Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Follow TVOvols on Twitter
Welcome to TheVolunteerOnline. The Volunteer Online is a place where UT fans cross paths to discuss sports and life's other matters. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.

Fill out the registration as instructed. Go to your email, where a message will be sent to you. Click on that link to activate your membership and posting options.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
What Ever Happened To The White Athlete?
Topic Started: Jan 13 2014, 01:20 PM (253 Views)
*TennesseeTuxedo
Member Avatar
Administrator

This article is one of the 2-3 SI columns that have stuck in my mind over the years in my lifetime.

Take time to tread it. It is well worth your time.

Posted Image

What Ever Happened To The White Athlete?
Quote:
 
Whites have in some respects become sports' second-class citizens. In a surreal inversion of Robinson's era, white athletes are frequently the ones now tagged by the stereotypes of skin color. The twist: Whites themselves are doing much of the tagging. They are more and more often choosing sports in which they feel they can still compete—baseball, ice hockey, in-line hockey—thereby perpetuating a cycle. White athletes, outplayed or simply intimidated, stop playing basketball or football; examples of college and pro success by whites become more scarce; the sport loses some of its appeal for the next generation of white kids.

The white athlete is disappearing from sports like basketball and football. Why is that? Rule changes? Game changes?

Whereas in games like college baseball, the majority of the players are white. Why is that?
Quote:
 
All of which leads to a question that's often at the heart of the discussion of race and achievement: Does one group outperform another because of innate ability or outside influences? Is it nature or nurture (page 52)?
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
LonzoVol


No deep, dark secret here. Physical differences have been noted for years.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*TennesseeTuxedo
Member Avatar
Administrator

I can tell you that a lot of white mothers and fathers have kept their kids from playing football because of the risks involved in playing. On the other hand, the black kids see football as a way out of ghetto or their current environment.

Look at the rule changes that have been implemented in football- the targeting rule. In basketball, they are eliminating the hand check.

IMO those two rules in different sports have leveled the playing field to a point in regards to how the game is played. Without being racists, the influx of black players into the league has definitely elevated the athleticism in the game, but it has also elevated the lawlessness of the play as well.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*OrangeRev
Member Avatar
Tree hug'n, bleed'n heart, lazy luv'n, global warm'n token liberal

It has to do with poverty ... baseball isn't so much white, but latino-white.

White's are still well represented in wealthy sports such as golf, polo, skiiing, etc.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
LonzoVol


You won't see many blacks in the upcoming winter Olympics. There is a still a place for great white athletes, just not in football and basketball. If you want me to be brutally honest here, well, back about 150 or so years ago, the biggest, finest black female was bred to the biggest, strongest black male. Those genes are still very alive and well in the South.
Oh, and speaking of Latinos, how ya like Ms. Daisy Fuentes?
Edited by LonzoVol, Jan 13 2014, 05:13 PM.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
el diablo
Awesome
[ * ]
OrangeRev
Jan 13 2014, 05:06 PM
It has to do with poverty ... baseball isn't so much white, but latino-white.

White's are still well represented in wealthy sports such as golf, polo, skiiing, etc.
Economics is the key. Poor kids use sports to better themselves. Rich/middle class kids are inside with their play stations and cell phone texting. They have other options.

Clyde Frazier had a vacation home in the Bahamas where he would go in the Summer to rest and then to run/work out. He would always take his son. Frazier said he ran the beaches early every morning. Sometimes his son got, sometimes he didn't. Clyde had 1 option, basketball, out of poverty. His son had several.

When Joe Dimaggio was asked what was the key to being a baseball player he said, "Baseball will always be a poor man's sport." That is true today as it was back then.

How many pro sports players have a parent that makes more money than they do? Very few if any.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*OrangeRev
Member Avatar
Tree hug'n, bleed'n heart, lazy luv'n, global warm'n token liberal

el diablo
Jan 14 2014, 10:41 AM
Economics is the key. Poor kids use sports to better themselves. Rich/middle class kids are inside with their play stations and cell phone texting. They have other options.
You haven't been hanging around too many poor kids ... they can be well immersed in poverty and still have an iPhone and X-Box.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*Zippy
Member Avatar
Burning Man, 2009 FOREVER

The poorest kids in the country have a very high standard of living insofar as electronic do-dads are concerned. Gaming consoles, smart phones, etc...

But it's still a different culture, and the point stands. Poorer black kids are more likely to be involved in football and basketball, regardless of whether or not they are physically more gifted for the sports than white kids.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Tnphil


I can carry you in a lot of places around here in 95 July heat and you'll see black kids playing basketball. You won't see one white kid however.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
LonzoVol


Well, guess what. This thread has been up a couple of days. I was just watching the Wisconsin, Indiana basketball game. The Badgers are undefeated and about two minutes ago, they had five white boys on the floor at one time. :smh:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Tnphil


You see a lot of white football players in the Big 10 too.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*TennesseeTuxedo
Member Avatar
Administrator

LonzoVol
Jan 14 2014, 07:32 PM
Well, guess what. This thread has been up a couple of days. I was just watching the Wisconsin, Indiana basketball game. The Badgers are undefeated and about two minutes ago, they had five white boys on the floor at one time. :smh:
There are plenty of great white athletes. Their parents choose sports for them that are not as violent and sports that people from higher socioeconomic backgrounds gravitate to.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
el diablo
Awesome
[ * ]
OrangeRev
Jan 14 2014, 02:16 PM
el diablo
Jan 14 2014, 10:41 AM
Economics is the key. Poor kids use sports to better themselves. Rich/middle class kids are inside with their play stations and cell phone texting. They have other options.
You haven't been hanging around too many poor kids ... they can be well immersed in poverty and still have an iPhone and X-Box.
See Phil's post about the 95 degree heat. My HS had a TB (black kid) that would play basketball all day at the park in between 2 day Aug practices while the rest of the team tried to recover in the AC in between practices.

I have a father that grew up dirt poor. His older brother went to UTMartin on an athletic scholly and played OT with a gimp leg (polio). Dad had a scholarship to play football at UT then Murray State after he blew his knee out. His younger brother played basketball at Louisville on scholly. This was their only way out of poverty.

Black kids in basketball and football, Hispanic kids in baseball, see sports as their way out of poverty. They may have some of the same toys as middle/upper class kids, but they have time to play ball.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
*TennesseeTuxedo
Member Avatar
Administrator

Richard Sherman of the Seattle Seahawks gave an example of why parents don't want their kids exposed to gangster attitudes and it's culture.

Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
BJVOL III
Awesome
[ * ]
Boxing has quite a few white boxers Who have made it good.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
Go to Next Page
« Previous Topic · Neyland Stadium · Next Topic »
Add Reply