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Robert Kennedy was a senator representing New York by the time of his presidential run, and the New York Mets took the most vocal stand after his death. With the backing of Manager Gil Hodges and chairman M. Donald Grant, Mets players voted unanimously not to play their game against the Giants in San Francisco on the day of RFK's funeral.
“Senator Kennedy represented our state,” Mets player rep Ed Kranepool said at the time. “He followed the game. He was running for election from New York. We decided it would be disrespectful to play.”
The Giants were so angered by the Mets' move that they took their case to National League President Warren Giles, who said the game would be a forfeit, but the Giants eventually backed down. They issued a statement agreeing to cancel the game in deference to RFK and because, they said, a forfeit would not be in the best interest of baseball or the public. “The Giants sincerely regret the disappointment of thousands of young fans who had intended to attend the Bat Day game tomorrow and are compelled now to rearrange their plans,” the team added in a tone-deaf comment.
“If we do forfeit, so what?” Kranepool said. “It's only one game. It's better than playing.”
The Mets, a relatively new team known primarily as a National League laughingstock to that point, won admirers for taking on the baseball establishment.
“Even the threat of a possible forfeiture of the game and a stiff fine could not get them on the field the day Bobby Kennedy was buried — a lofty principle displayed by a once lowly club,” Oakland Tribune sports columnist Ed Levitt wrote.
Ron Swoboda, a young Mets outfielder who would make one of the most dramatic catches in World Series history in the Miracle Mets' championship season the next year, said in an interview last month that refusing to play was a no-brainer.
“We felt like there wasn't any choice at all,” he said. “This guy was probably going to be the next president.”
Swoboda said that he supported Kennedy for president but added there was “zero politics” in the Mets' decision.
“It was the decent thing to do,” he said. “We just did it out of respect. If it had been a Republican candidate, we would have done the same thing. There wasn't a whole lot of discussion. No one said: ‘Why is this liberal Kennedy important to us? Why should baseball pause?'” |
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2021/06/06/rfk-death-mlb-players-boycott/
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