Say It Ain't So

Well, I just watched the movie Eight Men Out, and we have just been doing a lot of work with ethics in finance, so that is kind of on my mind right now. What I'm thinking is that Joe Jackson should be in the Hall of Fame. Yes, he did take the money according to all sources, but he also had an amazing series. That makes no logical sense whatsoever which makes me think that Joe did not know what he was doing. Most people have made the claim that Joe Jackson was not very intelligent. I will not go there simply because I have not done enough research to make claims like that about people. Where I will go is that I wonder if he was told the whole truth. The only reason I make that claim is because even if he was not very intelligent, he'd know better than to cross guys like those gamblers. Even street knowledge of those guys would have led him to realize not to cross them. Therefore, why would he knowingly deal with the guys and then cross them? Perhaps he was told that it was a bonus from Comiskey. That would totally be out of character given what I have read about Comiskey, but framed in the right context, who knows? I guess that is my point. Who knows what really happened, and I do know that he was one of the best players in baseball history.

Photo from http://www.shoelessjoejackson.com/about/photos.html

Shady Dealing

I forgot to write fiction yesterday; my bad. So, even though there is still much to write about today, I will backtrack to yesterday and give you a piece of fiction.

Glancing stealthily around the corner, Ben Wolfson wondered why he was even here. What on earth had possessed him to abuse the privilege to access the Commissioner's Office? He knew the answer to that one; he was being paid a lot of money. He knew that that wasn't enough reason to rig the draft, but somehow he justified this in his mind. He knew that what he was doing was a blatant abuse of his position. He was supposed to be there to make sure that the draft was fair and that every team got their appropriate level of first position chances. However, sometimes things change. For Ben, everything changed when he met Joe. Joe, who never liked his last name mentioned, came up to Ben in a bar, offering to buy him a drink and pulling up a chair. Not seeing anything wrong with this guy, Ben humored him and accepted the offer while initiating conversation. They chatted for a few minutes about the perceived common interest of basketball. Gradually, Joe drove the conversation toward the upcoming NBA draft. Feeling comfortable now, Ben talked about the important role he had in determining the eventual outcome. A slight smile came over Joe's face; he knew what he wanted this to go.

Remember, this is total fiction. Names, situation, and everything else is entirely fictional.

Photo by josh.liba on Flickr

Cursed?

As you might have guessed by now, I enjoy a good superstition. The Curse of the Bambino, which has since fallen, and The Curse of the Billy Goat are two of my favorites. I don't particularly believe in these curses; however, I like looking at the lengths people will go to avoid falling victim to a "curse." I'm sure many of you have heard of the Madden cover curse that plagues any athlete who graces the cover of this amazingly popular game (if you are not familiar, check out the Wikipedia entry for the Madden curse). However, I discovered a new curse today that was brought to my attention through the recent injury to potential Olympian Lindsay Vonn. For details on how this curse has come through history, check out this article on the Sports Illustrated website. It's amazing how consistent this has been throughout the history of the magazine. Even from the original cover boy Eddie Mathews who suffered a hand injury one week after he appeared on the cover of SI that caused him to miss seven games, the curse has progressed to nip even the most talented athletes. In 1993, Barry Bonds was featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated as he was having an amazing year. Within two weeks of this accomplishment, Bonds' batting average dropped 40 points! 40 points on a batting average can be the difference between an All-Star and a second rate starter. For example, think about the difference between Yadier Molina who was the All-Star starter last year and ended the year with a batting average of .293 and fellow National League backstop Jason Kendall who batted .241. Granted, Kendall is a fine player who makes other contributions to his team through his above-average speed for a catcher. However, this difference was a significant decrease in production from Bonds which "coincidentally" followed the magazine cover. Coincidence? Yeah, I pretty much think so. However, I think that without this aura of superstition surrounding various athletic traditions, the "magic" and "mystique" surrounding professional athletics would be lost. If people can't dream through sports, where else can they imagine what could have been if only fate had not been against them.

Was It For Real?

Okay, I'll admit it; I love a good conspiracy theory. Fortunately, it seems as though the world we live in is overflowing with them. It seems as though our entire entertainment industry is run by nosy paparazzi who are trying to find the "back story" that no one else will have and often times is untrue. For now, I challenge you, the reader, to be the paparazzi.

First, watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mN3OGRGybA. This should be a video entitled "David Stern Fixing 1985 Draft Lottery *High Quality*". Look at the envelope that David Stern chooses around second 45. You can see that one envelope on the bottom of the two in the foreground has a bent corner. Conveniently, this is the envelope that Stern chooses which then guarantees the New York Knicks the first pick in the NBA draft. They use this pick to draft a big man out of Georgetown who you may have heard of, Patrick Ewing. Conspiracy theorists say that the NBA rigged the lottery because they wanted New York City to have a star and rise to prominence.

Now, you be the judge. Do you think the NBA played a role in bringing a new face to the Knicks franchise?

I encourage you to comment on this and on the following argument that I will present explaining why I do not believe the bent envelope theory does not hold up. First, when all of the envelopes are placed into the drum, none of them appear as bent as the one that appears at second 45. Watching the envelopes spin in the drum, it is evident that some of the envelopes when they fall back down to the bottom of the drum land on their corners. This is also a possible explanation as to why this one envelope was slightly deformed. However, who says that more than one envelope was not bent? The camera angle does not allow the viewer to see all of the envelopes on our left hand side of the drum. Perhaps they all were dented too. Also, why exactly would the NBA prefer the Knicks as opposed to the Pacers? While the Knicks are in one of the largest markets in the world, why would this automatically make the Commissioner favor them? It seems as though the underdog story from a middle of nowhere town has become very popular. Look at Hoosiers which incidentally takes place in Indiana. This team that had not been overly successful in the past discovers a star player who turns them into a champion. This movie was released in 1986 to great acclaim after being nominated for two Oscars. Why then could a professional version of this story not develop as the new star in Patrick Ewing moved in to an Indiana town and revitalizes the team? As is evidenced by the movie, this storyline was popular at the time. Therefore, the NBA should have known that even if Patrick Ewing had gone to Indianapolis, the results could have been just as eye-catching as the fictional Hoosiers was.

Other theories have arisen such as the Knicks' envelope had been frozen, or at least chilled, before the drawing so that Stern could have felt the temperature differential and therefore known how to find the Knicks. He was pretty lucky if this is true however because he only had to touch two envelopes to find the correct one. We may never know if there was actually some form of conspiracy, but it is fun to engage in what my history professor would call "counterfactual speculation."