46:16 In the book Eight Men Out, Elliot Asinov explains why Comiskey's players hated him and provides several examples of his cheapness and callousness toward them. He paid them less than any other team and they were the class of baseball, for example. They go beyond being "an astute businessman." This documentary impugns Asinov's narrative. Why? Because Comiskey supported a black hospital and a black military unit? That is all fine, and maybe Comiskey wasn't such a bad guy, but the fact remains that his players hated him and that is a key reason why they were motivated to do what they did.
@@rstefanie2622 Educated yourself before you say stupid things on the internet! Saying that a rich white man supported black American ventures with absolutely no details on how he supported such ventures. Is a tactic of the right wing conservatives not the “woke” left as you losers call them! The right conservative wing of both parties are the only group of people in American history who try their best to lie, obfuscate and rewrite history! Especially the history of racist white people and white organizations! White people will go as far as to say that the kkk isn’t racist because they gave money to an orphanage with black kids in it!
I'm supposed to feel sorry for a millionaire owner. they were all crooked and screwed over the players any chance they got. he deserves his sullied reputation.
I also read they were called the Black Sox before they threw the Series because they had some boycott or issue with Comiskey, or he wouldn't wash the socks or something like that. This documentary uses information from the grand jury most don't.
The players were pissed off about their working conditions at a time when Labor vs Management conflicts was asAmerican as Spy vs Spy. The Scandal ruined my Great Uncles chance at the White Sox from the Minors when Chicago was his home town.
I'm 56 and first-generation American born to Eastern European immigrants. They didn't know about the sport as I was growing up, so I never played little league baseball. At age 13, I started watching my hometown team.....the Padres in my parents' room on a 13-inch television. I became enamored with the sport and eventually went to the library to read the history and became even more of a fan. I'm that dude that watches every pitch at home or at the ballpark. It's such a great game. I knew of the Black Sox scandal, but it really hit home with me when I saw Eight Men Out in 1988. This documentary is very well done, and I'm glad to have seen it. Even though my team got beat by the rival Dodgers, I still watched the rest of the playoffs. Baseball is a great sport. I got my son into Little League at age 5, and volunteer coached with him for 7 years. We went to the Cooperstown 12U tournament this past summer, and we toured the HOF, where I was in baseball heaven for 3 hours.
It’s a cool story. But it is most likely completely made up. I don’t want to spoil it for you. But it’s most likely a made up quote from a newspaper writer.
Gambling is a problem then when it’s illegal, gambling or we call it now as Sports Betting is still a problem now that it’s legalized in almost all 50 states.
If Joe Jackson really believed he was innocent because a jury said so, maybe we should call him clueless Joe Jackson. I think the commissioner had it right: banned for life.
Ty Cobb iin his Autobiography written with Al Stump published in 1961 said” Joe Jackson had the most natural swing” Cobb said “ Mine had to be manufactured over many years” But not Joes. “ Jackson was illiterate he felt Joe Jackson didn’t know what was going on despite evidence to the contrary. One night after leaving the Masters golf tournament in Augusta ,Georgia Ty Cobb stopped at a liquor store in Greenville??South Carolina where Joe Jackson worked. Upon seeing Joe Cobb said” you old so and so don’t you recognize me?” Ty then told everyone in the store what a great ball player Joe had been. Cobb added old Joe who seemed pleased with my remarks died not long after”.
Years after the Black Sox scandal, a player who once played against Jackson said "you can blindfold me, and I can tell you when Joe Jackson hit the ball. It had a special crack." Can only imagine the sound of a baseball coming off Black Betsy.
Professional sports always was and still is corrupt. When ever big money is involved corruption follows. It'll never end as longer as the suckers keep buying the tickets.
This is a fantastic episode! Big time props to whoever put this together. Very nicely done. More of this please!!! Let’s get some cool ideas like the first Wrigley Field night game, Billy goat curse, Sox/Cubs biggest rivalry moments etc…
SAD IT CAME TO THAT, FEELING THEY WERE SO UNDERPAID, AS THEY WERE, OWNERS ARE NOTORIUS FOR SCREWING THEIR PLAYERS, ALL ABOUT THE PROFIT, GREED RUINS EVEYTHING!!!
The NFL has had a history of rather close connection with organized gambling. Read the book "Interference". It is chilling. In the 1880's and 90's the term "Hipidroming" was a commonly used to describe ball games that were clearly being thrown.
@@Hardball247 I don't see that happening. Too much money at stake. Who in the government would shut them down? Gambling is legal in many states? Trump has bigger fish to fry.
It's a tragedy that the players felt the need to fix the series for money. However, the owners and above also contributed to this shame by finding ways to cheat the players by not honoring contracts and blacklisting them if they leave for another team.
The real shame is that there is always some big money jew out there who is more than happy to bankroll anything no matter how evil and rotten it may be, just as long as it makes him richer. Rothstein, Madoff, Soros, Goldman Sachs, BlackRock etc etc etc
Asa diehard White Sox fan the year of 2024 was the worst not just in their season but in all of MLB. My grandfather saw this scandal first hand when he found out it was his heroes Jackson and the rest he turned his back on all sports never followed baseball football or any of it he was done with it bitter and angry
Gene Carney, founder of the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) Black Sox Scandal Research Committee, wrote that "Baseball was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property;" and with the 10-Day Clause a player who was injured on opening day, and was out for the season, would only be paid for 10 days.
I've known about this for years and have seen the movie 8 Men Out, but I definitely enjoyed this excellent little documentary from a more modern perspective with recent occurrences of sports gambling and fixing. Very informative.
Good doc. One thing I didn't appreciate were the sycophants coming to the defense of Comiskey near the end of the program, who, iirc, wouldn't even have his players' uniforms washed back in the 19th century. That ending with the slop about supporting Black American troops and hospitals - yeah, well, I'm sure he wasn't the only one. Bezos "does philanthropy" too, while simultaneously not letting his employees go to the bathroom.
