Eric McErlain of Off Wing Opinion comments on an article that appear in the Toronto Star that focused on the racial makeup of the Toronto Blue Jays. You can find the original article here. I think Eric does a very good job of taking down the article, so I won't add any criticism of my own.

Let me, instead, take a different tack. Part of this is a backlash against something new and successful. Baseball writers, agents, managers and GMs have fed us a lot of hokum for years. And now, with Beane and company starting to prove them wrong, they are in a tither that the general public is going to start seeing them as naked emperors. Too bad. And as the Beane doctrine spreads, I'm afraid the Dominicans may be hit the hardest. Here's why. In a recent article about Soriano's slump:

Soriano said Jackson, who also has worked with Raul Mondesi this season, talked to him recently. "He wants me to wait on the ball," Soriano said. "See the ball and wait."

Patience is not a common trait for players from the Dominican Republic. That oft-quoted adage is: "You don't walk your way off the island." So Torre knows that Soriano will always be a free swinger, and even though he bats leadoff, he will never fit the traditional profile of a top-of-the order hitter.

The reason Dominicans don't walk their way off the island is that the scouts haven't looked for that. If that mentality doesn't change, they may no longer be able to hit off the island, either, and those same scouts that brought these players to the attention of the baseball world will have done them a long term disservice. I hope the examples of Sammy Sosa and Manny Ramirez show the islanders that walking has its benefits, too. They would be better to follow their examples of selectivity, rather than players like Tony Fernandez and George Bell. Otherwise, the scouts who will be working for the likes of Beane and Ricciardi will keep signing white guys who get on base.