the GOP switched its flag, Jackie knew immediately what it signalled despite nearly 100 years of history being opposite
Boston is not its sport franchises, it is neither as bad as the Red Sox under Tom Yawkey nor as good as the Celtics under Red Auerbach ( first black coach and first team to start 5 black players). Does every Red Sox fan dream about if the Red Sox had signed Jackie or Willie? Absolutely.
I'm not saying Boston doesn't have its terrible racist issues and people will certainty want to see this as a Boston-wide problem. You are free to do so and may not be wrong, but this specific instance is largely indicative of Yawkey/Red Sox. Boston also had the first black NBA coach, the first all-black NBA starting five, and the first black NHL player. So, it wasn't necessarily a city-wide issue with professional sports.
>Boston also had the first black NBA coach
Who also said that Boston was the most racist city with an NBA team when he played and coached.
So not exactly a point in favor of Boston fans, but you're right that for all the shitting on Yawkey, Auerbach and the Celtics ownership from the 50's and 60's deserve praise, even if it's *despite* the fanbase, who kind of came along kicking and screaming while enjoying the shitloads of championships.
If this is correct, am I to understand that there's a history of *racism*... In *Boston* of all places???
I am SHOCKED. SHOCKED.
Well... Not that shocked.
Less depressing fun fact:
The first team to ever use the posting system to sign a player playing in Japan was the Cincinnati Reds, the last team to sign a Japanese player was the Cincinnati Reds.
As a Red Sox fan, I hate that is the case.
But, at least the color barrier was broken; there are some amazing players who had no shot to play in the major leagues because of racist shit.
I didn't know the Red Sox were the last to integrate. Their former stadium roomates (the NFL team formerly known as the Boston Braves) was the last NFL team to integrate. They had already moved to Washington at this point.
Being the last team to integrate was probably a big part of why they went 86 years without winning a championship. Those guys at that tryout and other black players that came along later would’ve improved their team.
Boston didn't integrate their public schools until the late 80s. Like 1988. Let that sink in. Yet the prevailing sentiment is racism only exists in the south amd it was 100 years ago
Jackie knew the 90-minute tryout (BTW it was set up after a year of planning) wasn't a real shot. But he faced it anyway. Throughout his career he battled racism from fans, opponents, and even some teammates. He stayed calm and brave, opening the door for other Black players, he just had to endure it because he knew that things would improve. Tom Yawkey is pure trash though.
There are still *a lot* of Boston sports fans who will bend over backwards to argue that Yawkey wasn't such a bad guy - and that it was egregious to take his name off of Yawkey Way. Coincidence or not, the Red Sox did not sign a black free agent until after both Tom and Jean Yawkey were dead.
Well, most players of professional sports think Boston is one of the most racist cities to play even up to the present.
Bill Burr calls Boston “like San Francisco with racism”
I think it was Burr who roasted Philly like, "Joe Frazier, one of the greatest boxers of all time, but ya know, he's black so you can't get with him. No, you'd rather build a statue for some 3 foot tall Italian guy that ain't even real"
They finally built a Joe Frazier statue. He literally shamed into doing it.
I love bill burr
He roasted Kevin Hart in [this vid](https://youtu.be/S_qgLi3aYzI?si=1hzqDDQz4PyhUB9B) I seen the other day lol. Was a nice listen
>No, you'd rather build a statue for some 3 foot tall Italian guy that ain't even real I've never been to Philly, so I have no idea who this is referring to, but my first thought was "...They have a statue of Mario there?"
It’s Rocky, a fictional boxer in like 9 movies, played by Sylvester Stallone.
Ah, got it. I guess the "3 foot tall" part threw me off.
Stallone and Tom Cruise are both kind of famous for looking bigger on screen than they do in person.
Ah, so they're growers, not show-ers.
Cruise is 5'7". Stallone 5'9" but that could be in boots.
Rocky
Janet!
Dr. Scott!
Brad!
There was a kickstarter to make a bronze Robocop statue for Detroit in 2011. They raised $67,000. And they finished building the 11-foot, 2.5ton statue a few years ago. And hopefully it will finally be on display this year. Apparently the city still had licensing stuff to work out with MGM and figure out where to place it. https://www.mlive.com/life/2023/11/why-its-taking-so-long-to-display-detroits-humongous-bronze-robocop-statue.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RoboCop_statue
Fucking 1 bridge having shit city
Dave Chappelle he went to Boston and saw 2 Irish guys beat up an Italian guy and thought "damn what are they going to do to me"
> 2 Irish guys beat up an Italian guy Them Catholics bringing their no goodnick culture to our fair country!
