Did Jeff Pearlman go too far with F-word usage in ARod rant?

Posted on August 20, 2013 by admin

If you aren’t doing this already, you should check out Jeff Pearlman’s blog on a regular basis.

The former Sports Illustrated writer and current best-selling author (Walter Payton biography and more) never is dull. However, his latest post about Alex Rodriguez featured a certain word–a lot.

Writing on Ryan Dempster’s fastball that clipped ARod Sunday (“I was just trying to pitch inside”), Pearlman wrote the following.

And yet … I couldn’t help feeling that, with the pitch to Rodriguez’s body, Ryan was issuing a declaration on behalf of Major League Baseball’s clean, fed-up players. Namely: Fuck you.

Yes, fuck you.

Fuck you for cheating. Fuck you for stealing paychecks. Fuck you for influencing the outcomes of games. Fuck you for lying. Fuck you for dragging us all down. Fuck you—Ryan Braun and Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa and Roger Clemens and Miguel Tejada and Nelson Cruz and Barry Bonds and Jhonny Peralta and Paul Lo Duca and every other guy who felt the need to inject nonsense into their bodies to help accomplish what, naturally, they could not.

Fuck you.

I mean, what the F…, Jeff? Was that a deleted part from an old Sopranos script?

After taking some flak for his f-bombing, Pearlman followed up with another post.

What I was doing, by repeatedly breaking out the ol’ “fucks,” was showing (or trying to show) what Ryan Dempster’s pitches toward Alex Rodriguez seemed to symbolize—both to Dempster, as well as other clean players around the Majors.

Whether one agrees with Dempster’s tactics or not, I assure you—without question—there were cheers throughout Major League Baseball clubhouses. Two reasons: 1. Because, even without the whole PED issue, Rodriguez is considered a selfish fraud phony with the sincerity of a used car salesmen; 2. Because Rodriguez, along with Ryan Braun, has come to symbolize cheating in baseball, and non-cheaters are fed up.

And Pearlman added:

On a side note, I love cursing. I really do. I don’t curse around my kids or my nephews, because they’re young and I don’t want them getting kicked out of class. But a good curse feels greeeeaaaaaat. I’ve also never fully understood the taboo of the curse word. Years ago I wrote a lengthy piece on curse origins, and it’s all silly nonsense. They’re words. They come, they go, nobody dies.

Personally, I didn’t have a problem with Pearlman’s F-bomb rant on ARod. I’m fairly sure many baseball fans feel the same way.

Great F-ing job, Jeff.

Perception issue: Tribune ownership of Cubs primer for Red Sox’s Henry owning Boston Globe

Posted on August 7, 2013 by admin

In my latest column for the National Sports Journalism Center site at Indiana University, I look at what is in store for the Boston Globe sports staff in the wake of Red Sox owner John Henry purchasing the paper. I write from my experience at the Chicago Tribune during its ownership of the Cubs.

Here are some excerpts:

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Upon hearing the news that Red Sox owner John Henry plans to buy the Boston Globe, I reflected back to the first time when I directly encountered the issue of the Tribune Co. owning the Cubs.

In the winter of 1987, as the Chicago Tribune’s beat writer for the White Sox, I joined manager Jim Fregosi and a few players for a caravan through Central Illinois. Nothing like Peoria in February.

Fregosi was doing a Q/A for a group when someone asked, “Why does the Tribune favor the Cubs over the White Sox?”

Fregosi, one of my all-time favorite guys in 32 years covering the sports, knew he had just been served a hanging slider. Turning in my direction, with a very mischievous grin on his face, he said, “Yes, Ed Sherman, tell us why the Tribune favors the Cubs over the Sox?”

Now Fregosi wasn’t trying to make a point; he never complained about the Trib’s coverage as it related to the Cubs. Rather, he enjoyed putting me on the spot and watching me squirm.

I tried to plead my case, saying the Tribune, not the Sun-Times, had made the trip on this cold winter night. I insisted there wasn’t any pro-Cubs bias in the sports department and the Sox got a fair shake in terms of coverage.

The Sox fans in Peoria didn’t want to hear it, responding to my response with a collection of non-believing groans. I’m fairly sure it made Fregosi’s night.

It was the first time I had to deal with the perception issue between the Tribune Co. and Cubs. And it wouldn’t be the last.

