Style Points

Here’s a new feature where we dance on someone’s grave.  Today’s target?  Mickey Charles Mantle.  Follow me after the jump for 8 kinds of wrong…

Mickey Mantle is one of those athletes that generates a bunch of nostalgia and misplaced reverence from the baby boomer set.  To them he represents simpler times.  All their warm and fuzzy boyhood memories of listening to the games on the radio or combing the box scores for stats come rushing back at the mere mention of Mantle’s name.

Those same geezers are also the ones that are so eager to cast a stone at today’s modern ballplayer.  They accuse the Barry Bonds’s and Roger Clemens’s of the world of being distant, aloof pricks who don’t respect the game or the fans.  Well, I got news for you.  Mickey Mantle was a prodigious asshole as well.  If there was a Cooperstown for assholes, The Mick would have a bronze statue out front and god willing, buzzards and crows would shit on it every morning at daybreak.

Personal ancedote:  The Mick was scheduled to sign autographs at the local JC Penneys in, I’m guessing, 1986.  I was young, but I was fully aware of who Mickey Mantle was and what he represented.  I was fortunate enough to make it to the department store that day but had the misfortune to be near the back of the line.  I stood in line for roughly an hour as Mickey signed balls, bats and gloves.  He was openly berating the kids for wanting pictures, arguing with what I’m guessing were store employees and as I neared the table, he rose, mockingly wiped his hands as if to say “I’m done” and swiftly walked away from the table.  You may be making excuses for The Mick.  You are probably saying ‘Socks, there was probably tons of people still in line and he couldn’t sign for everyone.’  You would be wrong.   Want to know how many people were in line when he exited?  Eight.  Eight fucking people left to greet.

You may also be thinking that we all have our bad days and this was probably an isolated incident.  Again, you’d be wrong.  It’s common knowledge that he was a world class adulterer, a stone cold alcoholic, and was dismissive of his fans.  He drove his wife and kids to alcoholism before living the last 15 years of his life estranged from his wife.  Conveniently, The Mick kept the local press in his back pocket and never had to worry about his personal life coming to the forefront like the Alex Rodriguezs’s of the world.  Yes, we live in different times.  It doesn’t give everyone permission to look at the past with rose-colored glasses. 

The Bob Costas’s and Billy Crystal’s of the world would like you to believe The Mick was some sort of symbol for American Greatness – the hayseed kid from Oklahoma that left the coal mines for the bright lights of New York.  They have part of it right.  He was a hick from the Midwest that managed to waste the talent and opportunities afforded him.  He cheated the game as much as Manny, or Sammy, or Mark.  He took lousy care of his body by carousing all night, drinking until he literally needed a new liver (and it’s always been rumored that he bullyed his way to the top of the donation list), and smoked like a chimney.  Say what you will about the modern ballplayer, with his PED’s and corporate coldness, you can’t say they let you down any more than Mantle.  In their drive to succeed they did what most Americans do, they surveyed the landscape, realized everyone else is on take and asked themselves what’s the honor in being the last honest man?

So to hell with Mickey.  I’m glad he’s dead and I’ll be even happier when another generation passes and his legend is dead.  No more revisionists pontificating on the holiness of their era and the piousness of mine.  I give no quarter to a Mantle apologist and I in turn loathe him for making me defend the Barry Bonds’s of the world.  So rest in peace, Mick.  You, Pol Pot and Elvis have a great time playing cards, telling lies, and rotting in hell.