Everyone knows about Baseballs Black Sox scandal. Where in 1919, 8 members of the Chicago White Sox were barred from organized Baseball for their part in throwing the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. Those player were First Basemen and ring leader Chick Ghandil, Eddie Cicotte, Swede Risberg, Lefty Williams, Happy Felsch, Fred McMullin, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson, and Buck Weaver. The way in which they are ordered most likely reflects their level of guilt.
The Chicago Eight were not the first nor the last to be barred from the game. Here is a couple other scandals you may not have heard of:
The First Scandal
In 1865, Thomas Devyr, Ed Duffy, and William Wamsley from the New York Mutuals were accused of conspiring with gamblers to throw a game against the Brooklyn Eckfords. All three admitted their guilt and were released by the Mutuals, only to be reinstated a few months later.
The Scots Verdict
In 1904, Jack Taylor of the St.Louis Cardinals fell under suspicion of intentionally losing games. Testimony was heard for and against him but he received what reports in that period called the "Scots Verdict". Meaning there was good reason to believe he was guilty but not enough evidence to convict him.
Cobb and Speaker vs. Leonard
For a moment in 1926 a scandal arose that could have eclipsed that of the Black Sox when former Tigers pitcher Dutch Leonard let it be known that he had some incriminating letters from Smokey Joe Wood regarding bets that Leonard, Wood, Tris Speaker, and Ty Cobb had made on a game in 1919 between the Tigers and Indians. The bet was an after though after Speaker agreed to let the Tigers win so the could beat out the New York Yankees out of second place money.
At first Speaker and Cobb were persuaded to retire in exchange for the matter to be left unexplored. Then they reconsidered and decided to fight the charges. When Leonard refused to appear publicly to confront them, Landis let the issue go.
The theory of choice is that Leonard was merely trying to retaliate against Cobb for releasing him and Speaker for not letting him catch with the Indians. If this had happened just a few years earlier when Landis was riding the game of corruption without mercy , the game might have been shed of its two greatest stars
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