phil.mushnick@nypost.com DON’T SAY A WORD
TUESDAY morning I read “Under One Roof,” a short but powerful book written by Adam Henig about spring training in the 1950s and ’ 60s in St. Petersburg, Fla., and how black players endured despite hotels and restaurants that segregated them from white teammates.
Several endured with the steady help of Dr. Ralph Wimbish, who, when not delivering babies and heading the local NAACP, opened his home to racially excluded players, including Elston Howard and Bob Gibson.
Dr. Wimbish’s son, also Ralph, for years edited this and other Post columns and stories. I’d often pester him to tell me what it was like to be a kid and to come down for breakfast to see houseguests such as Howard, Gibson, Althea Gibson, Cab Calloway and Jesse Owens.
Of standout interest in the book is Larry Doby, the kid from Paterson, N.J., who in 1947 with Cleveland became the second African-American in the bigs.
In 1959, Doby, about done, was traded in exchange for Tito Francona to the Tigers, who trained in Lakeland. Though a nationally known, seven-time All-Star, Doby still felt the Southern sting — the passionate hate and ignorance — of those who shouted “N-----!” when he appeared.
“I heard ‘N-----!’ so many times in the outfield,” Doby said, “I thought it was my middle name.”
That was the winter of 1959; this is the winter of 2017. And it was still Tuesday, only Tuesday night.
On ESPN, Jemele Hill, co-host of “SC6,” grew excited. Her previous noteworthy excitements were tweets condemning President Trump as a “white supremacist” who contributes to the oppression of blacks, the second of which led to a brief suspension for defying ESPN’s instructions to cut it out.
Tuesday, Hill was excited for a different reason: ESPN had selected the halftime entertainment for its broadcast of the national championship football game.
“The powers that be finally got something right — Kendrick Lamar!” she squealed, pumping her arms in delight. “Kendrick Lamar!”
Given Hill’s race-based activism, one logically wonders why she’d so openly favor Lamar, a rapper who has grown fabulously wealthy through lyrics that consistently refer to black men as “N----s”.
I’d be glad to provide Hill examples of his lyrical artistry so she can recite them on ESPN. She could start with “Money Trees.’’
That could never happen because ESPN would never allow such a thing, thus she’s spared from exposing her rank hypocrisy.
Or perhaps she can identify the proper context in which AfricanAmericans should be called “N----s,” and those logical instances when the vulgar degradation of women should be recorded, sold, performed, applauded.
Does Hill know that 12-year-old black kids now effortlessly, reflexively call one another “n----s”? She’s good with that?
Odd, but not surprising, how it works. ESPN, a sports network, decries racism and sexism from within and beyond, yet eagerly seizes the cross-promotional (perceived) value in embracing such rappers. Still, not one ESPN exec would dare publicly repeat their lyrics.
Yet, ESPN fired tennis analyst Doug Adler as a racist for accurately describing a poach of the net by Venus Williams as “a guerilla” tactic. ESPN impossibly chose to hear that he called her, out of nowhere, “a gorilla.”
I figured that Barack Obama, the fa- ther of two daughters, our first African-American president and never shy to address racial issues — and with two-terms to speak out — would condemn the growing popularity of such vulgar, N-wording, womentrashing, challenge-issuing, Glockloving “artistry.”
Instead, he publicly embraced two who fully met with that description, Jay-Z and Snoop Dogg — though Obama, too, was never moved to publicly recite their lyrics.
The College Football Playoff and NCAA aren’t officially connected, but as NCAA boss Dr. Mark Emmert should know, that distinction is not clear in the public eye. Whatever the playoff represents also fully reflects on the NCAA. Would Emmert certify his approval of Lamar, then, on behalf of student-athletics, everywhere, publicly recite his lyrics.
Not a chance? Why not? Is there something wrong with them?