Ichiro, Ichiro

During last Wednesday’s game against the San Diego Padres, Miami Marlins outfielder Ichiro Suzuki had two hits, a dribbler of an infield single in the first inning and a searing line drive double in the ninth.  Taking into account the 1,278 hits Ichiro collected in his nine years playing for the Orix Blue Wave of the Japan Pacific League (JPL) before coming to the United States, his single in the first tied Pete Rose’s record for most hits in a career (4,256), and his double in the ninth passed Rose.  Furthermore, Ichiro now stands 21 hits away from 3,000 in his U.S. major league career, an accomplishment only 29 other players can boast.  

Obviously, Major League Baseball (MLB) does not consider statistics from other leagues, so Ichiro’s record is not official, nor should it be.  Rose stands as MLB’s career hits leader, as he should.  But that does not take away from Ichiro’s stunning accomplishment.   In fact, it could be argued that Ichiro’s career hit total is even more impressive than Rose’s, since the JPL’s season is shorter than MLB’s, and Ichiro averaged about 30 less games per year during his nine years in Japan than he has in the Major Leagues.  The counter-argument, is, of course, that JPL is not on MLB’s level, an arguable point bolstered by Ichiro’s higher batting average while in Japan (.353) than in MLB (.314).

Patrick Redford, writing for Deadspin:

Whether or not NPB [Japanese] ball is as difficult as MLB, Ichiro needed about 1,500 fewer plate appearances than Rose to equal his record, so you could adjust Ichiro’s NPB numbers for inflation and still determine that the hit record is Ichiro’s.

Redford continues:

There are plenty of quantitative arguments that support Ichiro as the greatest hitter of all time; he had 262 hits in 2004, the most ever; he had ten straight 200-hit seasons, and Rose had ten across his entire career; he grounded into exactly one double play in the 2009 season. Ichiro doesn’t have as many MLB hits as Pete Rose, but he is the best hitter of all time.

Arguing about the relative merits of Ichiro’s accomplishments versus Rose’s is fun, yet ultimately inconclusive.  And, as stated, there is no doubt that Rose is, and should be, MLB’s all-time hits leader.  The thing is, sometimes we can choose our heroes:

It has been reported that [Neil] Armstrong’s serene personality and low profile demeanor were among the reasons NASA selected him over his crewmate Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin to be the first man to step off the Lunar Module on that fateful July 20th.  If this was indeed the case, history bears NASA's decision out as amazingly prescient, for Armstrong, who thus became the public face of the most important feat ever performed by human beings, handled his post-mission role with elegance, aplomb and self-deprecation.

Sometimes we can’t.

Pete Rose’s handling of his “post-mission” role has been catastrophic, and an unmitigated embarrassment to the sport.

Bud Poliquin, writing for Syracuse.com

Pete bet on baseball games when he knew how wrong that was. Pete lied. Pete didn't pay his taxes. Pete went to prison. Pete hung around with some really creepy people. Pete became a brazen huckster and all but a Main Street barker in Cooperstown every July.

It’s bitterly ironic that baseball’s hits “king” constantly brings dishonor to his sport.

The nature of Ichiro’s personality, on the other hand, is evident in his actions when he broke George Sisler’s MLB record for hits in a season in 2004.  From Brad Lifton’s Seattle Times piece about a 2011 Japanese TV program in which Ichiro was interviewed (Pete Drochleman is George Sisler’s grandson):

In a recorded segment from his home in St. Louis, Drochleman acknowledged how the original misgivings he had that summer about Ichiro’s pursuit of Sisler’s 84-year-old record slowly turned to acceptance. By the time he arrived at Safeco Field, he had discovered Ichiro’s dedication and humility, qualities he felt his grandfather would have appreciated.

Once fearful his grandfather would be forgotten in the aftermath of Ichiro’s record, Drochleman now appreciates Ichiro for keeping his memory kindled. He knew that Ichiro took time to visit Sisler’s gravesite during the 2009 All-Star Game in St. Louis, but for the first time he was shown a photo of the moment. He got choked up seeing Ichiro in a posture very different than he had imagined.

“The fact that he’s kneeling down, saying a prayer maybe, that’s moving,” Drochleman said, fighting back tears. “Anytime my grandfather is remembered in any way, I’m overjoyed, and the fact that Ichiro would remember my grandfather says a lot for Ichiro.”