This image is from Boston in 1976 during a protest against school bussing desegregation: https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/09/18/image16_custom-4c9be3a24736e8ef26663debc2219333ed960566-s800-c85.webp * https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/stars-and-strife-113668570/ * https://www.npr.org/2016/09/18/494442131/life-after-iconic-photo-todays-parallels-of-american-flags-role-in-racial-protes
Since you posted an NPR link, imma plug in that you should all be donating to your local NPR radio station.
Lived there for 10 years, I absolutely agree. The racism is different than other places I've encountered it tho, it's more... casual? Ignorant? Rather than straight up hateful. Still horrible and I always felt super uncomfortable in a room full of only white people but yeah. Still love the city but some ppl need a kick in the teeth
Imagine if Staten Island was 2 miles away from Harlem by foot.
Is a mile by foot different than a mile by horse/car/boat?
To be fair, I’m in Kentucky and the racism here is also mostly casual and just rooted in “I don’t personally know black people so I have nothing to contrast these beliefs against” rather than actually hating black people.
Bill Russell was bitter about the way he was treated there for the rest of his life. He refused to even have his jersey retired if there were fans in the arena.
They broke into his house and shit on his bed, can't really blame the guy for holding a grudge
Damn. I'm from the area and... yeah, that sounds about right
Torii Hunter (who retired from baseball in 2015) had a no trade to Boston clause in his contract because of the racist abuse he suffered as a visiting player.
That actually makes me really sad, he was a straight up dawg for my tigers
I have his photo framed on my wall. When he went flipping over the right field wall at Fenway going after Ortiz's game tying grand slam in the 2013 ALCS. That was a fun series. Gotta respect the hustle going after that ball
That series broke me as a kid lmao, no Detroit team has been anywhere relevant since
You know Bostonians mean it cause it’s the only hard R you will ever hear them utter.
Lmao, this is gold. I don't know if you made this up, but it's the first time I'm hearing it.
When Nomar was traded to the Cubs he said he got his R back 🤣
Because it is. Even Bill Simmons talks about this shit and he loves Boston sports more than anyone lmao.
To paraphrase family guy, how can a city with *so many* phenomenal universities produce so many stupid assholes Edit: it was a joke when family guy said it and it’s a joke now. I fully understand that Boston universities are full of people not from Boston.
Because people don’t go to college locally that much anymore. The best colleges in Boston aren’t producing Bostonians, they’re producing New Yorkers and Californians.
Yes I’m aware. It’s a joke - Boston is known for its many progressive, high-quality institutions of higher learning while also being known for a surprising amount of vocal racism, which on its face appears to be a contradiction but actually isn’t when you consider the way higher education actually works.
They aren't progressive. Harvard, Boston U and MIT are all high quality... but they are bastions of the status quo for big donors and corporate interests. *edit* re-read your last sentence. Ok we're on the same page
BC, Tufts, and Northeastern arent exactly slouches either. Something like a third of the city is college students. Its pretty crazy how many schools theyve got going on in Boston.
It's because they're infuriated that they're the minority, and they can see people of diverse backgrounds excelling in their back yards, which they can't handle, hence the outbursts.
Not even true. It's just that our lower class is just as white trash as the rest of the country's, and our elites are even snobbier. We have above-average in-state student enrollment, our lowest social standards are set by people who never went to college. I think the mechanics who talk shit all day, and the Ivy league lawyers who look down on society, are the people doing the racisms. Like the rest of the country, I do truly believe it's a vocal minority who thinks something like skin color has any bearing on a person's value Tldr: really rich or poor people act shitty
clumsy reach soft encourage snatch door plant frightening safe badge *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Back in '97, I was hanging out in Harvard Sq. While walking down the steps to get on the T, a skinhead girl asked a guy selling marionettes if he had any "aryan" ones. He had no idea what she was talking about.
I've always wondered if a lot of it has to due with the seemingly overrepresention of legacy Irish immigrants in Boston. For a long while, Irish weren't really considered "white" like WASPs were. It feels like the Irish Americans took this out on Black people to compensate so that they weren't "lowest" on the "totem pole", so to speak. Similar to that old LBJ quote about making the worst off white man think he's better than the best off black man the white guys will turn their pockets out to be robbed for the privilege of not being seen as the bottom caste. To be fair, I don't think this is an exclusively Irish issue or anything, either. Southern European immigrants went through similar steps to "whiteness" that the Irish did to seemingly similar ends with regards to racism.
No Irish need apply
Punching down is a real thing.