It is stated in this documentary that Shoeless Joe hit .375 "but the big hits he was known for never came...too many times he and the team did not look right". Joe hit .353 with runners on compared to the .214 he hit in the 1917 World Series. Comiskey testified that "Joe played good ball...(there) was nothing suspicious about his performance." Ray Schalk said, "Joe hit as hard as he did during the season or even a little better." Sox outfielder Eddie Murphy also praised his performance in the 1919 World Series describing his hitting as "wonderful. He was robbed of a number of hits by sensational fielding, but even so he came through with many a timely clout." Chicago Daily News baseball writer Oscar Reichow reported "Jackson certainly demonstrated that a World's Series makes little difference to him. He played up to his standard." Joe scored 5 runs and drove in 6 on a team that only scored 20 the whole Series. He went 5-for-7 in Games 2 and 3 against what was considered to be the best pitching staff in the National League--a feat unmatched or bettered in a World Series (min 5 at bats) by such greats as Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Eddie Collins, Rogers Hornsby, Tris Speaker, Lou Gehrig, Joe Dimaggio, Mel Ott, Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, Hank Aaron and many more. Babe Ruth did it but it took him 35 games to accomplish this rare and remarkable feat. It took Shoeless Joe just 9. Jackson said he took the money from Lefty Williams after being told "it was for the use of his name". When deposed for Joe's 1924 civil trial the pitcher admitted Jackson never gave him permission to use his name. Shoeless Joe's detractors have been skeptical of his claim that he tried to show Comiskey the money and had the owner's office door slammed in his face. However, during the civil trial Comiskey admitted Joe came to his office the day after the Series ended, waited an hour and the owner did not see him. Letters were presented in evidence indicating Joe offered, a mere month after the World Series ended, to return to Chicago to tell what he knew. Comiskey brushed him off. Joe went to the Sox office when the scandal broke, I believe, to try to clear his name as he had attempted to do 9 months before. I also believe that he panicked after being told by grand jury Judge McDonald, during a phone call arranged by White Sox and Comiskey attorney Alfred Austrian, that he did not believe him when the ballplayer protested his innocence. Joe testified during the 1921 Black Sox criminal trial that Austrian told him that he was going to be indicted and that they were primarily interested in ridding the game of gamblers. If he confessed, Joe was told, he would only be used as a witness and would not be prosecuted. False confession expert Saul Kassin has written that "innocent people, if desperate enough, would confess if they thought they would escape punishment." Like others who have made a false confession, Joe said, "all I wanted was to tell my story and get out": Austrian, I believe, had to convince Jackson that he must not implicate Comiskey in the cover-up if he wanted them to help him stay out of jail. During the 1924 civil trial Joe said he told the grand jury in September of 1920 that he was "ashamed" of himself because Austrian "suggested" he so testify, evidence he was coached by the attorney. Austrian and Comiskey were concerned that Joe might expose the cover-up giving the owner's mortal enemy, AL President Ban Johnson, the ammunition he could use to destroy the owner. It is stated in the documentary that it is not true that Comiskey was a "tightwad" and that "to be an astute businessperson...doesn't mean you can't be a good generous human". However, the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) publication SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE and their Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletters contain several quotes that indicate the players did perceive the owner to be a Scrooge. Happy Felsh is described as leaving the team at one point "because of disputes with Comiskey over pay", and the outfielder "expressed great contempt for the penny-pinching Comiskey". Sox pitcher Win Noyes described the owner as "a skinflint...who should have been banned from baseball" and not Joe Jackson. Swede Risberg complained of the "starvation wages" they were paid and Eddie Murphy "believed that Comiskey underpaid his players and was rotten to them in other ways." The grandson of another Sox pitcher, Lefty Sullivan, said his grandfather thought that "whatever happened to Comiskey, Comiskey deserved"' and that he felt "pure hate" for the owner. Chick Gandil described Comiskey as "a sarcastic, belittling man who was the tightest owner in baseball. If a player objected to his miserly terms he was told 'You can take it or leave it', under baseball's slave laws what could a fellow do but take it?...There was a common bond among most of us--our dislike of Comiskey". Infielder Fred McMullin said during the first meeting of the crooked players that they were not being paid "a devil of a lot of money". The judge at the Black Sox criminal trial expressed amazement that 5-year veteran Lefty Williams, who had won 13 games in his rookie year, 17 in '17 and 23 in '19 was only paid $2500 in 1919. Manager Kid Gleason is reported to have sat out the 1918 season in a salary dispute with Comiskey and the White Sox players threatened to strike during the 1919 season if the owner did not renegotiate their contracts, which Comiskey refused to do. James Nitz writes in SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE that "the club was torn with dissension over wage disparities" and that Felsh, Jackson and Gandil "were rightly upset that their three salaries combined were less than the $15,000 made by college-educated Eddie Collins". Gene Carney, founder of the Black Sox Research Committee wrote, "Comiskey was probably not exceptionally tight...Every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations." Baseball "was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property". It may have been against that unfortunate reality that the White Sox players were rebelling. The Jacksons deposited the bribe money in the bank in December of 1919. Joe had tried to show the money to Comiskey in October and had offered to return to Chicago to tell what he knew in November. Because he received no response to his letter, I believe, Joe decided he may as well bank it. Joe testified that "he (Williams) did not want the damn stuff and since that lousy so-called gambling outfit had used my name, I might as well have their money as (Lefty)." Jackson also testified that he asked Sox secretary Harry Grabiner what he should do with the money and was told "as long as that bunch of bums used your name, you did the only sensible thing in keeping it". Joe might have thought he could put the dirty money to good use by paying his sister's medical bills. Was it a mistake to put the bribe money in the bank and make withdrawals for whatever reason? Yes, but in the context described, an understandable one and one for which the punishment, banishment from baseball for life and exclusion from the Baseball Hall of Fame, does not fit the crime.
You guys reach more than stretch Armstrong to try and lie for shoeless Joe Jackson! A man who admitted to taking the money, after conspiring with teammates on the train just like Eddie cicotte, and lefty Willian’s! Shoeless Joe admitted multiple times to being involved! But the movie and the book try to skirt these facts so he can make Cooperstown! It’s weird how white people are obsessed with this but hate on Colin kaepernick who actually had an entire football league collude to keep him out the nfl! Don’t yall see how hypocritical yall can be!
After the White Sox blew the 1919Series, it took 40 years before the team returned to the Fall Classic. After rhat six-game loss to the Dodgers, it took another 46 years before the Sox played Houston and swept the Astros for the title.
I don't like baseball, never played it as a kid and I don't want watch it which is a little isolating yet I am here watching a documentary because I find it fascinating just how much baseball meant for generations. I just wish I was part of it.
Got to remember that the owners OWNED the baseball players - free agency wasn’t a thing until the 1970s. There wasn’t any arbitration, nor paying what the player was worth - so Comiskey, even charged them for washing their uniforms.
@@slundgr He took the money from Lefty Williams and then took it to show Comiskey and had the door slammed in his face. Comiskey admitted in his testimony during the 1924 civil trial that Joe came to his office the day after the World Series ended, waited an hour and the Sox owner did not see him. Letters were presented in evidence indicating that Joe offered to return to Chicago the month after the Series ended to tell what he knew and Comiskey brushed him off.
They should have a wingin Cooperstown devoted to cheating. In 1908 a third base coach found a buzzer buried in the coaching area in the Cincinnati ball park.
As a lifetime baseball fan, the history of the Black Sox affects me more than any other episode in the sports history. Just the waste of these young, talented men's lives is a tragedy.
Lets hear some in-depth discussion on Comisky and his disrespect towards players. Not condoning their actions but Comisky was not just a businessman but a cheap arse.
The Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) publication SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE and their Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletters contain several quotes indicating what a Scrooge the players thought Comiskey was. Happy Felsch is described as leaving the team at one point "because of disputes with Comiskey over pay", and the outfielder "expressed great contempt for the penny-pinching Comiskey". Sox pitcher Win Noyes described the owner as "a skinflint...who should have been banned from baseball" and not Joe Jackson. Swede Risberg complained of the "starvation wages" they were paid and outfielder Eddie Murphy "believed that Comiskey underpaid his players and was rotten to them in other ways." The grandson of another Sox pitcher, Lefty Sullivan, said his grandfather thought that "whatever happened to Comiskey, Comiskey deserved" and that he felt "pure hate" for the owner. Chick Gandil described the Old Roman as "a sarcastic, belittling man who was the tightest owner in baseball. If a player objected to his miserly terms he was told 'You can take it or leave it', under baseball's slave laws what could a fellow do but take it?...There was a common bond among most of us--our dislike of Comiskey". The judge at the Black Sox criminal trial in 1921 expressed amazement that 5-year veteran Lefty Williams, who had won 13 games in his rookie year, 17 in '17 and 23 in '19 was only paid $2500 in 1919. Manager Kid Gleason is reported to have sat out the 1918 season in a salary dispute with the owner and the White Sox players threatened to strike in 1919 if Comiskey did not renegotiate their contracts which, of course, the Old Roman refused to do. James Nitz writes, "the club was torn with dissension over wage disparities" and that Felsch, Jackson and Gandil "were rightly upset that their three salaries combined were less than the $15,000 made by college-educated Eddie Collins". Gene Carney, founder of the Black Sox Scandal Research Committee wrote, "every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations." Baseball "was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property." I believe it was against that unfortunate reality that the White Sox players were rebelling.
Let's talk about Rothstein screwing them over. Documentary keeps downing the players for only getting g a little while another guy hustled everyone and walked away free and continued with that money and influence in other areas including our government. How many did he do it to there?
Thank God for Curt Flood, who challenged the Reserve Clause in late 60s. This eventually changed the sport dramatically and gave ballplayers the ability to bargain for what they were really worth. This was the root cause of the Black Sox scandal - a one-sided labor situation that was really nothing more than indentured slavery. Give them decent wages and this doesn't occur. While mentioned in the video, much more time should have been spent on this aspect of the issue to provide a more balanced view.
