...and I shouldn't even have to say this much.
Watch Aaron's record-breaking home run here. Do you see what he didn't do? There was no exulting at the plate. No standing there and watching to see where it went. The Hammer hit the biggest home run in baseball and started legging it towards first like it was just another hit. That was sportsmanship.
Of course, back in those days if you'd had the gall to stand at the plate with your arms raised and watch your home run leave the park, the pitcher would have put the ball in your ear on your next at bat, whether it had been your first homer or your 715th...
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3 comments:
I haven't cared about sports since the mid-70s or so, and wasn't a fanatic (i.e., fan) then, but I do remember seeing & hearing about sports figures--hell, I've never cared about baseball, but I remember when Henry Aaron broke Ruth's record. You couldn't not hear about it, even at 9 years old. I suppose it's the same now with Steroid Boy.
I do remember that players seemed to have such a thing as dignity then. They didn't act like giddy 11-year-old girls when they did what they were paid (a lot, though not as much as now) to do. Remember the Mean Joe Greene Coke & kid commercial? Now, Greene might or might not have behaved that way, but we thought he just might. I don't think I could believe such behavior from Pac-Man Jones, who's constantly in all the local media.
I thought the point of the Mean Joe Green commercial was that it was so out of character, since Green was known for being such an SOB on the field.
I don't suppose you've ever heard of Dick Butkus? He was a huge star, and he was known for biting people in the pile.
Baseball has a long tradition of sumsabitches getting a pass because they're good at baseball. Ty Cobb is the standard example here. I don't really follow baseball, so that's about all I've got.
I was thinking the same thing when I watched Bonds hit that home run.
Cockiness and ego has been an unfortunate part of pro sport since the emergence of free agency. Back in the day, you'd see players with loyalty to a team or a city. Now it's loyalty to the almighty dollar.
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