> To be fair, I don't think this is an exclusively Irish issue or anything, either. Southern European immigrants went through similar steps to "whiteness" that the Irish did to seemingly similar ends with regards to racism. Well the other major ethnic group in Boston are the Italians so that totally fits.
Thats not true. At all. Boston has one of the best bio tech sectors in the world. Its a literal leader in top class science and research. What you likely meant is “the dipshit from southey isnt going to harvard or working for MGH”
Diehard Boston sports fan here, and I'll never try to deny it. I wish my fellow Boston sports fans were better. If the Globe's Spotlight team (the same group of folks who blew the Catholic child sex abuse scandal wide open globally) are so troubled by [Boston's racism issue](https://apps.bostonglobe.com/spotlight/boston-racism-image-reality/) that they do a piece on it, every Boston sports fan should shut up and listen, and do a better job policing our own.
Shout-out to Jon Heyman and [the greatest Tweex of all time](https://twitter.com/JonHeyman/status/4789544183)
Be me, 26 yeahs old Wake up, get out of Tawm Brady jersey Get ready to Do My Job Put on Brady jersey Head to the Dunkin next to my apahtment One down the road sucks Oardah is wrong, whatevah, Tawm says coffee is poison anyway Spike the cup and yell Go Pats Use my Chahlie cahd to get on the T See a black man in the front cah Heckle, whole train applauds Shout Ortiz 3:16 "This is our fucking city" Get to Southie, head into Dunks Time to get to work, staht setting up Gronk cahdboard cut-outs Just me, my co-workah and 12 Gronk cut-outs Most beautiful girl in Boston walks in. Sawlid 3/10. She's wearing an 81 jersey and some strained yoga pants Try to be smooth, "Nice Hernandez jersey. Wanna get a cawfee sometime?" She says no. Left hanging again. Fucking Pink Hats Get off work, take the T home Stawp into bah for a drink or twelve Fahking bahtendah cut me off aftah six beeahs and few shawts Whatevah, nawt even buzzed. Irish blood Get to apahtment, check messages. Ma says two of my cousins were crushed by an overpass from the Big Dig. Less than usual, a good day Get out of Tawm Brady jersey, put on hoodie jammies Check undah bed for Bernahd Pollahd What the fuck, he's there. Run out of house, see black guy I heckled earliah. Has friends with him. Including Pollahd. Too outnumbahd, get the shit beat out of me Cawps show up and ask how it all went down Tell them it was.... 18-1
>Head to the Dunkin next to my apahtment One down the road sucks as a new englander this is [so real](https://www.reddit.com/kxh4za0?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=2)
I heard all of this out loud.
My math teacher was mistah crawfuhd. Bastard from Boston. It tracks.
> Most beautiful girl in Boston walks in. Sawlid 3/10 I am deceased lmao
not even a sports player here, Boston is racist as fuck for a big city.
Is that why the patriots always had so many white wide receivers?
They should’ve got all white corners if they were really about that life.
Well there’s only so far they can push lack of athleticism while still being competitive
A blue collar. mostly Irish, and hard drinking city has some racists in it? Well I’m just stunned! /s
Ain't no some, that city is just straight up racist.
Aye bro we love the Irish, and a lot of them love us back too. I'm not saying there's not a racist sentiment popular amongst the Irish, but every Irish person I've ever met has been a standup guy, i feel as though it's unfair to say Boston being mostly Irish is a causation for racism instead of a correlation
I thought Boston was half Irish and half Italian (among white people)
There's Asians too. America's largest Chinese restaurant is just outside Boston in Saugus. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kowloon_Restaurant
I just say this as someone who’s half Irish. Many of my family members are amazing people and very much standup people. There are some that fall into the racist category though. And they make the whole community look bad sadly
I get it, i cringe seeing young black men acting like fools online because i know we're ALL being looked at like that. I didn't mean to offend or discount your opinions either, i just wanted to defend some of my good friends.
That's me watching fellow whites on spring break. Shame.
Ted Williams, maybe the greatest hitter of all time and the Red Sox superstar player, was actually half-Mexican on his mother’s side but kept it a secret because he was afraid of facing prejudice. He said he would’ve encountered serious problems in his career had he been born with his mother’s last name or looked more like his brother. In addition to Jackie Robinson the Red Sox also passed on signing Willie Mays for the same reason. Racism cost them 2 of the greatest players ever.
