The nice thing about writing a column is that you get to unload a lot of what's in your head.
Sometimes events and ideas rattle around in there and cohere into a theory.
The current fodder:
1. Gary Sheffield's comments that there are now more Latin and fewer African-American players in the major leagues because Latins are easier to control.
2. This week's major-league amateur draft.
3. The immigration bill currently flopping around Congress.
Stay with me.
Here's what Sheffield said, after promising to drop a conspiracy if suspended for going nuts on an umpire:
"I called it years ago. What I called is that you're going to see more black faces, but there ain't no English going to be coming out ...
"It's about being able to tell [Latin players] what to do, being able to control them.
"Where I'm from, you can't control us. There are the things my race demands. So, if you're equally good as this Latin player, guess who's going to get sent home? I know a lot of players that are home now can outplay a lot of these guys."Leave aside, for a moment, that Sheffield lacks the ability to self-edit, and thus should avoid having his mouth open near microphones.
I mean: "
there ain't no English going to be coming out" ... ? When is some coherent English going to be coming out of you, Gary?
Leave aside, also, that NFL players are by far the most-controlled athletes in big-time team sports even though two-thirds of them are African-American.
(True, to an extent it depends how you define "controlled." I don't know exactly how Sheffield defines it and in all probability neither does he. He's just running his mouth.
I'm talking economic control, because all issues are economic.)
It is true that almost 30 percent of major-league baseball players are Latino, compared to 8.4 percent African-American. No one who watches much major-league baseball could be surprised by those numbers.
But then you see the names of the top picks in Thursday's MLB draft: David Price, Mike Moustakas, Josh Vitters, Daniel Moskos, Matt Wieters, Ross Detwiler, Matt LaPorta, Casey Weathers, Jarrod Parker, Madison Bumgarner, Phillippe Aumont ... .
(Phillippe Aumont? He's Canadian.)
These guys have options. They have agents. They can go to, or return to, college. It's going to take serious money to sign them.
And there's not a Hernandez or Rodriguez or Cruz or Ruiz among them.
Hmmmm ... .
This brings us to the immigration bill, which exists solely to cover the truth that illegal immigration isn't going away, because illegal immigration means cheap labor and American business is in hopeless love with cheap labor and what American business loves, Congress generally serves up, family-style.
And Major League Baseball is a very American business.
This is a broad but, it says here, fundamentally accurate generalization: Latin players can be signed younger, easier and much, much, much cheaper than their North American counterparts.
In many if not most cases, Latin players would consider a low-minor- league salary luxurious, and the low-minor lifestyle a step up from what they're used to. And for them, college sports, or any sport other than baseball, aren't an option.
(No, I'm not suggesting Latin ballplayers are in any way illegal immigrants. Baseball — from the big leagues to the Barnstormers — works hard to avoid work-visa issues.)
The point is, for what it's going to cost to sign Price — the African-American Vanderbilt University pitcher who was the first overall pick in the draft — you can go to the Dominican Republic and round up two dozen 16-to-18-year-olds hungry to "play their way off the island."
Which is the better investment?
It is about control, Gary. Cost control.
Mike Gross is a Sunday News sports writer. E-mail him at mgross@lnpnews.com.