Just something to add: the Reds were actually a pretty good team. They had pitching, pitching, and more pitching. Five quality starters. One of them was Hod Eller, who had a no-hitter to his name, and nearly pitched an emaculate inning. He was the master of the shine ball (applying stuff to the ball before he pitched it), so you could call him a spitballer (Urban Shocker of the Yankees was another). Anyways, another point is that the clean Sox didn't exactly play well either. Their pitching? Other than Kerr's effort in game three, it wasn't any good. Kerr gave up 11 hits and 4 runs in game 6, and he ran the team out of an inning when he tried to advance to second on a SF. A reliever, Roy Wilkinson, gave up 9 hits in only 7.1 IP. Another reliever (Bill James) gave up 8 hits in only 4.2 innings. James relieved Williams in game eight, and allowed three walks and a hit batter for good measure. Lefty Williams had told Joe Jackson that he was "going out to win the game" prior to the eighth contest. Why would he say that if you are going to throw the tilt? Eddie and Shano Collins didn't get hot until game 7, and it was against Slim Sallee, who was the weakest of the Reds' starting pitchers. (In game two, Chicago got 10 hits off Sallee, plus the White Sox had faced him a few times two years earlier in the 1917 Fall Classic.) Shano was hitting so poorly that Kid Gleason benched him for game eight. Nemo Leibold didn't get a hit until the first inning of the aforementioned contest, then stranded three basesrunners in a do-or-die game. Eddie Collins was know as a clutch player, having hit .400 in three Fall Classics. Here, in 1919, he hit .226 (and even committed two errors). One RBI. By comparison, the ringleader of the fix was Chick Gandil, who had five, including the winning ones in games 3 and 6. He also drove in the lone Chicago tally in game one (and the run was scored by none other than Shoeless Joe), which was thrown. Joe Jackson had five RBIs himself. So if they are "failing" in the clutch (and only one Cincinnati player had more RBIs than Jackson, Pat Duncan with eight), then so was everybody else on both teams. Little known fact is Jackson also reached base three times on an error plus he drew a walk, so he reached base 16 times in eight games. He wasn't trying? Sure could have fooled me. Only one Red player, Ivey Wingo (who hit an amazing .571) topped him in batting average among those who qualify for the lead. Wingo had an awesome four hits and three walks, including a perfect day at the plate against Cicotte in game seven (even though Eddie was trying his best). I think more credit needs to be given to the Reds. After routing Sallee for the second time in game seven, Dolph Luque, an excellent pitcher for the Reds, blanked the White Sox on one hit the rest of the way. He and Ray Fisher (who lost a tough 3-0 decision to Kerr in the third contest) totally stopped 'em. Seems to me, Chicago struggled against certain pitchers like Fisher, Luque, plus Jimmy Ring (2-0 shutout in game four, the only hits by Chicago were by Jackson, Felsch and Gandil, ironically) and had no problem with others like Sallee and Dutch Ruether (although Dutch was an awesome hitter).
@@Paul-ew5st Well, I'm giving the Reds some credit. Most people say they suck and were far inferior to the White Sox. Apparently, so do a few people in this documentary. Just trying to give the Reds a bit of credit. Nothing noble about what I'm doing. I think the people who make documentaries and write books (about baseball) are the real heros out there. What do you think? Could a guy like me write a book or two about baseball? Granted it might take time.
MLB has had its share of scandals over the years. Don't forget Denny McLain and his issues. Then there is the cocaine busts and trials of the players in the eighties. How wide spread is the fentanyl/opioid use in MLB? I don't think Tyler Skaggs was the only player. A couple of his teammates also got suspended for their part in the scandal. He just died from it. I think there is more to the Ohtani gambling story than we are being told, also.
There is nothing more satisfying to the pleasure of team sports when you are a member of a top team, a team of villains, or trash talkers, or tough guys, thick as thieves, and unmatched genuine loyalty to each other, but hated by all other teams and fans. It’s like being in the mob. I remember even our fans were hated for the crime of supporting their kin. But towards the end of the season, they grew into their role, and appreciated the pleasure of being the bad guy who wins.
40:10 Huh? How was it impossible to show that the players had the intent to defraud? What other intent could they possibly have had? Their contracts obligated them to play to their best ability - they did the opposite. The World Series spectators paid to see fair ballgames - the BlackSox gave them fixed ballgames. It's obvious from the testimony ("We took money to play poorly") that their intent was to defraud.
It is the most difficult of sentiments for me to deal with, my love of baseball and football. I had success as a youth, slightly more in baseball than football. Baseball from an external view may be more romantic than football. But from the inside, I’d trade my baseball state title for a loss in the football state tournament, which we missed getting into by one win. My allegiance was stronger to the football fans, and my teammates who gave it all on Friday nights. My sentiments of regret, though seemingly silly to most, for letting down the football fans far outweighs the pleasure of gifting a championship to the baseball fans. Like many competitive athletes, I never get over a loss, this releases me from the feigned satisfaction of closure and letting go.
So if a group of excellent ball players who were always honest and played within the rules just threw the most important 8 games of their life because they just felt like it?? Wrong. It's because the owner Mr. Comiskey was cheap and didn't care about if his players were paid a fare wage and kept lining his pockets off the backs of his players blood sweat and tears. BS. Reinstate Shoeless Joe!!!!
@Rockn614 This was by no means the first episode of game-fixing in baseball, and the eagerness of some White Sox players to put this deal over shows they were already inured to the practice. It had been going on for years, and one of the leading figures in the corruption was itinerant first baseman Hal Chase. Nobody forced or seduced these guys into throwing the Series. Comiskey being what he was is beside the point. A sizeable contingent of his players were crooked.
I was just a kid back then, the batboy for the White Sox during that infamous 1919 season. Imagine this: a scrawny kid like me, wide-eyed and starstruck, running around the dugout while legends like Shoeless Joe Jackson were swinging lumber. I didn’t know much about the whispers floating around-hell, I thought “fix” meant something wrong with the bats. But there was a tension, thick enough to cut with a knife. I remember one game vividly. Joe hit a ball so clean it sounded like a gunshot, and I ran to grab his bat when he got back to the dugout. He looked at me, those tired eyes of his, and said, “Kid, never stop playing this game for the love of it.” I didn’t know what he meant then, but looking back, I wonder if he was trying to hold onto something pure in the middle of all that dirt. The day it all blew up, the clubhouse felt like a funeral. Grown men sat silent, heads down, and I just kept fetching bats, trying to stay invisible. I didn’t fully understand what was happening, but I knew one thing for sure: the game I loved had just been cracked wide open. And me, I drowned my sadness in Hires Root Beer and endless boxes of Crackerjack. It’s how I developed childhood diabetes.
If Comiskey would've paid his players better, and treated them with more respect, the Scandal probably would've never happened. Comiskey was a penny pinching cheapskate.
It did not make a difference for the White Sox The Reds had a better team all around ...... Comisky was a cheap bastard anyway And deserves what happened....
I'm going to read the wiki page for more details- but one question- is it illegal to take money and play poor baseball? Think about it. Is there a law against that? The doc sez, "conspiracy to committ fraud" as the charge. Isn't that kinda vague?
I never knew that the WS was 'Best of 9' and it took 5 wins to get the series..!! Anyway, only the Owners are allowed to fixx games, never the Players.... So, they got a raise... of course.
