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Imagine your fate and future resting in the hands of one man’s judgment. This was actually reality for Shoeless Joe Jackson. Many argue that he was one of the best ever to play the game of baseball and was the greatest natural hitter of all-time. Yet, surprisingly, you will not find him among the familiar faces at the Hall of Fame. He was permanently banned from baseball, as well as seven others, for allegedly helping to throw the 1919 World Series.
Joe Jackson was born on July 16, 1888 in Pickins County, South Carolina. He was the oldest of eight children and grew up the son of a cotton mill worker. He began working in the mill at age thirteen and never learned how to read or write. He played baseball in his spare time, and his exceptional skills landed him in the minor leagues by the age of eighteen. He first entered professional baseball in 1908 with Greenville in the Carolina Association. It was during this same year that he received the nickname “Shoeless” Joe after he had just bought a new pair of spikes. They wore blisters on his feet and they hurt so badly that he just played in his stocking feet. Although he played only one game without the spikes, he was known as “Shoeless Joe” from then on (McGee 1).
Shoeless Joe made his major league debut later that year, in 1908, with the Philadelphia Athletics. He only played there a short time before being transferred to the Cleveland Indians. Finally, in 1915 he was sold to Charles Comiskey and the Chicago White Sox. It was here that he played his last few years of professional baseball and his life would be forever changed.
From the years 1917 to 1919 the Chicago White Sox were by far the dominant team in baseball. It is speculated that they could have “gone on to become one of the greatest teams in history” (Schwalbe 2). However, despite having the most talented team around, Charles Comiskey paid his players considerably less than any other winning team (Durst 2). Due to the oppression they were under, the player’s morale began to decrease as their need for money increased. They considered going on strike, but were talked out of it by their manager, “Kid” Gleason. They remained desperate until first baseman Chick Gandil met with a notorious gambler named “Sport” Sullivan.
The White So...
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...t up and protect his own reputation. Comiskey’s lawyer acted as Joe’s lawyer also, although he was really only trying to protect Comiskey.
In modern day, Joe would have had his own lawyer from the beginning and Landis would have been convicted of contempt of court since he went against the court’s ruling and banished the eight players for life. Joe would not have had to prove his innocence. Instead, someone would have had to prove him guilty. Clearly, this could not have been achieved. There is no evidence that he did anything wrong, and his statistics clearly support the opposite. Alongside, his performance in the 1919 World Series, Joe’s career batting average of .356 is the third best of all-time (CMG 1). On top of this, he led the league in triples eight times and held the throwing record for distance. It is a shame he was never inducted into the Hall of Fame because of one man’s judgment to ban him from the game. Part of Joe’s last words were “I’m going to meet the greatest umpire of all – and he knows I’m innocent.” (McCroskey 1). He passed away on December 5, 1951, and will remain, although often disparaged and misunderstood, one of our national pastime’s greatest legends.
... Series and banned from baseball forever. Rays father felt his son had the potential to also be in the major leagues, but it was too late as he passed away before he could even play a game of catch with his son. Ray is confused and lost internally because of the loss of his father on such bad terms; this becomes a bigger tragedy than he ever thought. It may have even been a tragedy as big as the death of Joe Jackson who died guilty of throwing the World Series. He was never eased of his pain until after his death which was too late. Tragedies are not uncommon phenomena in life, Ray Kinsella and Shoeless Joe Jackson have the misfortune of living a struggle fulfilled life that only consists of tragic events around every corner of their lives.
There was no investigation about the World Series until August 31, 1920 when evidence came up that gamblers had rigged a regular seasoned game between the Cubs and the Phillies. There was an investigation that went on and found that the World Series was fixed too. Eddie Cicotte decided to testify before the grand jury. He admitted his involvement in the scandal saying that he needed the money for his wife and kids. After his confession “shoeless” Joe Jackson testified and also admitted that he was involved. A few days later Lefty Williams and Oscar Felsch also admitted to being involved.The eight players were banned from playing
The 1919 World Series resulted in the most famous scandal in baseball history. Eight players from the Chicago White Sox were accused of throwing the series against the Reds and were banned from Major League Baseball. (“History files-Chicago Black Sox”) All eight players were expelled in an attempt to save the purity of the game. The White Sox lost the opening game of the series nine to one, and then ended up losing the series five games to three.
Especially if you were a Dodgers fan, considering he did accomplish many things not even the best white baseball players were doing. As long as it took for integration to finally be settled was due to the beliefs of the people on race equality dating back to pre-Civil War, throughout Jackie’s career. The views have most definitely changed between races throughout the years, allowing very few differences between race, beliefs, preferences and more to be supported throughout the league. This is greatly appreciated in modern baseball today because baseball would not be what it is today if integration still existed, and/or if the league still had the color ban.
won a prize for "Diamond Doom," a baseball mystery. At age eighteen, he published his
Jackie Robinson decided to fight to be the first African American to integrate the Major League Baseball (MLB). His autobiography states he “was forced to live with snubs rebuffs and rejections” ( Robinson). This quote shows that he was treated unfairly and disrespectfully. In Robinson’s autobiography it also states that Jackie Robinson broke the racial barrier and created equal oppurtunity proving that a “sport can’t be called national if blacks are barred from it”
Before beginning a dissection of the reasoning behind each theory, let us look into who Pete Rose is and why he received a lifetime ban from baseball. Peter Edward Rose was a Major League Baseball (MLB) player with the Cincinnati Reds from 1963-1978. From here Pete went on to join the Philadelphia Phillies and the Montreal Expos, now the Washington Nationals, before returning to the Reds as a player-manager in 1984 before becoming the full-time manager in 1986. During his time as a player Pete was able to compile numerous records and awards. He was the 1963 National League Rookie of the Year, a two-time Gold Glove winner, a three-time World Series winner, the 1975 World Series Most Valuable Player, and selected to the All-Star team 17 times. On top of the accolades Pete Rose is MLB’s career leader in hits with 4,2...
