November 09, 2004
The Great Debate, Day 2
Moderator
Thank you both for those eloquent opening statements, gentlemen. We will now begin the back-and-fourth portion of the debate. Each of you will be given three days in which to lay out your cases in greater detail. These days will alternate, so that one person will speak today, the other will have the opportunity for rebuttal the next day, and so forth. By mutual agreement, Mediocre Fred will have the first opportunity to speak.
Incidentally, I noticed that during your opening statements, both of you made fun of my record in Washington. I assure you and the viewing audience that I can take a joke just as well as the next man, but I would like both of you to direct your attention to my close friend and associate Fat Tony, who is seated in the front row. You will notice that he has brought his brass knuckles with him to the debate. Fat Tony is a close personal friend of mine, and he tends to take criticism of me personally. Very personally. I would suggest you take this under advisement as you craft your further arguments.
Mr. Fred, please proceed.
Mediocre Fred, Speaking for the Senators
Thank you, Mr. McLain. And I would like to assure both you and Fat Tony that when I referred to your tenure with Senators, I meant it with nothing but respect.
I'd like to commend my opponent for his clever and well-crafted opening statement. I particularly enjoyed this passage:
Since baseball started moving teams and expanding, clubs have adopted numerous new names. Most of the time, teams have chosen original names based on local associations or wildlife. But six squads have chosen new names based on previous club names. One, the Kansas City Royals, honored a Negro League team. Four, the Orioles, Padres, Angels, and Marlins, paid tribute to old minor-league teams. All of these teams have gone to the World Series, and all but the Padres have won the Series.Only one team, the Washington Senators, was named after a big-league team. The expansion Senators never won a pennant, sent no players to the Hall of Fame, posted only one winning record in 11 years, and couldn't even draw a million fans that year.
History shows that when we name teams in honor of old Negro League or minor league squads, the new teams become popular winners. When we name teams after defunct major league squads, the new teams become unpopular losers. The baseball gods are clear and just in their judgment of new team names.
Pretty impressive marshaling of statistics, no? He almost had me convinced for a second there.
Then, of course, I took a closer look at that statement, and I realized those numbers were more twisted than a Jack Ryan sex party. As you'll see throughout the course of this debate, my opponent's grasp of statistics is weaker than Marion Barry's grasp of quantum physics. I know that we're supposed to be making our own cases here and not questioning our opponent's, but I simply must ask: Why can't you just be straight with the people of Washington? Are you that careless about the facts, or just so desperate to make your case that you'll twist the numbers until they sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame?"
For instance, my opponent would have you believe that our Senators are the only team ever to adopt the name of a defunct major-league squad. And that simply isn't true.
Perhaps you've heard of the Milwaukee Brewers. Many people think they simply adopted the name of the local minor-league team (although oddly, my opponent didn't even recall this), but in fact, the Milwaukee Brewers were a charter franchise in the American League. They existed in Milwaukee for one season before becoming the St. Louis Browns. And the Brewers have indeed been to a World Series -- the much-beloved club known as Harvey's Wallbangers made the Series in 1982. Did my opponent not know this? Or was he trying to hide it?
That Browns franchise that relocated from Milwaukee relocated famously in 1954 to Baltimore, where they became the Orioles. And the Orioles are the linchpin of my opponent's argument, since they're by far the most successful of the teams who adopted minor-league monikers. But somehow he omitted the fact that the Orioles, too, were a charter American League member, playing two seasons in Baltimore before becoming the New York Highlanders (today's Yankees). Prior to that, the Orioles were in the National League from 1892 to 1899. That Orioles team, piloted by Ned Hanlon and featuring Wee Willie Keeler as its star, was a legend in its time, leading the league in wins three years running, from 1894 to 1896. Talk about a proud pedigree. It's hard to imagine that this could have slipped my opponent's mind. Did it? Or does he have something to hide?
And what about the Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves? What about the Kansas City/Oakland Athletics? What about the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants? These team all adopted names of major-league clubs that, by definition, became defunct when they left their original towns. Could my opponent have forgotten these teams, too? As the Church Lady would say, "How conveeeeenient."
