Roth/Goldman: Waiting for Hank Greenberg, a conversation about heroes
From David Roth and SABR member Steven Goldman at SB Nation on October 17, 2014:
According to the website JewishBaseballNews.com, which we might as well defer to in matters like this, there are 14 active major league players that identify as Jewish. This list does not include fake-you-out non-Jewish players with Jewish-ish names, although congratulations are due in this area to 2014 David Eckstein Award winner Trevor Rosenthal. The list does include the names of five players that made playoff rosters: Ike Davis, Ian Kinsler, Joc Pederson, Nate Freiman and Sam Fuld. Jewish minor leaguers are listed, too, by level; Jason Marquis is included seemingly just in case. All told, this seems about as comprehensive as a list like this could be, and we salute JewishBaseballNews.com for its attention to detail.
Of course, there is the question of why such a list even needs to exist and who such a list would be for. The answer, the most precise answer, is that it exists for my father, a 71-year-old man who has called me on the phone, during business hours, to see if I thought Anne Hathaway was Jewish. Another answer would be that the list is there for me, and a large number of my co-religionists. A more revealing answer, maybe, would be that I already knew all the names on it, and that I generally do at any given time.
Read the full article here: http://www.sbnation.com/2014/10/17/6888293/postseason-baseball-jewish-holidays-hank-greenberg-jews-and-baseball-heroes
Originally published: October 20, 2014. Last Updated: October 20, 2014.