Boston Red Sox: Racism causing team to lose out on talent

Torii Hunter showed that the culture surrounding the Boston Red Sox is so toxic that he had a no-trade clause due to racist taunts. This needs to change.

The world is experiencing a shift right now and it’s a good thing. Right now it seems that the world is focusing on exposing racism in all aspects of life. At this time we are seeing athletes across the world speak out. All Boston sports teams including the Boston Red Sox have put out statements.

Boston has always dealt with racism. This seems to come out the most at Red Sox games. Multiple players have reported that they have had racial epithets screamed at them, the main one in recent history being Adam Jones who played for the Baltimore Orioles.

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This lead to a group of people bringing a banner onto the “Green Monster” that read “racism is as American as baseball.” Once again Boston’s racist history was highlighted.

Now it seems that the Red Sox get the message. On the scoreboard at the bottom of the “Green Monster” it said, Black Lives Matter. It seems that these incidents highlight a minority of the fan base, but it is on the rest of us to condemn these racist incidents.

Once again these racist incidents were highlighted when Torii Hunter spoke on Tuesday. It seems that Boston still has some work to do.

"“When I went to Boston it was so consistent,” Hunter said. “It has nothing to do with the Red Sox. It has nothing to do with the players. It has nothing to do with the organization. It really has nothing to do with the fans. But that’s the issue when you hear that.”Hunter recalled a specific instance when “four or five” kids chanted the “N-word” at him during a game at Fenway. What disturbed him most was that no one in the stands asked the kids to stop.“When I heard ‘N-word, N-word’ just chanting my name and I looked at these grown-ups and they are clapping and laughing,” Hunter said. “I’m pointing saying, ‘Tell them to shut up. That’s bad.’” … So when I looked at the grown-ups and they didn’t do anything, that’s not a Red Sox issue. That’s an issue in society.”“I love Boston. I wanted to play there. It just hit me that I can’t have my wife and my kids in this area,” Hunter said."

That is just awful. It’s hard to even imagine that a kid would say that and that their parent would feel that nothing is wrong with this. This stuff needs to stop.

Now of course this is terrible in general. There is no room for this type of behavior in baseball and any aspect of life.

But on a much less important level, this is also causing the Red Sox talent. The culture around the team is so toxic that players are doing everything in their power not to go there.

Hunter also deserves some credit because he didn’t even attack the Red Sox. He didn’t blame them for the problem even though they should do more. You need to punish these people as soon as you witness an incident like this taking place.

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So hopefully when fans return to the stadium, the culture around the Boston Red Sox will be much different.

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