We can fruitlessly argue all night about who deserves the crown as baseball’s best hitter.  But there’s no question about whose head it would better fit.

Ichiro, Ichiro.

Photo by kowarski [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Fertile Ground

Most people would agree that Jimmy Carter would not have been elected President in 1976 had the Watergate Scandal not preceded the election.  Those were pretty bad times:

The scandal led to the discovery of multiple abuses of power by the Nixon administration, articles of impeachment, and the resignation of Nixon as President of the United States on August 9, 1974. The scandal also resulted in the indictment of 69 people, with trials or pleas resulting in 25 being found guilty and incarcerated, many of whom were Nixon's top administration officials.

Enough with the thugs and crooks, America said.  Straight from Central Casting came Mr. Carter, the little-known, unassuming former peanut farmer and Governor of Georgia.  Despite his Southern upbringing, which many considered made him too conservative to be desirable among Democrats, and his skimpy resume, his status as a relative outsider vaulted him to a surprise Democratic nomination:

Jimmy Carter ran as a reformer who was "untainted" by Washington political scandals,  which many voters found attractive in the wake of the Watergate scandal, which had led to President Richard Nixon's resignation.

Mr. Carter then managed to eke out a narrow general election win over incumbent Gerald Ford.  (Nixon had appointed Ford to replace Spiro Agnew as Vice President after Agnew’s resignation in disgrace in 1973, and Ford became President upon Nixon’s resignation in 1974.  Incidentally, Ford continues to be the only person to have served as both Vice President and President without being elected to either office.)

And so it came to be that, in 1976, we elected ourselves a thoroughly decent man, but, according to most historians, a below-average president.

The depths of Watergate constituted, at the time, the lowest point in the nation’s history with regard to trust in government.  Within a span of two years, both the President and Vice President had resigned in disgrace (based on unrelated scandals, no less) and dozens of government officials had been indicted.  Not surprisingly, the percentage of Americans who said they  trust the government always or most of the time, which stood at 77% one year into Lyndon Johnson’s administration in October of 1964, plummeted to 36% around the time Mr. Carter was elected to office.  And rather than stem the tide, the Carter administration exacerbated the problem, with the trust number hitting an all-time low of 27% in 1980, around the time President Carter gave his infamous “malaise speech,” in which he awkwardly blamed the nation’s economic woes on a “crisis of confidence.”

The trust-in-government number has gone up and down since then, but as of October of 2015, the percentage of Americans who trust their government was sitting at its all-time low, 19%.  Less than one in five of us trust our government.  And once again, our nation has been captivated by an outsider.  Except this time it’s not Jimmy Carter, a decent man lacking the qualifications and wherewithal to be an effective president.  This time, of course, it’s Donald Trump, a xenophobic, narcissistic, bigoted demagogue; a thin-skinned racist with the temperament of a 3-year-old.

I voted for President Obama twice, yet am disappointed in his administration.  The bulk of my disappointment doesn’t stem from specific actions or policies.  I can see both sides of the arguments around Obamacare, and the nuclear deal with Iran.  I am certainly unhappy that Mr. Obama presided over the dramatic expansion of the illegal surveillance of Americans that began under George W. Bush in the wake of 9/11, and was largely exposed by American hero Edward Snowden.  But my biggest disappointment is that my optimism about the Obama administration being a unifying force has been dashed.  

In March of 2008, as then-Congressman Obama was neck and neck with Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination, I wrote:

President Barack Obama. The possibility titillates. As our nation, indeed the world, desperately yearns for leadership, here comes a US President with a richly diverse background, endowed with a keen intellect, superb oratorical skills and exquisite charisma. Obama's election could easily inspire uplifting change, and result in dramatic disruption of tired paradigms. An intelligent, articulate leader with the rare ability to actually bring people together presents a formidable foe for all that ails us, as well as a catalyst for the kind of grass­roots activism not seen in this country for forty years. True leadership brings with it a can­-do attitude, which has been missing in action in this country for far too long.

I continue to think President Obama has a keen intellect, superb oratorical skills and exquisite charisma.  Yet somehow we find ourselves more divided than ever, over politics, race, ethnicity, and economics.  Race relations have deteriorated to the point that there are powder kegs ready to explode everywhere.  Our political parties are so divided that we have what can truthfully be called a non-functioning government.  The man I thought would bring us together has presided over us being torn apart.  And we trust our government less than we ever have.