Now that we have the facts, let's have an honest chart comparing teams that adopt major-league monikers and those that adopt minor-league or Negro League names. (The statistically-minded are free to check my math at Baseball Reference.)
(The chart format is as follows: Team name -- WS appearances (WS wins)
BIG LEAGUE
Dodgers -- 9 (5)
Athletics -- 6 (4)
Orioles -- 6 (3)
Braves -- 7 (2)
Giants -- 3 (0)
Brewers -- 1 (0)
Senators -- 0 (0)
Total -- 32 (14)
LITTLE LEAGUE
Marlins -- 2 (2)
Royals -- 2 (1)
Angels -- 1 (1)
Padres -- 2 (0)
Total -- 7 (4)
The picture looks quite different when the facts are viewed honestly, doesn't it? Turns out that the baseball gods are indeed clear and just; they respect tradition, and big-league tradition beats bush-league tradition every time. These are facts, not exaggerations. It's easier to traffic in facts when the facts are on your side, isn't it?
Now, I can't help but wonder why my opponent would go to such lengths to hide the truth. It's true that the weaker your position, the more you have to stretch the truth to defend it. But still, I wouldn't have imagined that his position was so desperate that he'd have to go to these lengths to conceal the facts.
But if I try to point out all the exaggerations and inaccuracies in my opponent's argument, I'll be here all month. (Never mind going after the fact that he admits an infatuation with Lisa Lisa & the Cult Jam and doesn't acknowledge the '80s girl-pop superiority of the Bangles.) Instead, I'd like to move on to the next point in my argument: the import problem.
No, I'm not talking about those low-priced Chinese electronics that are putting our workers out of good factory jobs. I'm talking about the name my opponent is arguing for. When Kansas City chose "Royals" for its team name, they were honoring the legendary Monarchs, a famous and successful team and, most importantly, a team that was local to KC. That's not the case with "Grays."
Did you know that the legendary franchise whose praises my opponent sings so loudly was not called the Washington Grays? No. It was called the Homestead Grays. Ever wonder where that "Homestead" comes from? Perhaps you assumed it was just a splash of color. After all, the Cuban Giants didn't actually play in Cuba, did they?
But no, Homestead is an actual town. It was a steel-mill town right outside of... Pittsburgh. And during the glorious run of championships that my opponent cited, the Grays split time between Griffith Stadium here and Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. And all that time, they retained the "Homestead" name. Here's a pop quiz that should be easy for true Washingtonians to answer: If an politician from Pennsylvania comes to serve in D.C., rents a house in Georgetown, lives there on weekdays when Congress is in session but keeps his Pennsylvania plates, does that makes him a D.C. resident? Of course not. The name for which my opponent argued so eloquently is an out-of-town interloper. Or to use a term familiar to my southern friends, a carpetbagger.
It's not enough that we had to fight for home rule. It's not enough that we had to fight to vote for president. It's not bad enough that we still don't have voting representatives in Congress. Now we have outsiders -- well-meaning outsiders, but outsiders nonetheless -- attempting to foist someone else's name on us. We've had enough of meddling control boards and corn-belt Congressmen calling our shots. Are we going to stand back and let another interloper invade our city?
The Washington I know rejects that. The Washington I know is sick and tired of outsiders seizing all the power. The Washington I know stands four-square behind its own history, loud and proud. The Washington I know doesn't need to import Pittsburgh's name.
Senators is the only candidate in this race that is Washington-born and Washington-bred. Senators is the name that is uniquely identified with Washington in major-league baseball's history. And Senators is the name that the people of Washington have overwhelmingly, and repeatedly, preferred for their baseball team.
So will we stand up and fight for the name that we've always loved, the name that's truly ours, the name that is the people's choice? Or will we stand by and let a bunch of out-of-towners give us Pittsburgh's second-hand name? I know and trust that my fellow baseball citizens will make the right choice.
Thank you.
Posted by Fred at November 9, 2004 12:34 AM