Sports Department Was Blind at the Time

Fifty-two years ago today, professional sports changed forever.

Yet on the day it happened, a lot of people were asleep at the switch--the L.A. Times sports department, for example.

It had been known for more than a year that Pasadena’s Jackie Robinson, onetime UCLA multisport athlete and a World War II veteran, was under contract to the Brooklyn Dodgers and would almost certainly be major league baseball’s first black player.

It happened in the Dodgers’ opener with the Boston Braves.

Robinson was a Southern Californian, a 1930s star at Pasadena’s Muir High and later Pasadena Junior College before moving on to UCLA.

A major story for The Times, right?

Here’s where it was: In the fourth paragraph of an Associated Press roundup of opening-day games.

That fourth paragraph said: “Clyde Sukeworth, who was named acting manager after Leo Durocher was suspended for the 1947 season . . . is slated to supervise the festivities at Ebbets Field, where a capacity 33,000 crowd is due to watch the official unveiling of Negro Jackie Robinson as a major leaguer.”

End of item.

And what of Day 2?

In a two-paragraph game story, this was in the second paragraph: “Although he did not get a hit in three official times at bat, Jackie Robinson, first Negro to play in modern big league ball, signalized his debut as a Dodger by sprinting home with the deciding run on [Pete] Reiser’s smash, and playing perfect ball at first base.”

End of item.

But not the end of the story.

In his 1990 book, “The Sporting Life,” longtime New York sports publicist Irving Rudd, wrote this about Robinson’s career:

“There isn’t a black athlete, past or present, from Bill Russell to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Willie Mays, who shouldn’t bless the name of Jack Roosevelt Robinson every night before he goes to bed--or counts his millions.”

Also on this date: In 1905, Fullerton High’s baseball team played Santa Ana to a 15-inning scoreless tie, the game called because of darkness. Fullerton’s pitcher that day was Walter Johnson--yes, that Walter Johnson--and he gave up seven hits, four walks--and struck out 27. . . . In 1958, the Los Angeles Dodgers played their first regular-season game and lost at San Francisco, 8-0. . . . In 1910, President William Howard Taft began the tradition of presidents throwing out the first ball to start the major league season.