Whether President Obama is to blame, or the Republicans in Congress, or, most likely, a combination of both, somehow our nation became fertile soil for a candidate who appeals to the worst in all of us.  A buffoon who would never have transcended the reality television world where he belongs had we not been so divided, and so unhappy with our government.

Watergate begat Carter.  And that was bad, but not catastrophic.  Eight years of ineffective government under President Obama and the intransigent Republicans begat the Trump candidacy.  

I hope the last word in the previous paragraph never becomes obsolete.

Photo by Alan Murray-Rust [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Retcon This!

The Charlotte Hornets were formed as an NBA expansion team in 1988.  Owned by the infamous George Shinn, they played in Charlotte until 2002, when prolonged contention between Shinn, Charlotte city officials and Hornets fans resulted in Shinn moving his team to New Orleans, becoming the New Orleans Hornets.  In 2013, the team changed its name to the New Orleans Pelicans, in honor of Louisiana's state bird, the brown pelican.

The NBA and Charlotte business leaders held that the failure of the original Hornets franchise in Charlotte was attributable to fans’ dislike of Shinn, and was not indicative of the city’s capacity to sustain an NBA franchise.  Wikipedia:

While the Hornets put a competitive team on the court throughout the 1990s, the team's attendance began falling dramatically. Many attributed this lapse in popularity to the team's owner, George Shinn, who was slowly becoming despised by the people of the city….  The consensus was that while Charlotte was as basketball-crazy as ever, fans took out their anger at Shinn on the team.

So, in 2002, the NBA awarded a new Charlotte franchise to a group led by Black Entertainment Television founder Robert L. Johnson, to begin play in 2004.  The new franchise was named the Charlotte Bobcats, and was purchased in 2010, in its majority, by former NBA superstar Michael Jordan, who thus became the first former NBA player to become majority owner of a franchise.

In 2014, the Charlotte Bobcats officially renamed themselves the Charlotte Hornets, with the permission of the original franchise, which wasn’t using the name anymore.  Moreover the “Hornets” moniker has special significance to the city of Charlotte:

The name was derived from the city's fierce [opposition to the] British occupation during the Revolutionary War, which prompted the British commander, Lord Cornwallis, to refer to it as "a veritable hornet's nest of rebellion."

So far, so good.  Here's where it gets interesting:

At a press conference regarding the change, team officials also announced that as part of a deal with the NBA and the Pelicans, the renamed Hornets reclaimed the history and records of the 1988–2002 Hornets.

Say what?  Wikipedia finds it necessary to clarify:

To restate and clarify a confusing series of events: after the 2002 season, the original Hornets moved to New Orleans. In 2004, Charlotte was granted a new franchise, the Bobcats. After the 2013-14 season, the Bobcats changed their name to the Hornets and reclaimed the history and records of the 1988–2002 Hornets. As a result, the Hornets are now retconned as having suspended operations from 2002 to 2004, while the Pelicans are now retconned as having joined the league in 2002 as an expansion team.

“Retconned”?  I had to look that one up.  According to Google, “retcon” is a verb, meaning to “revise (an aspect of a fictional work) retrospectively, typically by introducing a piece of new information that imposes a different interpretation on previously described events”  (emphasis mine).

The thing is, history is not a fiction that can be “retconned.”  No matter what deals are made, the history and records of the Charlotte Hornets from 1988 to 2002 are those of the original franchise, the one that moved to New Orleans.  You can’t “reassign” a past from one organization to another, no matter how much you pretend to do exactly that.  To assume that the people of Charlotte will be comforted by ignoring the facts and pretending that their present team was established in 1988 and “suspended operations” from 2002 to 2004 is condescending and insulting.  This deal, as well as its precedent, set by the NFL’s Cleveland Browns in 1996, is nothing less than historical revisionism that illegitimately distorts the historical record, and is the malevolent purview of totalitarian regimes, not professional sports leagues.  Are fans in Charlotte and Cleveland supposed to make believe that their franchises never abandoned them?

Dan Feldman of NBC Sports, reflecting on the Charlotte franchise name change and records “acquisition”:

This is a much more logical and satisfying reflection of NBA history and records….  Kudos to the Pelicans for following suit and helping to make this happen. The NBA and our sense of history is better for it.

