by DCScrap, Our Book of Scrap
The more I follow sports, the more I lose interest in caring about whether Barry Bonds cheated. A day doesn't go by in which someone is accused of cheating or skirting the rules. Whether it's a driver in NASCAR racing with an illegal car, a track and field athlete blood-doping, a cyclist with too much testosterone, a baseball player juicing, or a football coach video taping, it's all getting tiresome. So when I saw this story over the weekend, I pretty much gave up hope that there is anyone in sports that really plays the game without a little help.
An article the Canadian magazine Walrus strongly suggests that Joe DiMaggio's legendary hitting streak record might deserve an asterisk. In the article the author suggests that the official scorer, a Mr. Dan Daniel, was a baseball writer who had covered the Yankees for a long time, was a personal friend of many of the players, traveled with the team and submitted his expenses to it. He was also the official home-game scorer for the Yankees.
You see where this is headed, right?
The author of the article, David Robbeson, cites two games in the middle of the streak, the 30th and 31st, when DiMaggio managed just one hit. In each of these games, the hit was suspect and could well have, and perhaps should have, been deemed an error.
Now that's a shocker, a home official scorer giving the home team player a hit instead of charging the defense with an error. Someone call the United Nations.
It is stated that the chances of Dimaggio getting a hit in any given sequence of 56 consecutive games was (.7924)^56 = .000 002 192, which I guess puts more credence into the fact that there is little chance that Joe D kept the streak alive strictly on his own merit.
So how does this compare to Barry Bonds or Gaylord Perry or any of the number of other players who allegedly cheated to achieve great statistical prowess? My answer to that question is, "Who cares? I'm tired of all of it." What do you think?
Source: ABC News
Monday, October 8, 2007
PUT ASTERISKS ON EVERY RECORD WHILE YOU'RE AT IT
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2 comment(s):
Is this guy serious? Does he really think the examples are analogous? Does he really believe that all "cheating" is equal and, if so, ok?? How about slipping a mickey to your opponent in a tennis match? Brass knuckles inside your boxing gloves?
Even if DiMaggio's record did have help, it doesn't make him a cheater. He didn't do it. He didn't try to gain some illegal advantage over the competition. Bonds cheated: not once or twice, but every time he came to work for several years running. Apples and oranges. Or rather, rotten apples and oranges.
I actually went and READ the article in Walrus and yes-he is serious. And no-he did not make the point that every "asterisk" is equal...just that one of the most celebrated "records" in sports may have been the result of a scorekeeper who was actually buddies!!! with the guy he was scoring.
I do not think the author ever accused Joe of cheating-just that he did not really hit in 56 straight games. Remember, it is history and history should never be read as the gospel (get it?)-it should be fluent; ever changing the more facts we get.
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