 "Photo: Natasha Sankovich")
On April 15, 1947, the Brooklyn Dodgers did something no professional baseball team had done before.
The Dodgers sent Jackie Robinson, a 28-year-old black man, to play first base in Brooklyn's season opener against Boston.
More than 60 years after the color barrier was broken in baseball, A&M ballplayers Kyle Colligan and Randall Thorpe do not face the same difficulties Robinson faced in the 1940s.
The outfielders, the only black ballplayers on Texas A&M Head Coach Rob Childress' team, do not have to worry about their teammates rebelling, opponents going on strike or restaurant and hotel owners turning them away. Still, 60 years of change has not been easy.
Thorpe, a freshman from Grapevine, Texas, said he played in hostile environments in high school and summer leagues. He said he often heard racial slurs from the stands and opposing coaches and players.
While playing against the Dallas Mustangs, a summer league team, the Mustangs were walking off the field when a player yelled, "No. 14, you're a…," Thorpe said, pausing to indicate a racial slur.
In June 2008, Thorpe was playing for Team Texas at the All-Star Senior Sunbelt Baseball series in Oklahoma when he encountered more racism. Thorpe was at bat against the Oklahoma team when he started jawing with the catcher. He hit a three-run home run and was rounding the bases when the Oklahoma coaches started arguing the home run.
"They were disputing the call because they thought it was a foul ball," Thorpe said. "The coaches went out arguing and the Oklahoma coach says to the umpire, 'look at this kid acting like a" - he paused, again, to avoid saying the slur - "out here, can't let that happen.' I was pretty mad about that."
Though Thorpe could have chosen basketball, a sport he played in his youth, he came from a baseball family. His father, Randy Thorpe, played baseball at the University of Texas-Arlington from 1978 to 1981.
During his career at UTA, he never played with more than five black players in a season.
"He was from New York, so he didn't really know about the common black jokes around the south like chicken and watermelon," Thorpe said. "They said that to him and he didn't really know what they were talking about. He said you just can't listen, you've got to focus in."
Randy Thorpe, who was drafted by the Texas Rangers in the 22nd round in 1981, has the single-season, stolen-base record for the Mavericks with 53 in 1980 and the career record with 151.
Colligan, a senior from Houston, has had different experiences on the baseball field. He said he's never experienced racism when playing.
"I like to play sports with a bunch of different types of guys," Colligan said. "Instead of just one, I like to be around every kind of person. Playing baseball you meet a lot of different guys, a lot of different races, I really don't buy into the race factor that much."
Childress, who has coached Colligan for three seasons, said he has never witnessed Colligan being disrespected because of his race.
"I want to recruit the best players we can get," Childress said. "I don't care what color they are. We want great baseball players and great people. It doesn't matter what their race is to us."
When the A&M baseball season begins Friday, Black History Month will be in its final days.
Thorpe said a month designed to recognize contributions black Americans have made is meaningful. "There are a lot of great things that we have done in the past and are doing now," he said. "There are a lot of great inventions that we have done that not many people know about."
But baseball, a sport that once boasted that 1-in-4 ballplayers were black in 1984, no longer stands as a bastion of race relations.
In 2006, the percentage of black players on MLB rosters had reached a 27-year low of 8.4 percent, according to a report by the University of Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports in 2007.
"There needs to be more African-Americans playing the game of baseball," Colligan said. "It's dying down a little bit."
Colligan said young black athletes are more attracted to football and basketball because of the ease of playing the game. Those sports, he said, are easier because they require only a ball.
Baseball, on the other hand, takes time to prepare and play the game.
"You've got to start young," Colligan said. "You've got to build it and you've got to make it something they want to do. You've got to make the game fun."
On Friday, Colligan and Thorpe will take the field against Wright State to open the 2009 season. The Aggies are ranked No. 1 nationally after Baseball America selected them as the top team in its preseason poll in January.
"I feel privileged to be able to represent African-Americans in the game of baseball, especially at this University," Colligan said. "I'm proud to play for A&M."
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