Eighty-one days separated the Major League debuts of Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby. But the difference in our collective appreciation for what those two great men meant for the game -- and the nation -- is incalculable.
Jackie was the face of a movement, the representative of an idea larger than baseball. In film, in print and in the unprecedented tribute that came with the league-wide retirement of No. 42, he has been celebrated accordingly.
Doby endured the same hatred and the same bigotry that did Robinson, but with less publicity and, ultimately, less recognition.
"Larry Doby was a better ballplayer than Jackie Robinson," the legendary Bob Feller once told me, in that gruff, no-nonsense way of his.