"We hold baseball pure" ~ because we loved playing it from +/- 5 years old upward... we watched our older brothers, friends or neighbors playing better baseball and we grew... and became decent players. 😮😮😮 I stopped playing in 1971 at age 14 ... as a fan of the 1960s Harmon Killebrew Twins, and the early Colorado Rockies of the 90s... this is the first video I've watched regarding the Sox. How they got busted was eye-opening. 😮😮
@@Paul-ew5st Compared to other inferior teams their pay was the lowest! That was the gripe they had with Comisky! I haven’t read the book about it so I’m totally going off of the movie and documentaries
Always felt bad for Buck Weaver no eras and led the team in hitting for the series but was banned for life because he was approached and said no. He deserves better
That's bull crap sign-stealing and football or baseball is crap it's so easy to go around signaling to your players on what the play is ,it is just an excuse why you lost😅😅😅😅😅😅😅
Bill Veeck found the 1918 salary ledger for the White Sox in 1959 and published the details.`Basically only Joe Jackson and Lefty Williams were underpaid compared to their peers. Eddie Collins was the highest paid second baseman in the game, Ray Schalk was the highest paid catcher and Buck Weaver was the highest paid 3rd baseman. Everyone else apart from Jackson and Williams were fairly compensated, the idea that Comiskey was cheap, at least in regard to salaries, is totally wrong.
Paul Browne wrote in a SABR Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletter that there is "a convincing argument that the White Sox of 1919 were not underpaid in comparison to other players around the American League. But that doesn't necessarily mean that they did not FEEL underpaid." Tim Hornbaker writes in his Shoeless Joe biography the salaries of ballplayers were "rarely given out by people in the know, seldom confirmed and hardly ever correct." The salaries were often "overinflated". Comiskey told the press he was paying Jackson $10,000 per year when the ballplayer was actually paid $6000. So, it is possible the White Sox perceived themselves to be underpaid because they apparently did not know what other players were making and may well have believed the reported inflated salaries. Gene Carney, the founder of the SABR Black Sox Research Committee, wrote, "Comiskey was probably not exceptionally tight. Every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations...Baseball was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property." Perhaps it was against this unfortunate reality that the players were rebelling. David Fleitz asserts in his Joe bio, "Comiskey was not a monster. He was a typical purveyor of the business ethics of the era. He made as much money for himself as he could and spent as little of it on his employees as he could possibly get away with spending". According to Hornbaker, "Across the major leagues a wider and wider divide grew between players and the owners...Comiskey was going to wear the same badge his fellow owners wore: being labeled a penny-pincher and cheap...owners were tagged as being greedy and Comiskey was lumped into the pile." Hornbaker also states that "the divide between club management and the players...wasn't limited to any one league city." Management was criticized "as being tightfisted and obsessively greedy...The sentiment of major leaguers with regard to the supposed greed of club owners was one of the most common threads across the sport. Those who bought into the idea felt magnates were in a place to rack up incredible sums of money off their hard work, and believed they continuously received the short end of the stick during salary negotiations. 'Leave it to the big bosses to cop all the dough" an unnamed member of the Sox told a reporter,,,.(Comiskey) like other big league moguls, (was) perceived for their insatiability of wealth." The players throughout the major leagues threatened to strike after the 1916 season when the owners "wanted to rework contracts to ensure the 10-Day clause was an available option as well as strengthening the reserve clause." The Federal League, which went out of business in 1915 had given the players a taste of what they could earn on an open market as free agents were it not for the reserve clause.
@@alanthurston2369 It may well be that the White Sox were uniquely malleable for the purposes of the perpetrators of the fix. Although Cicotte is portrayed here as the instigator of the idea to throw the series, from what I have read Gandil was the one with the shady contacts who could pull it off. He needed Cicotte and Williams to be on board for the plan to have any chance of succeeding. The theory given here that the Sox were split into two distinct cliques of players who did not get along, with the 'rougher' element harbouring resentment towards the more genteel players and the owner might not have been unusual among ballclubs at the time. There may even have been a feeling that if they got caught, at least they would take down Collins, Schalk and Weaver with them...
You guys left out that basically Eddie was supposed to pitch three more games and comiskey sat him for those games he was supposed to pitch so he had a chance to have his 30 wins and he didn't get it because directly of comiskey so comiskey screwed him of the bonus.
The White Sox, to me, are the worst MLB franchise in it's history The fact Chicago has two teams with only a total of 6 WS in over 100 years is crazy and the Sox haven't been contenders for most of that time unlike the Cubs
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
46:16 In the book Eight Men Out, Elliot Asinov explains why Comiskey's players hated him and provides several examples of his cheapness and callousness toward them. He paid them less than any other team and they were the class of baseball, for example. They go beyond being "an astute businessman." This documentary impugns Asinov's narrative. Why? Because Comiskey supported a black hospital and a black military unit? That is all fine, and maybe Comiskey wasn't such a bad guy, but the fact remains that his players hated him and that is a key reason why they were motivated to do what they did.
The Woke who supported this video couldn’t resist throwing that in at the end.
@@rstefanie2622 Educated yourself before you say stupid things on the internet! Saying that a rich white man supported black American ventures with absolutely no details on how he supported such ventures. Is a tactic of the right wing conservatives not the “woke” left as you losers call them! The right conservative wing of both parties are the only group of people in American history who try their best to lie, obfuscate and rewrite history! Especially the history of racist white people and white organizations! White people will go as far as to say that the kkk isn’t racist because they gave money to an orphanage with black kids in it!
I'm supposed to feel sorry for a millionaire owner. they were all crooked and screwed over the players any chance they got. he deserves his sullied reputation.
I also read they were called the Black Sox before they threw the Series because they had some boycott or issue with Comiskey, or he wouldn't wash the socks or something like that. This documentary uses information from the grand jury most don't.
The players were pissed off about their working conditions at a time when Labor vs Management conflicts was asAmerican as Spy vs Spy. The Scandal ruined my Great Uncles chance at the White Sox from the Minors when Chicago was his home town.
I'm 56 and first-generation American born to Eastern European immigrants. They didn't know about the sport as I was growing up, so I never played little league baseball. At age 13, I started watching my hometown team.....the Padres in my parents' room on a 13-inch television. I became enamored with the sport and eventually went to the library to read the history and became even more of a fan. I'm that dude that watches every pitch at home or at the ballpark. It's such a great game. I knew of the Black Sox scandal, but it really hit home with me when I saw Eight Men Out in 1988.
This documentary is very well done, and I'm glad to have seen it.
Even though my team got beat by the rival Dodgers, I still watched the rest of the playoffs. Baseball is a great sport. I got my son into Little League at age 5, and volunteer coached with him for 7 years. We went to the Cooperstown 12U tournament this past summer, and we toured the HOF, where I was in baseball heaven for 3 hours.
Much love much respect
👀🌟🌟💯💯💯💯💯🌟👀👀👀🌟💯🛵🛵🛵🏍️🛵🚀🚀🚀😵🥁🥁🥁🥁
💯💯💯💯💯💯🛻🛻🧨🧨💥💥💥🛑🛑🚨🚨🤡🥁🥁🥁🧨👀👀👀🌟💯💯
Go Pads!
I think Field of Dreams references this inncident too....Hello from the UK by the way.
Shoeless Joe Jackson's house looks so modest & endearing! But I never would've thought the saying *"Say it ain't so, Joe"* came from this.
It’s a cool story. But it is most likely completely made up. I don’t want to spoil it for you. But it’s most likely a made up quote from a newspaper writer.
@@jpmnky because you said so... okay
My grandmother was born in 1919 and just passed, by that perspective it really wasn't that long ago
105 years is still a long time ago
@michaelleroy9281 it really is but it's not but then again it is😅
Gambling is a problem then when it’s illegal, gambling or we call it now as Sports Betting is still a problem now that it’s legalized in almost all 50 states.
If Joe Jackson really believed he was innocent because a jury said so, maybe we should call him clueless Joe Jackson. I think the commissioner had it right: banned for life.
Ty Cobb iin his Autobiography written with Al Stump published in 1961 said” Joe Jackson had the most natural swing” Cobb said “ Mine had to be manufactured over many years” But not Joes. “ Jackson was illiterate he felt Joe Jackson didn’t know what was going on despite evidence to the contrary. One night after leaving the Masters golf tournament in Augusta ,Georgia Ty Cobb stopped at a liquor store in Greenville??South Carolina where Joe Jackson worked. Upon seeing Joe Cobb said” you old so and so don’t you recognize me?” Ty then told everyone in the store what a great ball player Joe had been. Cobb added old Joe who seemed pleased with my remarks died not long after”.
