The Game of Baseball: Hancock's Dad Milk's Tragedy For Cash

Hancock's Dad Milk's Tragedy For Cash

There is an old joke about the young man who was convicted of murdering his parents in cold blood. When the judge asked the convicted man if he had anything to say for himself he said "Have pity on me Your Honor for I am an orphan."

It takes a lot of nerve to make a statement like that in those circumstances. It was also the first thing that came to mind when I saw that Josh Hancock's father was suing several parties saying they contributed to his son's death.

Hancock, a pitcher for the ST Louis Cardinals died back on April 28, after he got extremely intoxicated in a bar following a game between his team and the Chicago Cubs. It was an afternoon game and according to attorneys for Hancock's father, the pitcher spent 3 and a half hours at the establishment. He had ingested enough alcohol that the coroner's report said his blood alcohol level was 0.157 nearly twice the legal limit in the state of Missouri which is 0.08. He then got into his SUV in which police also found a small quantity of Marijuana. It was theorized that Hancock was on his cell phone and speeding, when he slammed into the back of a tow truck that was pulled off the highway to help another disabled vehicle. Unfortunately, Hancock was killed upon impact there were no other injuries.

On Thursday May 24, it was revealed that Hancock's father had filed a suit against others that he say played a role in his son's death. He is suing the establishment where he got intoxicated, the establishment's owner former Cardinal Mike Shannon, and Shannon's daughter the bar manager. The suit states that they should have stopped serving him alcohol, because he was so intoxicated. He is also suing the tow truck company owner, the tow truck driver, and the driver of the disabled vehicle. As far as we know the Marijuana dealer was not named in the suit.

I feel very badly that such a promising young man's life was ended on April 28,2007. But Josh Hancock had nobody to blame but himself for his demise. We are talking about a normal intelligent rational adult here. He should have known he was too drunk to drive. It was not anybody else's responsibility, not the bar's and certainly not the disabled vehicle, or the tow truck driver. As tragic as this episode was thankfully no innocent bystanders were hurt. And we are talking about a Major league baseball player, even if by some strange chance he was making the league minimum, are you telling me that he could not afford to be taken home by a limo or a cab? Of course he could, but now we get down to that sense of invulnerability, which all young people have but athletes most of all.

I guess that you could rationalize, that Hancock's father is so grief stricken that he is just lashing out in anger at the world, and this is the way it is manifesting itself. Bad things do happen to good people, sometimes for inexplicable reasons. It is understandable to want to point fingers, so that you don't have to blame your own son. If that is the reason, then when Mr. Hancock hopefully is able to get a little more past his grief, he will drop these suits. The problem in our day and age is the motives behind peoples actions. If Mr. Hancock is just looking for a payoff than he should be ashamed of himself, and will only further sully his son's reputation.

Posted by Jeff Sack on Thursday, May 24, 2007 at 6:48 PM | Permalink