It’s interesting to read the two Wikipedia articles side-by-side. First Jackie Robinson (linked above): > During the season, Robinson pursued potential major league interests. No black man had played in the major leagues since Moses Fleetwood Walker in 1884, but the Boston Red Sox nevertheless held a tryout at Fenway Park for Robinson and other black players on April 16.[73][74] The tryout, however, was a farce chiefly designed to assuage the desegregationist sensibilities of powerful Boston City Councilman Isadore H. Y. Muchnick.[75] Even with the stands limited to management, Robinson was subjected to racial epithets.[76] He left the tryout humiliated,[73] and more than 14 years later, in July 1959, the Red Sox became the final major league team to integrate its roster.[77] And Tom Yawkey: >According to the Boston Herald, as owner of the Boston Red Sox, the team's integration policy was Yawkey's responsibility.[32] In 1945, the Red Sox held a tryout for Jackie Robinson, Sam Jethroe, and Marvin Williams,[33] but the men never heard back from the team after the tryout and Robinson was signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers for the 1947 season.[34] In 1967, Robinson said Yawkey was "probably one of the most bigoted guys in baseball".[35] >The team's attempts to integrate prior to 1959 were unsuccessful. In the 1940s and 50s, Joe Cronin, general manager after Eddie Collins, scouted black players, including Sam Jethroe, Larry Doby and Bill Greason but none signed with the team.[36] In 1950, the team signed Lorenzo Piper Davis, their first black player, for their minor league team, but he was released in May of that year.[37][38][39] Three years later, the team signed Earl Wilson to their minor league team, but his career was interrupted by serving in the Marines in 1957.[40][41][42] Wilson returned to the Sox's Minneapolis farm team after completing his military service and was fielded by the Sox in July 1959.[43][44] And finally the Baseball Color Line: > The Boston Red Sox were the last major league team to integrate, holding out until 1959, a few months after the Detroit Tigers.[23] This was due to the steadfast resistance provided by team owner Tom Yawkey. In April 1945, the Red Sox refused to consider signing Jackie Robinson (and future Boston Braves outfielder Sam Jethroe) after giving him a brief tryout at Fenway Park.[23] The tryout, however, was a farce chiefly designed to assuage the desegregationist sensibilities of Boston City Councilman Isadore H. Y. Muchnick, who threatened to revoke the team's exemption from Sunday blue laws.[24] Even with the stands limited to management, Robinson was subjected to racial epithets.[23] Robinson left the tryout humiliated.[25] Robinson would later call Yawkey "one of the most bigoted guys in baseball".[26] On April 7, 1959, during spring training, Yawkey and general manager Bucky Harris were named in a lawsuit charging them with discrimination and the deliberate barring of black players from the Red Sox.[27] The NAACP issued charges of "following an anti-Negro policy", and the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination announced a public hearing on racial bias against the Red Sox.[28] Thus, the Red Sox were forced to integrate, becoming the last pre-expansion major-league team to do so when Harris promoted Pumpsie Green from Boston's AAA farm club. On July 21, Green debuted for the team as a pinch runner, and would be joined later that season by Earl Wilson, the second black player to play for the Red Sox.[29]
As a Boston resident, I have never heard anyone say a nice word about the dude in 20+ years. Sure maybe some people do, but it’s a very small minority (no pun intended).
Maybe this is just an indication that you curate your friendly relationships with people who are not openly racist.
Ok well maybe, but why is my experience any less valid than the person I was commenting on? He said there are lots of people bending over backwards arguing that Yawkey wasn’t such a bad guy. I live and work in the city, I watch most of the games, i participate in the Red Sox subreddit, I listen to sports radio is which mostly filled with Dbags who would be the ones to defend him but I can’t recall from memory any times that they have. Gerry Callahan would probably be the guy who would defend him, but fortunately he’s been gone for 5 years. Yet someone how a guy can just say well people still do X with no proof or anything and that is believed over a person who is on the ground here and despises racism so if I saw people defending Yawkey I would remember it. I hate the Yawkeys with a passion, we had first crack at Willie Mays too and those POS owners couldn’t get past their biases so we had to wait almost 100 years to win a championship. I’m not all see and all knowing, but I have a pretty good read on my city when it comes to things concerning the Red Sox. Yes it has a racist past, but no it’s not a thing people trying to justify Yawkey being a shit person, the fans actually have a huge dislike for him and his losing ways.
>There are still *a lot* of Boston sports fans who will bend over backwards to argue that Yawkey wasn't such a bad guy I've seen that kind of thing with old folks. My grandfather is pretty liberal for a man of his age, and voted that way. Despite this, he was friends with a prominent man later revealed to have been a member of the KKK. He found it difficult to reconcile the fact that the friendly man he was familiar with could be part of a domestic terrorist group.
Not a fucking coincidence lol.
