Major League Baseball has a problem. Er, actually, Major League Baseball has had a problem—a big one—for a few years now. Unfortunately, the percentage of African-American players who take part in MLB has steadily declined and, as of last season, just 8.3 percent of MLB players were black. The problem has gotten so bad that the Giants won the World Series last year without a single black player on the team.
So why does this problem exist? People have thrown out all kinds of theories. Some believe it's because baseball costs more to play than sports like basketball, while others believe baseball just isn't "cool" enough right now. Chris Rock falls into that second camp and thinks baseball needs to find a way to break out of some of its longstanding traditions in order to attract more black players and, maybe more importantly, more black fans. Otherwise, he thinks baseball itself will see a decline in popularity over time.
In the clip above, Rock breaks down his thoughts on black players in baseball during a seven-minute monologue that he put together for HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel. Some of the language is NSFW, but Rock definitely makes some strong points. Enjoy.
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[via Fox Sports]
