"Calling signs with fingers when there are hundreds of cameras trained on you seems archaic. Yet it is traditional..."

"... and the collision of technology and tradition needs a bridge if we want to preserve aspects of the past that are the signature of the game’s heartbeat. The real consequence of the Astros scandal may be to stoke the feeling of helplessness we all feel with technology at times, always a step behind.... Maybe the values behind the rules, the 'love of the game,' are naïve. That it is idealistic to dream of a World Series ring won through pure team and individual effort; maybe we should have realized the temptation of cutting corners for spoils that can more easily be acquired with money, drugs and better technology. A rocket arm, a quick bat, a big heart, a blessing from divine sources or humility are diminished in such a world. What you came with is not enough naturally. If we do not respond by fighting for what we claim to value in fair play, such a scandal makes us beholden to the notion that the prerequisites of success are simply deeper pockets, a better pharmacist and a[n] unethical hacker. And in such a world, humanity is marginalized and no game remains. Just video. So maybe the top isn’t that shiny simply because it is the top. Maybe the top is just resting high on an ice cream cake, doomed to melt from the heat of 'do whatever it takes' ethics."

From "Baseball’s Existential Crisis/The Astros cheating scandal calls into question the fundamental values of the game" by Doug Glanville (in The NYT). Glanville was a major league baseball player from 1996 to 2004.

We talked about the sign-stealing problem last November, where I wrote (in the comments):

Signs are made out in the open. Why can’t you read them?

How is it “stealing”?

It’s looking and seeing.

I put "stealing" in quotes because stealing usually sounds bad, but in baseball stealing bases is a celebrated skill. The easiest solution to this "existential crisis" is just to accept sign stealing as part of the game, no more unethical than stealing a base. Since that route is possible, isn't the real dispute about the balance of advantages between pitcher and batter? Is the hand-wringing about ethics pro-pitcher propaganda?

Also in the comments at that November post, Char Char Binks wrote:

I know little, and care less, about this controversy, but it illustrates one of the things I hate about baseball. The game is rife with unfairness, chicanery, and outright cheating. The general ethos of the game is “it’s not against the rules if you don’t get caught”, with flexible strike zones, brush backs with a deadly weapon, corked and tarred bats, pitchers secretly altering the ball to suit their preference, and players openly “razzing” opponents with behavior that would be considered grossly unsportsmanlike in almost any other game, but that coaches teach players to do from a young age.

How baseball came to be seen as the exemplar of good, clean American fair play I’ll never know.

Psota responded:

Ha! Baseball is PERFECT as a symbol of American society's distinctive combination of "High ideals" + "low morals" approach to life. This is not a comment on Dems v GOP, Trump v Hillary,etc. Charles Dickens was writing about our peculiar national character in Martin Chuzzlewit.

What did Dickens say about Americans in "Martin Chuzzlewit"? I'm not sure, but Lisa Simpson says:

"I think we should invest in a set of The Great Books Of Western Civilization. Look at this ad from The New Republic for Kids: Each month, a new classic will be delivered to our door. Paradise Regained, Martin Chuzzlewit or Herman Melville's twin classics Omoo and Typee."