Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 12, 1993 TAG: 9301120058
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: DALLAS LENGTH: Medium
JACKSON PRESSURES BASEBALL
The Rev. Jesse Jackson called Monday for baseball owners to establish affirmative action hiring programs and threatened selective boycotts if plans are not in place by Opening Day.Jackson spent the day organizing the Rainbow Commission for Fairness in Athletics. He was scheduled to address baseball owners today at Grapevine, Texas, a speech spurred by alleged racial remarks attributed to Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott.
"The owners are absolutely paralyzed now in how to deal with Marge Schott because they have done or said similar things," Jackson said at a news conference.
Earlier, at a breakfast of business and community leaders, he widened his agenda to the hiring practices of all professional and college sports teams and media.
"If we've simply gone from carrying cotton balls to carrying footballs, basketballs and baseballs, we haven't had fundamental progress," he said.
Jackson claimed there is "an apartheid policy of exclusion" in the hiring practices of teams. "We want to have an affirmative action plan by April 5 of this year or face selective boycotts," he said.
Jackson said that if he calls for boycotts, incoming President Clinton shouldn't throw out the traditional first pitch of the season.
"We would urge the new president, in keeping with his conviction to heal, to tear down walls and build bridges, not to cross our picket lines," Jackson said, flanked by former baseball player Tony Perez and football player Drew Pearson.
Jackson said the commission will ask National League president Bill White and Rachel Robinson, the widow of Jackie Robinson, who broke major-league baseball's color barrier in 1947, to be co-chairs. The commission, which will have a $1 million budget, will seek to have branches in each city with professional teams and will publish statistics on their hiring practices.
Jackson also said the group will publish statistics on hiring at colleges, and make recommendations on which schools athletes should stay away from.
He said recent hirings of minorities by Schott were an attempt to make her past look better.
"You have this furious activity taking place right now because they're trying to do everything to alter their records, which are embarrassing," Jackson said.
He said he spoke Sunday night with NCAA president Dick Schultz about improving minority hiring in the athletic departments of NCAA member schools. Jackson said Schultz told him he could address the NCAA Presidents Commission in April, and Jackson said he would seek to have athletic departments distribute profits to athletes after they graduate.
"These students are essentially the employees of these coaches," Jackson said. "If they do not perform, the coaches will fire them."
Although baseball has two existing programs aimed at inner-city youth, Jackson called for teams and sporting goods companies to fund inner-city youth leagues. He said youths were "better beating a ball than beating someone's head, or stealing a base instead of stealing a car."
Jackson is scheduled to be the lead speaker at today's owners meeting. Approval of the sale of the San Francisco Giants also was anticipated, NL spokeswoman Katy Feeney said.
In other matters:
The restructuring committee met for several hours Monday, and co-chairman Fred Wilpon of the New York Mets said he didn't know if the committee would deliver its report today. The report was due Nov. 1.
Milwaukee Brewers owner Bud Selig, the executive council chairman, made a conflicting statement about whether a search committee for commissioner would be appointed. Selig had said Dec. 9 the search committee would be appointed within a week.