Man, something is REALLY strange about the order in which these new threads get posted.

It's just a wafer-thin mint.

"Here, let us break that wand for you."

So does this mean no more beer & KFC in the front office, either?

The Red Sox Monday asked senior adviser of baseball operations Bill James to refrain from commenting about Joe Paterno and the sexual abuse scandal at Penn State.

Should it say something to you when you have to muzzle your own adviser?

:-)

I bet the conversation they had with James was hilarious. I wonder how far it went before the phrase, "WTF are you thinking?" was uttered.

There is just no pile of dogshit the Red Sox can avoid right now, is there?

I'm trying to come up with something about James being silenced and the line, "My name is Bill James. I am not a Bill Jamesian," but nothing's coming.

I said it in the other thread, but SBNation should also tell Neyer to stop talking about this.

But if all these guys are silenced, no punching bags for the rest of us.

I said it in the other thread, but SBNation should also tell Neyer to stop talking about this.

I don't know, I'm instinctively against any kind of muzzling. I can see the Red Sox reining James in, but I don't see why SB Nation has to stifle the debate.

Fortunately for SB Nation, once James is muzzled, Rob probably won't have anything to say.

Anyone have a sense of James' personality? By which I mean, is he the sort of person to take this kind of public slapdown (notice that they didn't merely tell him STFU, they made a point of releasing a statement to the press) humbly? Or is he one of those prickly loose cannon types?

Would love to see a big meltdown here.

Fortunately for SB Nation, once James is muzzled, Rob probably won't have anything to say.

BUUUUUUUUURN.

I don't know James beyond a few minimal email exchanges. But I do know several people who know James very well, and the very strong sense I have is that James is and always has been a very difficult personality.

I don't know, I'm instinctively against any kind of muzzling. I can see the Red Sox reining James in, but I don't see why SB Nation has to stifle the debate.

I agree with you, but I see their situations the opposite way. Bill James used his own site to express his views, he didn't do it on the Red Sox site or on a Red Sox broadcast. Rob Neyer is using his SB Nation blog to express his views, if SB Nation doesn't want their writers entering that territory on their sites, they can directly reign Neyer in.

I don't know James beyond a few minimal email exchanges. But I do know several people who know James very well, and the very strong sense I have is that James is and always has been a very difficult personality.

That's my sense too but I don't see James as someone who goes looking for fights. Maybe I'm wrong but it seems like he puts his opinions out there (whatever the topic) and after some limited back and forth just lets his findings/opinions speak for themselves. I also think he's savvy enough to understand why the Sox put out a statement even if he probably thinks it's unnecessary since it was his own personal website.

I don't really get the feeling James regards Paterno as a Wronged Man who needs a loud public advocate (Paterno is, after all, dead), or himself as that advocate, anywhere nearly strong enough to resign his consulting gig. He'll probably shrug and move on.

Fortunately for SB Nation, once James is muzzled, Rob probably won't have anything to say.

Not having anything to say has never stopped Rob from saying it.

I said it in the other thread, but SBNation should also tell Neyer to stop talking about this.

Why? SBNation is a website whose business model involves page hits. Writing controversial things -- and let's face it, what Neyer is writing is pretty attenuated from real controversy anyway (*) -- plays into that model; it doesn't undermine it. The Red Sox, on the other hand, are trying to sell tickets to families. James is not part of their sales campaign.





(*) Neyer is defending James for defending Paterno against the charge that he didn't do enough to stop Sandusky from actually doing the harm. Neither Neyer nor James is defending pedophilia, Sandusky, or Paterno's alleged malfeasance.

Not having anything to say has never stopped Rob from saying it.

Well jeez, if we're going to adopt that standard we might as well all shut up and go home.

I blame Bobby V.

James also said in a radio interview that men showering with young boys was ''quite common in America 40 years ago.''

Oh, well, I guess we are cool then. Of course, ####### them in the shower, you've got to go back a few more years.

(*) Neyer is defending James for defending Paterno against the charge that he didn't do enough to stop Sandusky from actually doing the harm.

I'm offended that he's defending the defender of the defender of the offender.

Which calls to mind the following exchange from Big Bang:

Sheldon: You’re a lucky man, Leonard.

Leonard: How so?

Sheldon: You’re talking to one of the three men in the Western hemisphere capable of following that train of thought.

Leonard: Well, what do you think.

Sheldon: I said I could follow it, I didn’t say I cared.

Not defending James in any way, but I took public showers with adults at the gym/pool when I was a kid - that'd be in the 80s. Never thought that was unusual, but also never asked.

Thinking back, #25, that was the case as well at a number of the public pools in my suburban childhood (80s). My suit may have stayed on, and then sheepishly hid behind locker doors as I got dressed, but there were men 18-80 in that locker room sans clothes and suits in the shower and locker room.

Thinking back, #25, that was the case as well at a number of the public pools in my suburban childhood (80s). My suit may have stayed on, and then sheepishly hid behind locker doors as I got dressed, but there were men 18-80 in that locker room sans clothes and suits in the shower and locker room.

I think it's still the rule in a lot of public pools. Of course, they don't usually open up the public pool and locker facilities for exclusive use by a man and a young unrelated boy (like they did at Penn State). There's generally a lot of people coming and going to limit the danger of such an activity.

SoSH has he relevant point. yes, I've used public showers with other men, no I've never gone into showers with other men, nor was there ever any horsing around is those showers that I'm aware of, even back when people actually used that phrase.

trying to imagine my reaction had someone 40 years ago (I'd have been 14) said, "C'mon, let's take a shower." Nope, it's not working.

Besides, we're not talking about showering here, anyway, unless that's a Kansasism I'm not aware of.

If Sandusky had showered with these kids, there's no crisis.

25-27: How much horseplay was there with boys and men 40 years older than them in these showers?

& WTF does 40 years ago have to do with 2001, anyway

Of course, Mayor, I agree with all of that - I just thought that some of the criticism James got for that line was unwarranted (apart from it being an unneeded addendum to an untenable address).

WTF does 40 years ago have to do with 2001, anyway

[throws bone in air.]

Of course, Mayor, I agree with all of that - I just thought that some of the criticism James got for that line was unwarranted (apart from it being an unneeded addendum to an untenable address).

It deserves every ounce of scorn one can muster actually. It's an utterly ridiculous and offensive statement, given the overall context.

I went to a public pool recently, and when I came back to the locker room I waited for a stall to open in order to change. I'm in there trying to tiptoe around urine in order to maintain decorum and then I walk out and see a 60ish year-old man standing bare ass naked in front of a locker. I don't know who was right, but I'm more comfortable doing it my way.

I think James's comments about Paterno have been stupid, and Boston's totally within bounds telling him to knock it off, but why not just quit the Sox at this point? I mean, you won your two rings, you HAVE to be financially comfortable by now, and there's nothing seemly about a grown free-speecher getting his free speech quashed by the boss. He should go full Murray Chass.

Misirlou, allow me to rephrase... if you want to knock it in the context in which it appears, go for it. But, I've seen a lot of mockery of that line outside of that context and that's what I found odd.
Granted, my question/comment is very small potatoes...

Misirlou, allow me to rephrase... if you want to knock it in the context in which it appears, go for it. But, I've seen a lot of mockery of that line outside of that context and that's what I found odd.

To me, it's along the lines of Whoppie Goldberg's "Rape rape" comment.

Of course, Mayor, I agree with all of that - I just thought that some of the criticism James got for that line was unwarranted (apart from it being an unneeded addendum to an untenable address).

The difference, as I see it -- well, beyond the fact that Sandusky was literally raping the kids -- was that these "public pool" and locker room situations were/are just situations where males of all ages happened to be mulling around taking showers and often even standing around naked chatting before getting dressed. But these Second Mile kids were there as Sandusky's guests, and he was showering with them (why? why shower in the first place? were they swimming? why would Sandusky shower with them even if the boy needed a shower?), and "horsing around" with them in the shower. Again, why? If any of us here were chaperoning a young underprivileged kid, would we ever find ourselves in a shower naked with the kid, horsing around? Especially after hours, in a private locker room, when nobody else is around? Should that not raise an eyebrow if we saw someone else doing it, to say the least?

