Labor Sports - The Curious Case of Curt Flood

Labor Sports Oct 14

SUBJECT - LABOR

including directions.    

One thing -- if you are hitting a paywall with the article about Curt Flood in The Atlantic -- you can always draw from the one below.  Also, we watched parts of the 2-part documentary -- The Curious Case of Curt Flood. 

Curt Flood, the Supreme Court, and MLB's Antitrust Exemption — 22ZINThe story of Curt Flood is a lesson in the separation of powers, checks and balances, race, economics, and power. This essay examines how a trio of questionable Supreme Court decisions—Federal Baseball (1922), Toolson (1953), and Flood (1972)—have allowed MLB to act as a legal monopoly.

LABOR/ANTH 120L Fall 2024

Task #1

Question 1 (40 points - 3-4 paragraphs): Discuss the “rise and fall” of Jack Johnson as a historical figure whose life was shaped by and challenged a variety of social forces. First, discuss the broader political context of the US in the first decades of the twentieth century. What was the racial climate in which Johnson grew up? What sorts of obstacles did he face as a black man growing up in the United States? Second, situate his boxing career within this broader political context. What obstacles did he face as a boxer? Why was US society threatened by his very presence? How did his success challenge understandings of race and white supremacy at the time? How and why did they ultimately bring Jack Johnson “down”? Finally, briefly compare his life to the “rise and fall” of Paul Robeson – who came of age a couple decades later and was openly political.

Question 2 (30 points – 2-3 paragraphs) In “Heterosexuality as a Factor in the Long History of Women’s Sports,” Mary Anne Case explores women’s participation in sports from the Ancient World to the present. By going back so far in time, what is Case arguing about women and sports – about how we understand women’s participation in sports? Why is this early history important to her argument? What does she mean by a “heterosexual payoff” and how does it fit into her argument about how society understands women’s participation in sports?

Question 3 (30 points – 2-3 paragraph) Who was Curt Flood and why did he sue Major League baseball? To what extent, and in what ways, was his struggle against baseball linked to the broader civil rights struggle? In what ways was it not? Why did he not get much open/public support from other professional baseball players?