The sports staff of the Boston Globe is bracing for a new day when Henry officially takes over ownership of the paper. Several writers voiced their apprehension in an article that ran over the weekend in The New York Times.

“This was the last circumstance anyone would want,” said longtime column Bob Ryan, who still works as a contributor to the Globe. “It’s nothing anyone would wish. It’s scary, to say the least, for all involved.”

Indeed, it is difficult to think of a larger conflict of interest. Not even if the Mayor of Boston bought the Globe because the Red Sox are much bigger in the Hub. From this point forward, the Globe now will be covering the team owned by the paper’s owner.

Welcome to our world, Boston.

********

I worked as an associate sports editor for the Tribune during a period in the 90s. If anything, my recollection is that we almost bent over backwards to give the Sox better play over the Cubs at times.

When I would hear about a Cubs bias, I used to tell people that the Tribune sports desk had many more Sox fans than Cubs fans. I was among a South Sider legion that included Bob Vanderberg, who continues to write books about the Sox. We all have fond memories of Dan Moulton, a cranky but beloved character nearly popping a vein after a Sox reliever blew a save.

Yet despite my protestations, people always thought the Tribune was in the bag for the Cubs. The paper owned the team. Hence, whenever the Cubs won (rarely, I might add during the Tribune‘s main ownership tenure), the newsroom surely exploded in a chorus of “Go, Cubs, Go…”

No matter what you say, people are going to believe what they want to believe. Perception easily was the biggest issue the Tribune sports staff encountered when it was the main owner of the Cubs.

The perception wasn’t just limited to fans. Malcolm Moran, director of the National Sports Journalism Center, recalled he had questions when he left The New York Times to join the Tribune during the 90s.

“When I started at the Tribune, I had to sign a series of documents, many of which related to ethical requirements,” Moran said. “As I signed one after the other, I remember thinking, ‘You own the Cubs, and you’re telling me about ethics?’ There is a fine line between a conflict of interest and a perceived conflict, and both are dangerous. I never saw any evidence of favoritism. But I did wonder, in that tainted home run summer of 1998, whether the assignment of writing about Sammy Sosa’s hop was the result of a corporate agenda.”

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And there’s more. Here’s the link to the entire column.

Of course we watched: ARod’s freak show pulls in big ratings in New York, Chicago

Posted on August 6, 2013 by admin

We were eating dinner last night with the TV on, something my wife hates.

“I want to see ARod’s first at bat,” I tried to explain.

“Why do you care? He’s a cheater,” she replied.

For better and mostly worse, I explained it might have been the most significant moment of the season. And I wasn’t alone.

In the no-surprise department, the Alex Rodriguez show delivered a season-high 4.34 rating for a Yankees game on the YES Network. At its peak, from 8:30-8:45 p.m., coinciding with his first at bat (cheap bloop single), an estimated 756,000 New York households were tuned into the game.

Meanwhile, in Chicago, where ratings have plummeted for the woeful White Sox, the game did a 3.09 rating on CSN Chicago, the second highest of the season after the season opener. The game peaked at a 4.37 rating during the 7:30 p.m. quarter-hour (approximately 152,286 Chicago TV homes tuning in for A-Rod’s first at bat).

As much as he is detested, people love to watch a good villain. And they don’t come any bigger now than ARod.

Bob Ryan on Red Sox owner buying Boston Globe: ‘It’s scary for all’

Posted on August 5, 2013 by admin

Dan Shaughnessy had this opener to a notes column Saturday:

Picked-up pieces while reminding all of you that John Henry’s greatness has been vastly underappreciated.

Ah yes, it is a new day for Shaughnessy and the Boston Globe sports staff upon the news that Red Sox owner John Henry is buying the paper. And think about this: Henry spent more on signing on one player, Dustin Pedroia ($100 million), than he did to purchase one of the top publications in the country ($70 million). And unlike Pedroia’s contract, the Globe deal doesn’t expire in seven years.

If that isn’t a sobering statement about the state of newspapers, nothing is.

Naturally, Globe sports staffers aren’t thrilled about the situation. The New York Times’ Peter May got their reaction over the weekend.

“This was the last circumstance anyone would want,” Ryan said Saturday of Henry’s purchase of The Globe and other media properties from The New York Times Company for $70 million. “It’s nothing anyone would wish. It’s scary, to say the least, for all involved.”

