Rule 21
It hangs in every clubhouse from the low minors to the major leagues — a giant poster with the headline:
TO PLAYERS AND MANAGERS
THIS IS PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL RULE 21, REGARDING GAMBLING, etc.
Boiled down to its essence is the first sentence, “Any player, umpire, or club or league official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game in connection with which the bettor has a duty to perform shall be declared permanently ineligible.”
Identifying as a Champion
From the June 4th Danbury (CT) News-Times coverage of the Connecticut Girls Track Championships:
“Terry Miller of Bulkeley won the 100 meters in 11.72 seconds, beating the previous State Open record, set in 2004 by Shanea Calhoun of Wilbur Cross, by one-tenth of a second. She also won the 200 in 24.17 seconds, breaking thye (sic) previous State Open record of 24.24, which was set in 1997 by Shayla Wallace of Northwest Catholic. Miller also placed fourth in the 400 (57.61).”
Sounds like a pretty straight forward report, doesn’t it? Except for one thing. Terry Miller is a boy. He has the body of a boy. The entire body of a boy. He says he psychologically identifies as female but he has not undergone either hormone treatments or reassignment surgery.
Wanna Bet? The Supremes Say… “Maybe.”
Six years ago, faced with a gaping hole in the state budget, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie decided the way to fill the coffers was to offer legalized sports betting. All four major professional sports leagues and the NCAA immediately objected and sued to stop it. Their hammer was the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act – or PASPA.
PASPA was the brainchild of Bill Bradley, the three-term Senator from the Garden State. It sought to stem the spread of sports betting after three states added sports games to their lotteries to accompany the already legal sports books found in Nevada. Bradley, who is a Basketball Hall of Famer, understood that the only thing that separates professional sports from professional wrestling and roller derby is the idea that the games are on the up-and-up. When the law was passed in 1992 we were just three years removed from Pete Rose’s lifetime banishment from baseball and mere months from Michael Jordan’s first retirement from the NBA.
The Libertarian Podcast: Is Unionization the Future of College Football?
In this week’s installment of The Libertarian podcast from the Hoover Institution, Professor Epstein and I discussed the recent NLRB decision allowing unionization for college football players at Northwestern University.
Is it legitimate for college athletes to claim “employee” status? Can college sports survive the implications of this ruling? Is it an injustice for these students not to be paid? And would higher education be better off being decoupled from athletics, especially those that are functionally semi-pro? Those are some of the questions we explore in this episode:
The Obama Scandal Bracket 2014 — Jon Gabriel
Since nothing else is going on in the world, President Obama went on ESPN today to unveil his annual NCAA bracket.
The President’s “Barack-etology” always gets big buzz from the media, unlike his administration’s growing mountain of scandals. Wouldn’t it be convenient to organize the bad news into a format the average reporter can follow?
That’s pretty much it. Just wondering, since time’s running out. My coffee cup from 2 years ago’s Challenge is getting lonely. Edit: CuriousJohn has created a Bracket Challenge. His post is here: http://bit.ly/1l4qv3F Preview Open
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Introducing the Obama Scandal Bracket!
With so many White House scandals—and new ones popping up every day—how are average citizens supposed to keep track? Wouldn’t it be nice if Obama went on ESPN and mapped them all on a bracket?
Why wait for next year’s March Madness when you can start May Madness today? Introducing the Obama Scandal Bracket! Click here for a full-size version and vote for the scandal you think will bring down the president.
