September 22nd, 1920: Chicago Jury Convenes to Investigate 8 White Sox Players

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September 22nd, 1920

A Chicago grand jury convenes to investigate charges that eight White Sox players conspired to fix the 1919 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds.  Oops.

While the eight players were ultimately found guilty and banished from baseball forever, we give them a lot of credit for picking up the pieces of their lives and landing prominent roles in “Eight Men Out” and “Field of Dreams“.  That takes courage.

Impress your co-workers: the 1919 World Series was actually a best-of-nine series (as were the 1920 and 1921 World Series).  After 1918, baseball decided to try the 9-game format in an attempt to generate more revenue – which is ironic since Shoeless Joe and the gang (presumably) tried their dearest to get a piece of that pie and were punished for it.  Frankly, I’m surprised that the “more World Series games” strategy hasn’t been discussed in recent baseball.  Then again, the World Series already runs into November.

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