This is what scares Ryan:

The team’s stunning collapse in September 2011 was followed by a Globe investigative piece by Bob Hohler, revealing that pitchers John Lackey, Josh Beckett and Jon Lester had been eating fried chicken and drinking beer in the clubhouse during games. Hohler also wrote that management had concerns that Francona’s deteriorating marriage and his use of painkillers may have affected his performance.

In a radio interview at the time, Henry said of the article, “It’s reprehensible that it was written about in the first place.”

Henry would now be in a position to kill such an article, which concerns Ryan, who retired from The Globe in 2012 but who has a verbal agreement to write up to 40 columns in 2013.

“Anyone in this situation has to look at it with a great deal of trepidation,” Ryan said. “It’s uncomfortable and it puts the Globe sports department, especially the Red Sox writers, in a potentially uncompromising position.”

Then there was this from Shaughnessy:

Dan Shaughnessy, The Globe’s lead sports columnist, has written critically about Henry since he became the principal owner of the Red Sox in 2002.

“There’s an inherent conflict of interest which no one can do anything about,” Shaughnessy said. “All we can hope for is that everyone is allowed to do his job professionally and that we are able to keep our independence.”

Shaughnessy and the former Red Sox manager Terry Francona wrote a book, “Francona: The Red Sox Years,” which detailed Francona’s ugly exit from the team after its collapse in September 2011. The book was highly critical of the Red Sox ownership group, and Shaughnessy said it was “not exactly a party-starter” for Henry.

Globe sports editor Joe Sullivan hopes it will be business as usual with the new owner:

“We don’t know what the new situation is going to be in terms of hierarchy, but I would hope to be able to continue to cover the Red Sox the way we always have, “ the sports editor, Joe Sullivan, said.

Good luck, Joe, Bob and Dan.

Check back for more of my views on this development. After all, I used to work at the Chicago Tribune, which to own majority interest in a certain baseball team.

ARod’s legacy: Last 2 SI covers have been steroid related; long fall from first SI cover

Posted on August 1, 2013 by admin

Alex Rodriguez is featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated for the seventh time this week. There might be an eighth if he is suspended for life.

ARod’s last SI cover was in 2009 when everyone first learned that his amazing career numbers weren’t exactly pure.

Below is his first cover when everything about ARod still was full of wonder and anticipation. Talk about ruining a career and a legacy.

New York Times profile on Harrelson: “I can get away with things most announcers can’t”

Posted on August 1, 2013 by admin

For a play-by-play man calling games for a last-place team (another dreadful defeat last night), this has been the summer of Ken “Hawk” Harrelson.

The Chicago White Sox announcer has sparred with Brian Kenny; had a documentary on his life on MLB Network; and sites like Awful Announcing routinely replay some of his memorable calls.

Now comes a profile of Hawk in the New York Times. Written by Ben Strauss, the piece focuses on his old-school approach to baseball. As we all know, Harrelson isn’t a sabermetrics guy.

Strauss writes:

Harrelson maintains that he does, in fact, like numbers and that sabermetrics does have a valued place in baseball, but that he would prefer it be a role much more limited that it is now and that too much deference is being paid in general to numbers crunching. He called its rise over the last decade “the biggest joke I’ve ever seen.”

“Look down there at a guy like Gordon Beckham,” he said, peering down at the White Sox’ second baseman. “If you got someone who gets a chance to take him out on a double play — like me — I’m not going to take him out, I’m going to take him out into left field.

“So if the shortstop bobbles the ball, and I have a chance to get him, he knows that. Gordon will get busted and he’ll take the hit. There’s no number to define that in a player.”

Then there’s this passage that includes a quote from Bob Costas:

It should be noted that Joe Morgan, a far more prominent announcer than Harrelson when he did commentary for ESPN’s Sunday night baseball broadcasts, was also a critic of the sabermetrics movement and received flak for his stance.

Harrelson, in a local market rather than on a national stage, and with his image as a character firmly established, can probably coast along with his anti-statistics stance easier than Morgan could.

“I can get away with things most announcers can’t,” he acknowledged.

And that, said Bob Costas, a veteran sports voice who is most identified with his work in baseball, is not necessarily a bad thing.

