Sunday, May 10, 2009

Plaschke Resembles Salem Witch-Hunters

Oh, Bill Plaschke.

We try not to mention your insufferable writing here, replete with broad-stroked provocative stands that lack basic logic or insight. Oftentimes, your columns are like the tantrums of a petulant child who is about to get a long timeout for misbehaving. Plaschke's columns are rarely worth the column inches he wastes. And yet we're stuck with you, a pebble rolling around the bottom of the shoe of an LA Times subscriber.

But today's headline, "Manny Ramirez supports resemble Giants fans," is particularly absurd. Angry that LA Times readers didn't embrace his prior histrionic, double-standard viewpoint that Ramirez should be thrown out of the game altogether, an opinion he continued to espouse on ESPN, Plaschke has now resorted to a TJ Simers-like article trying to answer the hundreds of emails which told him to go to hell.

Any letters of Ramirez support, in Plaschke's mind, demonstrate our moral turpitude. And in Plaschke's mind, a better punishment for Ramirez is to hold him to the whims of a hack sports columnist, issuing his own moral judgments on others without considering the logical legitimacy of a tsunami of alternate opinions.

Certainly, there are many who share my views that Ramirez is a knucklehead who shouldn't be allowed to return without full transparency, if at all.

And, certainly, those who agree with my columns generally do not e-mail about them.

So the poll here is unscientific, and the numbers are skewed, but the conclusions are unmistakable.

The loudest Dodgers baseball fans want to win at all costs, even if the price is drugs and deceit.

Many booed Andruw Jones when he broke unwritten rules about becoming fat.

Yet, many will apparently cheer Manny Ramirez even though he broke the explicit rules about becoming strong.

Fat doesn't win games. Strength does. The message is clear.

So when Manny comes back and hits his first home run, we will stand and welcome him back. The Dodgers will be in a pennant race with Manny, and nobody will care about what happened yesterday.

[...]

When Ramirez returns to Chavez Ravine this summer, Dodgers fans will have a chance to show that he must slowly earn his way back into their hearts.

Even though they are understandably desperate for their first World Series championship in 21 years, Dodgers fans will have an opportunity to show that they want to win it fairly.

Demand that he show up and apologize, which hasn't happened. Demand that he fully explain himself, which he also hasn't done.

Make him show you that he has changed, that he is clean, that he wants to regain your trust.

If he does, you can forgive, but don't forget, and let him know you don't forget.

Let Manny Ramirez know that, in the smart, sophisticated sports landscape of Los Angeles, there can be no victory without honor.

The cheers that accompanied each of Barry Bonds' tainted home runs in San Francisco will forever stain that city's baseball culture.

Dodgers fans have a chance to show they are different.

But are they?

Jon Weisman does a better job at articulating Plaschke's logical inconsistencies when trying to lynch Ramirez with a separate, arbritrary set of rules capriciously determined by a man with a word processor. Ramirez is being punished, hence the 50-game suspension. You can choose to support him when he returns, to stand up and cheer for Ramirez on July 3, or not. But you shouldn't develop and advocate your own set of rules of justice, beyond those already outlined in the books. That's vigilante law, to which you as a journalist are irresponsibly inciting the LA Times readership. And that's not just, no matter how deeply your own personal code of ethics is violated. Because your code of ethics isn't the same as your neighbor's, or your reader's, or even the sport's itself.

A world where Bill Plaschke is--or even logically believes--he is the judge and jury, beyond the rules of the game, extending punishments as he sees fit--is ridiculous.

Unless, of course, we can get the opportunity to throw sports columnists out of journalism forever, when they publish a piece of unsound commentary or unfair accusation. That might be a deal worth the trade.

12 comments:

Mr. LA Sports Czar said...

I'd like to ask Plaschke if he thinks Pettitte, Giambi, A-Rod, and J.C. Romero should be banned from the game to.

Mr. LA Sports Czar said...

I mean "too"

Orel said...

THERE CAN BE NO VICTORY WITHOUT HONOR

rbnlaw said...

We in OC have a better alternative. Mark Whicker wrote a much better piece on Mannygate, and I believe he has a Pulitzer. Plaschke just has a weight problem.
Whicker's column:
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/ramirez-testing-dodgers-2399434-hood-manny

Ryan said...

Diamond Leung and Tony Jackson are currently unemployed while Bill Plaschke and TJ Simers are still polluting the Times with nonsense.

Seriously, does anyone even understand TJ Simers writing, let alone enjoy it?

You know, it's a tough economy and companies (Times included) need to have "A" players on the field in order to compete. Why don't we - the loyal and faithful Dodger fans and Times readers - let the editor know that he/she could improve the staff (and probably save a couple of bucks) by terminating Plaschke and Simers and replacing them with Jackson and Leung.

Thoughts?

Vigilante said...

Count me as a member of the the 99-er Club from Mannywood. Except for the PED's, he's still a role model.

cigarcow said...

Plaschke forgot that Bonds was an a-hole way before the steroids. Nobody ever liked him. Steroids just gave us yet another reason to hate him and mock the Giants. There's the difference.

Steve Sax said...

Cigarcow: nor was Bonds ever punished by mlb...

karina said...

and Manny tested negative in 15 tests made randomly in 5 years, we don't even know about Bonds.

Ebag said...

Kurt Streeter's article was as intolerable as Plaschke's. Whereas I didn't even bother to read what Plaschke had to say (the headline was enough to keep me away), Streeter's self-righteous, sanctimonious, holier-than-thou crap about how journalists (yes, journalists) should be our moral compass by setting ethical standards made be stop reading about a third of the way through his article. These opportunistic writers who have no qualms about making a very good living off of guys like Manny and using these scandals for their own benefit are the last people I would look to for moral advice.

thound said...

Plaschke is a talentless hack.

Always has been, always will be.

Simple proof that a degree in "journalism" doesn't equate to one having the talent to actually write well or with intelligence.

Vigilante said...

I disagree! Plaschke is a talented hack.