The Man Who Changed Baseball
Theme of the Week: Restoring Relationships
Steve Riach
Monday, October 13, 2003
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Key Bible Verse: How wonderful it is, how pleasant, when brothers live together in harmony! (Psalm 133:1). Bonus Reading:Psalm 133:1-3
Branch Rickey was an innovating genius. As a baseball general manager, he introduced the farm system, pitching machines, spring training complexes, and the batting helmet. He helped force expansion to the western part of the U.S., and was a cofounder of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
Rickey's desire to racially integrate baseball first came to him as a coach at his alma mater, Ohio Wesleyan College. While the team was traveling to play other college teams, a black player named Charles Thomas was denied a hotel room in South Bend, Indiana. Only when Rickey intervened was he allowed a cot in Rickey's room. As Rickey told it, he later overheard Thomas crying and saw him pulling at his hands, as if he wished he could wipe off his pigmentation.
Rickey spent three years studying what would be necessary to break the color barrier and looking for the player with the right personality profile. He settled on Jackie Robinson.
Before Robinson died, he wrote to Rickey, "I am glad … that I had a small part to do with the success of your efforts, and I must admit, it was your constant guidance that enabled me to do so."
—Steve Riach in Heart of a Champion
My Response: Where could my influence foster equality?
Thought to Apply: There's a world to gain. / But suppose I don't want it, / Why take it? / To remake it.
—Langston Hughes (poet)
Adapted from Heart of a Champion (Broadman & Holman, 2001) by permission.
Copyright © 2003 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
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