“If I’m listening to the White Sox play the Indians, I’m listening for Hawk to tell a great story about Charlie Finley,” said Costas, who narrated an MLB Network documentary about Harrelson. “Or the time he was sitting with Mickey Mantle at an L.A. hotel and Marlon Brando walks in.

“If a guy doesn’t know what WAR is but he’s got good baseball war stories, I’ll take the trade-off.”

OK what’s next for Hawk. His own reality series?

Major TV crossroads for Cubs: Will they leave WGN? Will they get billion-dollar deal?

Posted on July 31, 2013 by admin

My latest Chicago Tribune column examines what the Cubs will do on the TV front. It will have major ramifications for the franchise. Non-Tribune subscribers can access via my Twitter feed.

From the column:

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Now that the Wrigley Field package has been approved, the Cubs can turn their attention to another deal that will have dramatic implications for the financial future of the franchise.

Negotiations are expected to heat up between the Cubs and WGN-Ch. 9. Technically, their pact runs through 2022, but the Cubs are exercising a clause to opt out after the 2014 season. At stake for the Cubs is a chance to cash in on exploding local TV rights fees. The Dodgers, Angels, Rangers and Mariners recently have signed long-term rights deals in the billions. Yes, billions.

By comparison, the current value of the Cubs package with WGN-Ch. 9, estimated at $20 million per year for 70 games, feels like utility infielder money. Some projections have the Cubs receiving as much as $80 million annually for those games. The team’s other games will be on CSN through at least 2019.

Yet before Chairman Tom Ricketts starts counting the additional TV cash, there are real questions about whether the Cubs are positioned to receive a windfall of their own; the possibility that WGN might end a relationship that dates back to 1948; and if the team will begin to lay the foundation for its own network.

Nobody from the Cubs or WGN is willing to comment, mainly because there are too many things to figure out.

“At this point, it is really complicated,” said a source close to the situation. “No option has been eliminated.”

Here are some of the issues:

•Still super? There is a provision in the contract that allows WGN to extend the Cubs rights by paying “fair market value.” However, that seems difficult to determine because there isn’t a comparable arrangement in baseball. The other recent deals were for cable, while WGN operates as a free, over-the-air signal in Chicago.

This relationship has defined both the Cubs and WGN. Everything, though, comes to an end.

There is speculation that WGN might go the route of TNT and TBS (which formerly aired Braves games) and become a complete national outlet featuring mainly entertainment programming.

“You could produce a lot of shows for $80 million (per year),” said one source familiar with the network’s stance.

Meanwhile, would the Cubs forsake the exposure of being in 75 million homes through WGN America? The superstation helped the Cubs make millions during the heyday of Harry Caray. However, a proliferation of Major League Baseball games available on various cable outlets has blunted the novelty of the Cubs going coast-to-coast.

Experts believe the Cubs would leave WGN if they could get more money elsewhere. Exposure won’t buy high-priced free agents.

•Leverage problem: The mega Dodgers deal ($7 billion over 25 years) stemmed from having multiple suitors. Time Warner eventually won a heated battle over Fox Sports’ regional station in Los Angeles.

A similar situation doesn’t appear to exist in Chicago. And don’t say: What about moving the WGN games to CSN? There’s no room at the inn at CSN, which has a full slate of White Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks games. According to sources, the network isn’t interested in having more scheduling conflicts that would cause spillover games to air on CSN Plus, where they traditionally do much weaker ratings.

So where is the leverage for the Cubs here? There had been some speculation that Fox could become a player, airing games on WFLD-Ch. 32 and WPWR-Ch. 50. However, sources indicate the network hasn’t jumped into the fray yet.

Obviously, that could change, but for now, there appears to be only one network in the race. If that’s the case, what would compel WGN to give the Cubs a big rights increase?

•Cubs network: Forget about the recent sagging ratings. TV observers say the Cubs have enough of a fan base to follow the lead of the Yankees and Red Sox and start their own network.

“When they get good, their ratings are going to explode,” said a source.

The Cubs, though, can’t go on board with their own network until their CSN deal runs out in 2019. However, they could use this current negotiation to lay the foundation for a Cubs channel beginning in 2020.

Luckiest man: Gehrig biographer writes his Hall of Fame speech

Posted on July 27, 2013 by admin

Wanted to share this from Jonathan Eig.

With no living players being inducted in the Hall of Fame this year (thanks inventor of steroids), Lou Gehrig will be honored during ceremonies this weekend.

