50 Shades of Gregg Zaun

[MurphDogg]

Interesting article about Gregg Zaun on life as a rookie and playing the game the right way.

I?ll never forget it: I was out in the stretch circle, I played catch with Chris Hoiles every single day, and I lobbed the ball to him ? and he was paying attention, but he pretended like he wasn?t. He head-butted the ball and all of a sudden I had what was called ?the posse? all over me. Cal Ripken, Ben McDonald, Brady Anderson, Chris Hoiles, all of the above. They beat me on my ribcage, physically abused me on my way to the training table. They taped me spread-eagle to the training table, they wrote ?rookie? on my forehead with pink methylate, and they shoved a bucket of ice down my shorts. I missed the entire batting practice, and you know what? Phil Regan, the manager of the Baltimore Orioles, he did not care, because he knew that what those guys were doing was ?educating me.?

Apropos of nothing, Cal Ripken has a children's book about how bullying younger players is bad.

[weams]

Interesting article about Gregg Zaun on life as a rookie and playing the game the right way.

Apropos of nothing, Cal Ripken has a children's book about how bullying younger players is bad.

He was Rick Dempsey's favorite nephew. They were simply giving back what was deserved.

[srock]

Interesting article about Gregg Zaun on life as a rookie and playing the game the right way.

Apropos of nothing, Cal Ripken has a children's book about how bullying younger players is bad.

Were they bullying him or punishing him for lollygagging in practice?

and I lobbed the ball to him ? and he was paying attention, but he pretended like he wasn?t. He head-butted the ball

Sounds like they were teaching him a lesson.

Maybe the technique was wildly inappropriate and there is a fine line with bullying here, but its not exactly the same if the intent is to punish/educate vs. control with power and fear.

Edit, next paragraph in article confirms that's what Zaun means:

I had taken liberties with some of the veteran players. I had become a little bit too mouthy. And, I’m sure this comes as a shock to you guys — I was a little bit chatty; a little bit talkative as a young player, yeah. But I learned how to stifle myself. I learned how to show these veteran players respect and give them their room, and all the while close my mouth and be the guy who listened.

[MurphDogg]

Were they bullying him or punishing him for lollygagging in practice?

Sounds like they were teaching him a lesson.

Maybe the technique was wildly inappropriate and there is a fine line with bullying here, but its not exactly the same if the intent is to punish/educate vs. control with power and fear.

Edit, next paragraph in article confirms that's what Zaun means:

This is pretty clearly bullying:

If I had a dollar for every time Cal worked me over, physically, I’d be a pretty wealthy guy. He still owes me a suit! He told me flat out, he said, ‘You are never to come past this point into the back of the plane, under no circumstances.’ So, I’m in my first suit that I paid for myself as a Major League player, feelin’ real frisky, and Cal says, ‘I need you to come here.’ And all of a sudden I crossed over that imaginary barrier line. He tackled me, wrestled me to the ground. They had just got done eating a bunch of blue crabs in the back of the plane, so there was nothing but mud and Old Bay seasoning everywhere. He throws me to the ground and he tears my suit off of me, and I’m like, ‘What are you doing?’ And he goes, ‘Remember when I said that under no circumstances do you come back here?’ I’m like, ‘Well you just told me to!’ ‘I said under no circumstances, and that includes when I ask you to come back here.

From the article about Cal while promoting his book:

"The other thing they would do is the older players would sneak up behind you and slap you on the back of the neck," said Ripken, whose younger brother also eventually played on the high school team. "You feel powerless. You don't know what to do for a solution."

As Ripken got older, he refrained from doing what he saw.

"Anything you do that is demeaning to someone else is wrong," said Ripken, who played 20 years all with the Orioles. "I don't believe you can build a team with that attitude."

If you can parse out what Cal did as not violating the statement "Anything you do that is demeaning to someone else is wrong," then you are more intellectually dexterous than I am.

