New book should clear Joe Jackson

[Giants666]

We understand Bud Selig's got a pretty full plate of distasteful goulash in front of him, between the burgeoning HGH scandal, the mess and accompanying media backlash his pal David Glass has created with a once-proud franchise in Kansas City, and the latest profane, offensive ravings of Ozzie Guillen.
Just the same, a new book that sheds new light on the plight of "Shoeless Joe" Jackson is worth the commissioner's attention in what little spare time he finds these days. If he does give it a read, and he is able to get past the rather scathing indictment of his own in-house historian, longtime Chicago sportswriter Jerome Holtzman, Selig might feel compelled to reexamine the lifetime ban (and Hall-of-Fame ineligibility) imposed on Jackson for his alleged participation in the 1919 World Series fix by the Chicago White Sox.

It was right around the time Pete Rose first began petitioning Selig to have his own lifetime ban re-considered that Hall of Famers Ted Williams and Bob Feller implored the commissioner to give serious consideration to reinstating Jackson who, they maintained, had done nothing to throw games in the 1919 Series and had never even been afforded a hearing from his "executioner," baseball's first commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis.

After reading "Burying The Black Sox - How Baseball's Cover-up of the 1919 World Series Fix Almost Succeeded" by freelance baseball researcher Gene Carney, one could easily draw the conclusion that there is an even bigger injustice than Shoeless Joe being out of the Hall of Fame and that is the fact that Landis and White Sox owner Charles Comiskey are in. After listening to Feller's and Williams' plea, Selig dispatched Holtzman to research the events of the 1919 fix and its aftermath. In his research, Holtzman came across the 1920 grand jury testimony of Jackson and the other alleged White Sox conspirators (the testimony mysteriously disappeared at the time of the trial, leading to charges against all the players being dismissed) and used Jackson's admission of having received $5,000 from teammate Lefty Williams as a "confession" of guilt in the fix.

However, as Carney points out in accusing Holtzman of getting many of his facts wrong and essentially using that one admission to craft his case against Jackson, there was much more to Shoeless Joe's testimony. And too many people, Landis especially, chose to ignore it.

Specifically, Jackson said he was given the money after the World Series and immediately took it to Comiskey and White Sox general manager Harry Grabiner. According to Jackson, he was told to keep the money and keep his mouth shut, also saying that Grabiner later told him that Williams and Eddie Cicotte (the other White Sox pitcher among the eight players permanently banned by Landis) "wrongfully used your name."

Jackson testified to this in his subsequent 1924 trial in Milwaukee, in which he sued Comiskey for defrauding him on the three-year contract he had signed before the 1919 season. He said he had repeatedly tried to tell Comiskey and Grabiner what he knew about the fix (from Williams) after the Series, only to be rebuffed. He also maintained at that trial that he didn't know his name was involved in the fix until Williams gave him the money.

Until now, about all we've known for sure about Jackson and the 1919 Series is that he led all hitters with a .375 average and six RBI and committed no errors in the field. Carney notes that Holtzman maintained Jackson had been "inept in the clutch" in the first five games and hit .462 in the last three. By that particularly selective logic, Carney says, Holtzman would make "fixers out of Hall of Famers Eddie Collins and Edd Roush too."

The fact is Comiskey clearly knew a lot more about the fix in its aftermath than Jackson did - and chose to do nothing so as not to jeopardize his team for 1920. And Landis, empowered by the owners to take whatever measures he deemed necessary to cleanse the game that had become rife with gambling, ignored all of this in throwing the eight accused (though court-exonerated) White Sox players out of the game for life in 1921 without so much as a hearing. In his "eviction edict" Landis stated: "No player who throws a ballgame, no player that sits in conference with a bunch of crooked ballplayers and gamblers where the ways and means of throwing games are discussed and does not promptly tell his club about it, will ever play professional baseball."

According to Carney's research, Jackson maintained he did none of those things, other than inform his team of money he was given.

So it would seem only right for Selig to appoint a panel of acknowledged baseball historians to re-examine the facts, accounts and papers in the Jackson case in order to determine once and for all whether Shoeless Joe, third-highest hitter of all-time at .356, deserves a lifetime ban or should be reinstated to the Hall of Fame ballot.

It would certainly be a lot more than Landis did. But other than throwing the eight men out and being credited for cleaning up the game from corruption, just what did Landis do to deserve enshrinement in Cooperstown? There is sufficient evidence that says he did a whole lot more to keep players of color out of the game. And when it came to the game growing, the average attendance at the start of Landis' reign in 1920 was 9,120, and it was 8,772 when he died in 1944. By contrast, average attendance rose from 15,130 to 21,443 during Bowie Kuhn's term of office and from 26,575 to nearly 31,000 since Selig has been full-time commissioner.

[Providence A's]

just curious, you got a link or something? or is that your writing?

[Giants666]

just curious, you got a link or something? or is that your writing?

Here you go

[love_that_reefer]

Joe Jackson's name should be clear in every baseball fans mind.

[Dam8610]

Joe Jackson was clean in the series, and so was Buck Weaver. Think about it, part of the "evidence" they had against Jackson, another thing that disappeared during the trial, was a signed written confession. Am I the only one here who finds it amazing that an illiterate man, could write, read, sign, and understand such a thing? The fact that he gave the money he was given by another player to Comiskey and told him about the whole thing makes it even more obvious that he had no involvement in the scandal. So, basically the only basis they have for banning Joe Jackson is that he "wasn't good in the clutch" in a few games. Well, if that's all the evidence we need to ban a player for life, I propose immediate lifetime bans for Alex Rodriguez and Vladimir Guerrero.

[GiantsFanatic]

thats good im happy for shoeless joe jackson, i have read about the blacksox scandal and seen the movie 9 men out, sadly it only took them 80+ years to figure it out!!!!!

[GiantsFanatic]

Joe Jackson was clean in the series, and so was Buck Weaver. Think about it, part of the "evidence" they had against Jackson, another thing that disappeared during the trial, was a signed written confession. Am I the only one here who finds it amazing that an illiterate man, could write, read, sign, and understand such a thing? The fact that he gave the money he was given by another player to Comiskey and told him about the whole thing makes it even more obvious that he had no involvement in the scandal. So, basically the only basis they have for banning Joe Jackson is that he "wasn't good in the clutch" in a few games. Well, if that's all the evidence we need to ban a player for life, I propose immediate lifetime bans for Alex Rodriguez and Vladimir Guerrero.

dont forget Jeter!!!!!!!!!!!

[ghettochild]

since when has a book done any good for baseball. all it does is stir up more controversy

[riverdunesrat]

And.....Pete Rose should be in the HOF.......