Reconnecting the Baseball Star

If Babe Ruth were a sports star in the digital age, how would the media handle him? Consider the event enshrined as the "bellyache heard round the world," Ruth's physical setback before the 1925 season. The crisis begins at spring training, where he started to feel ill but remained with the team and kept playing. On April 7 his condition worsened to the point where he collapsed while in Asheville, North Carolina, and was sent home to New York the next night for treatment. After arriving in New York, Ruth's personal physician, Dr. Edward King, ultimately diagnosed him with an intestinal abscess, which he said was caused by Ruth's diet. In the media, sportswriter W. O. McGeehan recast the doctor's conclusion, claiming that Ruth's collapse was the result of a hot dog overdose, a story that led to the event's now famous bellyache label.¹

Despite this seemingly convincing story, lurking questions about what caused Ruth's illness have always underlain the bellyache episode. Was it merely overindulgence in brats and Coca Colas that caused the intestinal abscess? Or was it the result of the hard drinking, womanizing, and gluttonous lifestyle that Ruth had been leading? Some sportswriters even privately speculated that Ruth suffered from gonorrhea, a condition contracted from his notorious late-night partying.² While these theories questioned Ruth's lifestyle and his penchant for alcohol and women, sportswriters at the time never printed a word of speculation, and Ruth survived not only a medical problem but a surefire communications nightmare.

This situation would have been drastically different if today's all-pervasive, technology-driven media covered Ruth's illness. A cable television sports network would be following the Yankees in spring training, covering the team in advance of the season with a behind-the-scenes look at the players. At the first suggestion that Ruth was suffering from stomach cramps and a fever, news would be flashed on sports Web sites and text messaged to cell phone users—"Ruth Has Bellyache, 102.3 Fever. Listed as Day-to-Day"—and the television anchors and newspaper reporters would file instant reports on his condition, often belligerently debating its causes and solutions as if they all went to medical school. And the crawler on the cable stations all morning, afternoon, and night would read: "BREAKING NEWS: Ruth in serious but stable condition," followed by: "Sources close to the team hint at lifestyle causes."

Adding to the media barrage would be the key opinion-leading bloggers and podcasters, who would join the media blitz by writing or recording their own thoughts and interpretations of the illness, with the traditional media using this information in their own reports. Fans themselves would also travel to the training facility with their video recorders and digital cameras, hoping to capture a video to upload on YouTube and take a picture to post on their MySpace page. All of this is just day one of the Ruth bellyache. As new information about his condition is released, the sports world would expect updates in all channels until his illness was resolved and recovery time completed.

During his era Ruth was glorified for not only his home runs but also his outsized persona, receiving a pass in the prime of his career for behavior that today's baseball stars could never attempt without significant consequences. In today's media environment, it is unlikely that stories of Ruth's excessive lifestyle would go unnoticed, and his image would almost certainly be tarnished. In light of this comparison, would Babe Ruth still be considered as not only the greatest baseball star of all time but also the gold standard of the golden age if he played under such media scrutiny? Although it is impossible to compare players across historical generations in sports, it is certainly less likely.

Placing a Babe Ruth crisis in a modern-baseball context demonstrates how the contemporary communications environment in the sports industry has evolved over the course of baseball history. Ruth played in an era in which, despite his wildly careening off-the-field decisions, his...