![]() “If I do an interview on the baseball side, that may not touch Black culture, because they’re not watching that shit,” he explained. Nonetheless, he’s become one of the faces of Black baseball in America-and intends to use his platform to connect with more Black people, both to supply more context whenever his name is in the news, but also to give them the comfort and confidence to navigate predominantly white spaces, baseball or otherwise. “Baseball? Nobody fucking plays that sport!” Anderson said of his mentality as a kid. Growing up Black in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, baseball wasn’t just an afterthought-it wasn’t a thought at all. ![]() The hoopla (the Donaldson incident, loud bat flips, being saddled with the dreaded “injury prone” label) only contributes to his long-earned sense that to be Tim Anderson is to constantly feel othered, singled out, misunderstood, and even an outcast among his own people. In conversation, at least, he’s disarmingly laid back, dripping with charming Southern affectations. Spending an hour face-to-face with Anderson-talking about that incident, but also the long, strange trip he’s had as a rare Black superstar in an overwhelmingly white league-helps to clarify why, exactly, it seems like he’s such a magnet for attention, good and bad. After all-making the Jackie crack meant that Donaldson had seen Anderson compare himself to the legend in the first place. “I’m glad he’s reading my interviews! At least he’s paying attention,” he said. On the field, you know they’re not going to let us get to each other! But I could see you walking to the car…” After suggesting that Donaldson intended to “stir the pot” amongst Black athletes with his comment, Anderson was happy to shrug the whole thing off with his playful, winking sense of humor. If you really want it, I’ll see you after the game. Are you for real, or are you for real for real? Nobody is for real for real in the league. I could have did something! But there really was no need to. “His energy was all about trying to make me do something, trying to provoke me. You’re fucking with me,” Anderson explained, re-living the strange saga out loud. Or to let someone else have the last word.īy the time we met at Lucille’s, a coffee shop in Harlem, with the White Sox in town to play the Yankees in early June, he’d had a year to reflect on the “Jackie” incident. ![]() Whether because of the kerfuffle with Donaldson, for his tabloid-fodder love life, or for his baseball abilities-Anderson owns the league’s third-best batting average since the start of the 2019 season-it’s hard for him to simply slink into the shadows. ![]() As his star has risen, he has been unable to avoid the headlines. This was all sort of par for the course for Anderson, who seems to find controversy whether or not he’s looking for it. ![]() Eventually Anderson responded by walloping a home run later in the series, delivering a hearty, “Everybody shut the fuck up!” after circling the bases. Tony La Russa, the White Sox’s manager at the time, called Donaldson’s comment straight-up racist. Anderson made it clear he took it more as a barb than on-field banter. Donaldson insisted it was meant as a playful joke, made in reference to a 2019 Sports Illustrated article in which Anderson said he felt like today’s Jackie Robinson. The short version: during a game in the Bronx last May, Yankee third baseman and professional instigator Josh Donaldson-a white man-referred to Anderson as Jackie, as in Robinson. The Chicago White Sox shortstop, one of the most prominent Black players in Major League Baseball, was back in the city for the first time since the biggest controversy in a career unusually rich with them. Tim Anderson couldn’t help but think about it when he touched down in New York. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |