Casey Stengel channels his inner Garbo

Stengel sees the future
Originally uploaded by vegacura.

In advance of their testimony tomorrow, I suggest the players (minus Jason Giambi who prosecutors seem to want for bigger things) bone up on the testimony given by a "baseball man" some decades before.

Casey Stengel's testimony before the July 8, 1958 Senate Anti-Trust and Monopoly Subcommittee Hearing, and more specifically, his logic, is the perfect anecdote to the blathering of our nation's Great Statesmen.

Senator Langer: You look forward then, do you not, to say, ten years or twenty years from now this business of baseball is going to grow larger and larger and larger?

Mr. Stengel: Well, I should think it would. I should think it would get larger because of the fact we are drawing tremendous crowds, I believe, from overseas programs in television, that is one program I have always stuck up for. I think every ballplayer and everyone should give out anything that is overseas for the Army, free of cost and so forth. I think every hospital should get it. I think that because of the lack of parking in so many cites that you cannot have a great ballpark if you don't have parking space. If you are ancient or forty-five or fifty and have acquired enough money to go to a ballgame, you cannot drive a car on a highway, which is very hard to do after forty-five, to drive on any modern highway and if you are going to stay home you need radio and television to go along for receipts for the ball club.

Even in more light-hearted moments, the great Stengel will not be denied!

Senator Langer: Mr. Chairman, my final question. This is the Antimonopoly Committee that is sitting here.

Mr. Stengel: Yes, sir.

Senator Langer: I want to know whether you intend to keep on monopolizing the world's championship in New York City.

Mr. Stengel: Well, I will tell you, I got a little concerned yesterday in the first three innings when I say the three players I had gotten rid of and I said when I lost nine what am I going to do and when I had a couple of my players. I thought so great of that did not do so good up to the sixth inning I was more confused but I finally had to go and call on a young man in Baltimore that we don't own and the Yankees don't own him, and he is going pretty good, and I would actually have to tell you that I think we are more the Greta Garbo type now from success.

And Stengel keeps his equilibrium even when they throw a lotta Latin at him.

Senator Carroll: It is not now subject to antitrust laws. What do you think the need is for this legislation? I had a conference with one of the attorneys representing not only baseball but all of the sports, and I listened to your explanation to Senator Kefauver. It seemed to me it had some clarity. I asked the attorney this question: What was the need for this legislation? I wonder if you would accept his definition. He said they didn't want to be subjected to the ipse dixit of the Federal Government because they would throw a lot of damage suits on the ad damnum clause. He said, in the first place, the Toolson case was sui generis, it was de minimus non curat lex. Do you call that a clear expression?

Mr. Stengel: Well, you are going to get me there for about two hours.

Senator Carroll: I realize these questions which are put to you are all, I suppose, legislative and legal questions. Leaning on your experience as manager, do you feel the farm system, the draft system, the reserve clause system, is fair to the players, to the managers, and to the public interest?

Mr. Stengel: I think the public is taken care of, rich and poor, better at the present time than years ago. I really think that the ownership is a question of ability. I really think that the business manager is a question of ability. Some of these men are supposed to be very brillant in their line of work, and some of them are not so brillant, so that they have quite a bit of trouble with it when you run an operation of a club in which the ownership maybe doesn't run the club. I would say that the players themselves Â? I told you, I am not in on that fund, it is a good thing. I say I should have been, to tell you the truth. But I think it is a great thing about that fund.

Senator Carroll: I am not talking about that fund.

Mr. Stengel: Well, I tell you if you are going to talk about the fund you are going to think about radio and television and pay television.

Senator Carroll: I do not want to talk about radio and television, but I do want to talk about the draft clause and reserve systems.

Mr. Stengel: Yes, sir. I would have liked to have been free four times in my life; and later on I have seen men free, and later on they make a big complaint "they wuz robbed," and if you are robbed there is some club down the road to give you the opportunity.

Senator Carroll: That was not the question I asked you, and I only asked you on your long experienceÂ?

Mr. Stengel: Yes, sir. I would not be in it forty-eight years if it was not all right.

Senator Carroll: I understand that.

Mr. Stengel: Well, then, why wouldn't it stay that?

Senator Carroll: In your long experience...

Mr. Stengel: Yes.

Senator Carroll: Do you feel, you have had experience through the years...

Mr. Stengel: That is true.

Senator Carroll: With the draft system, and the reserve clause in the contracts. Do you think you could still exist under existing law without changing the law?

Mr. Stengel: I think it is run better than it has ever been run in baseball, for every department.

Senator Carroll: Then, I come back to the principal question. This is the real question before this body.

Mr. Stengel: All right.

Senator Carroll: Then what is the need for legislation, if they are getting along all right?

Mr. Stengel: I didn't ask for the legislation. (Laughter).

This should be required reading for everyone forced to appear before tomorrow's House UnAmerican Activities Committee...er...House Reform Committee. As Mickey Mantle well understood. Appearing before the committee immediately after Stengel's tour de force, he opened his testimony with, "My views are pretty much the same as Casey's."

But, you know, the players better be careful because the Right Reverend Davis can investigate...everything.

MR. RUSSERT: What authority does your committee have? Could you look into drugs in Hollywood, drugs in the music business? How widespread do you feel you can go?

REP. DAVIS: Rule 10, Clause 4C2 gives us the ability to hold a hearing on any matter at any time. We're the major investigatory committee of Congress. We don't abuse it. We didn't issue any subpoenas for the last two years. Henry and I worked together in a bipartisan fashion to decide what we'll do. But this is a serious problem. Kids are dying from the use of steroids. They're looking up to these major- league leaders in terms of the enhancements that they're using. And we have to stop it.

The children. I recall now. The Constitution allows the Reform Committee to investigate "any matter at any time" as long as it's for "the children."

Tomorrow should be a long afternoon in the Capitol. Watching aged peacocks strut before the athletes they've condemned can get pretty tedious.