On Josh Hancock
At the risk of perhaps stepping on a few St. Louis toes, I wanted to contribute a few thoughts to the ongoing discussion surrounding the death of Cardinals pitcher Josh Hancock last weekend. I would have done this earlier, but time did not allow. I also wanted to wait for the police report before throwing something out here not substantiated by the official investigation. On the backside of that investigation and report, my perspective has not changed.
Living in St. Louis, I've been amazed by the outpouring of sentiment from what is called (annoyingly so, in my opinion) "Cardinal Nation". People have created makeshift memorials and left flowers outside of Busch Stadium; you would think everyone actually knew the guy and just had him over for dinner during the last homestand or something. Though I appreciate the show of sympathy/empathy for Hancock, his family, and the Cardinals organization, the depth of it seems questionable to me, and mostly a function of Hancock being semi-famous.
While I respect the Cardinals as being one of the better organizations in baseball, I have been intrigued by how much of a hero they seem to have made Hancock. Granted, he was on the team and part of the Cardinals "family" (one of the most overused and misdefined terms of the past week), but would the Cardinals have done half as much of the public memorializing that they have if Hancock had actually killed someone driving drunk a week ago? Would a victim's family have stood for that? Would the public? Are you kidding me?
Listening to the first half of the press conference on the radio yesterday, I was once again reminded how hypocritical the media (as well as our country) is when it comes to issues of morality. Immediately following the Cardinals' opening statement, multiple reporters in the room began asking about the team's alcohol policy for the clubhouse and on the plane. The implication of the questions was clear: the Cardinals (having once been owned by Anheuser-Busch and still playing in Busch Stadium) must have contributed to Hancock's death in some way, and surely you're going to do something about that to protect "young" ballplayers like the 29-year-old Hancock (who also happened to be an adult). Since when does the media care about morality, legislated or otherwise?
Though the Cardinals did not allude then to any need to make changes in their current policy (Hancock, after all, was drinking at Shannon's, not at Busch), in this morning's Post-Dispatch, I read that the team caved to the pressure with a "CYA" move, pulling alcohol from the team's clubhouse (though not from the visitor's clubhouse), as well as choosing not to serve alcohol on return plane trips since players would be driving home from the airport. Are they going to stop handing out marijuana in the clubhouse and on the plane as well? Oh, wait a minute - Hancock (again, a 29-year-old adult) somehow got that all by himself.
I realize I may sound somewhat cynical, but I have yet to hear anybody raise these questions in the midst of the swirl of emotions surrounding Hancock's death. I don't mean any disrespect to Hancock or his family and I'm sorry he died, doing so with so little personal resolution in his areas of addiction. I'm sorry for the Cardinals and the hurt their personnel have experienced in the midst of what is (so far) their worst start as a team since 1990. I'm sorry for the fans - particularly the young ones, who are again having to understand that, as glorious a game as baseball is, those who play it can be not so much.
But most of all, I'm sorry we live in a fallen world that still believes the lie that morality covers a multitude of sins. Last I checked, that was still love's job.