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Houston Rockets GM Daryl Morey was among a wide range of celebrities to use his social media platforms on Monday to commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the founding of baseball’s Negro Leagues.
The virtual campaign launched Monday with photos and videos from numerous politicians, civil rights leaders, entertainers, and sports legends. Among those to take part included former U.S. Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter; athletes such as Michael Jordan, Derek Jeter, and Hank Aaron; and many more.
Appropriately, Morey’s image features him tipping a red Rockets cap in front an artist’s depiction of a bearded James Harden.
The Tipping Your Cap website is chronicling the various salutes across many industries. In summarizing the mission, it states:
The Negro Leagues were both a tragedy and a triumph. The Leagues only came to be because of an unwritten law in Major League Baseball preventing any team from signing a black player. The tragedy is easy to see. The triumph, however, has been overlooked for many years.
For 40 years, from 1920 to 1960, Black players — African Americans, dark-skinned Latinos, men and women — played joyous and brilliant baseball in the Negro Leagues. They played in the steadfast belief that, in the words of General Colin Powell, “if they kept working at it, if they showed their professionalism, if they never gave up, if they always searched for perfection, sooner or later the doors would open for them.”
This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Negro Leagues. We ask you to take a moment and tip your cap to these extraordinary people who just wanted to play ball and, in the process, changed baseball and America.
The racial justice movement remains a clear focal point in 2020, with many people and organizations in the sports industry increasingly using their platforms to promote change. In that spirit, it’s also an appropriate time to reflect, which the Tipping Your Cap movement seeks to do.
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