You're knowledge of baseball history is seriously lacking.
In fact, it's just plain wrong.
Here's what really happened when the baseball owners unsuccessfully tried to break the national baseball players strike by using minor league "replacement players".
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The 1994–95 Major League Baseball strike was the eighth work stoppage in baseball history, as well as the fourth in-season work stoppage in 23 years. The 232-day strike, which lasted from August 12, 1994, to April 2, 1995, led to the cancellation of between 931 and 948 games overall, including the entire 1994 postseason and World Series (these numbers account for the fact that postseason series can be of varying lengths; in addition, 12 other games scheduled to be played prior to August 12, 1994 were cancelled for other reasons, mainly weather-related). The cancellation of the 1994 World Series was the first since 1904; meanwhile, Major League Baseball became the first professional sport to lose its entire postseason due to a labor dispute.
The rest of the season, including the World Series, was called off by Bud Selig on September 14. Selig acknowledged that the strike had torn an irreparable hole in the game's fabric. The move to cancel the rest of the season meant the loss of $580 million in ownership revenue and $230 million in player salaries. In 1994, the average MLB salary was an estimated $1.2 million.
On January 1, 1995, five bills aimed at ending the baseball strike were introduced into Congress. Four days later, Donald Fehr declared all 895 unsigned Major League players to be free agents in response to unilateral contract changes made by the owners. On January 10, arbitrator Thomas Roberts awarded 11 players a total of almost $10 million as a result of collusion charges brought against the owners. On January 26, both players and owners were ordered by President Bill Clinton to resume bargaining and reach an agreement by February 6. Unfortunately, President Clinton's deadline came and went with no resolution of the strike. Just five days earlier, the owners agreed to revoke their arbitrarily imposed salary cap and return to the old agreement.
REPLACEMENT PLAYERS
After the deadline passed with no compromises, the use of replacement players for spring training and regular season games was approved by baseball's executive council on January 13. Replacement players (among them, former Boston Red Sox pitcher Dennis "Oil Can" Boyd) were reportedly guaranteed $5,000 for reporting to spring training and another $5,000 if they made the Opening Day roster. Declared Selig, "We are committed to playing the 1995 season and will do so with the best players willing to play."
Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angelos, on the other hand, announced that his team wouldn't use replacement players (due in no small part to the fact that Cal Ripken, Jr. was going for Lou Gehrig's consecutive games record, but mainly due to Angelos' career as a union side attorney). On March 20, Angelos' Orioles canceled the remainder of their spring training games because of the team's refusal to use replacement players. The next day, the Maryland House of Delegates approved legislation to bar teams playing at Camden Yards from using replacement players.
In addition to Peter Angelos' problems, Detroit Tigers manager Sparky Anderson was put on an involuntary leave of absence as he refused to manage replacement players. Two days after Anderson's punishment, the Toronto Blue Jays assigned manager Cito Gaston and his coaching staff to work with minor league players so that they wouldn't have to deal with replacement players. On March 14, the players' union announced that it would not settle the strike if replacement players were used in regular season games, and if results were not voided. On March 28, the Ontario Labour Board announced that replacement umpires would not be allowed to work Blue Jays home games. Under the Ontario labor law then in force, replacement workers were not permitted to be used during a strike or lockout. The Blue Jays opted to play their home games at their Spring Training facility in Dunedin, Florida as long as replacement players were used.
STRIKE ENDS
On March 29, the players voted to return to work if a U.S. District Court judge supported the National Labor Relations Board's unfair labor practices complaint against the owners (which was filed on March 27). By a vote of 26–2, owners supported the use of replacement players. The strike ended when federal judge Sonia Sotomayor issued a preliminary injunction against the owners on March 31. On Sunday, April 2, 1995, the day before the season was scheduled to start, the 232 day long strike was finally over. Judge Sotomayor's decision received support from a panel of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which denied the owners' request to stay the ruling.
In 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2004, certain players who were part of the World Series-winning New York Yankees, Arizona Diamondbacks, Anaheim Angels and Boston Red Sox were not permitted to have their names or likenesses on commemorative merchandise because they had been declared replacement players for having participated in the 1995 spring training. The players who were noted are Shane Spencer of the 1998, 1999 and 2000 New York Yankees, Damian Miller of the 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks, Brendan Donnelly of the 2002 Anaheim Angels and Kevin Millar of the 2004 Boston Red Sox.
The names or likenesses of replacement players, since they are not permitted to join the MLBPA, may not be published in officially-licensed video and tabletop games. Many games nevertheless include them, with blank or fictional names and different appearances.
One final bookend to the strike's legacy: Sonia Sotomayor, the 2nd Circuit Appeals judge whose injunction ended the strike, was appointed by the President to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States in 2009. MLBPA representatives (most notably David Cone) testified for her at her confirmation hearings.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_Major_League_Baseball_strikeYou wrote:
"Asking millionaire players to involve themselves in civil rights issues is a fool's errand. It has been tried with Jordan and Woods and many others and they have turned their backs."
Arizona's Martin Luther King Day controversy
Super Bowl XXVII was originally scheduled to be played at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona, the home of the Phoenix Cardinals.<2> Immediately after the Cardinals relocated from St. Louis, Missouri to the Phoenix, Arizona area in 1988, the NFL was eager to hold a Super Bowl in that state.
Meanwhile, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, the United States federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr, was observed for the first time in 1986. However, the holiday was only celebrated in 27 states and the District of Columbia during that first year. Opponents across the nation tried to stop the holiday from being recognized in their own local areas.
In 1986, an Arizona holiday honoring King had been declared by Governor Bruce Babbitt after a bill to create the holiday failed in the state legislature. A year later, though, newly-elected Governor Evan Mecham rescinded the holiday in 1987 on the grounds that the holiday had been illegally created.<3>
Legislation to create the holiday was passed by the state legislature in 1989, but opponents to the holiday succeeded in forcing the holiday to undergo a ballot initiative.<4> Arizona voters rejected the 1990 initiative to create a King holiday.<5>
The NFL, which had an increasing percentage of African American players, and urged by the NFL Players' Association, voted to yank Super Bowl XXVII from Arizona, and awarded it instead to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.
Faced with the boycott, Arizona voters finally approved the holiday by ballot in 1992, and on March 23, 1993, the NFL awarded Super Bowl XXX (1996) to Tempe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Bowl_XXVIIIt was the pressure of NFL football players who demanded the Super Bowl be moved out of Arizona and organized in the NFL Players' Association union, that made the difference. Without their involvement in this civil rights issue that victory would not have been won.
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