Moore: A bean ball war 95 years in the making
From Jack Moore at The Score on October 11, 2013:
Kevin Towers was angry on Tuesday. Angry about losing, surely, as those obnoxious, rebellious, and pool-violating Dodgers surged into the National League Championship Series. But he was mostly angry about his team’s failure to enact justice on the diamond, to take matters into their own hands. He was mad, as the Arizona Sports 620 AM host put it, about his club’s lack of “cojones.” And he made it clear: the Diamondbacks are an organization that will strike back.
“If not, if you have options there’s ways to get you outta here. You don’t follow suit, or you don’t feel comfortable doing it, you probably don’t belong in a Diamondbacks uniform.”
Baseball has come a long way in the last 96 years.
When they used the term “expulsion,” [Garry] Herrman and the National Commission — the sport’s pre-commissioner governing body — were not referring to ejection. They meant expulsion from professional baseball for a period no shorter than five years, after which reinstatement could be applied for.
The National Commission was replaced in 1920 by Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis and the official post of Commissioner of Baseball. As was typical for a man who constantly refused to confront the problems within baseball, Landis never truly addressed the bean ball. In 1932, the bean ball was “banned” according to an Associated Press report, but the penalty was severely reduced, to the point where a third offence warranted merely a month’s suspension.
Read the full article here: http://blogs.thescore.com/mlb/2013/10/11/a-bean-ball-war-95-years-in-the-making/
Originally published: October 11, 2013. Last Updated: October 11, 2013.