History Of The Black Sox Scandal

“Is big league baseball being run for gamblers with players in the deal?” (“History.com.”) This was the title for the famous article The New York Evening World said by Hugh Fullerton who help investigate the 1919 series. Hugh Fullerton was a sports writer who lead the charge on news about the fix. This quote is saying that gamblers were paying players to get the results they want. The Black Sox scandal in the 1919 world series was the championship between the Chicago White Sox and the Cincinnati Reds. It was best of 9 games or the first to win 5 games. The players of the White Sox had ideas to fix the game a week or two before the games took place. Nothing this big has ever happened in the MLB. The fix was successful and the white sox lost

The exact origins of the fix are still unknown, although 2 plans have materialized and they are the believed start to it all. Two gambling clicks were approached one of them is run by a gambler Joseph “Sport” Sullivan and the other by “Sleepy” Bill Burns and his friend Billy Maharg. Gandil was the one who probably approached them but some people say that Eddie Cicotte may have went alone or with Gandil ("Black Sox Trial Indictment."). After the gamblers were approached, they needed a way to provide the money for the players. Abe Attell was approached to pay out the $100,000 the player wanted for throwing the games. Arnold Rothstein also raised money to give to the players since it was such a large amount. Cicotte was the only player smart enough to ask for his money in advance. He received $10,000 for his part in the fix. After the first two game only some of the money made it to the white sox. The players were frustrated with the gamblers failing to pay them. They decided that the fix was going to be off and they were going to try and come back in the series. The white sox played hard the next two games and won, making the it 4-3 only behind by a game. The gamblers became nervous and needed to get the players back on board with the fix. They sent an anonymous hitman given the alias Harry F. Harry F told the pitcher for the next

To start off game 1 Cicotte pitched. A sign that the fix was on, he hit the lead off batter in the back with a pitch (Milner,). In the 4th inning Cicotte gave up a few hits including a two out triple to the other pitcher. The Reds scored 5 runs in that inning. The Reds went on to win 9-1 for the first game of the series. In game 2 Williams was due to pitch and did not want to be as obvious as Cicotte. Williams pitched well into the 4th inning and then he walked three batters and gave up three runs. There was a lack of hitting for the White Sox and they lost 4-2. The next game was in Chicago and Dickie Kerr, who was not in on the fix was the starting pitcher. Kerr did extremely well and was masterful holding the Reds to 3 hits and a shutout victory 3-0 for the Sox. Cicotte was once again pitching in game 4 and he did not want to look as bad as he did in the first game. The first few innings him and the opposing pitcher Jimmy Ring matched zeros. With only one out in the 5th, Cicotte fielded a soft ground ball and made a horrible throw to first base and the runner advanced to third. The next man up had a base hit to centerfield and Cicotte cut the ball off instead of it going straight to home and let the runner score. The Reds won the game 2-0 and lead the series 3 games to 1. The next game was delayed because of the rain and had a late start. After it got underway Williams and Hod