The Betrayal The 1919 World Series and the Birth of Modern Baseball (Audible Audio Edition) Charles Fountain Bob Reed Audible Studios Books
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In the most famous scandal of sports history, eight Chicago White Sox players - including Shoeless Joe Jackson - agreed to throw the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds in exchange for the promise of $20,000 each from gamblers reportedly working for New York mobster Arnold Rothstein. Heavily favored, Chicago lost the series five games to three. Although rumors of a fix flew while the series was being played, they were largely disregarded by players and the public at large. It wasn't until a year later that a general investigation into baseball gambling reopened the case, and a nationwide scandal emerged.
In this book, Charles Fountain offers a full and engaging history of one of baseball's true moments of crisis and hand-wringing and shows how the scandal changed the way American baseball was both managed and perceived. After an extensive investigation and a trial that became a national morality play, the jury returned not-guilty verdicts for all of the White Sox players in August of 1921. The following day, Judge Kennesaw Mountain Landis, baseball's new commissioner, "regardless of the verdicts of juries", banned the eight players for life. And thus the Black Sox entered into American mythology.
Guilty or innocent? Guilty and innocent? The country wasn't sure in 1921, and as Fountain shows, we still aren't sure today. But we are continually pulled to the story, because so much of modern sport, and our attitude toward it, springs from the scandal. Fountain traces the Black Sox story from its roots in the gambling culture that pervaded the game in the years surrounding World War I through the confusing events of the 1919 World Series itself to the noisy aftermath and trial and illuminates the moment as baseball's tipping point. Despite the clumsy unfolding of the scandal and trial and the callous treatment of the players involved, the Black Sox saga was a cleansing moment for the sport. It launched the age of the baseball commissioner, as baseball owners hired Landis and surrendered to him the control of their game. Fountain shows how sweeping changes in 1920s triggered by the scandal moved baseball away from its association with gamblers and fixers and details how Americans' attitudes toward the pastime shifted as they entered into "The Golden Age of Sport".
Situating the Black Sox events in the context of later scandals, including those involving Reds manager and player Pete Rose and the ongoing use of steroids in the game up through the present, Fountain illuminates America's near century-long fascination with the story and its continuing relevance today.
The Betrayal The 1919 World Series and the Birth of Modern Baseball (Audible Audio Edition) Charles Fountain Bob Reed Audible Studios Books
Northeastern University professor Charles Fountain’s The Betrayal: The 1919 World Series and the Birth of Modern Baseball retells the story of the 1919 World Series “fix” and explains its ramifications for the game’s development. He relates the known facts, helpfully clarifying between which are known, which are speculated and even that which are “known” but not really true largely thanks to previous accounts that are as much fiction as fact. The result is a more accurate account and deeper understanding of how and why the scandal unfolded as it did.To do this, Fountain takes us back to the 19th century so we can appreciate baseball’s complicated relationship with gambling (and to some extent game fixing). For “behind the Black Sox story,” he writes, “stretches a long history of organized dysfunction and incorporated hypocrisy.” Only after a period of toleration did baseball’s powers that be come to recognize that fixed games alienated spectators and threatened owners’ financial interests. Efforts to clean the game of dirty players were largely successful by the 1880s.
But the events of 1903 would undo this progress, recreating an environment conducive to gambling and fixing. For it was in this year, Fountain explains, peace was achieved between the warring National League and the upstart American League. With peace came an end to competition for players and the higher salaries that went with it. Instead, the reserve clause and their depressed salaries would rule. In addition, a new owner-dominated governing structure would be created and it promptly failed its first test in dealing with allegations of game fixing, choosing to look the other way instead.
In the early 20th century, players’ gambling on the outcome of games was not seen as problematic. It was even encouraged to show confidence, perhaps like a CEO who takes a large share of their pay as stock options rather than cash. But so long as there was gambling, there would always be losers seeking to shift the blame. Allegations of a “fix” would follow each World Series, and when similar allegations surfaced in 1919 even before play began they were not illogically dismissed out of hand.
Fountain spends considerable time on the politics of baseball management, focusing on the rivalry between White Sox owner Charles Comiskey and AL President and de facto baseball CEO Ban Johnson. By 1919 the two were locked in blood feud, and each would try to use the fixed series as a tool to gain the upper hand. The result would be a new Commissioner with dictatorial powers. And Commissioner Mountain Kennesaw Landis would react much differently when the 1919 fix became common knowledge than the National Commission had in 1903.
Colorful profiles help keep the readers’ interest. Besides Comiskey and Johnson, Arnold Rothstein (the gambler who would remain at an elusive center of the fix), “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, Judge Landis and Hal Chase are profiled at length. Although one of the “Black Sox,” as guilty players were tagged, Jackson’s actual role was also very small (he admitted taking money on the understanding he was supposed to be throwing games, but there is no evidence that he did so) but Fountain goes on at considerable length about his life and legacy.
There are some flaws with Fountain’s account. Many threads, such as the profile of Chase and the relationship between Comiskey and Johnson just to cite two examples, are much longer than necessary to explicate the book’s central story. As a result the reader frequently finds herself in an alleyway of baseball history, often very interesting but also largely beside the point. Fountain also makes several rather egregious errors when it comes to discussing Jackson and the Hall of Fame. For instance he writes that it was Commissioner Bart Giamatti who proclaimed that no one on baseball’s eligible list was eligible for election to the Hall of Fame. In fact, it was an ex post facto rule change in 1991 by the Hall’s governing board in reaction to the Pete Rose case. Fountain also asserts that writers never had the chance to elect Jackson to the Hall. In fact, Jackson was on the 1936 and 1946 ballots, but received only two votes each time.
1919: The Great Betrayal contains a great deal of very interesting history about different aspects of the baseball’s early period and brings many of its characters to life even if it is not all strictly related to the 1919 World Series fix. The story is not really complete, however. Nothing about Babe Ruth, the livelier baseball or the phenomenon of the home run” that began to appear in 1920 and would change the game dramatically appears in Fountain’s account, all of which are necessary to understand the “modern” (or post dead ball) game. But fans of baseball history will find much to enjoy, ponder and argue with in Fountain’s retelling.
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The Betrayal The 1919 World Series and the Birth of Modern Baseball (Audible Audio Edition) Charles Fountain Bob Reed Audible Studios Books Reviews
I think this is overall an excellent book and a useful corrective to "Eight Men Out," both the book and the movie, which perpetuates a lot of myths. Fountain debunks many of them. For example, one of the key elements in "Eight Men Out" is that the Black Sox threw the first two games, did not get what they thought was due, and then decided to win. Prior to the last game, according to this narrative, Lefty Williams, the starting pitcher for the Sox was approached and his family threatened if he did not throw the game and throw it quickly. Fountain shows that there is little, if any, evidence for this having happened. In fact, Fountain suggests that Eliot Asinof largely made up the story in "Eight Men Out." He does the same with the famous Joe Jackson incident with the little boy saying to Jackson as he was leaving the courthouse "Say it isn't so, Joe." Fountain does not say definitively that it did not happen, but notes that no one else heard such a conversation.
In general, the book is more evenhanded in its account of the Black Sox and Charles Comiskey, the team's owner, than is Asinof. Asinof basically attributed the fix almost entirely to Comiskey's cheapness and the low salaries he paid the players. Obviously, players in those days did not make anywhere near what they make today, but, in general, they still made far more than the average working Americana. While Fountain does not necessarily discount discontent over their pay as a motive, it is not at all clear that the players hated Comiskey in general, as Asinof seems to argue. In fact, the one criticism I have of the book is that, in my view, it did not really attempt to explain just what the motives of the players were. It seems as if the gamblers were there, game fixing was fairly prevalent, and the players were drawn, almost against their will, into the fix. This is the one part of the book that I found rather unsatisfying but maybe it was better than advancing a thesis, as Asinof seems to have, without any real basis. Given the owners' apparent reluctance to take against known game fixers, such as Hal Chase, which Fountain makes clear, the players might well have believed they could get away with it. There is an interesting analogy with the steroid era in baseball, where both the owners and the players looked away from rampant steroid use because it benefitted them both. I think the background story on gambling in baseball in the early days of the game is probably the most interesting part of the book
One other aspect of both this book and "Eight Men Out" that I found a bit strange was the idea that because Jackson and other players had good batting statistics during the World Series, this disproves the notion that they were throwing the Series. But, in fact, it would be fairly easy to throw games without making it obvious or without even having terrible statistics. You wouldn't need to strike out every time up, just don't get a hit in critical situations. The same with pitching; you wouldn't need to give up ten runs; just hang a breaking pitch at a crucial moment would be enough. That happens all the time even with the players not trying to throw the game. In fact, I would expect that players of that skill level would try not to make it obvious they were throwing the game.
Northeastern University professor Charles Fountain’s The Betrayal The 1919 World Series and the Birth of Modern Baseball retells the story of the 1919 World Series “fix” and explains its ramifications for the game’s development. He relates the known facts, helpfully clarifying between which are known, which are speculated and even that which are “known” but not really true largely thanks to previous accounts that are as much fiction as fact. The result is a more accurate account and deeper understanding of how and why the scandal unfolded as it did.
To do this, Fountain takes us back to the 19th century so we can appreciate baseball’s complicated relationship with gambling (and to some extent game fixing). For “behind the Black Sox story,” he writes, “stretches a long history of organized dysfunction and incorporated hypocrisy.” Only after a period of toleration did baseball’s powers that be come to recognize that fixed games alienated spectators and threatened owners’ financial interests. Efforts to clean the game of dirty players were largely successful by the 1880s.
But the events of 1903 would undo this progress, recreating an environment conducive to gambling and fixing. For it was in this year, Fountain explains, peace was achieved between the warring National League and the upstart American League. With peace came an end to competition for players and the higher salaries that went with it. Instead, the reserve clause and their depressed salaries would rule. In addition, a new owner-dominated governing structure would be created and it promptly failed its first test in dealing with allegations of game fixing, choosing to look the other way instead.
In the early 20th century, players’ gambling on the outcome of games was not seen as problematic. It was even encouraged to show confidence, perhaps like a CEO who takes a large share of their pay as stock options rather than cash. But so long as there was gambling, there would always be losers seeking to shift the blame. Allegations of a “fix” would follow each World Series, and when similar allegations surfaced in 1919 even before play began they were not illogically dismissed out of hand.
Fountain spends considerable time on the politics of baseball management, focusing on the rivalry between White Sox owner Charles Comiskey and AL President and de facto baseball CEO Ban Johnson. By 1919 the two were locked in blood feud, and each would try to use the fixed series as a tool to gain the upper hand. The result would be a new Commissioner with dictatorial powers. And Commissioner Mountain Kennesaw Landis would react much differently when the 1919 fix became common knowledge than the National Commission had in 1903.
Colorful profiles help keep the readers’ interest. Besides Comiskey and Johnson, Arnold Rothstein (the gambler who would remain at an elusive center of the fix), “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, Judge Landis and Hal Chase are profiled at length. Although one of the “Black Sox,” as guilty players were tagged, Jackson’s actual role was also very small (he admitted taking money on the understanding he was supposed to be throwing games, but there is no evidence that he did so) but Fountain goes on at considerable length about his life and legacy.
There are some flaws with Fountain’s account. Many threads, such as the profile of Chase and the relationship between Comiskey and Johnson just to cite two examples, are much longer than necessary to explicate the book’s central story. As a result the reader frequently finds herself in an alleyway of baseball history, often very interesting but also largely beside the point. Fountain also makes several rather egregious errors when it comes to discussing Jackson and the Hall of Fame. For instance he writes that it was Commissioner Bart Giamatti who proclaimed that no one on baseball’s eligible list was eligible for election to the Hall of Fame. In fact, it was an ex post facto rule change in 1991 by the Hall’s governing board in reaction to the Pete Rose case. Fountain also asserts that writers never had the chance to elect Jackson to the Hall. In fact, Jackson was on the 1936 and 1946 ballots, but received only two votes each time.
1919 The Great Betrayal contains a great deal of very interesting history about different aspects of the baseball’s early period and brings many of its characters to life even if it is not all strictly related to the 1919 World Series fix. The story is not really complete, however. Nothing about Babe Ruth, the livelier baseball or the phenomenon of the home run” that began to appear in 1920 and would change the game dramatically appears in Fountain’s account, all of which are necessary to understand the “modern” (or post dead ball) game. But fans of baseball history will find much to enjoy, ponder and argue with in Fountain’s retelling.
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