Every time I read about Jackie Robinson and what he did, I wish I were a baseball fan.

Fortunately, you don't have to be a student of the game to appreciate Mr. Robinson's stoicism and self-discipline in the face of racial insult and intimidation 60 years ago.

Jackie Robinson carried the weight of representation with him on Ebbets Field on April 15, 1947, his stomach churning every step of the way as he ascended the national platform with his dignity and stamina intact.

For days stretching into weeks, Jackie Robinson had to assure himself that the crack of wood reverberating throughout the ballpark was the benign sound of an opposing batter trying to get to first base -- not the recoil of the long-threatened assassin's rifle.

Fortunately, only verbal bullets rained down on Jackie Robinson. The game adjusted to the presence of its first black player with a curious mix of fury and resignation.

Threatened walkouts by prominent players never materialized. Distant nods became cautious handshakes, even across team rivalries. The contempt of the most ignorant gradually receded like an iceberg in temperate waters. Before the season was over, Mr. Robinson had earned the grudging respect of many of the most hostile fans, but not all.

Through it all, Jackie Robinson played gloriously. Because he bore the weight of representation, he understood that he would never have the luxury of confronting a racist system with anger and invective.

Now that a black man had taken the field and upended racist expectations, white fans and players could no longer pretend that the pre-Jackie Robinson status quo had the mandate of heaven. It no longer made sense to deny Major League Baseball a much-needed infusion of Negro League talent.

Imagining baseball without Jackie Robinson or other black players would become an absurd death wish for the game after April 15, 1947. Everyone knew Mr. Robinson was the harbinger of a new era, but what was only dimly suspected at the time was the role that baseball would play in integrating society.

"I see great things in baseball," the poet Walt Whitman said when the game was in its infancy. "It's our game -- the American game."

One hundred and one years after the New York Nine beat the New York Knickerbockers in the game's first recorded matchup, the Brooklyn Dodgers delivered on Whitman's effusive declaration.

Jackie Robinson not only broke the color barrier, but his presence also ensured a certain amount of authentic meritocracy. He brought the spirit of democracy to baseball. His unimpeachable character and self-possession made arguments about the worthiness of blacks to compete at the highest level of Major League Baseball moot from 1947 on.

Today, few athletes display half the character Mr. Robinson did. The last thing that the millionaire crybabies who populate newspaper sports pages will cop to is the weight of representation. They're the first to say in the vernacular of the well-paid sneaker pitchmen they've become: "I ain't no role model."

It's true. Most people suffer in comparison to Jackie Robinson, especially modern athletes. They aren't the only ones, of course, but their prominence in the imagination of young people makes their claim of non-responsibility all the more appalling.

All athletes are role models whether they want to be or not. What many actually mean by denying the social dimension of their privileged status is that they aren't willing to cop to anything beyond their level of play. As far as they're concerned, a professional athlete operates in a vacuum with complete moral autonomy.

That's why it's no surprise that so many professional athletes haven't the foggiest idea who Jackie Robinson was. The things he did for America are literally beyond their comprehension.

While watching the press conference by the Rutgers University women's basketball team last week, it was easy to spot qualities they shared with the late Jackie Robinson.

Like the civil rights pioneer, the women maintained their dignity in the face of an unprovoked insult from Don Imus. They exuded so much self-possession that it blew the minds of nearly everyone who tuned in.

The scale of Mr. Robinson's achievement dwarfs theirs, of course, but the spirit is the same. The Scarlet Knights understand and accept the burden of representation.