[Archive]

Posted By: runscott

Acceptable player lifestyles certainly varied from generation to generation. As some board posters have alluded to, Landis was lenient with Speaker and Cobb, even though (and this is true) Cobb admitted to being involved in the betting on the game. But the problem was more pervasive - during Cobb's time it was accepted for teams that had their position in the standing nailed down, to take a little cash to lose a game and help out another team - moving up in the standings could mean bonuses. Landis had clamped down on the Black Sox because that's exactly what he was hired to do - the Sox went too far and gave baseball a major black eye. Landis was brought in to clean up with an iron fist, which he did. Gamblers had a major part in baseball back in the 1800's, and the game was not considered a respectable profession even as late as the 1920's. You can read some great stories about it in "The Glory of Their Times" and I also encourage you to get the cd's (amazing listening to these guys).

By the 1950's it was certainly a cleaner game, and perhaps the kids even expected more out of the players in terms of "role model" behavior, but if you had the potential to go to college and land a job as a chemical engineer, you certainly would forego taking a shot at the ML's unless you were something phenomenal (and I'm glad my Dad made that decision!).

By the time Pete Rose got caught, the days of baseball players betting on games being acceptable, was long gone. Drunkenness has always been acceptable among baseball players though, so when Pete had the urge to bet perhaps he should have called Billy Martin instead.