February 15, 2026
Dear editor;
It only takes a warm day or two in February for me to eagerly anticipate baseball’s opening day and the forth coming season. Memories of past seasons, both as a player and as a fan, shared with friends, teammates, and family, stoke that enthusiasm in me and millions of others across America and indeed, the world. Regardless of sex, age, or any artificially induced illusion of separation, be it political, religious, or racial, thoughts like these convince me more than ever that as human beings we are far more alike than different.
Baseball had a glorious history for us young ball players. Names like Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, and scores of others were the legends the “old-timers” of our day would reminisce about, with a certain twinkle in their eye.
There were scores of others, equally legendary, but lacking the notoriety because of the color of their skin. We never heard the exploits of William “Rube” Foster, the best pitcher at the turn of the century, because the so-called “gentlemen’s agreement” forbade the contracting of black Americans to play major league baseball, but “notoriety” was only lacking in the mainstream, white press. Soon after his playing days, Rube was instrumental in organizing the Negro National League in 1920. Professional black ball players had a home.
For whatever their rationale, there is a trend among political leaders currently sitting in our highest offices to remove historic symbols they deem unworthy, given their narrow conception of what America is, was, or currently stands for. They also ban books.
Baseball, it has been written, mirrors our society at large. In his book “Invisible Men, Life in Baseball’s Negro Leagues,” Donn Rogosin writes that the term “Negro League Baseball” describes the “big league black teams of segregated America” differentiated from the white majors and the ubiquitous minor league, black independent teams. He writes, “great black baseball players were forced to exhibit their talents behind a rigid color barrier…. Confronted by an intolerant society, the black community built its own sports world.” He writes that the importance of the Negro Leagues transcended the realm of sports, and “in the black community the Negro League was a cultural institution of the first magnitude.”
Sometimes as a society we may take a step or two back from our motto “e pluribus unum” but I am confident that in these not unfamiliar strange times our inherent diversity will win the day. (Especially this time of year!)
For all the boys, girls, women, and men training for the up-coming season, “keep ‘yer head in the game and ‘yer eye on the ball!” Good Luck!
Dave Hoehne, Aurora