Black Sox Scandal: A Century Later

 

 

 

 

 

A young boy pleaded to Jackson as he left the Grand Jury room,” Say it ain’t so, Joe, say it ain’t so.”  Jackson replied,” Yes kid, I’m afraid it is.”

“Shoeless Joe” Jackson to young boy. This is a reporter’s myth, but it should have happened, and is now enshrined in the lore of baseball.

 

 

As the above video indicates the Black Sox scandal remains controversial.  The folly of turning professional athletes into heroes was amply demonstrated by players throwing the World Series for money a century ago. The players were found not guilty in a conspiracy to defraud case in Chicago in 1921, in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.  Legendary Federal judge, and first national Baseball Commissioner, Kenesaw Mountain Landis had an appropriate response to the verdicts:

 

Regardless of the verdict of juries, no player who throws a ball game, no player who undertakes or promises to throw a ball game, no player who sits in confidence with a bunch of crooked ballplayers and gamblers, where the ways and means of throwing a game are discussed and does not promptly tell his club about it, will ever play professional baseball again.

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