Skip to main content

Tim Anderson and the suspension that Major League Baseball can't enforce


Tim Anderson plays shortstop for the Chicago White Sox and he's off to a fantastic start to the season.  Not only did he welcome his second daughter to the world in April, but statistically, he is off to the hottest start of his career and one of the hottest starts in the league.  He's hitting .422 for the year, with 4 home runs, and 7 stolen bases.  The batting average puts him at first in the American League.  Not too shabby.  



Anderson has also attracted some attention to himself for the newfound energy he has brought the game.  Anderson is one of the more energetic players I've seen lately and he's at the forefront of a new trend we're saying: bat flips and emotion are the new "in" thing.  His most recent bat flip was more of a throw than anything else.  We saw Bryce Harper excessively flip a bat when he hit a home run against his former team.  We've even seen pitchers start to get involved in the fun with their own version of a bat flip (the insiders call this "pimping" a strikeout).   The only problem with all of this is that it feels awfully similar to America in 2019 -- in the midst of a cultural clash.  The opposition to this newfound emotion is just as strong.  They insist that players "act like they've been there" and just carry on with their day as normal.  

 This cultural clash roared to the surface following one of Tim Anderson's at bats -- immediately following the "bat flip" event, Anderson was hit by a pitch and the benches cleared.  In the process, Anderson yelled a racial epithet towards the pitcher (the n-word).  It was this event -- and not anything else -- that yielded Anderson a 1-game suspension.  And it's this that I have a problem with: an unenforceable suspension.

 Note:  Yes, I realize that the suspension was enforced and Anderson took the suspension without appeal.  That's not my issue.

My issue is with something bigger.  The league has thrown down a suspension for something it can't enforce.  Sure, there have been a few suspensions over time regarding language.  It has happened.  But how strictly is the league enforcing those boundaries?  Has the league even bothered to establish a boundary in the first place?  It's not clear to me.  Is the league telling us that this is the first time this particular racial epithet was used ever?  

I personally disagree with using that particular word.  But as a white person (OK, half-Cuban), I am entitled to no opinion over that word.  And that's part of the reason I don't like the way that this suspension feels.  We haven't had a real conversation about race in baseball and yet we're levying a suspension based on a racial word.   Where is the standard exactly?  Where are the boundaries?  As I sit here typing, I recognize that this ball of yarn is pretty hard to unwind.  As Adam Jones and Marcus Stroman explained in their defense of Tim Anderson, the word in question here is fully embedded culturally as slang.  I'm not suggesting that's a problem for Major League Baseball, but it is something that needs to be discussed and addressed globally.  Are white players held to the same standards for any similarly-damaging words?  If not, why not?  The idea of a double-standard is particularly damaging for a league that is desperate for new talent and new fans.  

 The emotion-charged wave has been positive for baseball this year.  The decorum is important, but so is the emotion.  There is a place for both and maybe we'll tackle that topic at a later day.  But for now, we should be more concerned that the league has set itself up for failure at a critical juncture.


Popular posts from this blog

When you create something bigger, your failures are given context

The first chunk of my life was dictated for me.  I went to school and I was told what to do in school.  I got a job and I was told what to do at that job.  I went to college and I was told what to do in college.  I found a better job and I was told to do in that job.   My success in those different contexts was some milestone, goal, or achievement that was given to me by those different contexts.  I didn't have to think about what the goal was - it was merely given to me.  In some sense, that's great - I appreciate that someone was training me. But the problem is that no one told me that I was merely being trained.  Without necessary communication and context, I kept drifting through the days thinking another goal or milestone would magically appear. Well, it didn't.  And it took me a few years to figure this out - more than I'd like.   What did I learn in the process? That you must set those goals for yourself - even if those ...
Read more

My body failed - what's next? How to fix it.

My body is f*cked. What's the best way to proceed?  Well, that's a tad complicated to answer - we're all snowflakes (translation: no, it's not that you're soft, but you are uniquely injured ). There aren't many worse feelings than knowing you are forever physically limited.  And if you fit into that category: I am sorry.  But here's the key: you cannot, and should not, feel sorry for yourself.  It beats the alternative (you know, not having a living, breathing body with flowing, pumping blood).   In this vein (pun intended), our goal is to use what we have.  It's to work with the hand we have been dealt.  It is to not stop at the first sign of danger - it is to see the danger, acknowledge it, and then move the fuck on.   You are not on this earth to sit still.  You are not on this earth to waste away.  You are not on this earth to do anything other than to inch closer to your potential. And so yes, there have been moments where...
Read more

The More Good Days than Bad Days Principle

There are seven days in a week, about 30 days in a month, and 365 days in a year.   Not all of those can be good days.  No one has 7 perfectly good days.  Likewise, I've never gone through an entire year without a single bad day.   I have two reactions to that: The first reaction is the whole "control what you can control" thing.  You can control your effort and your attitude.  And that's absolutely true.  But sometimes a day is so bad that no amount of effort or attitude will fix it. The second reaction is that, in any given week, if you have 4 good days and 3 bad days, you're still winning.  Even if you have a few "meh" days, but the good ones are still outnumbering the rough ones, I think we're in a good place. The same goes for our practices with our little leaguers.  We've had some truly rough and awful practices.  The coach's didn't show up with patience, the kids didn't show up with their attention spans, a...
Read more