Today is Juneteenth, an annual holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. This holiday was not recognized until 2021, when President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law.<\/p>\n
The A\u2019s are celebrating by making tonight\u2019s first of four home games against the Los Angeles Angels African-American Heritage Night.<\/p>\n
While outfielder Lawrence Butler is the only African American on the current A\u2019s roster, the franchise has employed some of the greatest Black players in MLB history, from Rickey Henderson (the Man of Steel) to Reggie Jackson (Mr. October), Frank Thomas (The Big Hurt) and Coco Crisp (Mr. Bernie Lean).<\/p>\n
Down on the farm, two of the A\u2019s top 10 minor-league prospects, outfielder Devin Taylor and infielder Kuroda-Grauer, hope to add more of an African-American presence to the A\u2019s roster in the coming years.<\/p>\n
Overall, MLB still struggles with roster diversity as squads primarily consist of White and Latino athletes.
According to MLB.com, Black players make up 6.8% of active and inactive Opening Day rosters in 2026, marking two consecutive years of growth. This is the highest percentage in nearly a decade, yet more work remains.<\/p>\n
The Athletics were deeply ingrained in and involved with the diverse Oakland community during their 57 years spent playing at the Oakland Coliseum. They continue to remain active in the communities of their temporary home of Sacramento and future home of Las Vegas. However, both cities have fewer African American residents than the East Bay, making any community impact there likely less impactful.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, struggling veteran left-hander Jeffrey Springs gets the start tonight, looking to reverse his recent slump and get back in the win column After falling short on Pride night earlier this week, it would behoove the Athletics to secure the win on this special day.<\/p>\n
A\u2019s top prospect Leo De Vries continues to hold his own in Double-A. He remains on track to reach Triple-A Las Vegas sooner than later, which would be the last stop on his supersonic ascent through the minor leagues.<\/p>\n
The A\u2019s pitching staff continues to give up runs at an alarming rate. It is a testament to the team\u2019s offense that they are entering the weekend with a nearly .500 record, which outperforms their expected record of 32-42 based on runs scored and allowed.<\/p>\n
Zack Gelof\u2019s re-emergence as an everyday starter and major contributor has arguably been the Athletics\u2019 biggest bright spot so far this season.<\/p>\n
What do you think of this draft proposal as well as the corresponding one for international players?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Today is Juneteenth, an annual holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. This holiday was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":367905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[116118,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-367904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-athletics-news","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}