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They were allowed to continue their careers (I distinctly remember them all on the Yankees long after their drug issues) and no one booed them or mentioned drugs much at all. In fact, all three seemed well like by teammates and fans.
Snarky comment above aside I think this stuff certainly helps. Rather than running into hiding he has admitted he made a mistake and at the very least said all the right things about atoning for that (and other mistakes). Fairly or not standing up and saying "I'm sorry" goes an awfully long way in the public eye. It always amazes me when public figures (athletes, politicians, actors) get caught with their hand in the cookie jar and then try to make excuses. "Yes I did it and I'm sorry I did it and I won't do it again" is almost always the best response from a PR standpoint.
That's exactly what I was wondering. I don't get it. What did he do that needs my forgiveness? The forgiveness of his wife and kids, maybe, but not mine. He didn't commit a crime. He's a recovering alcoholic and he had a slip-up. My forgiveness is unrequired.
Seriously, where have all the copy editors gone? I'm assuming Hamilton didn't crack open a brewski on Beck's show.
This would have been much more interesting.
For me it's:
1. Home Run Derby at YS
2. Killed a guy
3. Drugs
4. Great player
Neither Gooden nor Strawberry reached his peak AFTER drug problems. That's the important distinction. If Hamilton was on a HOF-track and got derailed by drug abuse, he'd be in exactly the same boat, a cautionary tale for the rest of his life.
If Josh Hamilton were a black athlete who'd done the same things, would he have been invited onto Glen Beck's network to profess his sorrow? I'll even go a step further - if he were black and Muslim?
You know the answer; as one of my college professors used to say to something so obvious, "Not just no, but hell no."
Sure, but I'm not sure how extensible this argument is. It's Glen Beck, after all.
Agreed. And I am not kidding.
That's more a Glenn Beck issue than anything else.
If you view the question of "would he be forgiven" I think "yes, as he long as he performs well" is the correct answer. If he was black he probably would have done a show other than Glenn Beck but if he had the same events and responses he would have been similarly forgiven. People stopped complaining about Vick once he started throwing for 300 yards a game.
The comps to Straw and Doc aren't good ones because the career shape is so different. It's a bit less jarring to see a guy struggle struggle struggle SUCCEED than to see SUCCEED struggle struggle struggle. With the former the perception is "it took him awhile to figure it out." With the latter it's "he threw it away." I think Steve Howe is perceived the same way as Straw and Doc.
Uh, really?
Hell, I wouldn't have banned Steve Howe for two minutes. That was between Howe, his employer, and the legal system.
Unfortunatly...thanks to LINSANITY!!....I can't snark that 'no black sportswriter would think of saying something so dumb'.
Well if he was a tattooed, cracked out, white female with kids...she'd generate more than sympathy from me. But I have very specific fetishes.
Isn't there a big difference in that Hamilton has never come across as an ass? An addict, sure, but otherwise a nice guy.
grammergrammar policing, no one has touched the questionThe Spelling Police say hello, citizen.
Darryl Strawberry is very hated in Philadelphia and I imagine much of the non-NYC world. Gooden and Raines, not too much.
There is a hard core animal lover cohort who will never, ever, forgive Michael Vick***. There are other, less extreme people who won't forgive him either. A small majority are willing to give him a second chance.
*** His work with the animal groups doesn't appear to be all that sincere (or frequent any more). He does seem to look genuinely interested when dealing with kids however. Of course that's just me judging what I see on TV.
That's kind of what I mean. I wonder if there is a segment of the population who reacts negative to what Hamilton says and positively to what Iverson says. In fact, I have been around groups of people who deify Iverson. I don't know what their opinions of Hamilton are. Regardless, Iverson being an ass is probably more of a reflection of dominant sociological narratives than inherent human decency. I guess that's more of an assertion that "cultures exist" than it is an assertion that "this is racist."
The public is simply grateful that he put Bam Bam Bigelow in his place at Wrestlemania XI.
I hear they arrange kid-fights in England.
Well, that and the felony conviction.
Tim Tebow was called "the greatest college football player ever" by more than one commentator, even though he never, even for a single game, was. ESPN couldn't get enough Tebow this year.
EDIT: And, the point of the linked article is that Hamilton isn't villified in the press.
Tim Tebow was called "the greatest college football player ever" by more than one commentator, even though he never, even for a single game, was. ESPN couldn't get enough Tebow this year.
