After a scheduled week off, and you can see one of the reasons why in this Bill Ballou story in the Worcester Guardian, we return to another edition of “Friday 4,” where I discuss the four things I’ve been thinking about over the last week and the upcoming weekend in sports and the world.
ONE
It’s old news now, but ten days or so ago, Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred removed Pete Rose, ‘Shoeless’ Joe Jackson, and other deceased ballplayers from MLB’s permanently ineligible list. Of the long list, only Rose and Jackson are seen as potential candidates for the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Despite casting a fake ballot every January 1st, I’m far from an expert on such things, but it’s my understanding that based on current rules for players who last played more than 15 years ago, it looks like the earliest Rose and Jackson could be enshrined is summer 2028 if, they are elected. In my eyes, Jackson belongs in the Hall of Fame and should be added as soon as possible.
And despite being one of the greatest ballplayers ever, Rose absolutely does not belong in the Hall.
Rose is nothing short of a despicable human being, and betting on baseball is only part of it. It was his continual denial of betting on the game that’s part of the issue, only finally coming clean and admitting it when it served his purpose to do so. Despite agreeing to a permanent ban in 1989 when an MLB investigation concluded that Rose, as a player and manager of the Reds, bet on games in the mid-1980s, time and time again, Rose tried to play himself as the victim in all of this.
You know who was the real victim? The 14-year-old girl Rose admitted in court to abusing, claiming in court that he thought she was 16, as if his victim being the age of consent would make his actions any less reprehensible. As quoted in the link, when asked about it, Rose said, “It was 55 years ago, babe,” to a female baseball writer for The Philadelphia Inquirer.
For me, the lack of sincere contrition for any of his wrongdoings is the deciding factor on Rose being in the Hall of Fame.
Yes, I know the Hall of Fame is full of players who were, by today’s standards, in the same category as Rose in terms of being trash as human beings. Lots of racists and other low-moral individuals litter Cooperstown. But they were voted in during different times, when their actions and beliefs would not have been cause to keep them out.
The Baseball Writers’ Association of America has several rules voters have to follow when determining a player’s Hall of Fame credentials. Rule #5 says (emphasis mine), “Voting shall be based upon the player’s record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played.”
Look at those two words I put in bold. Integrity and character. Rose fails on both of those. So if I had my way, Rose would never get into Cooperstown.
And you can bet on that.
TWO
The IIHF World Hockey Championships are going on right now, co-hosted by Sweden and Denmark. Because by this point in the season, Worcester pro teams have always been out of the playoffs, I tend to pay a lot of attention to the World Championships, probably a lot more than most of the hockey fans in the area.
This season, only one former Worcester player took part, former Railers defenseman Zsombor Garat, who is a longtime member of Hungary’s national team. They didn’t do so hot in this year’s tourney, finishing 7th in Group B with a 1-6-0 record, beating only Kazakhstan and finishing 14th in the 16-team tourney.
While I planned on mentioning all of this today, I do so with a much bigger smile after Thursday’s quarter-final action saw the top-ranked Canadian team give up two goals in the final three minutes in their game against host Demark, sending the Danes to a semi-final matchup against Switzerland on Saturday and the boys from The Great White North home.
To complete the record, Team USA takes on Sweden in the other semi-final, also on Saturday.
THREE
Keeping with hockey, the Bruins did the most-Bruins thing ever and signed General Manager Don Sweeney to a two-year extension after the team missed the playoffs for the first time since 2016. I could fill a dozen blog posts on why Sweeney should have been fired as opposed to getting an extension, but for now, we’ll just mention one reason…
Brad Marchand.
Anyone paying attention to the NHL playoffs? Because I am. While it’s nice that Sweeney managed to get a 2027 or 2028 first-round pick for Marchand, the former Bruins captain is showing that whatever Sweeney was offering him for a contract extension was probably not enough.
That’s been the story for all of Jeremy Jacobs’ tenure as owner of the team, penny-wise with proven players on the team and pound-foolish in signing players to replace guys they were too cheap to keep, but Sweeney seems to take this to the next level.
Sweeney’s drafting is also terrible. You should never, ever write off a 19-year-old kid, but Sweeney picking Dean Letourneau in the first round last summer looks like a failure already, as the Ontario native managed just three assists while playing center at Boston College. Their only other first-rounder in the past five seasons, Fabian Lysell, isn’t exactly lighting it up in Providence.
Sweeney’s first draft, in 2015, was pretty good, selecting Jake DeBrusk (1, #14), Brandon Carlo (2, #37), and Jeremy Lauzon (2, #52). It could have been one of hockey’s all-time great drafts were it not for two first-round misses by Sweeney when he picked Jakub Zboril (1, #13) and Zachary Senyshyn (1, #15). No first-rounder that year played fewer NHL games than Senyshyn’s 16, and Zboril’s 76 NHL games were third third-fewest.
2016 wasn’t terrible for picks, with Sweeney selecting Charlie McAvoy (1, #14), Trent Frederic (1, #29), and Ryan Lindgren (2, #49). Since then, Sweeney has had one great pick, taking Jeremy Swayman in round four in 2017. The rest were, to be kind, crappy.
But hey, good enough for two more years of mismanagement and mediocrity, I guess.
FOUR
And finally, 25 years ago this week, two teams I hated played in the AHL’s Calder Cup semi-finals, where Terry Virtue scored in overtime to send the Hartford Wolf Pack to the Final, and on to his second consecutive Calder Cup win.
We started this post with someone who doesn’t belong in his sport’s Hall of Fame, and ended it with someone who absolutely belongs in the AHL Hall of Fame.
The next time the AHL All-Star game is played near New England, they need to select Virtue for their Hall of Fame so fans of his from Worcester, Hartford, and Providence can all come celebrate his induction. There will be a whole lot of partying when that happens.
And you can bet on that, too.
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