Years after the Black Sox scandal, a player who once played against Jackson said "you can blindfold me, and I can tell you when Joe Jackson hit the ball. It had a special crack." Can only imagine the sound of a baseball coming off Black Betsy.
Gambling has ruined sports.
Good documentary and liked the follow up with more current instances.
I don't think baseball was as "pure" as they're saying. I mean not even by fan standards of that era.
There were many reports of games being bet on and players taking money, before and after the Sox threw the Series.
@@slundgrThe sudden retirements of Tris Speaker & Ty Cobb are an example.
Professional sports always was and still is corrupt. When ever big money is involved corruption follows. It'll never end as longer as the suckers keep buying the tickets.
Nope, never was. Watch Ken Burns baseball documentary
@@GeorgeD1965 I have that whole set on DVD. Just a great history lesson.
This is a fantastic episode! Big time props to whoever put this together. Very nicely done. More of this please!!! Let’s get some cool ideas like the first Wrigley Field night game, Billy goat curse, Sox/Cubs biggest rivalry moments etc…
Anything to take the focus off the Bears.
watch Ken Burns baseball documentary
They sold their souls for the dollars
The culture of sports has had a gambling issue for literally over a century.
Remember folks, don't ever cheat to lose the World Series but if you cheat to win one, you're A-OK.
Who cheated to win one?
@@arthurmorgan7086 Houston Astros
@@typicaledc how?
I LOVE these documentaries! The narrator's voice is AWESOME and it makes these documentaries even better.
Really don't like that voice, sounds like he's selling fake-leather furniture.
Who is the narrator?
@@gino82marroneAnthony Fleming III
Great video and very informative. Sorry to hear what happened to the passengers and pilots.
SAD IT CAME TO THAT, FEELING THEY WERE SO UNDERPAID, AS THEY WERE, OWNERS ARE NOTORIUS FOR SCREWING THEIR PLAYERS, ALL ABOUT THE PROFIT, GREED RUINS EVEYTHING!!!
The NFL has had a history of rather close connection with organized gambling. Read the book "Interference". It is chilling. In the 1880's and 90's the term "Hipidroming" was a commonly used to describe ball games that were clearly being thrown.
I think you mean MLB
@@paulhelman2376 the nfl didn’t start until 1920
Read Larceny Games. NFL has a long history with gambling and unsavory characters.
@@slundgrNow it has reached an apex which could get them close to being shut down to be cleaned up by the government
@@Hardball247 I don't see that happening. Too much money at stake. Who in the government would shut them down? Gambling is legal in many states? Trump has bigger fish to fry.
Rick, Giants fan here going back to 1970. I loved your post. Warm thoughts to you and your family.
Also do a show on the 2017 Cheatin' Houston Astros.
It's a tragedy that the players felt the need to fix the series for money. However, the owners and above also contributed to this shame by finding ways to cheat the players by not honoring contracts and blacklisting them if they leave for another team.
The real shame is that there is always some big money jew out there who is more than happy to bankroll anything no matter how evil and rotten it may be, just as long as it makes him richer. Rothstein, Madoff, Soros, Goldman Sachs, BlackRock etc etc etc
Asa diehard White Sox fan the year of 2024 was the worst not just in their season but in all of MLB. My grandfather saw this scandal first hand when he found out it was his heroes Jackson and the rest he turned his back on all sports never followed baseball football or any of it he was done with it bitter and angry
Die hard here too brother. Sad story but, it was a great documentary. They did a good job on this.
Gene Carney, founder of the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) Black Sox Scandal Research Committee, wrote that "Baseball was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property;" and with the 10-Day Clause a player who was injured on opening day, and was out for the season, would only be paid for 10 days.
I've known about this for years and have seen the movie 8 Men Out, but I definitely enjoyed this excellent little documentary from a more modern perspective with recent occurrences of sports gambling and fixing. Very informative.
Gambling today is still ruining each sport even worse with betting allowed on every facet of the game
Good doc. One thing I didn't appreciate were the sycophants coming to the defense of Comiskey near the end of the program, who, iirc, wouldn't even have his players' uniforms washed back in the 19th century. That ending with the slop about supporting Black American troops and hospitals - yeah, well, I'm sure he wasn't the only one. Bezos "does philanthropy" too, while simultaneously not letting his employees go to the bathroom.
It is stated in this documentary that Shoeless Joe hit .375 "but the big hits he was known for never came...too many times he and the team did not look right". Joe hit .353 with runners on compared to the .214 he hit in the 1917 World Series. Comiskey testified that "Joe played good ball...(there) was nothing suspicious about his performance." Ray Schalk said, "Joe hit as hard as he did during the season or even a little better." Sox outfielder Eddie Murphy also praised his performance in the 1919 World Series describing his hitting as "wonderful. He was robbed of a number of hits by sensational fielding, but even so he came through with many a timely clout." Chicago Daily News baseball writer Oscar Reichow reported "Jackson certainly demonstrated that a World's Series makes little difference to him. He played up to his standard." Joe scored 5 runs and drove in 6 on a team that only scored 20 the whole Series. He went 5-for-7 in Games 2 and 3 against what was considered to be the best pitching staff in the National League--a feat unmatched or bettered in a World Series (min 5 at bats) by such greats as Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Eddie Collins, Rogers Hornsby, Tris Speaker, Lou Gehrig, Joe Dimaggio, Mel Ott, Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, Hank Aaron and many more. Babe Ruth did it but it took him 35 games to accomplish this rare and remarkable feat. It took Shoeless Joe just 9.
Jackson said he took the money from Lefty Williams after being told "it was for the use of his name". When deposed for Joe's 1924 civil trial the pitcher admitted Jackson never gave him permission to use his name. Shoeless Joe's detractors have been skeptical of his claim that he tried to show Comiskey the money and had the owner's office door slammed in his face. However, during the civil trial Comiskey admitted Joe came to his office the day after the Series ended, waited an hour and the owner did not see him. Letters were presented in evidence indicating Joe offered, a mere month after the World Series ended, to return to Chicago to tell what he knew. Comiskey brushed him off. Joe went to the Sox office when the scandal broke, I believe, to try to clear his name as he had attempted to do 9 months before. I also believe that he panicked after being told by grand jury Judge McDonald, during a phone call arranged by White Sox and Comiskey attorney Alfred Austrian, that he did not believe him when the ballplayer protested his innocence. Joe testified during the 1921 Black Sox criminal trial that Austrian told him that he was going to be indicted and that they were primarily interested in ridding the game of gamblers. If he confessed, Joe was told, he would only be used as a witness and would not be prosecuted. False confession expert Saul Kassin has written that "innocent people, if desperate enough, would confess if they thought they would escape punishment." Like others who have made a false confession, Joe said, "all I wanted was to tell my story and get out": Austrian, I believe, had to convince Jackson that he must not implicate Comiskey in the cover-up if he wanted them to help him stay out of jail. During the 1924 civil trial Joe said he told the grand jury in September of 1920 that he was "ashamed" of himself because Austrian "suggested" he so testify, evidence he was coached by the attorney. Austrian and Comiskey were concerned that Joe might expose the cover-up giving the owner's mortal enemy, AL President Ban Johnson, the ammunition he could use to destroy the owner.