Really, Mr. Feldman?  Our “sense of history” is better for something that fictionalizes the past and obscures history?  History can’t be altered so that we feel better about it.  Our “sense of history” can only be improved as we clarify the past, not as we obfuscate it   Obviously there are many things in the past that we would have liked to have happened differently, but, guess what, they didn’t!  And pretending they did doesn’t change anything.

I was born in Barranquilla, Colombia in 1961.  I left Colombia for the U.S. as a student in 1978, became a U.S. Resident in 1985, and a U.S. Citizen in 1994.  All true so far, but now, for the sake of argument, let’s say that I became a world famous tennis player, a constant leader in the ATP tour.  Let’s also say that in 1994 I changed my name to John Peters.

I became so famous that in 1990, a baby born in Barranquilla was named after me, Jack Azout. The city of Barranquilla, proud of my accomplishments, offered me a boatload of money in exchange for reassigning my history, through 1994, to the “new” Jack Azout.  I agreed.  So now, the 25 year-old Jack Azout that lives in Barranquilla is celebrated for his accomplishments on the world tennis circuit.  How ludicrous is that?

About as ludicrous as the 1988-2002 records of the “new” Charlotte Hornets.

Photo by Lin Pernille Kristensen [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Full of Barbaras

Ladies and gentlemen: the story you are about to read is true. Only the names (and a few facts) have been changed to protect the innocent.

As he walked around the back of his car, wallet in hand, to get to the gas pump, Joel’s phone vibrated in his pocket.  He quickly swiped the credit card, selected the gasoline grade, popped the fuel tank open and put the nozzle in place.  He then put the credit card back in his wallet, and laid the wallet on top of the fuel pump so that he could quickly fish the phone out of his pocket and take the call.  It ended up being a long conversation, so by the time it was over the tank was full and the pump had automatically shut off.  Joel put the phone back in his pocket, hung the nozzle back on the pump, and drove home.

The wallet, forlorn, lay helplessly on the pump.

It was a long drive, and Joel took the time to think about the implications of his telephone conversation.  It was only about an hour later, when he got home, that he realized he had left his wallet at the gas station.  He tried to call there, but the number he found online was inoperative.  Driving an hour back to the station seemed futile, as Joel was sure by that time someone would have happened upon the wallet, and would have been up to no good.  He cancelled his credit cards, ordered replacements, and requested a duplicate copy of his driver's license.

An hour later, he received the following comment on his website:

Hello, I have found a wallet that belongs to Joel Ferguson. I'm hoping this is you.  If it is, please contact me at (813)555-1234 as I would like to return it. Thanks!

Barbara Thompson

Joel immediately called the number.  The otherworldly charm and kindness of the woman who answered was such that it placed her in fictional 1950’s Mayfield, not today’s South Florida.  Barbara offered to mail Joel’s wallet back to him.  Joel thanked her.  Profusely.

A few hours later Joel received a text from Barbara with the tracking information for the wallet.  She didn’t merely stick the wallet in an envelope, slap a few stamps on it and throw in it a mailbox.  She took the time to visit a post office, and paid extra to send it via First Class Parcel Service, which includes tracking.

The very next day he received the package.  She had lovingly placed the wallet in a cushioned envelope for added protection.  Along with the wallet, (its contents, of course, intact), Barbara included a note, handwritten on notebook paper:

Hi Joel,

I hope this package finds you in good spirits.  I’m sorry I had to riffle through your wallet to find you, but I’m glad I get to return it to you.

Wishing you well,

Barbara

Joel had told Barbara over the phone (and repeated it in a note he sent her along with a box of chocolate-dipped strawberries) that she restored his faith in humanity.  But as he thought about it, he realized that the opposite was really the case.

Barbara, Joel thought, is a remarkable human being, but the fact that she is remarkable is sad.  If humanity were deserving of his faith, Barbara’s actions when she found his wallet would be commonplace, not exceptional.  Joel discussed this incident with many people, and every single one of them was astonished that he got his wallet back.  We just don’t expect honesty from people, Joel thought, because we rarely get it.   So Barbara’s actions did not restore his faith in humanity.  They only made him realize just how wonderful the world could be.  

If it were full of Barbaras.

Photo by KRoock74 [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons