As a Yankee fan, I’m really enjoying this Mets debacle. But there is a labor issue in “thumbs down”-gate. It’s obviously very silly for players like Francisco Lindor and Javy Báez to get so upset at the fans for booing them; they are playing very poorly, and fans have a right to be mad. But sometimes players need silly little gimmicks to get them energized, whether it’s “cowboy up” or the Rally Monkey or “savages in the box” or what have you. The Yankees even did the “thumbs down” thing a few years ago (although it wasn’t directed at their own fans, to be fair).
So for the team to issue statements condemning the players, and for media figures like Buster Olney to say it’s “impossible to think of another prospective free agent making a bigger public relations” is a ridiculous policing of player behavior. Just let them play, good grief.
Anyway, here’s your monthly recap of everything from Undrafted, in case you missed anything good:
Trades!: A reflection on the MLB trade deadline, specifically on whether the excitement and fun of trades can be reconciled with a belief in player autonomy. In a world where minor leaguers were treated fairly, would it be so easy to trade them?
“Socialist Sports Movie Review! Space Jam!”: In the inaugural Lefty Specialists movie review, we discussed the original Space Jam and the new sequel with LeBron James. They’re not good movies, BUT they do reveal some funny things about the last 25 years of capitalism. You can also listen if you want to hear me do a dramatic reading from Karl Marx’s Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts.
An Olympics for the People?: A look back at some historical attempts to build a left-wing Olympics, and whether such a goal is even possible.
Roles and Cogs: For this piece I was inspired by one annoying Aaron Boone bullpen move to break down how we even think about the bullpen and, more generally, how we think about labor. I’m not sure my criticism of Boone’s move holds up, but I stand by what I wrote about worker roles being more useful for bosses than the workers themselves.
“Players on the Move”: A Lefty Specialists episode about the MLB trade deadline deals, Kumar Rocker, and the start of NBA free agency.
It Actually Is a Personal Choice: Vaccine discourse has gotten totally out of control in this country, with some people eating horse paste and others accusing people of murder for not getting a shot. This post was just a plea not to turn every individual choice into a culture war fight, since that is not how policy victories are really achieved.
“What Ever Happened to the Death of Football?”: A podcast deep dive into the narrative around the supposed “death of football” that once seemed rampant, and how the events of 2016 seem to have kept it alive. We also dunk a lot on technocrats and centrists like Malcolm Gladwell.
NET WORTH WEEK! Part I: The Owners; Part II: The Teams; Part III: The Players: Last week was Net Worth Week, which was really an excuse to talk about the concept of “value.” In sports, there is an attempt to value things with such precision that it obscures an important fact: Economic value is a function of political power dynamics. Anyway, if you take away nothing else from Net Worth Week, please at least stop citing “net worth” figures for owners as if they are real numbers.
How the Other Teams Integrated, 1947: Part One of a new series where I look back on how the slow process of desegregating baseball. The goal here is not just to highlight some lesser-known figures in baseball history, but to look deeper at how social change happens. The integration of baseball was a real victory. Jackie Robinson was not just a token—for a time, Black players really dominated baseball, and in 1981 were overrepresented in the MLB. Now, though, those gains have been largely reversed. In 2016, they made up less than 7% of the league—the lowest percentage since 1957, which was before all the teams were even integrated. It’s a real reminder that real progress is possible, but not inevitable. It’s useful to look at how that change happened.