[srock]

This is pretty clearly bullying:

From the article about Cal while promoting his book:

If you can parse out what Cal did as not violating the statement "Anything you do that is demeaning to someone else is wrong," then you are more intellectually dexterous than I am.

Bullying implies an intention to control someone else via fear and power.

The intent is not here to label it bullying.

A messed up system of reciprocity? Yeah, there are better ways to handle these things.

It appears the current Orioles do a much better job. Not that we really get the full story to know for sure, but it appears Adam Jones and company achieve the goal without being violent or demeaning.

[byrdz]

Bullying is what you call it when discussing children, I suppose, this sounds more like assault. I'm sure it doesn't happen quite like this anymore these days. Especially under Buck's watch. Those were different times and I'm sure widespread and accepted as the norm.

[Aristotelian]

Were they bullying him or punishing him for lollygagging in practice?

:

Yes and yes. No place for this in professional sports.

[stomperspc]

Nobody should have to be physically abused or mentally harassed/hazed to be "taught respect". I fail to see how baseball is any different than any other profession in that regard. If someone is not doing their job the way they should be doing it, you talk to them. You make it clear that their performance or behavior is not acceptable. You follow up and hold them to that standard. If they don't fall in line, then they need to be fired or benched or whatever. There is absolutely zero reason to haze a player or physically abuse them in order to get them to do their job better or learn respect. Anyone that results to that kind of stuff is a poor and unfit leader. Hazing doesn't teach someone respect. It teaches them that people should be treated better/worse depending on seniority which is complete BS.

This article reminded me of something I read before the 2011 season about Matt Wieters:

Connecting with Wieters wasn't hard for Showalter. The kid is polite, smart and receptive to instruction. But turning him into a forceful leader has proven to be more of a work in progress. Last year, Showalter became aware of some Orioles veterans hazing Wieters and quickly put an end to it.

"I'm very protective of the guy who's going to be catching our pitching staff, without that [hazing] happening. I'm not a big fan of that stuff," Showalter said. "Make the guy's path easier, not harder. Matt's the last guy who should have that coming to him, because Matt is almost to a fault respectful of [veterans]."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/10/AR2011031005236.html

Like Buck says, the idea should be to make a guy's life easier, not harder. Telling a young player straight up that his demonstrated behavior will not to be tolerated should ultimately make his path easier. Hazing him or whatever in no way makes his path easier or helps him.

[TonySoprano]

[Ohfan67]

There's always been chatter that the Orioles veterans including Cal, Mussina, etc., were not good with rookies/young players. The level of stupidity, however, seems to have been much, much higher than I imagined. Idiotic and, unfortunately, incredibly stereotypical "jock" behavior from the day.

[OFFNY]

Apropos of nothing, Cal Ripken has a children's book about how bullying younger players is bad.

The last time that Ripken, Jr.'s book came out in 2012, he came to New York City to promote it, and signed copies of the book and took pictures with the Orioles fans.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/38845593@N00/5490950498/

[PA724_Oriole]

Bullying implies an intention to control someone else via fear and power.

The intent is not here to label it bullying.

A messed up system of reciprocity? Yeah, there are better ways to handle these things.

It appears the current Orioles do a much better job. Not that we really get the full story to know for sure, but it appears Adam Jones and company achieve the goal without being violent or demeaning.

Not that I really care about it all. But they over powered him n made him do things im sure he didn't want to. And you still wouldnt label it as bullying?

So I guess kids in school can give someone a swirly without it being considered bullying?

[weams]

Not that I really care about it all. But they over powered him n made him do things im sure he didn't want to. And you still wouldnt label it as bullying?

So I guess kids in school can give someone a swirly without it being considered bullying?

I don't think their is much "bullying" occurring at the MLB level.

[paulcoates]

Bullying, or hazing?

[El Gordo]

When adults bully it's called teaching a lesson. When kids do it it's called bullying. In both cases the real reason for it is to make people who somehow feel impotent, feel more powerful. It doesn't work. People who bully are cowards, no mater how much you want to play with semantics.