Clemente or Koufax?

[Mark17]

Thank you, this is a very good reply. I didn't really give an opinion myself; I just asked the question. But my opinion would be similar: Some would call Sandy courageous, some would be angry and say he had shirked his duty and let his team and fans down at the worst possible moment.

Looking at how some guys, and I mean, really decent human beings, had their lives almost ruined by bitter fans, it makes me wonder if something like that might've happened to Sandy.

Fred Merkle was a very popular Giant until his "boner". His teammate, Fred Snodgrass, was often accused of losing the 1912 World Series throughout the rest of his life. Author Larry Ritter commented that Fred's obituary title read: Fred Snodgrass, who dropped a fly ball in the World Series.....

I knew a guy from New York who never forgave Tony Kubek for the Yankees losing the 1960 World Series. When I reminded him that Bill Virdon's bad-hop grounder hit Kubek in the throat, his angry reply was "He still should've flipped it to Richardson!"

And we all know about the sad tail end of Bill Buckner's otherwise great career, when he lost the 1986 Series.

Sandy was a very nice, very popular player. Would most fans have stood by him or turned on him? Personally I am very glad we will never know. I have more respect for Sandy's integrity than I do for the mob mentality that sometimes sets the historical narrative.

Now.... Had Sandy then proceeded to team with Drysdale in their dual holdout, which netted Sandy an unheard-of $40,000 raise prior to the next season, I think that might have really tipped the scale of public opinion against him. Had all this hypothetical stuff happened, we might view Sandy Koufax very differently than we do now, basically through no real fault of his. He might have been the Fred Merkle of the 1960s.