I don’t know the derivation of the goofy saying that someone is turning over in his grave, but right now Bowie Kuhn must be turning over in his grave.

As commissioner from 1969 to 1984, Kuhn was so adamantly opposed to Major League Baseball having any link to gambling he banned Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle from the game because they had public relations jobs with Atlantic City casinos. After he was retired as commissioner, he criticized a successor, Fay Vincent, for allowing Lotto signs in ball parks.

Today, M.L.B. has a commissioner, Rob Manfred, who has sold his soul for a mess of pottage, in this case, millions of dollars that he negotiated to gain from MGM Resorts International as a sponsor of M.L.B. In that regard, Manfred is the third commissioner of a professional sports league to …

Keep reading...

A week ago I explored the reasons baseball writers so consistently voted for Mike Trout either for the most valuable player award or high up on the list of players considered for the award. Responses from 10 of the 24 writers who placed Trout first, second or third made it clear that writers were not voting for the most valuable player but for the best player. That was a change from the years when I was an M.V.P. voter.

One response in particular made that change clear. Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County (Calif.) Register wrote:

“In short, I believe ‘most valuable’ and ‘best’ are the same thing. That’s how it works if you’re discussing the value of anything else. I don’t know where the word ‘valuable’ got twisted into …

Keep reading...

In a website headline last Friday, the Boson Globe declared, “In voting Mookie Betts MVP, writers got it right.” I agree with that headline, but I will add one of my own: In voting Mike Trout second, the writers got it wrong.

I do not belittle Trout as a player; he may very well be the best player in the game. He certainly is the most consistently outstanding player. But he was not the second most valuable player in the American League last season, as 24 of the 30 writers voted him, or the first, as one writer designated him.

Trout plays for the Angels, as he has every year of his professional career. The Angels had a losing record – 80 wins and 82 losses. The Angels finished in fourth place in the A.L. West, a distant 23 games from first. What did Trout do that made him so valuable? He prevented the Angels from finishing in last place? He kept them from having an even worse losing record?

This has happened before, though not all of the time when …

Keep reading...