“Smokey Joe” Wood was selected because of what he did in the 1912 season. It was easily his best of his career, and it’s also arguably one of the greatest seasons by any pitcher ever. He won an astonishing thirty-four games while only losing five. He had a 1.91 ERA (Earned Run Average) while striking out 258 batters. Since 1900 there has only been 21 times a pitcher has won over thirty games. Wood’s thirty-four win season is the sixth highest total; however, after this season he was never again able to reach this level of success in his career. He won 117 of th...
It helped that Jackson loved to be around the games, as a kid he and other neighborhood kids would play “stickball”, a form of baseball using a tree branch and a beat up tennis ball. As a teenager, he would be working out or practicing constantly at his high school trying to get better (Jackson and Schaap, 43). Not only did Jackson work hard, he had a great work ethic throughout his career. He was the kind of ballplayer who was the first one to the field, even before the coaches, and the last one to leave the field. Jackson was born with great athletic ability, but that can only go so far for an athlete.
Jackie Robinson, born Jack Roosevelt Robinson, is known for being the first African-American to play in Major League Baseball. He was born on January 31, 1919 in Cairo, Georgia as the grandson of a slave. He was the youngest of five children and at six months old his father left them. At this time, because it was so hard for African-Americans in the south, his mother Mallie Robinson decided to move them to Pasadena, California where it was easier for African-Americans to live and find jobs.
The World Series of 1919 was found out to be thrown by the Chicago White Sox, creating many problems within the American League. This World Series was different than many others. The 1919 World Series was played in a best-of-nine series, rather than being played in best-of-seven like all other World Series games before it. The other team involved, the Cincinnati Reds, had no idea of the scandal. The Baseball Hall of Fame states in their article “Guide to the Black Sox Scandal (American League),” Gambling was not new to baseball. There is evidence that White Sox players, in 1917, paid pitchers from the Detroit club, who beat Boston during the pennant stretch run $200 each.” This shows that the White Sox not only cheated in the 1919 World Series, but also in the 1917 season. There were 8 players involved in gambling with the 1919 World Series, including many of the league’s best players. The eight players involved included Eddie Cicotte, Oscar “Happy” Felsch, Arnold “Chick” Gandil, “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, Fred McMullin, Charles “Swede” Risberg, George “Buck” Weaver, and Claude “Lefty” Williams. These 8 players, threw the game for a cash reward from 5 separate gamblers who were involved in the scandal. Abe Attell, Bill Burns, Arnold Rothstein, Billy Maharg, and Joseph “Sport” Sullivan, were all indicted along with the players for gambling with the 1919 World Series, and was considered as a “crime against baseball
As a 20 year old youth in 1883, Billy played baseball in the lots of his neighborhood in Marshalltown, Iowa. One day the captain for the Chicago White Sox, A.C. Anson, was in the lots watching all the teenagers, young adults, and Billy Sunday playing baseball. Anson was so impressed with what he had seen in Billy’s baseball performance that Billy was signed unto the White Sox soon after.
John W. Fowler was the first black professional baseball player. He was born a free man in 1854. Fowler played for a team in New Castle Pennsylvania. He was the first of more than thirty black players in the white leagues before 1900. He was recognized by the white media as one of the best second basemen of his day, but he never got the chance to play in the Major Leagues. The first black major league player was named Moses Fleetwood Walker. Walker was in Ohio in 1857. He played two years of baseball for Oberlin College, and two years playing with Michigan at Ann Arbor. In 1983, he joined the Toledo club of the North Western league. Toledo entered the American Association a year later and Walker become the first black Major Leaguer. Walker was actually well received in most of his games. He was even applauded in some places. However, in two southern cities, Richmond and Louisville he was harasse...
Officially Joe Louis Barrow, Joe was born in the foothills of Alabama to his mother Lillie and father Muroe Barrow on May 13, 1914. Munroe was a sharecropper, but was committed to an asylum when Joe was only two, and died when he was four. Following this his mother got a job doing washing to support her eight children, but eventually married Patrick Brooks when Joe was seven. Their large family, Lillie's eight children and Patrick's eight children, moved into an eight room house on Detroit's Macomb street in 1926. Here Joe began to go to school at first Duffield and then Bronson, two vocational schools, until he was seventeen.
This game of a stick and ball has captivated the United States during good and bad times. In either time most of us today can remember stories of players from the late 1800’s to early 1900’s. These are legendary figures in the sport of baseball that have are celebrated as hero’s and in scandal, i...