What in the world are people defending this for, with "Oh, 40 years ago men would shower with boys." The situations are entirely different. And this wasn't 40 years ago, anyway.

There is just no pile of dogshit the Red Sox can avoid right now, is there?

I'm waiting for the "Syria in full scale civil war, Red Sox involved somehow" headline.

#37 Extra credit if your scenario somehow involves fried chicken.

I have showered many times in public locker rooms with many different ages of men.

At no point was there hugging or soaping of showermates. Sometimes there was horseplay, though that was only between teammates of the same age, and mostly involved people snapping towels, or this one dude who was always trying to pee on people.

In a non-team situation, there is a very strict protocol and horsing around is definitely to be frowned upon.

(In my experience)

Paging Jack Keefe

James also said in a radio interview that men showering with young boys was ''quite common in America 40 years ago.''

Back in the 60's our neighborhoodlum priest would let use the Catholic school gym for nighttime hoops...providing we all showered after playing. Now while 'ol Fadda Fanutzi stood off to the side and occasionally got lightly sprinkled on...he made damn sure every one of us were scrubbed up!

The university gym I go to has swim classes for little kids on the weekend and is also used by the university's summer sports camps. So there will be people ages 8 to 80 in the showers at times. Though you'd never say that adults are showering "with" the kids, more that they're in proximity. There's no interaction between (non-parent) adults and the kids outside of someone occasionally yelling at some kid for running in the shower room or something like that.

I went to a public pool recently, and when I came back to the locker room I waited for a stall to open in order to change. I'm in there trying to tiptoe around urine in order to maintain decorum and then I walk out and see a 60ish year-old man standing bare ass naked in front of a locker. I don't know who was right, but I'm more comfortable doing it my way.

The older you get, the less you care about people seeing you naked. The less they care, too.

What do you think this does for his Hall of Fame chances?

As others have said, big difference between a group of men, even including teens and kids, showering at the same time and "showering together". Many of us have been there and the first rule is: no contact, including eye contact. You clean yourself up and move along.

Also, at the local Y, built just a few years ago, there is a locker room for under 15s (both boys and girls). I assume it is for just this situation, although, honestly, I think there probably is as much danger of trouble from giving them their own space as there is mixing them with adults.

#37 Extra credit if your scenario somehow involves fried chicken.

I look forward to Youk riding an Abrams out of Damascus with Bashar Assad's head mounted to the turret.

Well Al some 1 said I was paiged to a thread it is about whether 1 should shower with young boys Al. Now why do they think of me in this Contacts. Al you know your self when we were nippers in the public baths of Terre Haute I was the shy 1 who always modestly draped a Towel over my Midriff. I do not think men should shower with any 1 else. I do not even like to shower alone I always close my Eyes and then when I drop the Soap I am afraid to bend Over and once I slipt on a Cake and spent 21 days on the Dishevelled List. But now they are all up set because a man named Bilge Ames says he has stats that show how boys in Kansas took showers with glistening strong erect Adult Mails in the year Dot. He has records for Soapiest Shower with a 14 Year Old, Extended Horseplay Percentage, and Most Bratwurst Hidden. Al I dont know about Bilge Ames but in Indiana we do not go for that kind of thing. Kansas guys may play When I Shampoo Yoo with boy sopranos but in Indiana we just run under the water and get out and think about wholesome stuff like baseball and the Swim Suit Issue and how at Mass when I was 13 there was this girl named Tina Reggiseno and if you sat behind her you could see her Bra Strap slip down below the yoke of her Garment and now I think I must Log Off Al and call my girl friend Tawny before I get Impure Thoughts.

WTF does 40 years ago have to do with 2001, anyway

[throws bone in air.]

I thought this was awesome. Well done!

But now they are all up set because a man named Bilge Ames says he has stats that show how boys in Kansas took showers with glistening strong erect Adult Mails in the year Dot. He has records for Soapiest Shower with a 14 Year Old, Extended Horseplay Percentage, and Most Bratwurst Hidden.

First Jack Keefe post that has ever made me authentically laugh. Well done.

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