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For as long as I can remember, Ive been a Jackie Robinson admirer.

Rather, Major League Baseball was arguably still at the summit of pop culture in that era, where the NFL and Hollywood sit today. Before we knew who Charlie Chaplin was, had talkies, or tossed around a pigskin, Major League Baseball had become Americas pastime. Leisure pursuits come and they go, Hobbs, they come and they go. But the one constant throughout all the years had been baseball.

Therefore, Robinson wasnt just breaking the Major League Baseball color barrier. He was essentially breaking the color barrier.

Robinson was the first four-sport letterman ever at UCLA, one of the most successful collegiate sports programs in history. He served in the army for a country that didnt want to give him the same rights as white soldiers. Faced almost daily with mans inhumanity to man as he embarked on his pro baseball career, Robinson turned the other cheek. He became one of the best examples of public Christ-likeness in the national spotlight in recent memory.

But that doesnt mean he backed down like a coward. Instead, Robinson took his frustration out on the competition and let his play do the talking. He became a perennial all-star, World Series champion, and the first player ever to win both Rookie of the Year and MVP during the course of his career.

In short, Robinson was a real man in every sense of the term.

I own a Jackie Robinson throwback jersey. When the excellent movie 42 came out a few years ago, I made each of our kids see it twice because I wanted them to know what real injustice and real courage look like.

So when ESPN Radio decided to honor the 70th anniversary of Robinsons MLB debut during a show I was listening to Saturday morning, my ears perked up. Surely, I thought, not even the obnoxiously progressive ESPN could blow this one.

Sadly, I thought wrong.

The entire segment consisted of an interview with a white guy bemoaning the lack of black players in MLB these days and then claiming black players in MLB have an obligation to get more black people into the sport, all the while never telling us why; just that its a shame there arent more black players.

Setting aside for a moment that a progressive white guy saying black folks arent doing enough to fight fake racism is pretty much the most progressive ESPN thing ever, it also happens to be anathema to Robinsons legacy.

The reason Robinson was the first black player in MLB isnt because Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige, and others werent good enough. Its because they werent allowed in simply because they were black. The worth of their measure wasnt even considered, because they were instantly disqualified by their pigmentation. Thats institutional racism. Young black athletes voluntarily losing interest in baseball in 2017, for various reasons, is not.

In 1947, baseball was pretty much the one professional team sport in which you could make a life-changing amount of money. The NFL was still a niche. The NBA wasnt even founded until 1946. Hockey was just an original six. Therefore, if you were young, black, and gifted, there werent many opportunities in team sports beyond baseball for upward mobility. Nowadays there are. In fact, baseball is a definite third now, in terms of popularity and branding, behind the NFL and NBA.

Of course, that was never mentioned in the ESPN interview.

Neither was the real reason that its bad for baseball to be losing popularity in the black community. Its less than ideal for 12 percent of the population, which also happens to be one of the demos most invested in sports, to needlessly be losing interest in your sports product. Thats a simple economic reality and a bottom line any business plan in any industry would prefer to avoid.

Of course, that was never mentioned in the ESPN interview, either.

Instead, ESPN lamented the loss of black interest in MLB for the sake of counting people by the color of their skin not the content of their character.

Wasnt the point of what Robinson did to open up opportunities for those with the talent and ability to achieve excellence on their own merits, which were being denied because players were viewed only by their skin color rather than their skill set? Now ESPN is arguing for black players to be in MLB just because theyre black.

ESPN supposedly sought to celebrate Robinsons breaking of the color barrier. Instead, it effectively sought to perpetuate a new one. The networks descent into the mouth of politically correct madness continues.

Steve Deace is broadcast nationally each weeknight on CRTV. He is the author of the book A Nefarious Plot.

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ESPN's white progressives turn Jackie Robinson Day into yet another fake racism day - Conservative Review