It is stated in the documentary that it is not true that Comiskey was a "tightwad" and that "to be an astute businessperson...doesn't mean you can't be a good generous human". However, the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) publication SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE and their Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletters contain several quotes that indicate the players did perceive the owner to be a Scrooge. Happy Felsh is described as leaving the team at one point "because of disputes with Comiskey over pay", and the outfielder "expressed great contempt for the penny-pinching Comiskey". Sox pitcher Win Noyes described the owner as "a skinflint...who should have been banned from baseball" and not Joe Jackson. Swede Risberg complained of the "starvation wages" they were paid and Eddie Murphy "believed that Comiskey underpaid his players and was rotten to them in other ways." The grandson of another Sox pitcher, Lefty Sullivan, said his grandfather thought that "whatever happened to Comiskey, Comiskey deserved"' and that he felt "pure hate" for the owner. Chick Gandil described Comiskey as "a sarcastic, belittling man who was the tightest owner in baseball. If a player objected to his miserly terms he was told 'You can take it or leave it', under baseball's slave laws what could a fellow do but take it?...There was a common bond among most of us--our dislike of Comiskey". Infielder Fred McMullin said during the first meeting of the crooked players that they were not being paid "a devil of a lot of money". The judge at the Black Sox criminal trial expressed amazement that 5-year veteran Lefty Williams, who had won 13 games in his rookie year, 17 in '17 and 23 in '19 was only paid $2500 in 1919. Manager Kid Gleason is reported to have sat out the 1918 season in a salary dispute with Comiskey and the White Sox players threatened to strike during the 1919 season if the owner did not renegotiate their contracts, which Comiskey refused to do. James Nitz writes in SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE that "the club was torn with dissension over wage disparities" and that Felsh, Jackson and Gandil "were rightly upset that their three salaries combined were less than the $15,000 made by college-educated Eddie Collins". Gene Carney, founder of the Black Sox Research Committee wrote, "Comiskey was probably not exceptionally tight...Every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations." Baseball "was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property". It may have been against that unfortunate reality that the White Sox players were rebelling.
The Jacksons deposited the bribe money in the bank in December of 1919. Joe had tried to show the money to Comiskey in October and had offered to return to Chicago to tell what he knew in November. Because he received no response to his letter, I believe, Joe decided he may as well bank it. Joe testified that "he (Williams) did not want the damn stuff and since that lousy so-called gambling outfit had used my name, I might as well have their money as (Lefty)." Jackson also testified that he asked Sox secretary Harry Grabiner what he should do with the money and was told "as long as that bunch of bums used your name, you did the only sensible thing in keeping it". Joe might have thought he could put the dirty money to good use by paying his sister's medical bills. Was it a mistake to put the bribe money in the bank and make withdrawals for whatever reason? Yes, but in the context described, an understandable one and one for which the punishment, banishment from baseball for life and exclusion from the Baseball Hall of Fame, does not fit the crime.
What a great comment. I’ll buy your book😂❤
Please. Elaborate.
@@BringingTheHeat-VBC
☝️😆👍
Thank you!@@BringingTheHeat-VBC
You guys reach more than stretch Armstrong to try and lie for shoeless Joe Jackson! A man who admitted to taking the money, after conspiring with teammates on the train just like Eddie cicotte, and lefty Willian’s! Shoeless Joe admitted multiple times to being involved! But the movie and the book try to skirt these facts so he can make Cooperstown! It’s weird how white people are obsessed with this but hate on Colin kaepernick who actually had an entire football league collude to keep him out the nfl! Don’t yall see how hypocritical yall can be!
After the White Sox blew the 1919Series, it took 40 years before the team returned to the Fall Classic. After rhat six-game loss to the Dodgers, it took another 46 years before the Sox played Houston and swept the Astros for the title.
It makes you wonder how many times teams have actually gotten away with this in any sport, and we'll never know
"But the thing about betrayal is that it never comes from your enemies"-Lawkeeper Equity Mlp Ace Attorney EOJ
I don't like baseball, never played it as a kid and I don't want watch it which is a little isolating yet I am here watching a documentary because I find it fascinating just how much baseball meant for generations. I just wish I was part of it.
Game 1 reminds me of this year NY vs. LA
The 5th inning was a dive. You can’t tell me otherwise
Got to remember that the owners OWNED the baseball players - free agency wasn’t a thing until the 1970s. There wasn’t any arbitration, nor paying what the player was worth - so Comiskey, even charged them for washing their uniforms.
30:41 what'd you get that pin for comrade?
I have always wondered why the Reds get credit for winning the WS. And while I’m at it, that goes for the Astros.
Owner cheated the players out of livable wages and crooks cheated players out of promised riches.
In a nutshell, yes. I only wish Rothstein would have been held accountable and Comiskey.
21:12 "It was then biggest pitch of Eddie Cicotte's life"...and it was a called strike. Cicotte hit Rath with his SECOND pitch
Fascinating episode!
Best documentary ever on the Black Sox.
They were white not black- In fact EVERYONE involved was
Thisbus a really good documentary id love to see more baseball dox from yall
24:48 1919 White Sox forget how to play baseball
2024 White Sox: hold my beer
It's an utter shame that as great as shoeless Joe Jackson was. He'll never be in Cooperstown. Where he belongs.
So true
He took the money. He does not belong there.
He does not belong there…
@@slundgr He took the money from Lefty Williams and then took it to show Comiskey and had the door slammed in his face. Comiskey admitted in his testimony during the 1924 civil trial that Joe came to his office the day after the World Series ended, waited an hour and the Sox owner did not see him. Letters were presented in evidence indicating that Joe offered to return to Chicago the month after the Series ended to tell what he knew and Comiskey brushed him off.
😠👉 GUILTY! 👈😠
trying to justify decisions or even rely on their "history" is unreliable at best. lack of education really hurt some of those players.
They should have a wingin Cooperstown devoted to cheating. In 1908 a third base coach found a buzzer buried in the coaching area in the Cincinnati ball park.
How about the Giants and Bobby Thomson's "shot heard 'round the world?"
As a lifetime baseball fan, the history of the Black Sox affects me more than any other episode in the sports history. Just the waste of these young, talented men's lives is a tragedy.
There were no black players nor black management personnel On this teamteam. In addition the team was owned by whites
Lets hear some in-depth discussion on Comisky and his disrespect towards players. Not condoning their actions but Comisky was not just a businessman but a cheap arse.
The Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) publication SCANDAL ON THE SOUTHSIDE and their Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletters contain several quotes indicating what a Scrooge the players thought Comiskey was. Happy Felsch is described as leaving the team at one point "because of disputes with Comiskey over pay", and the outfielder "expressed great contempt for the penny-pinching Comiskey". Sox pitcher Win Noyes described the owner as "a skinflint...who should have been banned from baseball" and not Joe Jackson. Swede Risberg complained of the "starvation wages" they were paid and outfielder Eddie Murphy "believed that Comiskey underpaid his players and was rotten to them in other ways." The grandson of another Sox pitcher, Lefty Sullivan, said his grandfather thought that "whatever happened to Comiskey, Comiskey deserved" and that he felt "pure hate" for the owner. Chick Gandil described the Old Roman as "a sarcastic, belittling man who was the tightest owner in baseball. If a player objected to his miserly terms he was told 'You can take it or leave it', under baseball's slave laws what could a fellow do but take it?...There was a common bond among most of us--our dislike of Comiskey". The judge at the Black Sox criminal trial in 1921 expressed amazement that 5-year veteran Lefty Williams, who had won 13 games in his rookie year, 17 in '17 and 23 in '19 was only paid $2500 in 1919. Manager Kid Gleason is reported to have sat out the 1918 season in a salary dispute with the owner and the White Sox players threatened to strike in 1919 if Comiskey did not renegotiate their contracts which, of course, the Old Roman refused to do. James Nitz writes, "the club was torn with dissension over wage disparities" and that Felsch, Jackson and Gandil "were rightly upset that their three salaries combined were less than the $15,000 made by college-educated Eddie Collins". Gene Carney, founder of the Black Sox Scandal Research Committee wrote, "every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations." Baseball "was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property." I believe it was against that unfortunate reality that the White Sox players were rebelling.
Let's talk about Rothstein screwing them over. Documentary keeps downing the players for only getting g a little while another guy hustled everyone and walked away free and continued with that money and influence in other areas including our government. How many did he do it to there?
White Sox had the leagues highest payroll in 1919.
The 1919 World Series was the first series that standardized to best out of 7 - other series before were 5-9 games depending on the commissioner
And, this is why Pete Rose was banned and not in the HOF.
