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Is it time to retire the professional sports asterisk?
Results so far:
| Yes | 58% | 11 votes | Total: 19 votes | |
| No | 42% | 8 votes |
Yes
by C.A. De Las Casas
Created on: January 08, 2008 Last Updated: October 31, 2008
What is the most dreaded thing a sports player can endure aside from an accusation of steroid use, the modern day, professional sports witch hunt? While the Mitchellus Maleficarum swept across baseball, spurred on by the steroid induced heresies of Barry Bonds, another equally misused, reputation jarring accusation also plagues players of every sport. What is this weapon as overly used as misused political analogies?
The asterisk, that funny little star that tells you to look at the bottom of the page for more information, is a seemingly innocuous addition to any piece of data or statistics. But in record books the idea of that little star has become a tool of venom and distaste, an easy way to permanently lash out at those you don't like to conclusively diminish their accomplishments. In a way, it's the ultimate "get back", a chance to spike the chalice of victory just as the victor attempts to drink from it, and represents the same kind of failure of civil compromise that plagues Kenya and Georgia in the midst of their election crises.
The problem, however, is not simply in regards to just the placement of the asterisk, but the entirety of a people reluctant to yield without further contest to the legitimate winner. This occurs in many formats and platforms, and is not solely resigned to sports, though this is perhaps where the greatest amount of publicity and controversy entwines itself.
For example, an article by rivals.com inquires whether an asterisk should already await the victor of tonight's BCS Bowl Game - reasoning that between USC's amazing turn out against Illinois and the remarkable season upheaval this year surly deserves some sort of disparaging mark. Since this team isn't considered "as good" as previous teams by some, do they deserve a blemish on their victory? That is the argument posed by some.
This comes on the heels of demands that the Patriots' historic, perfect season be tarnished with an asterisk on the grounds of a tape that they were never able to utilize involving calls made by defensive coordinators of the opposing team. Amusingly, many reason that if they were caught doing it on the field, wouldn't it stand to reason that they'd have video recorded the calls at another time, and reviewed it after, or even before the game?
The answer to this question is most likely: since none of these things are against the rules. In fact, the Jets, the very team the Patriots were caught recording the signals of early in the 2007 season, confessed that they frequently recorded the Patriots' defensive signals: it was, after all, well within the league rules. Simply not for use in the locker room during the game. Since the security staff confiscated the tapes en route to the locker room well before they were able to utilize them, however, the tapes themselves had no impact on the over all outcome of the game: making an asterisk an additional punishment on top of the hefty monetary fine and the yielded first round draft pick of 2008.
Asterisks, however, should never be used as punishments: only actual markers of important or unusual information. The Patriots no more deserve an asterisk in this case, than the Colts would if they were to win the Superbowl over a controversial "crowd skip" that sounded suspiciously as though a CD track of an audience was blaring over loudspeakers in order to drown out Tom Brady's play calls.
From Roger Maris to the New England Patriots to the victor of the 2007-08 BCS Bowl Game, the asterisk has failed in its function as a denotation of peculiar information into a weapon for jealous rivals.
Therefore, it may be time to simply retire the old star - much like the jerseys of remembered players who have served their time and moved on from the sport, maybe it's that time for the asterisk too.
Learn more about this author, C.A. De Las Casas.
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No
by Zach Bigalke
Created on: March 10, 2008 Last Updated: October 31, 2008
On the seventh of August, 2007, Barry Bonds hit home run number 756 into the hometown stands of AT&T Park in San Francisco. Fans scrambled over one another to grab the piece of history... and to cash in on the riches associated with historic sports memorabilia these days. The ball was auctioned off to Marc Ecko in early September, who paid $752,000 for the baseball...
Then an unprecedented vote was held online to determine what should be done with the baseball. Ten million fans weighed in their thoughts, and the majority ruled that the ball should be branded with an asterisk and donated to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. An indictment of the way in which Bonds achieved the record, the asterisk has long been a symbolic gesture for fans and the sports media to mark dubious achievements. From Tour de France winners who have been granted the "maillot jaune" after the champion is stripped of the title for drug use, to Roger Maris' record of 61 home runs garnering an asterisk due to the extended season, to the current fiasco surrounding Barry Bonds, the asterisk is an easily-recognizable, easily-created character which is synonymous with sports indignation...
What exactly IS the asterisk, though, and how did it become the standard mark to set the record straight in sports statistics? A simple star pattern - * - the asterisk first gained infamy in sports as teammates Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle chased Babe Ruth's single-season home-run record in 1961. The commissioner of Major League Baseball, Ford Frick, declared at a press conference in July of that season that, "if a player does not hit more than 60 until after his club has played 154 games, there would have to be some distinctive mark in the record books to show that Babe Ruth's record was set under a 154-game schedule." Never calling specifically for the asterisk, Frick nonetheless ignited the conversation and the controversy. New York Daily News sports writer Dick Young suggested to the crowd at Frick's press conference that an asterisk should be used, asserting, "Everyone does that when there"s a difference of opinion."
So one sports writer changed the course of how we read our box scores and player statistics...
Regardl ess of circumstance, the asterisk allows a statistician to draw attention to more than mere numbers. An asterisk next to Barry Bonds' home-run total, for instance, allows the record-keeper to note that the athlete enjoyed synthetic advantages allowed to those who held the record previously. The asterisk for Maris denotes that he had eight more games in which to break the home-run record than did Babe Ruth to set the mark...
But perhaps the place where asterisks have become most relevant is in cycling. Asterisks came into use in the seventies and eighties, when drug testing allowed riders to be penalized on the road for their indiscretions. In those days, drug deterrence did not come in the form of suspensions; rather, riders were penalized certain numbers of minutes on their overall elapsed time, adjusting the standings accordingly as punishment for doping. The asterisk allowed more information about time differential, directing the reader to the bottom of the column for further insight. If athletes were committed to fair play, and sports leagues always remained static, there would be no need for enlightenment through footnotes...
And that is all an asterisk does, anyway - gives a reader further insight into what is behind the records in the record book. No amount of asterisks can remove Bonds' record or Maris' accomplishment... they merely enlighten sports fans into HOW they accomplished their feats. Oscar Pereiro, the 2006 Tour de France winner, has the asterisk - because Floyd Landis was on the top step of the podium at the actual award ceremony in Paris. Only a positive test for exogenous testosterone gave Pereiro, down 57 seconds after three weeks of racing, the title...
Same story with Denis Menchov in the 2005 Vuelta a Espana, which was won on the road by Roberto Heras. That race, which was originally declared as Heras' record-breaking fourth Vuelta crown, set the precedent by which Pereiro was awarded the next year's Tour de France. Last year, Alberto Contador won the Tour - but only after Michael Rasmussen was pulled by his team with only a few ceremonial stages before Paris and a seemingly-insurmount able lead for lying about his whereabouts to doping control agents...
Our current sports landscape, where no sport is immune from the nefarious scourge of doping, NEEDS the asterisk to sort out all the information at our disposal. This simple character, originally fashioned by printers as a genaeological symbol indicating date of birth, gives birth to a whole new world of opportunities for statisticians to get the true and complete story behind the creation of our champions and our greatest records.
Learn more about this author, Zach Bigalke.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
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