Crying racism...

I'm thinking that if they plugged the "he's just a dumb latino, he couldn't possibly have known the bat was corked" line, that would have worked better....and I agree, the argument is completely off-kilter.

I have no clue what is the difference between the corked and uncorked bats (baseball is not popular in my country), but I think that any claims about discrimination of non-Whites (well, Hispanics are Whites, by the way; as far as I know, there is no sufficient Black or Asian population in Spain or Mexico) in sports sound ridiculous; majority of the outstanding athletes in the USA are Black. And if some of them permit themselves unfair play, public has right to know this.

Gee, is George Brett suddenly Latin? How about all the other guys who corked their bats and were caught? They were caught up in the same sort of media circus. Sorry Jose and Pedro, but I ain't buyin' it.

PS Saw this in the paper today - an editorial from Spaceman Bill Lee of all people. He said the corked bat was there because Sammy had wanted to put on a batting practice show before the game (this is established). What Lee added, and I agree with is, what the hell is Sosa doing putting on a show outside of the game??? Isn't the game supposed to be enough of a show? What's wrong with this picture?

Slappy, I totally agree. If you're in the spotlight, yo have to asume it, and not to hide in stereotypicial victimist reactions.

steissd,
I'm afraid you don't have it that right in your racial calculations.
Hispanic population in the US is made mostly of Mexicans, Cubans and Portoricans, with assorted additions from every Spanish speaking country, the Salvadoreans growing the fastest.
Americans have a thing with race. They just have to classify you somewhere, and the Hispanic population is multiracial, so they classify them by the last name, whether they are blond or black.

We don't have racial classification in Mexico, but about 15% of the population is considered to be "white"; 75% is considered "mestizo", a mixture of white and native Mesoamerican; 10% is considered "indian": pure Mesoamerican. You see all shades. And -except for the non-Spanish speaking indians, who are discriminated against by many- we don't care. We just don't notice.
In Cuba and Puerto Rico, instead, the shades are between black and white. I don't know about P.R., but in Cuba -according to their unofficial measurements- about 60% of the population is white, 25% is mulatto and 15% is black. (The measurement of "blackness" in Cuba is opposite to the one in the US: while Wesley Snipes would be considered black, Hale Berry would certainly be a mulatto and Mariah Carey would probably pass as white).

In the cases Slappy is talking about, Mark McGuire is an American anglo, José Canseco is a Cuban white, Pedro Martínez is a Dominican mulatto and Sammy Sosa is a Dominican black. Canseco, Martínez and Sosa are all Spanish last names: this means they are all Hispanics.

Sosa's excuse was, that he only had one corked bat that he used for batting practice, to put on a show for the fans. Then during the game, he accidently grabbed the corked bat. Good excuse, but riiiiiiight.
Whatever, I really don't think the corked bat thing is that big a deal. But crying racism in this case is plain stupid and ignorant.

By the way, can anyone explain to me what is wrong with corking the bat? I understand that this is prohibited by rules, but what advantages does such a thing give to an athlete?

It makes the bat lighter, so you have more bat speed...while keeping the integrity of the bat, or maybe even increasing the "pop" the ball comes off that bat. It's supposed to give the batter the advantage of hitting the ball further than with a non-corked wooden bat.

cork inside = less weight in the same surface = with the same bodily strength the bat moves faster towards the ball.

Thanks for explanation. But why then manufacturing of such bats is not considered illegal?

They're not manufactured by the bat companies, the players do it themselves. They're tampered bats.

It's easy to do. All you need is a drill, some cork or super balls to cut up, some glue, and a bit of dowel that roughly matches the shade and grain of the bat.

Anyway, dude's bat explodes all over the field and somehow there's racism involved? Please.

Of course, the time I look to Jose Canseco for social commentary... though I might ask him what sort of jet fuel to put in my Lamborghini.

Because you can do it yourself by modifying an already-manufactured bat, and nobody knows but you.

Jespah- I don't believe George Brett was ever caught with a corked bat. I think you are thinking of the incident where he had a home run taken away because of pine tar too far up on his bat. Also illegal, but at least not hidden.

Steissd: When we say 'illegal' on this thread, we don't really mean they could go to jail. We mean 'a violation of sporting rules'. Just wanted to make that clear.

How much wine do you have to drink in order to get enough cork to fill a bat? I would think that all that alcohol would tend to lessen your athletic performance.

My error. Pine tar with George Brett. Thanks, Equus!

Enough to cork to fill a cylinder approximately six inches in length and 5/8 of an inch in diamter, equus. Granted, you can drink Thunderbird until the end of time and you'll never be able to fill the bat -- at least, not with cork.

Well, abuse of racial sensitivity is not being limited to sports. Al Sharpton in the USA or Eli Ishay in Israel made political careers by exploiting alleged oppression of Black/tanned people (Ishay's constituents are technically Whites, but the hue of their skin color is a bit darker than this of the Europeans). IMO, this is nothing than a cheap demagogy.

corking a bat is dubious when it comes to whether it helps or not.

there are upsides and downsides.

The fact that it is lighter is actually a downside.

But doing an illegal thing (regardless of its being helpful or not), being caught and calling the critics racists and bigots is doubtlessly mean...