Baseball again fails to solve the obvious problem
by Geep on Tuesday, May 8th, 2007 at 05:07pm
Today it was announced the Yankees were banning beer in their clubhouses. The ghost of Mantle and Mantle’s original liver will certainly be haunting the House that Ruth built.
I am saddened that Josh Hancock passed away. This would have been a perfect opportunity to address a serious problem. But much like when the US had the opportunity to do something about gun control after JFK was shot, baseball doesn’t even see what the problem is.
To the best of my knowledge Dennis Eckersley is the only sober baseball player I can remember. Of course if someone is a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, it is an anonymous program. But if there are approximately 14 million people in the country addicted to alcohol then there has to be more players than Eckersley and Hancock.
Was Josh Hancock an alcoholic? Only he could decide for himself, but it certainly seemed like he was heading in that direction. Who else is in his shoes? What type of program does MLB have in place to help players deal with this?
The sport that allowed Steve Howe to be suspended seven times is not proactively dealing with the problem of addiction. Certainly this can be difficult when numerous breweries are also you business partners.
Recently John Amaechi came out about his sexuality. An LA sportswriter had his dick cut off and is now a she. When will alcoholism come out of the closet in sports? When will it come out of the closet in the United States, in general? Our president says he hasn’t had a drink since his DUI, but denies he is an alcoholic or ever attended meetings.
I do not expect sportswriters across the country to address this in their columns. And if rumors are true, their profession suffers from a high rate of alcoholism.
Alcoholism is a disease. A diseased body processes alcohol differently than a non-diseased body. There is scientific proof. Do we whisper about Ron Santo’s diabetes? No we use him as an example of what a diabetic can accomplish.
Bud has to step up and address the issue. Baseball has to have a treatment program.
You can’t just ignore the 500lb. elephant until the next time someone dies.
Make Josh Hancock’s death worth something.