I think your sarcasm detector is on the fritz.
I mentioned in my previous post that his felony conviction was overturned for lack of evidence and he was granted clemency.
Also, do people second-guess Hamilton's version of his indiscretions as they do Iverson's claim that he was not in the bowling alley during the fight?
This I think is the most important part of the equation, with being white/religious/performing at a high level a close 2a/2b/2c.
I think Rickey Williams fits the remorseful/performing at a high level characteristics, but not the other two. He's the closest comp to Hamilton I can think of (talented, threw it away on drugs - kicked out of the league, came back to an all-pro level).
Defenders are supposed to be bad.
I admit I don't know that much about Iverson beyond what was going on in Philadelphia around his peak, and maybe he's a very bad person, but I didn't realize there was a general negative perception of him. I just remember loving him surrounded by a whole city that loved him.
The news was that he drank alcohol at a bar, he said that he drank alcohol at a bar, what is there to second-guess? If there is something more, he managed to hide the bodies.
Exactly how great does an artist need to be, and how awful their crimes, before it becomes hard to appreciate their art? I always found Chris Brown an appealing but not terribly interesting singer, so after learning that he's a vicious abuser, I've happily ceased consuming his art. Polanski, on the other hand, may be an unrepentant child rapist, but I'll still see pretty much any movie he makes. Is there a crime that Polanski could have committed that would lead me to avoid his films? (Or should I anyway?) And how much lesser of a director would Polanski need to be before I started ignoring him like Chris Brown? Michael Mann? James Cameron? Adam McKay? I really don't know.
This isn't about political art - if Brown wrote a song about how great it is to beat women up, or Polanski a movie supportive of child rape, I wouldn't appreciate it or have any trouble condemning it. But their normal stuff.
EDIT: The original version of this post included the incredibly unfortunate phrase "went Chris Brown on him." It was used to describe not watching someone's movies, but I noticed it was there and took it out. I'm happy for the edit feature right now.
His album was called "Forgiving All My Enemies."
Because HE deserves forgiveness for people being mad at him for what he's done and his behavior afterwards.
That said, the people paying him are almost as repellent for sponsoring the non-apology train.
Gooden had yet to continue falling and falling and falling when the Voice published that comment in its late great sports section. It was a succinct and apt observation about the media. Don't recall Dick Young delivering a "STAND UP AND BOO" back cover for Mullin's return to the court.
You actually believe "athlete picking up girl in bar" is newsworthy? Even Jeter can toil away at that until there is an amusing gift basket episode to tell.
Why would he have? Mullin was a west coast player by the time the news about his alcoholism emerged. It wasn't like the news hit when he was at his peak with St. John's. If Mullin had been a Knick, then it would have been an interesting comparison.
And whatever the merits of the case, I really don't think Iverson was perceived negatively on a national level. Maybe he got some occasional #### from sports talkers trying to fill a 4-hour block of air time in metro Dallas, but I think nationally he was perfectly well appreciated, and locally he was beloved.
i've had trouble getting myself in the mood to watch woody allen movies ever since all that sh-t came out about him screwing his stepdaughter behind his wife's back. but i had been getting tired of his schtick anyway. he kept giving himself the mensch lines in his movies and setting himself up as a lovable loser. when that sordid stuff came out i had a visceral reaction to 'husbands and wives' cuz there he is playing this character who's too noble to mess around with a younger woman, when all along he was taking advantage of soon yi. blyetch.
but for some reason i've always been able to watch polanski films without the same inner conflict. i admit i'm being inconsistent, but there you have it.
I understand this and #64, and trust me that I'm not casting stones, but I have had an incredibly easy time avoiding any and all of Polanski's work since I've fully grasped his crime. I think I'm doing no one a service, nor do I care one iota about convincing others to do the same. But I'm happy to avoid him
I haven't had the same issue at all with Allen, although his peak was years ago, so it hasn't really come up.
I had a conductor in CA who refused, angrily, even, to perform any work of Carlo Gesualdo, due do his murder of his wife, her lover, and possibly his second son. A friend of mine found it stupid, but I appreciate that kind of strict commitment.
*it's black metal--your definition of "good" is probably not mine.
Oh boy, I hope you don't own a copy of March of the Penguins.
