The three-game suspension of Shelley Duncan, a Yankees first baseman, for his spikes-high slide into second base in an exhibition game against the Tampa Bay Rays prompted me to think about the change that has occurred in baseball.
Virtually forever, until relatively recently, if a player performed some dastardly deed in a game, the players on the opposing team dealt with him themselves by retaliating in some fashion.
This retaliation was generally comparable in pain inflicted to the original act—even playing dirty has its rules—and everyone understood that such measures were clearly tit-for-tat. As Tommy Lasorda puts it, "It’s evened up. He got our guy; we got their guy.”
View my complete profile