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Its not that fucked up apart from the way eddie died, sports is about entertainment and ig the novelty of midgets wears off when they walk every other at bat.
Yes, the issue though is that being tall isn't necessarily as big of an advantage as being super short with no strike zone is. There have been a few super tall baseball players like Randy Johnson. Johnson is 6'10" and as far as I know, the only pitcher to ever kill a bird during a game. He was a great pitcher and dominating, but not so dominating as to require a rule to be created to prevent that from happening again. In the case of Eddie, he was so short that his strike zone would be only a couple inches wide, meaning that if the pitcher wanted any chance of a strike out, they would need to put it where he could hit it. The main strategy would be to pitch as slowly and softly as possible to try and make him run for the bases, something that he was presumably quite a bit slower at than a typical player.
Exactly a little person can't even hit the ball or run the bases to any effect, where as 6' 7" is like the perfect height for an athlete. Everyone who upvoted this post has brain damage. @@Js-eq7yd
To add a bit onto Gaedel's story: Bob Cain, the Tigers pitcher, found the situation so unbelievable that (per Veeck) he "was laughing so hard that he could barely throw" after the first two pitches. Cain was also the only major leaguer to attend Gaedel's funeral.
Exactly he just moved on so fast. I did some more research and apparently the beating caused a heart attack after he crawled all the way back to his mothers home. Crawled in bed, and died that night. His mother found him the next morning. This is sad asf and just looked over.
Eddie Gaedel's grandnephew nearly joined him in the majors. 6'3" OFer Kyle Gaedele was drafted in the 6th round of the 2011 MLB draft and made it to AA before flaming out. He still plays independent ball
He was beat to death outside of a bowling alley and then the next day they voided his contract and banned dwarves from playing? Thats some shady as hell shit right there.
the man has created entire lore, a bunch of fictional characters, and hired numerous actors to film this footage, this is an insane amount of work for a fake sport
A couple things 1. The most common phenotype of dwarfism results in a relatively normal torso length and short legs. 2. It seems possible to me that a little person could be good enough at baseball that they could contribute in ways besides getting walked. The fastest little people in the world can run 100m in under 15 seconds. Thats definitely slow by mlb standards but not unheard of. Dwarfism has an incidence of 1/25000, so there are around 15000 little people in the united states, including about 2000 men in or near their athletic prime. Extend that to the whole world and you get around 40000 eligible little people. Remember, they dont need to be mlb caliber in their skills, they would just need to be good enough that they arent completely useless on the field-- good enough that the advantages they bring outweigh the deficits in "traditional" baseball performance
I guess with odds like those, it’s really weird that I grew up next to a dwarf. She invited us to a local dwarfism awareness thing and there were plenty of little people there.
it also feels like it would be less ugly and demeaning to hire a little person who was expected to like... play? like, i think the whole thing comes off a lot less freak show if you're like 'look this person has a tiny strike zone but also will bunt sometimes' or whatever
I hear you, but we're talking about the big leagues, so how would a dwarf be good at any aspect of baseball to the level where he'd be serviceable in any other facet than to be walked? Anyone deficient on the basepaths generally makes up for it in power, which enables them to avoid baserunning more. So you get a dwarf who never gets past first now having to run all those bases and it'd have to be at the DH position because you won't find one who wouldn't be a total liability defensively on a MLB team. Like you'd have to have the top superstar athlete dwarf to even think about this working and even then, it's not that inspiring of a proposition.
@bennylevine387 my point is that, if they could consistently get walked, they wouldn't have to be "MLB good" in order to provide net utility to their team with multiple at bats per game as a DH. A 15 second 100m is fairly slow by mlb standards but not out of place, and the disadvantages in speed conferred by short legs would be of lower relevance since baserunning is more about acceleration than top end speed.
@@mikeCD62 Yeah, I'm not even disagreeing. I don't think anyone could wrap their head around all the possibilities. Or if maybe it'd be better just to have one in a pinch-hitting capacity to get that walk under optimal conditions, rather than letting the dwarf run bases or have to slide, which I'm not sure they can do proficiently. And I'd be interested where they're holding dwarf track meets to where you can quote times. Or if they need that first length of distance to get rolling and their base-running wouldn't translate. An interesting thing to ponder though to be sure.
I was very short growing up, I actually made the cities highest level of baseball team. I was on the team for 1 reason; to get walked and steal every base to home. I was one of the fastest guys and my strikezone was so small pitchers rarely struck me out. I played outfield and 2nd base.
on my highschool soccer team my teammate was a dwarf who was extremely fast in a short sprint. we won many games together in which he was the one I was passing to so he could score which he did. was one of our top scorerers aswell as he could dribble and shoot very quickly.
Man us OSRS comunity must be dying cause just a few years ago the top comments would always be pointing out random bits in videos unrelated to runescape
The first little person on the video is a batboy/team assistant for the aguilas de mexicali in the mexican pacific league. Hes a well known legend in Mexico. They call him “Chevale”👏 👏 He made it to @baseballDoesntExist, took his legendary status to another level🚀
@@SBDdauntless Nah, organizations that support them go by titles like: "Little People of America" (LPA). Same as a "Trans person" or "Black person". But I get where you're coming from, I could see a lot of people getting offended at the title, "Big person".
