Cal.E.'s Korner

C.: Hi, D.C.. I haven’t heard from you in a couple of days, so I thought I’d give you a ring.

D.: Gold? Silver? Silver? Platinum? Maybe I should shun you more often if you’ll give me a ring made of precious metal to get my attention.

C.: No, I meant I decided to call you, since you haven’t called me in a few days. Anyway, what do you want to talk about today?

D.: Baseball.

C.: As in Mickey and The Duke? Or the fact that you put up the tombstone at the beginning of the blog a couple of months ago, and now the Astros are in first place in their division.

D.: I won’t take credit for that. I compare the Astros to Ussain Bolt

or Secretariat.

C.: How so?

D.: Well, both had trouble getting started, but almost always won their races, often setting records for the distance despite bad starts. Of course, Secretariat was being held back most of the time by his jockey. When he was given his head to see what he could do, he set an unapproachable record in the Belmont in his final Triple Crown race.

C.: So,  you’re comparing the Astros to the fastest human on record?

D.: I am.

C.: And you think that a one-hundred twenty-pound man could make twelve hundred pounds of speed and power do what the jockey told him to do?

D.: No, not really. My comparison is that racehorses are humble. They have the power to do what they want but are under control at all times. There are probably some horses that would have made great racehorses but were too undisciplined to race.

C.: I thought you wanted to talk about baseball, not racehorses.

D.: I do. In particular, Gary Sheffield.

C.: Who?

D.: Exactly. I trust you know who Reggie Jackson is.

C.: Mr. October?

D.: Yes, and he is deservedly in the Baseball Hall of Fame. However, another player had similar statistics to REGGIE, minus the World Series heroics, but was shunned by the sports writers who determine who gets into the hall of fame. Both were below average fielders, but exceptionally good power hitters.

C.: Why?

D.: Because he was linked steroids. I wasn’t a huge fan of Sheffield, but if that’s all that is keeping him out, he should be elected to the hall by the senior’s committee.

C.:???

D.: Besides the fact that most of the players were doing the same thing, I don’t think what he did gave him a large advantage over other players. He used steroid cream on his aching knees, something almost anyone would do to stop that pain. And, while it probably did make him run faster—because his knees didn’t hurt—I doubt it improved what he was known for—hitting.

 Providers often prescribe anabolic steroids to help patients recover faster from surgery or to quell acute or chronic pain. However, team doctors were aware that they would be sanctioned if they provided steroids to players on their team, and the players knew this as well. So, if someone like Gary Sheffield suffered an injury and needed something to quell his pain and let him continue to play baseball, he would need to obtain it illegally.

Now, imagine those same sports writers develop severe osteoarthritis in their hands from typing so much,

and their doctor has an aversion to prescribing steroids. Then, a coworker says that he has just the thing to quell the writer’s pain, but it must be obtained in a clandestine manner...

Let’s take it a step further and say that local writer is being considered for nationwide or even worldwide syndication of his column, but his fingers hurt so badly that s/he cannot type…

C. Couldn’t he use voice command on his computer?

D.: And he has laryngitis. The big column that will get the attention of the nation or the world is due in three days, not long enough for his voice to recover. Would that writer not be tempted to use the steroid cream he’s being offered by his coworker? And, if s/he does, should s/he get the opportunity to have a syndicated column taken away because of that decision?

There are many subjective reasons athletes are or are not elected to a hall of fame in their sport. Consequently, I believe that artificial intelligence should be used for what it was invented to do—give voters statistics that are unbiased and let that be the basis for whether or not someone is or is not elected to a hall of fame.

C.: Should I say it, or will you?

D.: This has been D.C. Scott, with one man’s (correct) opinion.