Legends honor LA's 'huge' baseball past, look to its future

LOS ANGELES -- Southern California has long been a hotbed for baseball talent. More players -- and more Hall of Famers -- have roots in the greater Los Angeles area than anywhere else in the world.

An impressive collection of that talent gathered on Sunday for a panel, titled “Los Angeles MLB Legends,” at PLAY BALL Park’s All-Star Clubhouse, located at the Los Angeles Convention Center. Participants were seven-time All-Star outfielder Reggie Smith; two-time All-Star outfielder Eric Davis; former catcher/outfielder Darrell Miller, now the director of the MLB Youth Academy in Compton; and retired umpire Kerwin Danley, who was the first full-time Black crew chief in AL/NL history. The discussion was moderated by Tyrone Brooks, senior director of MLB’s Front Office and Field Staff Diversity Pipeline Program.

“The history of baseball in this city is huge,” said Davis. “And it's a point to where it's time for us to start to get recognized of the value and the talent that we gave to the sport just in this city.”

The panelists took turns sharing their histories growing up in and around Los Angeles, detailing their paths to the Majors, telling stories from their careers and sharing their thoughts on the state of the modern game. There was a particular reverence shown for Smith, whom Davis described as a “pioneer” that players like himself looked up to growing up.

Above all, the theme of the day was the importance of accessibility to baseball amongst youth of all backgrounds and income levels, in all parts of the country.

“The bottom line is, baseball has gotten pretty expensive to play,” said Smith. “In baseball, you’ve got to have a bat, you’ve got to have a helmet, got to have a glove, got to have shoes. Well, in my day, the coaches provided bats and helmets and everything for you. And you just had to have a pair of shoes.”

Danley, who umpired in the Majors from 1992-2021, offered a reminder that there are plenty of appealing options for jobs in baseball beyond just playing.

“It's been a godsend for me,” Danley said of umpiring. “It's kept me on the straight and narrow. It taught me intestinal fortitude. It taught me to never get rocked. It taught me that you have to have more than one egg in your basket. … Everybody's not gonna make it, but there's a lot of opportunities in Major League Baseball.”

There was a particular emphasis on Black participation in baseball, as the number of Black Major Leaguers has waned significantly in recent years. Progress is being made on that front, though. Programs like those provided at MLB’s Youth Academies across the country have gone a long way towards making baseball instruction more available to more children.

Increased involvement from the MLB Players Association as well as the MLB Players Alumni Association will also make a big difference, according to Miller.

“Former players having access to financial support to be able to build programs in their communities is going to be a major piece of how we move forward and everyone gets a chance to play baseball for free in the United States,” said Miller. “To me, if we can do that, you're going to see some things change very quickly. A lot of people that don't have access to this sport will now have access.”

While there’s still a long way to go and a lot of work to be done, some of the impact of these longstanding efforts is starting to become noticeable. A few hours after the panel, just down the road from the Convention Center, the 2022 MLB Draft got underway at L.A. Live. There, four of the first five Draft picks were Black players, something that’s never happened before.

“Knowing the more success we have, the more the kids want to play, the cooler the sport becomes,” said Davis. “… So hopefully, there's a lot of success in this Draft, and then that'll move into more and more opportunities for Blacks and Latinos and everybody else to get an opportunity to play this great game we love.”