Jackie Robinson

From Wiki Gonzalez

Jackie Robinson was a famous infielder with the Brooklyn Dodgers of the 1940s and 1950s, and in the Negro Leagues before then.

Robinson is best known for reintegrating Major League Baseball in 1947, as its first African-American ballplayer since the days of Cap Anson.

Robinson was a multi-sport athlete at UCLA, but decided to concentrate on baseball. Most sources credit his personality and character as the reason Dodgers GM Branch Rickey selected him out of the Negro Leagues as the black ballplayer who would break MLB's color barrier.

Many books and documentaries have thoroughly documented Robinson's role and that of Rickey in integration of an all-white institution in the face of persistent racism. Perhaps the best historical research on Robinson and his times has been produced by Jules Tygiel.

Robinson came to be universally respected inside and outside the game for his personal qualities. In the late 1990s, around the 50th anniversary of his debut, MLB ordered that his number 42 be retired by all major league teams; those players who were currently wearing 42 were allowed to wear it until they retired.

Even if Robinson weren't in the Baseball Hall of Fame for his pioneer status, his statistical and historical record as a player would be more than Hall-worthy by the Keltner Test.

[edit] References

• Jackie Robinson on baseball-reference.com