Sport's Place in A Historic Day

The inauguration Barack Obama yesterday meant a lot of different things to a lot of different people. To many political pundits, Obama's first day on the job was the signal of a generational change; that the proverbial torch has been passed from the one generation of Americans (Baby Boomers) to the next (Generation X).

To the layman, Obama's election and taking office is the signal of renewed hope in the American spirit. Or maybe they too feel what the pundits feel.

And of course, to many, Barack Obama's election is the finality of a century's long struggle for true freedom and equality in the United States.

If you ask the sports world, that's what Obama's place in history means to them. Sure, there are those fluff stories about how Obama loves basketball.

But true reason why athletes and the sport world took a break to watch this historic moment in American history is because the Presidency seemed so far away for minorities in the United States. It was always that mountain top that many thought no African-American individual would ever get to.

ESPN devoted coverage of the inauguaration on SportsCenter. Athletes around the country spoke out as to why it was important to them. And it was pretty much the same message: we've broken the color barrier in sports, a thing done 62 years ago, but to see a black man in the Oval Office, that was only the biggest of dreams--at least that's what Dave Winfield told the Union-Tribune.

But sport is one of the truest and purest proving grounds. It's where race or religion or belief does not matter. And because of sport's seeming progressive nature, of course they had to remind the rest of the country that "we were first."

Yesterday, as the world watched Obama take the oath of office, it was as if the sports world was saying, "you're welcome."

It was the black athlete that first stood up against Adolf Hitler's hatred when Jesse Owens and Archie Williams took home gold medals from Berlin in 1936.

It was Joe Louis, Jim Brown and Ernie Davis who stood up to oppression in their sport. It was Muhammed Ali that help put the Civil Rights movement on his shoulders. It was Arthur Ashe and Kareem Abdul-Jabar who continued the movement, though quietly.

It was Larry Doby in the American League and of course it was Jackie Robinson before him in the National League.

These were the pioneers.

There should be no question as to why the sports world paused to celebrate Obama's achievment. Because as much as Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks and Jesse Jackson laid down the foundations of the Civil Rights movement, it was the black athlete that captured the hearts of Americans.

It was in sport, where equality has no pillars to hide behind, that showed everyone 62 years before, that yes we can. Yes, America can have no racial strife, no racial inequality, that everyone truly is the same.

That, yes, America can actually hold up to its founding principals and set forth what the founders meant to do.