I Love History Good Documentary Awesome Narrator
Could you imagine if the sox would have won? How many good players would would have came to Chicago to play for them in the years following?
Thank God for Curt Flood, who challenged the Reserve Clause in late 60s. This eventually changed the sport dramatically and gave ballplayers the ability to bargain for what they were really worth. This was the root cause of the Black Sox scandal - a one-sided labor situation that was really nothing more than indentured slavery. Give them decent wages and this doesn't occur. While mentioned in the video, much more time should have been spent on this aspect of the issue to provide a more balanced view.
Just something to add: the Reds were actually a pretty good team. They had pitching, pitching, and more pitching. Five quality starters. One of them was Hod Eller, who had a no-hitter to his name, and nearly pitched an emaculate inning. He was the master of the shine ball (applying stuff to the ball before he pitched it), so you could call him a spitballer (Urban Shocker of the Yankees was another).
Anyways, another point is that the clean Sox didn't exactly play well either. Their pitching? Other than Kerr's effort in game three, it wasn't any good. Kerr gave up 11 hits and 4 runs in game 6, and he ran the team out of an inning when he tried to advance to second on a SF. A reliever, Roy Wilkinson, gave up 9 hits in only 7.1 IP. Another reliever (Bill James) gave up 8 hits in only 4.2 innings. James relieved Williams in game eight, and allowed three walks and a hit batter for good measure. Lefty Williams had told Joe Jackson that he was "going out to win the game" prior to the eighth contest. Why would he say that if you are going to throw the tilt?
Eddie and Shano Collins didn't get hot until game 7, and it was against Slim Sallee, who was the weakest of the Reds' starting pitchers. (In game two, Chicago got 10 hits off Sallee, plus the White Sox had faced him a few times two years earlier in the 1917 Fall Classic.) Shano was hitting so poorly that Kid Gleason benched him for game eight. Nemo Leibold didn't get a hit until the first inning of the aforementioned contest, then stranded three basesrunners in a do-or-die game.
Eddie Collins was know as a clutch player, having hit .400 in three Fall Classics. Here, in 1919, he hit .226 (and even committed two errors). One RBI. By comparison, the ringleader of the fix was Chick Gandil, who had five, including the winning ones in games 3 and 6. He also drove in the lone Chicago tally in game one (and the run was scored by none other than Shoeless Joe), which was thrown. Joe Jackson had five RBIs himself. So if they are "failing" in the clutch (and only one Cincinnati player had more RBIs than Jackson, Pat Duncan with eight), then so was everybody else on both teams. Little known fact is Jackson also reached base three times on an error plus he drew a walk, so he reached base 16 times in eight games. He wasn't trying? Sure could have fooled me. Only one Red player, Ivey Wingo (who hit an amazing .571) topped him in batting average among those who qualify for the lead. Wingo had an awesome four hits and three walks, including a perfect day at the plate against Cicotte in game seven (even though Eddie was trying his best).
I think more credit needs to be given to the Reds. After routing Sallee for the second time in game seven, Dolph Luque, an excellent pitcher for the Reds, blanked the White Sox on one hit the rest of the way. He and Ray Fisher (who lost a tough 3-0 decision to Kerr in the third contest) totally stopped 'em. Seems to me, Chicago struggled against certain pitchers like Fisher, Luque, plus Jimmy Ring (2-0 shutout in game four, the only hits by Chicago were by Jackson, Felsch and Gandil, ironically) and had no problem with others like Sallee and Dutch Ruether (although Dutch was an awesome hitter).
So you're saying that a team that made it to the World Series was actually "pretty good"? Wow thanks for that insight!
@Paul-ew5st Cards of 2006 won 83 games.
@@scottmorissey8915 Brilliant I'm learning so much bravo noble fact provider
@@Paul-ew5st Well, I'm giving the Reds some credit. Most people say they suck and were far inferior to the White Sox. Apparently, so do a few people in this documentary. Just trying to give the Reds a bit of credit.
Nothing noble about what I'm doing. I think the people who make documentaries and write books (about baseball) are the real heros out there. What do you think? Could a guy like me write a book or two about baseball? Granted it might take time.
MLB has had its share of scandals over the years. Don't forget Denny McLain and his issues. Then there is the cocaine busts and trials of the players in the eighties. How wide spread is the fentanyl/opioid use in MLB? I don't think Tyler Skaggs was the only player. A couple of his teammates also got suspended for their part in the scandal. He just died from it. I think there is more to the Ohtani gambling story than we are being told, also.
Big money ruins everything .. sports have become just entertainment. The line is gone.
I am the only one that noticed Eddie Cicotte had a fresh fade in 1918 😳😳😳
They had barber shops back then to 😂😂😂
Great documentary
There is nothing more satisfying to the pleasure of team sports when you are a member of a top team, a team of villains, or trash talkers, or tough guys, thick as thieves, and unmatched genuine loyalty to each other, but hated by all other teams and fans. It’s like being in the mob. I remember even our fans were hated for the crime of supporting their kin. But towards the end of the season, they grew into their role, and appreciated the pleasure of being the bad guy who wins.
Such a sad story.
40:10 Huh? How was it impossible to show that the players had the intent to defraud? What other intent could they possibly have had? Their contracts obligated them to play to their best ability - they did the opposite. The World Series spectators paid to see fair ballgames - the BlackSox gave them fixed ballgames. It's obvious from the testimony ("We took money to play poorly") that their intent was to defraud.
Awesome ! TY!
It is the most difficult of sentiments for me to deal with, my love of baseball and football. I had success as a youth, slightly more in baseball than football. Baseball from an external view may be more romantic than football. But from the inside, I’d trade my baseball state title for a loss in the football state tournament, which we missed getting into by one win. My allegiance was stronger to the football fans, and my teammates who gave it all on Friday nights. My sentiments of regret, though seemingly silly to most, for letting down the football fans far outweighs the pleasure of gifting a championship to the baseball fans. Like many competitive athletes, I never get over a loss, this releases me from the feigned satisfaction of closure and letting go.
So if a group of excellent ball players who were always honest and played within the rules just threw the most important 8 games of their life because they just felt like it?? Wrong. It's because the owner Mr. Comiskey was cheap and didn't care about if his players were paid a fare wage and kept lining his pockets off the backs of his players blood sweat and tears. BS. Reinstate Shoeless Joe!!!!
@Rockn614 This was by no means the first episode of game-fixing in baseball, and the eagerness of some White Sox players to put this deal over shows they were already inured to the practice. It had been going on for years, and one of the leading figures in the corruption was itinerant first baseman Hal Chase. Nobody forced or seduced these guys into throwing the Series. Comiskey being what he was is beside the point. A sizeable contingent of his players were crooked.
I was just a kid back then, the batboy for the White Sox during that infamous 1919 season. Imagine this: a scrawny kid like me, wide-eyed and starstruck, running around the dugout while legends like Shoeless Joe Jackson were swinging lumber. I didn’t know much about the whispers floating around-hell, I thought “fix” meant something wrong with the bats. But there was a tension, thick enough to cut with a knife.
I remember one game vividly. Joe hit a ball so clean it sounded like a gunshot, and I ran to grab his bat when he got back to the dugout. He looked at me, those tired eyes of his, and said, “Kid, never stop playing this game for the love of it.” I didn’t know what he meant then, but looking back, I wonder if he was trying to hold onto something pure in the middle of all that dirt.
The day it all blew up, the clubhouse felt like a funeral. Grown men sat silent, heads down, and I just kept fetching bats, trying to stay invisible. I didn’t fully understand what was happening, but I knew one thing for sure: the game I loved had just been cracked wide open. And me, I drowned my sadness in Hires Root Beer and endless boxes of Crackerjack. It’s how I developed childhood diabetes.
If Comiskey would've paid his players better, and treated them with more respect, the Scandal probably would've never happened.
Comiskey was a penny pinching cheapskate.
The White Sox were one of the highest paid teams in baseball though.