I actually think he was perceived TOO highly. He wasn't nearly as great of a player as casual fans thought he was, and his MVP award was the NBA's worst selection since I've been following basketball (a little over 20 years).
Yeah, I have a huge gap in my metal history listening where Mayhem and Burzum would go. It's not so much that I've specifically avoided it, but I sure haven't been motivated to seek it out.
I'll see your "Allen Iverson" and raise you 2 "Steve Nash over Shaquille O'Neil"s.
I'll give you the first one (2005), but in 2006 Shaq wan't even the best player on his own team (Wade) or one of the top 10 players in the league. Going off memory since I'm too lazy to look it up, the 2006 MVP should've gone to Dirk or Duncan (or Kobe, if you don't think the MVP needs to play for a contender, though I do). Nash's best case for MVP was actually 2007 when he didn't win. Him and Dirk should swap their 2006 and 2007 trophies.
But there wasn't a coach in the league (including his own) that would've wanted Iverson on their team in 2001 rather than Shaq, Duncan, or Garnett.
d'oh! that's pretty high on the icky factor too.
And what Phredbird said in 64. It's not a challenge with Allen, since he's been so bad in anything I happened to see while, say, at a party where one of his more recent films was playing on a tv in a corner.
***
Ah, the Glen Beck parody. Well done.
WTWTWTF?
WTF?
That's...
Nailing your underage step-granddaughter? When you were forty five years older than she was?
Won't someone think of the wrinkles?!?!
It sounds like she wants to avoid the publicity that keeps following her (and her family, especially her mother) every time Polanski's case is in the news, and just wants it to go away (as she's managed to move on, regardless of Polanski's fate). I wouldn't confuse that with forgiveness, or any feelings that he didn't do something very, very awful to her.
This doesn't excuse what Polanski did, but assuming she's not been misquoted, her feelings are clear.
It's not fair, but most people's reaction to a guy like Cabrera is that he's a jerk because he chooses to party hard at the expense of his job performance. Hamilton is a sympathetic figure because it's so obvious he can barely control himself. It's impossible for any of us to accurately judge how powerful either man's addiction is, but most people assume it's harder for Hamilton because he's had more problems.
In a perverse way, Cabrera would probably receive more sympathy if he drank more and exercised less self control.
Wait, what??! Why did anyone ever enjoy that?
Of course, Hamilton's occasional lapses from sobriety don't seem to have hurt the Rangers directly, but his drug use sure as hell hurt the Rays, and it might also be contributing to his persistent injury problems.
Hmmmm, him being high as a kite could be the explanation for his erratic managing during the post-season.
As is, people make Hamilton like he is Tim Tebow or something - when Tebow seems much more like someone I'd actually have as a role model.
With other notable crackheads [recovering or otherwise] in professional sports, it's open season as far as people's snark, punchlines are concerned and no one is as sympathetic.
Raines has been pretty much forgiven. Sounds like the biggest mistake Gooden and Strawberry made was playing in New York where fans like making wise cracks about drug problems. I realize Raines played for the Yankees too, but he wasn't using then. It's "New York 'Humor'". It's funny only to people from New York. Mickey Mantle was brutally criticized for boozing as well. It's not just black players. It's players in New York who are perceived to have wasted their talents. Hey Hernandez, What's a six letter word for white drug?
Hamilton is probably going to lose tens of millions of dollars in salary at FA time for his drug problems. In that sense he's not being forgiven at all.
Wait, what? His most recent relapse or the one a couple of years ago that eventually provided us with all those shirtless pictures of Hamilton? Either way, I hadn't heard that.
It's not fair, but most people's reaction to a guy like Cabrera is that he's a jerk because he chooses to party hard at the expense of his job performance. Hamilton is a sympathetic figure because it's so obvious he can barely control himself. It's impossible for any of us to accurately judge how powerful either man's addiction is, but most people assume it's harder for Hamilton because he's had more problems.
In a perverse way, Cabrera would probably receive more sympathy if he drank more and exercised less self control.
I think you're right. I do find it a bit puzzling that the assumption is often "Hamilton is powerless against his terrible addiction, I feel sorry for this poor man and pray that he stays sober because he means so much to his teammates and is such a delight to watch on the field" while on the other hand "Cabrera needs to quit getting drunk all the time and should care more about his teammates; he's throwing away his career and good riddance to him if he does."
