Friday, July 5, 2013

Suspensions and Dirty Harry

Detroit Titger pitcher Rick Porcello took the mound Friday night against the Cleveland Indians. This comes in the wake of Porcello being suspended by major league baseball for 6 games after the powers that be concluded he had intentionally "hit" an opposing batter a few days ago.

True, nobody but likely Porcello himself knows for sure whether he plunked that batter on purpose or a pitch "just got away from him". Yet in the baseball world an unwritten rule has long applied. You hit one of ours, and we're going to hit one of yours. Sometimes the payback will happen the very next inning, and other times it might fester for weeks or months.  But it always seems to eventually come around. Baseball players have long memories and slights don't go unavenged. This is pretty much universally accepted, even though sometimes a player that had absolutely nothing to do with the original offense has to pay the price by absorbing the pain of a 95 MPH fastball thudding into his body somewhere. It's not fair to that player, but it's always been that way, and sometimes a guy just has to "take one for the team". It goes with the territory. It might fairly be said that trying to figure out who originally started one these family feuds is akin to solving the age-old chicken and the egg question.

Thing is, Porcello, like most other athletes in the world of the Big 4 American professional sports (MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL), has a right to an appeal once the original punishment has been handed down from on high. While such appeals are pending, players are allowed to keep playing. There's a couple different ways of looking at this.

First, the league offices are pretty much a kangaroo court to start with. They hand out punishment without even affording the "accused" the benefit of a trial, where all the evidence could be presented and arguments made both ways. Bang, you're hit, no pun intended. Then again, I think we can safely assume the league takes into account such things as thoroughly reviewing video tapes of the actual incident, as well as pondering any "priors" that may have led to it, before meting out "justice". Basically, they do the best they can with what info they have, and most times they get it right. But not always.

On the other hand, one is left to wonder about the appellate process itself when it comes to professional sports. Oftentimes, when the player/coach appeals his fine/suspension (to the same people that handed it down in the first place -- but that's a story for another day), it will be reduced. In Porcello's case, the 6 game suspension might well become a 3 day suspension. The evidence that led to the original sentence wouldn't have changed one bit. Tapes don't lie.

So why don't the sports execs deal with such matters like they're handled in the real world? An example.....  If a citizen is accused of stealing a car or robbing a bank, and the evidence appears to be overwhelming against him/her, they can plead guilty and receive a certain sentence. Because it saves the prosecution the time and energy that would have been necessary to go through a trial, oftentimes a deal, or plea-bargain is reached, resulting in a more lenient punishment.

However, if that same defendant insists on going to trial and is still found guilty, it's almost a guarantee he/she will get slapped with a much harsher sentence. The stakes, and consequences go up. It really shouldn't make a difference, because after all, the crime hasn't changed -- only the punishment. But right or wrong, we all know that's how the system works.

So again, why shouldn't multi-millionaire professional athletes have to face the same dilemma? If they want to appeal -- go for it. But if they're still found guilty, the penalty should go UP -- not down.

It appears athletes have nothing to lose and everything to gain by appealing fines/suspensions handed down by the league office for whatever infractions they've been deemed guilty of.

To be sure, yours truly is no big fan of power-hungry executives looking to flex their muscles or overzealous prosecutors trying to pad their convinction rate. Lord know, we have way too many of them.

But every once in a while, methinks it would be rather refreshing if an athlete appealed his original punishment, only to be found still guilty, and the sentence went up. In a perfect world, we might hear the following:

"OK, Mr. Porcello. Upon further review, we still find you guilty of the crime. Your argument for lenience has been carefully considered, and rejected. In lieu of what this court considers a frivolous appeal which was totally without merit, your original sentence of a 6 game suspension has now been amended to 12 games. Further, as a condition of your probation, you are also sentenced to 200 hours of community service -- such labors to be alternately performed as a manservant to Judge Judy and Roseanne Barr. This court is adjourned."

Now do just one athlete like that -- and the rest of them would think twice about that whole appeal thing for something they were obviously guilty of in the first place.

High stakes indeed. It's like the immortal line once uttered by Dirty Harry -- "Do you feel lucky, punk?" Or perhaps "make my day".

Either way, it would get their attention.

No comments:

Post a Comment