My buddy Mason played little league with me up until we got older and bigger….. but for those few years he was our #3 batter and I was our clean up. He would get walked EVERY TIME. and I was so fat we ran at the same speed 😂 I’ll never forget those legendary times
Aye you just gained a subscriber. MLB need to hire you at this point. You made baseball interesting for me. Never thought that would happen. 😂 this also helps me realize baseball got a lot of rules that need adjusting . The strike zone rule is crazy
4:16 Disco Demolition Night was an idea envisioned by his son and a local Chicago DJ. Bill Veeck approved the idea however. Also, Bill Veeck’s wife conceived the idea that ball players wore shorts instead of pants. It lasted one season and players wore them for a couple of games.
You mean make a rule that specifically gives a disadvantage to players below a certain height? I'm not sure the ada would be much happier with that. It would probably have to be a universal strike zone to make them happier. But I think it's more likely they would get rid of the DH and add stipulations around pinch hitters requiring them to field an inning.
@@The_Taken_Names It's not a disadvantage, they'd still have the smallest possible strike zone compared to larger players with way bigger strike zones.
@@d_mb I think that's the point. The rule wouldn't be discriminatory because it applies to everyone, it just would facilitate that people who cannot fit the strike zone wouldn't be considered skilled enough to play. Same way with the NBA hoop height, MLB base size, size of a baseball, etc. Applies to everyone, regardless of physical ability.
@@djii7837 i think this is right, not a lawyer, but the case against it would be does it apply more to a few than to all the others. like let's say it's a 1ft x 1ft min for the aruguement, if the only people that the minimum applies to, are little people/ dwarfs, then it could still be effectively discriminatory which would still be a litigious issue. a minimum height that the strike zone boundaries can be at might be better than a minimum area of the strikezone, which i think is what y'all are saying now and i'm misreading this. oh well
@@OmniBui There could also be a case raised if someone challenged the ban, that an individual is not “otherwise qualified” to be an MLB player if the only thing that makes them attractive to an MLB team is the fact that they are so short they could likely walk an insanely high amount of the time. The ability to actually hit, field, and throw would likely be considered essential functions of the job. Even if that’s not the case there would also be a case from a safety standpoint although I think that would be even more complicated.
Absolutely brilliant video! I knew some of the Bill Veeck stories, including the midget batter, the lobster giveaway, the wooden leg ashtray, and disco demolition night. I didn't know about the outfield wall being moved between home and away batters. And didn't know about the crouching batter stance rule. This has been a fun and enlightening 9 minutes. 👍👍
My dad and me talked about Gaedel and what if someone tried it again. One thing my dad mentioned was what if the pitcher starts throwing at the little guy, for someone not experienced with rhis at all, with no athleticism, 95 mph coming at you might change your mind quick. Another problem we mentioned was it would be needed to be a DH likely, and you also just used up a bench spot in the 1st inning when benches are smaller today with all the pitchers on the roster.
Im fairly certain most major league pitchers nowadays wouldn't have any problem hitting a dwarf's strike zone. Especially if he was specifically instructed never to swing because all the pitcher would need to worry about is control. No secondary pitches, no high velo, nothing. If Spencer Strider can put a 100mph fastball in the upper outside quadrant of a normal batter's zone he can put a casual 88mph fastball somewhere in a the zone of a guy who is 110cm.
I don't think too many more pitchers back then would have necessarily had a hard time, to be fair. Bob Cain gave up 95 BBs in 175 innings in 1951. So, he did have below average control.
So the ADA prevents discrimination based off a disability (I.e. dwarfism) but there are workarounds that would essentially do the same thing based off “required job functions”. The MLB would probably claim they have a minimum height requirement for safety, faithful execution of ump job functions, and potential undue economic impact that upsetting the meta of the game would cause, all of which are pretty standard objections to the ADA.
Disabled people have their own leagues or divisions, eg wheelchair basketball and wheelchair bodybuilding or special Olympics. They don't join into regular divisions
My first thought when it was said 1951 its gotta be Bill Veck being involved 20 seconds later Bill Veck name came up. Gotta love consistency of shinanigans he is involved in.
Rewatching this for the second time, I can’t believe I missed the RuneScape reference with the lobsters and the chat font on screen my first time watching it.
I mean you can fix the issue with the little strike zone by making a minimum size strike zone that also must be X inches from the ground. It would only apply if the normal strike zone was smaller than the minimum or if the height of the zone was too low to the ground.
I hit the ball twice in eight years playing baseball, so my baseball coach made me lunge. I walked 75% of the season. We went undefeated Edit: I’m 5’11” my shoulders were about 7 inches from my knees.
I'd say it heavily depends on the pitcher. Especially if he knows the batter ain't swinging. So he basically just needs to rely on control and not velocity or breaking. I mean there are catchers who are crazy on point across the whole diamond.
i was looking at old photos of the astros they have at minute maid park. and there seemed to be like a team manager who was a dwarf for the astros. was like 70s era i think.
Very few videos in this category has the reaction of "I need a cigarette now" these days Crazy Bonus, includes a high powered rifle! Don't see that everyday when it comes to baseball!
Bill Veeck is legendary. I remember his crazy ideas and promotions having grown up in Chicago in the 70s. Note to creator: the background noise is maddening.
