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Redbirds' Williams looking to connect
02/23/2009 10:00 AM ET
By Danny Wild / MLB.com

Reggie Williams made the four-hour car ride from Memphis to St. Louis many times as a child. It wasn't the Cardinals that sparked his interest in baseball, however. His dad, a former ballplayer, loved to take his son to the park when the Dodgers came to town.

Williams, a Memphis native, went on to play for the Dodgers and Cleveland Indians two decades later. His love of baseball, sparked by the likes of Jackie Robinson, Willie Stargell and Reggie Jackson, keeps him involved today. He's still in Memphis and he's still in the game, but, even he admits, times have changed for African-Americans and the game they helped revolutionize.

"Baseball opened the door to minorities and African-Americans," said Williams, who spent four years in the Major Leagues in the 1980s. "For African-Americans, baseball was really the first sport of our race. When Jackie was playing, African-Americans were playing baseball, they weren't playing football."

Williams, vice president of community relations for the Triple-A Memphis Redbirds, speaks nationally to children about the importance of baseball, not only for African-Americans but all youngsters. He runs the RBI (Returning Baseball to the Inner-city) program in Memphis, an instructional baseball and softball summer program hosted by the Redbirds Baseball Foundation.

"I think baseball needs to be brought back to the kids when they're younger. We need to grow these kids up on the sport," Williams said. "But if you ask the average kid, if you ask them to name an African-American baseball player, the first person they'll say is Barry Bonds, and he's not even playing anymore. Or they'll say Sammy Sosa, and he's Dominican. They don't have anyone to connect to."

Reconnecting baseball and African-Americans has been a struggle both nationally and in Memphis -- Williams suspects many area children have never visited The National Civil Rights Museum, an eye-opening facility just a few blocks from the Redbirds' AutoZone Park. The museum is on the site where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.

Memphis was dealt another blow when Major League Baseball recently opted to move the annual Civil Rights Game from the city and Redbirds organization for 2009. The game, organized by Redbirds general manager Dave Chase, was created to embrace baseball's history of African-American players and generate interest for future black players. The Minor League club hosted the nationally televised event for two years and is now dealing with its loss.

"I'm incredibly disappointed the game moved," Chase said. "I've come to grips with it. But it's something that was given birth to here in Memphis, and MLB thinks it's big enough that a Major League team hosts it. So I do plan on being in Cincinnati when it's played this summer."

The game had been a perfect match for a city that once hosted the Memphis Red Sox, one of the few Negro League teams that had its own stadium. Williams recalls growing up in Memphis, listening to games on the radio and dreaming of making it big.

"I was exposed to it here in Memphis, we had the first radio that was black format in WDIA," Williams said. "They broadcast baseball though the '60s and '70s and I was a benefactor of that. I got exposed to baseball early. During that time, baseball was alive and well. You had so many great heroes -- Chris Chambliss, Joe Morgan, all those players were big at the time. As time rolled on, the sponsorships waned and baseball died out for a while."

The racial landscape of baseball continues to change. Williams is quick to note the shrinking number of African-Americans in the Majors -- the figure was around 8 percent in 2007. It's a problem, something Williams hopes to fix through community work.

"Major League Baseball could do a more pro-active job of getting the more high-profile African-Americans back in the spotlight, like Torii Hunter and Jimmy Rollins, so the kids can identify with them," Williams said. "When I was growing up, the Cardinals were really the team, and that fascinated me -- Bob Gibson, Bill White, Curt Flood -- we identified with them."

Williams, who had 98 hits over four seasons before becoming a teacher and school administrator, now travels to schools and speaks to kids about the importance of African-Americans in baseball history.

"From my perspective, I talk about baseball and the benefits to being exposed to a great part of life through baseball," he said. "Inner-city kids having the opportunity to play -- college baseball paid for my education, it afforded me the opportunity to travel through this country, to other countries. So for me, I try to share that. No. 1, baseball is a great sport as it relates to life and being exposed to the world around you."

Plagued by rainy weather during its two years in Memphis, the Civil Rights Game brought that message to kids in Memphis and across the nation. The game will continue to do that on a larger scale, but it's somewhat heartbreaking for the city that started it.

"We're trying to think of another vehicle to benefit the museum," Chase said. "But we're a long way from coming close."

"I've been there since day one and [the Civil Rights Game] was a proud moment to showcase some elite teams on our level and on the national stage," Williams added. "I think we did a great job and put it on a Major League stage. And with the Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, I would like to see us be a benefactor of whatever emanates from the game."

Chase said the Redbirds already have planned to send their 16 interns on a trip to the museum, but also acknowledged that many Minor Leaguers who play in Memphis don't know the museum exists and aren't aware of the city's civil rights history.

The Redbirds, America's only not-for-profit baseball team, plays an annual game that honors the Negro Leagues and their history in Memphis -- the team dons Memphis Red Sox uniforms, while opponents wear uniforms of the Homestead Grays. Former Memphis Red Sox Joe B. Scott, the first African-American to play at Wrigley Field, is a frequent visitor to the game and AutoZone Park in general.

Williams, who speaks at schools year-round, is hopeful that an interest in baseball can be rekindled among African-American youngsters.

"I think all children in Memphis should go and visit the museum and do some projects on it," he said. "I'm not sure every child has had a chance to go and see it and, to me, that's not good. That's a critical part of history and I think education is a part of that -- someone could be doing a better job of exposing inner-city children to baseball.

"In Memphis, many of the parks are pristine. And in the inner cities, they don't have that. The parks in inner cities are deplorable. But baseball is missing the African-American player. We're trying to return baseball to the inner city so we can get more African-Americans involved and participating."

This story was not subject to the approval of the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues or its clubs.