👏👏thank you!!!!!🤘😜
Today I learned that “Shoeless” Joe Ohtani hated his nicknames!
One thing I was unaware of, Cincinnati had a vastly better record. They were 8 games better on the year yet the White Sox were a significant favorite.
It did not make a difference for the White Sox The Reds had a better team all around ...... Comisky was a cheap bastard anyway And deserves what happened....
Nope
@@daniellinehan63
Yep.
I'm going to read the wiki page for more details- but one question- is it illegal to take money and play poor baseball? Think about it. Is there a law against that? The doc sez, "conspiracy to committ fraud" as the charge. Isn't that kinda vague?
Nobody didn't mention of Buck wilber as they did in the movie saying he didn't take as by money didn't make one error he hit 320 in the series
I never knew that the WS was 'Best of 9' and it took 5 wins to get the series..!! Anyway, only the Owners are allowed to fixx games, never the Players.... So, they got a raise... of course.
So the ring leader (Arnold Rothstein) got away with it? What a piece of 💩
When yer the head boss of a J ewish mob
You get away with A TON
Rose & Jackson to the Hall!
@@MrLee23 It’ll never happen but I agree they should both be there!
I agree
"29 ain't 30, Eddie" - Charles Commiskey
What I remember hearing is that he was removed from the rotation so he couldn't win 30
@howardlervik4983 missed 7 games. He was good for at least one win
"We hold baseball pure" ~ because we loved playing it from +/- 5 years old upward... we watched our older brothers, friends or neighbors playing better baseball and we grew... and became decent players.
😮😮😮
I stopped playing in 1971 at age 14 ... as a fan of the 1960s Harmon Killebrew Twins, and the early Colorado Rockies of the 90s... this is the first video I've watched regarding the Sox. How they got busted was eye-opening.
😮😮
Dog fighting, abuse, gambling,steroids, they come close. No excuse
Ruth’s number should be retired across MLB. He truly saved baseball.
Kennesaw Landis looked like Ernest. Just need him to say 'Hey Verne'
There is a saying that you can’t judge a man if you haven’t been in his shoes, unfortunately, he was shoeless Jackson
Look where we are now. Legalized gambling in all of professional sports. This was 105 years ago
Id love to see some serious investigations of the NFL referee's.
No RED'S fan likes to acknowledge that 1919 banner, it's as if it was "Handed to us"
Now guys are making millions of dollars a year.
eight men out good movie
'Say it ain't so, Joe, say it ain't so.'
I've heard that members of the Cincinnati Reds resented the Black Sox story. Reds players felt they had a better team, and that's why they won.
Awesome documentary! I sympathize with the players! They were basically slaves
They made between $5000 and $15000 a year in 1919 please spare us the nonsense.
@ Only problem they had was they got caught
@@russellpayne070 That was their legit baseball pay not the bribe to throw the series
@@Paul-ew5st Compared to other inferior teams their pay was the lowest! That was the gripe they had with Comisky! I haven’t read the book about it so I’m totally going off of the movie and documentaries
@@russellpayne070 Sox had the highest payroll in the league in 1919. Find better sources of information.
Never forget the Black Sox Scandal of 1919. But, Babe Ruth saves MLB while playing for the Yankees in the 1920's.
Can someone say Houston?
This is cool history and so sad
Always felt bad for Buck Weaver no eras and led the team in hitting for the series but was banned for life because he was approached and said no. He deserves better
Shoeless Joe led the team batting .375. Buck hit .324
@ I stand corrected you are right
@ buck didn’t take a dime of the money he just knew about it. He fought to be reinstated right up to a week before he passed.
he didn't lead the team in hitting tho - jackson did!!!
@@paulcarey191 yes I was wrong but he was the only one who did not take a dime
That's bull crap sign-stealing and football or baseball is crap it's so easy to go around signaling to your players on what the play is ,it is just an excuse why you lost😅😅😅😅😅😅😅
Professional sports are basically reality shows.
Bill Veeck found the 1918 salary ledger for the White Sox in 1959 and published the details.`Basically only Joe Jackson and Lefty Williams were underpaid compared to their peers. Eddie Collins was the highest paid second baseman in the game, Ray Schalk was the highest paid catcher and Buck Weaver was the highest paid 3rd baseman. Everyone else apart from Jackson and Williams were fairly compensated, the idea that Comiskey was cheap, at least in regard to salaries, is totally wrong.
Paul Browne wrote in a SABR Black Sox Scandal Research Committee newsletter that there is "a convincing argument that the White Sox of 1919 were not underpaid in comparison to other players around the American League. But that doesn't necessarily mean that they did not FEEL underpaid." Tim Hornbaker writes in his Shoeless Joe biography the salaries of ballplayers were "rarely given out by people in the know, seldom confirmed and hardly ever correct." The salaries were often "overinflated". Comiskey told the press he was paying Jackson $10,000 per year when the ballplayer was actually paid $6000. So, it is possible the White Sox perceived themselves to be underpaid because they apparently did not know what other players were making and may well have believed the reported inflated salaries.
Gene Carney, the founder of the SABR Black Sox Research Committee, wrote, "Comiskey was probably not exceptionally tight. Every owner wielded the reserve clause as the ultimate closer in contract negotiations...Baseball was a legal monopoly, a business in which players were in fact slaves...They were property."
Perhaps it was against this unfortunate reality that the players were rebelling. David Fleitz asserts in his Joe bio, "Comiskey was not a monster. He was a typical purveyor of the business ethics of the era. He made as much money for himself as he could and spent as little of it on his employees as he could possibly get away with spending". According to Hornbaker, "Across the major leagues a wider and wider divide grew between players and the owners...Comiskey was going to wear the same badge his fellow owners wore: being labeled a penny-pincher and cheap...owners were tagged as being greedy and Comiskey was lumped into the pile." Hornbaker also states that "the divide between club management and the players...wasn't limited to any one league city." Management was criticized "as being tightfisted and obsessively greedy...The sentiment of major leaguers with regard to the supposed greed of club owners was one of the most common threads across the sport. Those who bought into the idea felt magnates were in a place to rack up incredible sums of money off their hard work, and believed they continuously received the short end of the stick during salary negotiations. 'Leave it to the big bosses to cop all the dough" an unnamed member of the Sox told a reporter,,,.(Comiskey) like other big league moguls, (was) perceived for their insatiability of wealth."
The players throughout the major leagues threatened to strike after the 1916 season when the owners "wanted to rework contracts to ensure the 10-Day clause was an available option as well as strengthening the reserve clause." The Federal League, which went out of business in 1915 had given the players a taste of what they could earn on an open market as free agents were it not for the reserve clause.
@@alanthurston2369 It may well be that the White Sox were uniquely malleable for the purposes of the perpetrators of the fix. Although Cicotte is portrayed here as the instigator of the idea to throw the series, from what I have read Gandil was the one with the shady contacts who could pull it off. He needed Cicotte and Williams to be on board for the plan to have any chance of succeeding. The theory given here that the Sox were split into two distinct cliques of players who did not get along, with the 'rougher' element harbouring resentment towards the more genteel players and the owner might not have been unusual among ballclubs at the time. There may even have been a feeling that if they got caught, at least they would take down Collins, Schalk and Weaver with them...
Where was the Warner Hotel
It's called Draft Kings now
Getting paid to win is the same as getting paid to lose
Bout to say….no way a “Rothstein” would say no to chunk of change
You said it.. original take Jews and Money you could have a career in comedy with that material
This is before the NBA, NFL and more widespread than the regional NHL.
You guys left out that basically Eddie was supposed to pitch three more games and comiskey sat him for those games he was supposed to pitch so he had a chance to have his 30 wins and he didn't get it because directly of comiskey so comiskey screwed him of the bonus.
The White Sox, to me, are the worst MLB franchise in it's history
The fact Chicago has two teams with only a total of 6 WS in over 100 years is crazy and the Sox haven't been contenders for most of that time unlike the Cubs