Gehrig wasn’t healthy enough to attend his own Hall of Fame induction in 1939. While it would have been hard to top his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium, Eig imagines what the legend might have said at Cooperstown in a piece in the Wall Street Journal.

Eig, the editor of ChicagoSide, has a good perspective. He wrote the bestselling biography on Gehrig, The Luckiest Man.

Eig envisions Gehrig beginning this way:

It is a wonderful honor to gain induction today to the Baseball Hall of Fame and to join the pantheon of great athletes and great men who have come before me. This game of baseball has meant everything to me, as it has so many boys. It took me and my family out of poverty. It taught me to be a man. I’m proud that I played hard and that the Yankees won a lot of ballgames and our share of World Series with me at the first sack. I’m proud I hit the ball square and sometimes far. I’m proud that I played fair. I’m proud that I showed my opponents the same respect I showed my own teammates. I’m proud I gave it my all every time I grabbed a bat or slipped on a glove.

But I guess if there’s one thing above all else that I’m proud of, one thing that made me who I am today and got me to the Hall of Fame, it would be this: strength.

Regarding his disease:

You probably heard that I gave a speech at Yankee Stadium when I found out I was sick…that I was…dying…I said I considered myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. Well, I wasn’t saying I was lucky to get this disease, this amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Nobody’s lucky to get sick. I was saying I was lucky to have had a good life, lucky to have parents and a wife who love me, lucky to have played baseball. Mostly, I guess I was lucky to be strong. But here’s what I’ve learned, now that this disease has got me behind in the count no balls and two strikes: I learned that it’s not really muscles that make you strong. I learned that it’s how you face a challenge—like how my parents faced the challenge of losing three kids, or how my wife is facing the challenge of losing me…

And finally:

To fight on through disaster, to dedicate your final days to the loved ones you will soon leave behind, and to believe in yourself when you have nothing left but that will to believe…that is the greatest strength I know.

If only he could have given that speech.

Braun fallout: Media must remain dilligent about reporting on PEDs

Posted on July 25, 2013 by admin

Michael Bradley, writing for the National Sports Journalism Center site, says the media has to keep up the pressure on this issue. There are more Ryan Brauns out there.

Bradley writes:

As a result, the media can’t afford to succumb to the prevailing thought that fans are tired of hearing about steroids, HGH and simply neglect the issue. It remains a huge part of baseball, and Monday’s news proves it. If Major League Baseball decides to come down hard on more P.E.D. users in the coming weeks, it proves that players have not lost their appetite for banned substances. All it means is that they are trying harder to find things that can avoid detection. And it’s up to the media to make sure fans understand that they are paying a lot of money to watch people perform who might well be cheating.

Later, Bradley writes:

Here’s where the media must remain vigilant – in regard to Braun and everybody else in professional sports. No matter how desensitized the fans are to the continued P.E.D. drumbeat, the culture that continues to prevail must be exposed. It’s unfortunate that young fans can’t adore their heroes anymore. It used to be that it was tough to develop a bond with a player because he could leave your town as soon as his contract was up. That was a necessary evil to protect the labor force against ownership’s desires to squelch costs. But this puts even the most loyal player into question. Is his big season the product of a maturation of talent or the result of laboratory experiments that have produced a faster swing?

Amen, to that.

After 63 years, Milo Hamilton has called his last game

Posted on July 24, 2013 by admin

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle reports that Milo Hamilton is calling it a career a bit sooner than he had hoped.

Barron writes:

Former Astros announcer Milo Hamilton said Tuesday he is undergoing chemotherapy for treatment of the chronic form of leukemia from which he has suffered since 1974 and that he has called the final major league game of his 63-year career in radio.

Hamilton, 85, had hoped to make a road trip with the Astros this year to Detroit to call a game at the 60th ballpark in which he has worked Major League Baseball games since 1953. However, he said health issues from earlier this year and the recent decision by doctors that he will require two days of chemo each month will keep him at home.

He said he would not consider making a one-game road trip next year to make it to 60 ballparks and is satisfied with 59.

“I don’t think anybody else cares about 60,” he said during an impromptu news conference in the Astros’ dugout. “Maybe I built it up too much. It’s a fact of life now, and that’s OK.”

Think about it: 63 years in the booth. That’s quite a run.