Bill Parcells’ first coaching job was in 1964 as an assistant at Division III Hastings College (Neb.), and before the big game against Nebraska Wesleyan, Parcells went over in practice multiple times a bootleg play the opponent liked to run in the red zone.
The best and most attentive player on the defense was a safety named Jack Giddings, who went the wrong way when Nebraska Wesleyan ran the play on its first drive for an easy touchdown. Parcells began to lambaste Giddings on the sideline about not retaining the information when the head coach and a Parcells mentor, Dean Pryor, told Parcells, “ ‘Leave him alone because you didn’t go over it enough because he didn’t get it right,’ ” Parcells recalled during a phone conversation Tuesday.
“That was one of the great lessons I had in coaching right there. The accountability factor and that he was right. I didn’t go over it enough. … I hadn’t impressed him correctly or he would have done better when he saw it. And I never forgot that lesson. And every time I had players making repeated mistakes, I always thought back to that and would say, ‘Hey Parcells, go over it again with him.’ And you know, it’s just accountability.”
I thought of this story when MLB announced Tuesday that it had suspended five players, four for one year and one for life, for gambling on baseball.
At this point, I wonder if Rule 21 hanging in the clubhouse has become like a 55 mph speed limit sign on the highway.
I wonder if MLB bringing in gambling experts to talk to each team once a spring is just another excuse for players to scroll through whatever is the fancy of the moment on their cellphones.
These items plus punishments are currently the deterrents to a sin that should resonate in baseball more than any other sport because — among other things — there would be no commissioner without illegal gambling on baseball and the all-time hits leader would be in the Hall of Fame not on their permanently ineligible list.
Perhaps addicts will not heed any warnings. There is no 100 percent solution. But you save who you can to try to avoid the catastrophe next door. The accountability must go to the leagues — the Parcells lesson — to find yet another way to stop more people employed in the sport from betting on baseball.
MLB does not forbid its personnel from wagering on other sports, even at team facilities. Am I silly to see that as a gateway to worse? Perhaps the leagues and the gambling sites can come up with technology that would block baseball-related gambling for any personnel covered by this rule who have an app in their name (yes, I see all the get-arounds to that, but you have to start somewhere).
And the written Rule 21 is no longer enough since it is more wallpaper these days than warning. Teams meet every day and the potential scandal and damage that would come from personnel gambling on the sport and their teams is such that as part of that meeting — every day — someone should out loud remind everyone that gambling on baseball is a one-year ban and betting on a game you have involvement in is a lifetime ban. Then go to the umpire’s room. Then go to front offices. It is overkill. But betting on your games is just too imperiling to the sports to not do overkill, and saying it out loud daily would remove any attempt to suggest not fully understanding the implications.
This is not a baseball problem alone. It is societal. It is all sports. But here is baseball living anew with more gambling problems, albeit with minor names and with MLB stating in a release that its investigation showed none of these players appeared in games in which they bet and there was “no evidence to suggest … that any outcomes in the baseball games on which (there were bets made by these players) were compromised, influenced, or manipulated in any way.”
Let’s say it is all accurate — and MLB’s press release is detailed in the accounting down to noting that reliever Andrew Saalfrank is losing a year of his career because he gambled $445.87 on baseball.
It still underscores that whatever warnings are offered are not being fully heeded. That could be because there are folks with addictive personalities who will scoff at warnings. But gambling has become so mainstream that the commonality of it has drowned out the peril. It is just a little bit of fun. It is just going 62 mph in that 55 mph zone. So the warning needs to be in their face as often as the temptation.
Call it the Parcells Plan — take accountability and find more ways to be out loud and redundant about the devilish deal that betting on baseball is.
Remember, MLB created the office of the commissioner in response to the allegations that members of the 1919 White Sox threw the World Series for a payout. It was part of an overall feeling that gamblers and baseball players were too often in the same Venn diagram and that the death of sports to a fanbase is not believing outcomes were reached through fair play. So in 1920, Kenesaw Landis was hired by MLB owners as the first commissioner and the following year — a day after their acquittal in court — eight White Sox, including Shoeless Joe Jackson, were suspended for life by Landis.
Rule 21 was written and is posted on every clubhouse door in the majors and minors. It details the prohibition against gambling on baseball and the ramifications. Rose opened one of those doors in uniform more than just about anyone in history. Yet, Bart Giamatti, the seventh commissioner, banned Rose for life in 1989 when he determined that Rose had bet on games involving the Reds.
So every other sport has its shaving scandals or gambling dark side and the consequences that ensued. But when Shohei Ohtani was ensnared in a gambling issue that arose in March, the link to Shoeless Joe and Rose was instantaneous. That all current reporting suggests Ohtani was a victim in this story should be an exhale for MLB, but also combined with this slate of suspensions a call to greater action.
Call it the Parcells Plan — take accountability and find more ways to be out loud and redundant about the devilish deal that betting on baseball is.