Wouldn't it be just as logical to think: "Cabrera has better self-control and more moral strength that Josh Hamilton"? Maybe they both face the exact same temptation, psychologically and chemically and physically, but Cabrera has been smart enough and strong enough to not let it destroy his life.
Woody Allen kind of creeps me out in general**, but the funny thing is that Husbands and Wives is the only movie of his out of the dozen or so I've seen that I'd ever want to see again. I recorded Repulsion last month but I'm not sure if I'll ever get around to watching it. Polanski's a dirtball but I doubt if that alone would stop me from watching it.
**Though I have to admit that part of the yuck factor for me is a shameful aesthetic judgment on his taste in women young enough to be his granddaughter. Juliette Lewis (his movie fling) I can see on a certain level, since with her I could see Allen trying to relive his youth when girls with Gauloises and Harvard bags who didn't fall asleep during English classes were all the rage, but that very plain-looking stepdaughter of his? Please.
(But FWIW in Husbands and Wives, Allen didn't stop seeing Juliette Lewis because he was noble. He agonized a bit about it, but was only after he saw her with her stud boyfriend and took the hint that he finally came back to Earth.)
Early in his career Mickey Mantle was brutally criticized for striking out too much and "not living up to his potential". After 1961 he could have been elected Mayor of New York. After his career ended and the stories about his boozing began to go from the gossip columns to the front pages, he became the subject of a lot of pointed criticism, but even then, it was more in sadness than in moralizing. The only real personal criticism I ever heard of Mantle in his later years was that he acted like a world class bunghole every time he made a personal appearance. That may have been a product of his drinking, but if he hadn't acted like a bunghole I doubt if anyone but his close friends would have cared one way or the other. To most Yankee fans, after 1961 he was just The Mick, and could basically do no wrong.
Raines has lost votes because of cocaine usage, really? Maybe I missed it, but I don't remember seeing a single column where a voter said "Sure he clearly had a Hall of Fame career, but he did cocaine so no vote for you (soup nazi's voice). The very few writers who bother to explain a no vote mostly seem to fail to grasp the value of OPB and walks and think he didn't do enough to merit election. It is possible that there are voters who weigh his cocaine usage in their decision. It is also possible some of those who didn't vote for Molitor considered his drug use in their deliberation. Key difference is Molitor cleared the 3,000 hit milestone and the voters like big round numbers.
Addiction is a disease, sure, but you can't compare it to other diseases that just happen beyond a persons control. Unless your Mom was drinking/smoking/doing drugs while she was pregnant and you were born with the dependency, you still have to make the choice to get involved in that lifestyle to begin with before you're ever going to know you have a problem.
It's like lung cancer for chain smokers; it's a real disease, of course, but it's an entirely preventable, self-inflicted disease. And I think that's why some people have a hard time finding sympathy for addicts. It seems a bit unsympathetic to me, but the opinion that addiction is just unfortunate bad luck and it's beyond the "victims" control just isn't accurate. Well, it might be correct now, but they had a choice at the beginning knowing full well that such habits can be addicting and dangerous for some people. Therefore, they are responsible for their actions and whatever negative consequences they see in their lives because of them.
You never heard about a team passing on Molitor (as the Padres did on Raines) based on a coke problem that was as far in the past as Raines' was.
Some of it was timing. Raines left the team to get treatment. Molitor was (surprise!) on the DL at the time we know he was using. He seemingly never put in for treatment. We only know about his use because he testified against his dealer (he's supposed to have paid his dealer by check, though that may be an urban legend) and had a deal for immunity in exchange for that testimony.
But yeah, when discussing specifically the HOF case you don't need a drug explanation to explain the difference in the vote totals. That's not really what I was talking about though. For whatever reason Raines' past use attracted a consistent amount of attention (albeit not a large amount) and Molitor's was forgotten instantly.
Both Gooden and Strawberry have been arrested numerous times in their life and done significant stints of time in jail. Saying that Hamilton's character is worse than these two guys seems to me like a major stretch based on the evidence.
I'm the same way about Jeffrey Jones in Ferris Bueller. It's not that he's bad in that movie--it's that he spends the whole movie being made fun of, and that's enough for me.
He was, however, stupid enough and weak enough to get behind the wheel of a car while he was drunk. I think that's the difference between public perception of Cabrera and that of Hamilton, not their color or outward expression of religion, or whatever.
Pssh, everyone knows the original is always better than the sequel.
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