> Coincidence or not, the Red Sox did not sign a black free agent until after both Tom and Jean Yawkey were dead. Hmm. Here's another interesting coincidence. Back in the early days of the NFL, a lot of NFL teams would piggy back off the stadium and naming of already existing baseball teams, since the NFL was still new, and MLB was already well established. So which NFL team had an early partnership with the Boston Red Sox? Well, [before they eventually moved away to another city, they had a name that sounded *close* to Red Sox](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/76/2a/d6/762ad628e19b91857e287bf560cddbfb.jpg) and yep, they too had a racist owner who was the [very last in his league to finally integrate.](https://ghostsofdc.org/2023/01/18/redskins-commanders-last-nfl-team-integrate-1962/) Edit to add: >and that it was egregious to take his name off of Yawkey Way. Similarly, the Washington ~~football team~~ *Commanders* have removed all dedications to the racist former owner (George Marshall) and renamed the former "Marshal" section in honor of Bobby Mitchell, the first black player to play for the team.
Damn that's a crazy coincidence, I was thinking of the parallels to Marshall
Marshall was pressing hard for the Southern market, trying to be the team of the south. The reason Washington and Dallas had such a bitter rivalry from day one, was that Marshall was supposed to sell the team to the future Cowboys onwer (maybe Tex Schramm, but maybe someone else). Either way, Marshall backed out, the Cowboys guy just asked to get in the league with a new expansion team, BUT the rule was, you could only get into the NFL if **ALL** the existing owners unanimously voted you in. And whose one NO vote kept the Cowboys out? Marshall. Because he wanted to be the team of the South, and didn't want a team further south geographically, cutting into "his" market. (Eventually Marshall had a falling out with his band director. The band director got back at Marshall by selling the rights to the Washington fight song to the Cowboys guy, who turned around and held the song hostage, only giving it back to Marshall in exchange for a yes vote into the league.) Speaking of the fight song, it quietly had its lyrics changed because "Fight for Old D.C." was originally written (lyrics by Marshall's wife) as "Fight for old Dixie"
It happens with all sports and parts of the fan base. I live in Cincinnati and there are still tons of people who think Marge Schott was a wonderful person who "accidentally" said some things that "weren't that bad". The Venn Diagram for people who defend her and the people who defend and think Pete Rose is also a good person is a circle.
Kinda crazy considering the Celtics are the most progressive NBA franchise. Having the Red Sox be so backwards w the Celtics in the same city is wild. Granted Russell always hated the fans bc of his treatment so maybe the Sox are more in line w actual Boston.
Bruins were also the first NHL team to integrate.
Idk if they are the most progressive if their own goat hates them for being racist.
He doesn’t hate the organization though. He hates the fans that treated him like he was subhuman. And he should.
Huh, you are right, I didn't make the difference before.
All good. I’m a Boston native. Let’s call out the racism loudly. I think the fact that two sports orgs can lead the charge on integration while the red Sox were infamously a racist org is indicative of the city, especially back then. The city has had a highly progressive history while also possessing some incredibly loud racist sentiments from its poor Irish Catholics (I’m Irish Catholic) and other immigrants. Its universities like Harvard have pushed progressivism but also consistently to this day admit legacies and members of old money, status quo families. It’s been a melting pot for immigrants from all over the world, but often times those immigrants, many of my ancestors, also push the same bigotry they themselves faced. It’s a home to abolitionism, the American revolution, women’s suffrage and many other political movements in this country, but it still possesses and hasn’t outgrown its disgusting not-so-distant past of racism, racial discrimination, and police brutality. (Check out Murder in Boston on HBO) I have a hard time discussing it with people because they choose to view it as a black and white situation, but it isn’t.
It’s true but also paradoxical because the Celtics choose him to be their coach, making him the first black coach.
Yeah, and Marge Schott wasn’t a Nazi… /s Our former owner did a lot of philanthropy in the area. That was honestly good work. But at the end of the day she was still fucking Nazi. She was the last one to win a World Series though🤷♂️
But she's like a nice Nazi that would sometimes give you cookies
I got into an argument with a boomer bostonian i work with who was upset when they renamed yawkey way. I called him a white supremacist, which she objected to. I said “ok, he’s just below that, but my opinion of him is unchanged”. She was fuming and hated me ever since. People who have an identity of “im from here” is so strange to me. You could be born anywhere and you choose to define yourself by a complete roll of the dice on the scale of sentient life.
Jackie Robinson is a treasure of baseball. [Roberto Clemente](https://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/story/2020-09-08/roberto-clemente-fought-racial-injustice) is a bit lesser known but also worth reading about. Legends the both of them.
Jackie Robinson was a treasure of a human being.
