Bobby Doerr, Meet Jeremy Tyler

I’ve been re-reading David Halberstam’s excellent Summer of ’49, and I came across a passage last night which has a surprising tie-in to the ongoing debate regarding Jeremy Tyler.

Halberstam’s book profiles the season through the narrow viewpoint of the Red Sox and Yankees, going into incredible detail of the day-to-day activities of both rosters, from trainers to owners. Among the stories about the Dimaggios, Ted Williams, and so forth is the tale of Boston second baseman Bobby Doerr, a much-beloved player (by, among others, future commissioner Bart Giamatti) who would later enter the Hall of Fame.

Anyone who follows baseball closely knows the Doerr story – a classy man who parlayed solid defense, a strong bat, and good teammates into a ticket to Cooperstown. What they probably don’t know is that Doerr turned pro at age 16.

Yes, 16. While still enrolled in Fremont High School in LA, Doerr signed up to play professionally for the Hollywood Stars, meaning he spent the last two years of his high school years traveling around the west coast of the United States.

And yet, nobody made a big deal out of it. Doerr’s father, as part of the contract, insisted that the team allow Doerr to come back to complete his education, but it wasn’t as if the LA Times ran a huge story bemoaning how the Hollywood Stars were robbing the innocence of this poor young man. Bobby Doerr was a great player, a team wanted to pay him to play, and his family decided it was okay. End of story.

Today, though, we have developed some bizarre set of rules for our children. We allow them to watch horribly violent movies and video games seemingly from infancy and let our daughters wear clothes that hookers from 50 years ago would consider scandalous. But letting a 17-year-old get paid to play basketball in Europe? The horror!

Imagine if Jeremy Tyler had been offered a scholarship to attend school and play basketball in Amsterdam for a year. Would anyone care? Would any of us notice?

Of course not. And yet, for some bizarre reason, people such as Dick Vitale feel a need to criticize Tyler and his family for what they have chosen to do. I ask you, naysayers, are you as mad at Bobby Doerr’s family as you are at Jeremy Tyler’s? Do you think Tony Parker destroyed his life by turning pro before he could vote?

Further, why do you care? Who, exactly, is Jeremy Tyler hurting by doing this? Is he not better off than half or more of the African-American boys in this country?

Honestly, it’s not for us to say. It’s up to Mr. Tyler and his family. They’ve made their decision, and I suggest the rest of us just shut up about it.

McClendon, Ward in WSJ

In two separate stories, the WSJ reported on two owners of the Sonix, our good friends Aubrey McClendon (here) and Tom Ward (here).

The McClendon story is nothing altogether shocking - shareholders of Chesapeake are furious about McClendon's pay package, which is quite reasonable considering the performance of the company's stock in the past six months.

The Ward story concerns SandRidge Energy's sale of more than 15 million shares, including 3 million belonging to Mr. Ward himself, at a discount. This comes on the heels of the compay's announcement of a $1.3 billion first-quarter asset write-down due to crappy natural gas prices.

And, after reading all of that, you are free to bang your head against the desk whilst bemoaning fate ..... now.

Gee, Bob, I Can Think of a Couple ...

Robert Irsay, owner of the Indianapolis Colts, as told to the AP. Irsay is referring to the city of Indianaplis' desire to renegotiate their stadium deal with the Colts, owing to the funding shortfall the stadium authority has experienced.

"What business would come in and negotiate with the city and the state for three or four years and get all the details ironed out, and then three or four months after you're in the building have them say that doesn't really matter and then take your brand and rake it over the coals."

What kind of business? Well, there's this guy, who decided he didn't like his building less than a decade after it was built, and who tried to renegotiate his lease even though there was still close to five years left on it. Or this guy, who pulled a team out of town even though they still had a year left on their lease.

Or, maybe, this kind of business, the kind which promises to let the mayor of the city in which it resides of a phone call if it decides to move, then gets 15 moving vans to load up in the middle of the night and haul ass for Indianapolis. Sorry, Bob, but people who pull that kind of stuff don't get the right to act sanctimonious.