CLEVELAND, Ohio — Driving past Bump Taylor Field, an artificial-turfed stadium that sits in a valley below the former Patrick Henry Junior High School, I spotted cars parked on real grass outside the fence, on streets adjacent to it and in nearby asphalt lots. I watched scores and scores of Black boys, their families and friends head inside the gates.
It was 10:45 a.m. on a Sunday; the games had begun, and both grandstands were filling with onlookers. I never doubted players welcomed the support.
I’m glad these Black boys had something positive to do. Sports can serve as a foundation for teaching life lessons. But so can church. The church can teach lessons athletics can’t, which include spiritual enlightenment.
Black boys need the latter.
I suspect people inside Bump Taylor root for the right reasons. While they applaud a Black boy’s brilliance on the field, they should insist on his same excellence in the classroom and steer these boys onward into principled and spiritual men.
Aren’t Black boys being failed on that front? Might that explain why they’re also failing in other aspects of life?
Critics might argue I’m using a broad brush in painting this portrait of Black boys. I can accept such criticism. For unlike most in this East Side neighborhood, I’ve had a bird’s eye view, and I’ve been able to watch and point out this drive to achieve the wrong ends.
Few Black boys on Bump Taylor will go to the NFL; nearly all will go into the workplace. The sad fact is that too many are also going to state prisons or to early graves at the wrong end of a bullet.
I take an uncompromising view about where Black boys should go. We push them hard to excel in athletics, hopeful they’ll rise above their surroundings and find wealth in professional sports. Is it possible we’re putting pipedreams in their minds?
Football is a wonderful distraction, but we should focus harder on textbooks and less on TDs.
I mind Black boys playing sports on Sunday mornings. I’d prefer they waited to kick off until after church services, which is what Black boys did decades ago.
Through most of last century, Black boys and their families didn’t skip Sunday services. They packed pews in Baptist churches and sang and shouted about God and faith.
Black boys stood on a solid spiritual foundation. Black families did as well. They celebrated tackles and the “Ten Commandments.” Both held their place in life — at least on Sundays if not the rest of the week.
I’ve wondered aloud whether we should return to those Sunday mornings of sermons, and I’ve concluded we should. So, I’m encouraging families and friends to push Black boys back toward God. He’s blessed them with the athleticism to play a sport, but He’s insisted those Black boys show a dedication to Him.
Start games at 1:30 p.m., and Black boys at Bump Taylor would have time for worship and for football. God will reward them for putting Him first, for making space in their lives for Him. God must never be an afterthought.
For if Black boys cash in on their athletic gifts, it’ll be because of God, not just because of the coaching they receive on Sunday mornings when they should be sitting in church pews.
Justice B. Hill grew up and still lives in the Glenville neighborhood. He wrote and edited for several newspapers in his more than 25 years in daily journalism before settling into teaching at Ohio University. He quit May 15, 2019, to write and globetrot. He’s doing both.
Columnist Justice B. Hill
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