Derek Jeter scandal! There is no way I can have a totally unbiased view on the HBP incident in the Yankees/Rays game a few nights ago. However, I always watch the Academy Awards and expect for him to be nominated for best supporting actor for such a convincing performance.
The uproar seems to be due to the fact that Jeter is one of the faces of the league and My God, what will this teach the children? From what I can tell, kids will get two lessons from this. Yankee kids will see it as Captain Intangibles doing anything to get on base and do something to spark the team. All the other kids have better parents who are raising them to hate the Yankees and would have hated them no matter what. You never actual hear from the impressionable kids are so affected by incidents like this. It's the adults who are outraged and I think I've figured out why.
As adults, we know that the world isn't fair. We know that people cheat. Whether it's performance enhancing drugs, a phantom tag, or embellishing a hit to draw a penalty. We see this all the time. Adults take athletes breaking the rules so hard because when it comes to our sports, we are often very childlike in our devotion. We maintain the naive wonder we had when we were 7 and went to our first game. Our inner children want to believe that athletes are somehow better than us. In fact, they are just as painfully human as we are. Except maybe for A-Rod.
Questionable calls will be made. Sports are played and officiated by humans so a certain level of imperfection is to be expected. Besides, if everyone did exactly what they were supposed to and no one ever made a mistake or toed the line of villainy what on earth would we talk about? Deter Jeter not being ht by that pitch. Brett Hull's foot in the crease. Two different sports on two different surfaces but the lesson is the same. Shit happens. We don't always get what we want. Keep watching, keep cheering. There will always be more games.
But screw the Yankees. I hate those guys.
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