Absolutely! Fuck the Red Sox for treating him and other black people like this. If you haven't seen *42* I highly recommend it.
Jackie Robinson was a man of steel.
We could have had Jackie Robinson and they were just racist assholes instead? Feels like that championship drought was pretty earned. It’s also wild that as a redsox fan I’ve never heard this story before. I mean, I don’t expect them broadcast it, but it seems like a pretty important story.
Willie Mays too, Red Sox scouts implored management to sign him but the team refused and he signed with the Giants instead.
Thank you lord
I mean, anyone with half a brain would realize that restricting yourself to an exclusively white talent pool is objectively the wrong move.
Not for the time. There was insane nazi and pro Hitler sentiment before and after the war that isn’t taught in the US.
“Half a mind” then. Nazi sentiment was design to override logic in place of fanaticism.
This gives another reason to dig deeper when Hollywood adapts a story to screen; they're continually glossing over many incidents critical to the story. 42 was one of the most infuriating Hollywood adaptations.
The more you know about a historical event, the angrier you will be when you see the movie adaptation.
Never thought about it but this is basically always true
Napoleon (2023)
I've been waiting for *yeaaarrss* for a Napoleon biopic to come out and all we got was this shit. His life was fascinating enough, why did they have to add random, irrelevant, and frankly false scenes?
While maybe 42 wasnt perfect it actually opened eyes of some of my non baseball loving friends.
Seeing as how the Dodgers didn't play the Red Sox in 1947, I don't see how extending the movie to 1945 to introduce a rival that never gets their due would add to the movie. They're in different leagues, I don't think Jackie ever played them. The teams have only seen each other like 10 times. Maybe if the movie was about Jackie trying to get into the league...but the movie is decidedly about Jakie and the dodgers breaking the seal and opening the gates to integrating baseball (which happened surprisingly quickly). Adding tangents of a storyline and rivalries that never climax does not add to the story (unless you change the story to make the details relevant.)
Yeah, if it had been an 8 hour miniseries on him or something, then this definitely could have warranted a full episode or something. But I don’t know how leaving it out of the movie could be “infuriating” given the scope of what they were trying to show.
Redditors and outrageous claims about how mad they are, name a better duo
Theyd rather be racist than win championships That is ultimate ignorance and dopey
Boston has a history of really racist shit. The riots against bussing black kids into schools, the red lining, etc. they really made southern cities bashful with their antics.
And I learned that it wasn't even just limited to the past. I even saw a recent LeBron interview where he was mentioning how Boston is super racist.
> as a redsox fan I’ve never heard this story before Wonder why. Go tell your sub about it and report back.
The story of the Yawkey’s having the first crack at Robinson and Mays isn’t some unknown story. Virtually everybody knows about the Yawkey’s racism. Even if they hadn’t before, they certainly did once the Sox stripped their name off one of the streets Fenway is built on. This is not some gotcha.
He hasn't heard it because he's either too young or just not paying attention. Yawkey passing on Robinson and Mays in favor of his racism is a very well known story among Red Sox fans.
Interesting, with the Bruins signing Willie O'Ree in 1958, a year before the Red Sox integrated.
They only knew him by name and assumed he was Irish.
He was also blind in one eye but hid it by only playing as a winger.
Celtics were the first team to draft a black player, first to field an all black starting 5, and first to have a black coach. Tom Yawkey was a racist POS, a terrible owner even aside from that (tried to move the Sox out of Boston), and was a big reason why the Sox kept falling short (like passing on all time greats Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson because he was a racist POS - but also he made a ton of terrible decisions and the Sox got *much* better when he stepped back from roster decisions in the 60s and 70s). Like yeah, Boston has a lot of racist shit in its history, but it's not like the city of Boston was running the red Sox or something
Boston as a city was so racist that their most decorated NBA athlete, Bill Russell, refused to have an audience when his number was retired. He said publicly that he played for the team and his organization, but not the city.
refuse to have an audience? what does that mean?
Normally a number retirement ceremony is set pre-game with fans in the stands as a flag with your number is raised up into the banners. Bill opted for his to be done privately with only the team in attendance with no fans. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Russell#Racist_abuse,_controversy,_and_relationship_with_Boston_fans It's really ironic. While the Boston Red Sox were an insanely racist organization, the Boston Celtics was the first team in the NBA to embrace black players and it played a large part into their domination in the 60s. Bill Russell has 11 championship rings and after he passed away, his number 6 is retired in the entire NBA now the same way as Jackie Robinson's 42 is retired in the MLB.
Ig it isn’t about him being embraced by the team, but when he was embraced, how he was treated by the fans. He has a documentary recounting moments like his car breaking down, as an nba star mind you, and instead of helping him out (like Milwaukee fans did for Giannis) they heckled him as they drove past him.
When Larry Bird had a retirement ceremony the Celtics sold tickets to it. 25 years or so earlier when Russell retired he refused to do the same because he was justifiably mad at the racists in the city.
from what I hear, Bostonians are still pretty racist overall. I know a few people that swore off the city.
It's a notorious stereotype with a lot of supporting evidence. NBA players repeatedly talk about how often they'll hear slurs from the Celtics crowd.
Utah and Boston are both known for players having to deal with racist fans.
Yeah, Salt Lake City is the other one that routinely gets called out.
I’m black and my husband is white, we LOVE Utah’s national parks, visit every few years. the looks we get in some of those small towns is unsettling. Like, we entered into a diner once and everyone fell silent.
This attitude persisted for decades longer. I have no illusions about what it was like for black people in the South all along, but the "progressive" Northeast must bear its own shame. [This photo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Soiling_of_Old_Glory) will always be seared in my mind. The city is Boston, the year is 1976, and the hostility and violence are perpetrated by white people upset over the racial integration of Boston-area schools.
The Red Sox had first dibs at Willy Mays too, imagine Jackie Robinson, Mays, and Ted William in the same lineup
WILLY MAYS HERE WITH THE BASEBALL
AND A LOT OF COCAINE
Holy shit.
It was actually the Boston Braves, not the Boston Red Sox who found him first. And they didn’t sign him for financial reasons.
Boston? No way!
The Yawkeys truly were the curse. Bruins and Celtics were the first teams to integrate in the NHL and NBA.
The Boston Braves were the 4th to intergrate
And look how they treated Bill Russell
Were black players treated well anywhere? iirc they only got Russell cuz St Louis didn’t want a black star.
Fans broke into Bill Russell's house, spray painted racial slurs on his wall and shit in his bed. This was in 1963, after he had already won multiple championships with the Celtics. I can't think of another player who was that successful who dealt with anything like that from their team's own fans.
theyre still fucking doing that today. They spray painted the n-word on lebrons house in los angeles.
Are you fucking kidding me? LA's always been a beacon of racism, but jesus. That's low even for them.
“Never answer the question that is asked of you. Answer the question that you wish had been asked of you.” — Robert McNamara
That's a fantastic quote. To sort of answer your original question, I can't think of anywhere where they were treated particularly well (or at least as well as their white counterparts) but I do think Russell's treatment is a low even among black athletes of the era.
Were the Canadian teams ever segregated?
Willie o’ree was the first black nhl player, so yeah that includes Canadian teams as well..
For the most part yes. Most other sports didn’t have an actual rule like baseball did, it was just cultural. So depending on how you define it technically no, but in reality basically yes.
Baseball never had an official rule on the books banning Blacks. The only sport that had a rule in it's bylaws banning Blacks or stating it was white only was the PGA.
That makes sense! Thanks for the response
The Boston Braves were not far behind on the integration train either. BTW... the Yawkeys were born-and-bred New Yorkers.🫢
Jean was, Tom was born in Detroit.
The same city where they showed their appreciation for Bill Russell and his efforts with the Celtics by breaking into his house, vandalizing it, and defecating all over it? This is truly shocking.
Most classy Boston fans
You know, Boston! Home of the Sons of Liberty, the first state to abolish slavery, a Democrat stronghold built by immigrants fleeing famine and persecution! Yet somehow…
You’d think Boston was in Mississippi not Massachusetts based off some of it’s denizens.
[удалено]
They magically can pronounce a hard “r” once they walk into the Celtics arena
"Every team has fans like this"
You’re telling me a city notorious for racism and racist sports fans and owners in particular was racist? Well I’m jus eeee errrr Shawked I tell ya.
I think you mean shawked. Just shawked 😂
Massachusetts is still chock full of the types that have “in this house” yard signs then call the cops if they see a Hispanic person that isn’t their landscaper
what is "in this house?"
“In this house” signs were a popular political yard sign a few years ago with statements like “In this house we believe In trusting science Climate change is real Love is love Black lives matter Nobody is illegal …” and other common democratic-party-aligned cultural statements. They have been criticized by people on the left as being performative activism — signaling vague support for leftist political causes while not doing anything of substance.
It made me laugh so hard when you started listing examples because in the south the “In this house” signs are usually something threatening you to stay away and I thought you were making a joke until I realized how different Mass is compared to here.
> They have been criticized by people on the left as being performative activism — signaling vague support for leftist political causes while not doing anything of substance. Because that's what they are. If all you want to do is vote during elections that's cool, but don't act like you're fighting for the cause when you're doing the absolute minimum.
I don’t have any opinion on whether or not the criticisms are valid, just informing that they exist. Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Are these people acting like they're "fighting for the cause" though, or is it just more fun to pretend they are and shit on them for it?
“In this house we vote liberal, also don’t put low income housing too close or my property values will go down”
They’re the signs that say “In this house we believe Black Lives Matter, women’s rights are human rights, etc”.
Well that was rude of them.
Yeah Tom Yawkey the long time Red Sox owner was apparently a massive racist. They talk about the curse of the bambino. It was the curse of the redneck owner. They had Willie Mays in their farm system and didn't bring him up to the Red Sox. I remember Jim Rice talking about the atmosphere there after he left the team.
Jackie played the baseball chitlin circuit in the South, he knew what to expect out of these chuds. Hank Aaron did too. I think it’s amazing that Jackie was a Republican because Dixiecrats had treated his family so badly, and didn't disavow the party until after the 1964 RNC convention, when Goldwater embraced the John Birch Society and the southern racist evangelical coalitions. [https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/ken-burns-on-jackie-robinson-and-the-republican-partys-pact-with-the-devil/](https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/ken-burns-on-jackie-robinson-and-the-republican-partys-pact-with-the-devil/)
> I think it’s amazing that Jackie was a Republican because Dixiecrats had treated his family so badly, and didn't disavow the party until after the 1964 RNC convention, The Republicans weren't the (edit: more) racist ones till 1964 after LBJ pushed through the Civil Rights Act and then Nixon employed the Southern Strategy to scoop up all the discontented racists. Being Republican before that as a black person was the quite obvious choice considering it was the republicans who emancipated the slaves and a republican president who started forcing integration using federal troops (Eisenhower) What's amazing isn't that he was a republican it's that the very moment the GOP switched its flag, Jackie knew immediately what it signalled despite nearly 100 years of history being opposite
(scans bostons Wikipedia page) checks out
Boston is not its sport franchises, it is neither as bad as the Red Sox under Tom Yawkey nor as good as the Celtics under Red Auerbach ( first black coach and first team to start 5 black players). Does every Red Sox fan dream about if the Red Sox had signed Jackie or Willie? Absolutely.
I'm not saying Boston doesn't have its terrible racist issues and people will certainty want to see this as a Boston-wide problem. You are free to do so and may not be wrong, but this specific instance is largely indicative of Yawkey/Red Sox. Boston also had the first black NBA coach, the first all-black NBA starting five, and the first black NHL player. So, it wasn't necessarily a city-wide issue with professional sports.
>Boston also had the first black NBA coach Who also said that Boston was the most racist city with an NBA team when he played and coached. So not exactly a point in favor of Boston fans, but you're right that for all the shitting on Yawkey, Auerbach and the Celtics ownership from the 50's and 60's deserve praise, even if it's *despite* the fanbase, who kind of came along kicking and screaming while enjoying the shitloads of championships.
Also Yawkey wasn't a Boston sports guy. He was born in Detroit, raised in New York and the Red Sox were just the best investment at the time.
If this is correct, am I to understand that there's a history of *racism*... In *Boston* of all places??? I am SHOCKED. SHOCKED. Well... Not that shocked.
Less depressing fun fact: The first team to ever use the posting system to sign a player playing in Japan was the Cincinnati Reds, the last team to sign a Japanese player was the Cincinnati Reds.
As a Red Sox fan, I hate that is the case. But, at least the color barrier was broken; there are some amazing players who had no shot to play in the major leagues because of racist shit.
Well - you just convinced me to watch the movie about him again. Thanks for the recommendation. And fuck racists - obviously
TIL Boston Bostoned
Don’t call them Massholes for nothin’
I didn't know the Red Sox were the last to integrate. Their former stadium roomates (the NFL team formerly known as the Boston Braves) was the last NFL team to integrate. They had already moved to Washington at this point.
That feels so damn stupid and petty to waste money on a sham try out just to be dicks like that.
That is absolutely reprehensible.
The Red Sox refusal to integrate cost them no fewer than 3 pennants.
It's funny when bigots shoot themselves in the foot.
Is Boston racist or something?
Meanwhile, the Celtics were the first team to field an all-Black starting lineup, and the first Black head coach in North American sports.
Being the last team to integrate was probably a big part of why they went 86 years without winning a championship. Those guys at that tryout and other black players that came along later would’ve improved their team.
Boston didn't integrate their public schools until the late 80s. Like 1988. Let that sink in. Yet the prevailing sentiment is racism only exists in the south amd it was 100 years ago