The MLB Urban Youth Baseball Academy is a $10 million facility plunked down in a gritty inner-city region renowned for producing large quantities of talented athletes -- many of whom now grow up with as much interest in baseball as they have in cricket.

Tuesday, when the place opened with a splashy ceremony involving much pro baseball and local political royalty, Joe Morgan talked about a "lost generation" of city kids who had stopped playing the sport.

Reggie Smith pointed to the more glamorous alternatives to minor league baseball -- big-time college basketball and football opportunities -- that have attracted most of the top black athletes for decades.

Nor was it a coincidence that all three of those former major leaguers, all African-American, were active 30 years ago when more than a quarter of baseball's rosters were black. These days, that number has shrunk to less than 10 percent.

The academy, built on the campus of Compton Community College, is an emphatic, nuts-and-bolts display that the sport is ready to pursue a group of athletes who had long ago stopped pursuing it.

"We've created this academy to shore up the bridge from baseball to our urban community," Commissioner Bud Selig said. "This area has produced many major league players, and this area will produce many, many more."

That would be the most obvious intent of such a place. More than 2,500 kids ages 8 to 17 within a reasonable ride of Compton will be invited to free clinics of varying lengths in the first year alone. There is a major league-quality playing field, with another nifty practice field, a girls softball field, a youth-sized field and a 12,000-square-foot clubhouse. There also is a $1 million annual operating budget, shared by baseball and whatever corporate sponsors it can drag aboard.

"As proud as I am today," said Morgan, who has long badgered Selig personally to increase opportunities for blacks in baseball, "I'll be just as proud when these fields produce their first big leaguer."

Certainly the dwindling number of blacks in the major leagues was alarming enough to get baseball involved in such expensive and desperate outreach. But it also may be comforting to know that baseball hasn't completely lost its perspective in the pursuit of the next Hank Aaron, Barry Bonds or Dontrelle Willis.

Compton and its environs need something much more basic than producing a future big leaguer or two each year. Fortunately, that was understood Tuesday.

"Not everyone who comes here can play in the big leagues," said Miller, a Riverside native and sibling of basketball legends Reggie and Cheryl Miller, who called his new position "more of a mission than a job."

Lured by free baseball, kids also will find academic opportunities -- homework breaks and tutoring help. They will be exposed to off-field baseball jobs, from groundskeeping and umpiring to management and journalism options. Compton College facilities will be used for some of the instruction, a subtle way to make the campus friendly.

"Two, we want to send about 70 percent on to college or junior college. Three, we'd like to get about 10 to 15 percent of them an opportunity to play baseball at the next level -- pro or college."

It would appear that the baseball -- to mix a metaphor -- is now in someone else's court. Morgan lectured the community, in a general way, "I hope you take advantage of the opportunity you've been presented."

Smith, who went to Compton Centennial High and said he plans to volunteer time coaching at the academy, echoed the thought: "If people don't take advantage, it's not because baseball didn't make the effort."

Said Winfield: "This is a wonderful way to bring people of color, the underserved, back to the game. It will be very important for you to get inside here, see what we're doing and make it a success. Without your support, there won't be others like it."

"I would have loved to have had a place like this to come to when I was a kid," he said, adding a good wish for the program. "They say if you build it, they will come."

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