Talk:Delmon Young Suspended 50 Games/@comment-101784-20060510120758

Maybe I should have been more specific. When I refered to "black" players I meant "African-American." Because of your ignorance about the disappearance of African-Americans from baseball. I will inform you. Your "its not the 1960s" quip is right, but for the wrong reason. In the 1960s baseball was integrated and integrating. Now, baseball may be integrated but few african american players are in the league.

This phenomenon is hardly unique to Strong, or the Mariners. Five teams — the Boston Red Sox, Baltimore Orioles, Houston Astros, Atlanta Braves and Colorado Rockies — had no African-American players on their active rosters as of Monday, while several other teams had just one or two.

When Florida&quot;s Dontrelle Willis faced the Los Angeles Dodgers&quot; Edwin Jackson last week, it was a notable occurrence, an extremely rare matchup of African-American starting pitchers — rare because only five are in major-league rotations. And there is not one African-American catcher since Charles Johnson was waived by the Devil Rays in June.

The stark fact is that 58 years after Jackie Robinson integrated baseball, considered by many to be the single most significant event in the history of professional sports, the American-born black baseball player is slowly disappearing from the game.

The numbers tell the story. Since 1975, when 27 percent of major-league players were African-American, the number has steadily declined. A Seattle Times analysis of active rosters, including players on disabled lists, showed that 8.9 percent (79 of 888 players) were African-American.