Cobb himself wrote shortly before his death, "In legend I am a sadistic, slashing, swashbuckling despot who waged war in the guise of sport." He is widely regarded as the greatest baseball player of all time.
[22:11] <Seker> Ty Cobb.
[22:11] <Seker> A legend in his own right.
[22:11] <Seker> Honestly, I want to do an NS World Fair Lecture on Ty Cobb.
[22:12] <Seker> "In 1936 Cobb received the most votes of any player on the inaugural Baseball Hall of Fame ballot, receiving 222 out of a possible 226 votes."
[22:12] <Seker> Cobb's legacy as an athlete has sometimes been overshadowed by his surly temperament, racism, and aggressive playing style,[12] which was described by the Detroit Free Press as "daring to the point of dementia."
[22:14] <axis_of_evil> slashing things is good!
[22:14] <axis_of_evil> as is stabbing!
[22:14] <Seker> Cobb never had an easy time as husband and father. His children found him to be demanding, yet also capable of kindness and extreme warmth. He expected his sons to be exceptional athletes in general and baseball players in particular. Tyrus Raymond, Jr. flunked out of Princeton[97] (where he had played on the varsity tennis team), much to his father's dismay.[98][99] The elder Cobb subsequently traveled to the Princeton campus and beat his son with a whip to ensure against future academic failure.[98]
[22:14] <Seker> this man is literally
[22:14] <Seker> the most absurd figure ever
[22:14] <Sev> The Pharaoh is dead, long live the Pharaoh
[22:14] <Cormac> lol Sev
[22:14] <Seker> his son then went to Yale
[22:14] <Seker> was expelled
[22:15] <Seker> and he whipped him *again*
[22:16] <Seker> Llamas: He once beat up a heckler.
[22:16] <Seker> During a game.
[22:16] <Cormac> I saw. It was slightly gross.
[22:16] <Cormac>
[22:16] <Seker> And the heckler didn't have arms.
[22:16] <Seker>
[22:16] <Cormac> The blood, not the beating up the heckler.
[22:17] <Seker> He was in the US Chemical Warfare Corps during WWI and his job as a Captain in the Gas and Flame division was to expose recruits to gas chambers to prepare them for the front lines.
[22:18] == TimAFK has changed nick to Tim
[22:18] <Seker> ...he once stabbed an elevator operator because he was "uppity".
[22:18] <Sev> http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... 6_crop.jpg
[22:19] <Sev> You can see the... whateveritis in his eyes
[22:19] <Seker> you really can
[22:20] <Seker> ...his mother shot and killed his father in a reported "accident"
[22:20] <Seker> or was acquitted, rather
[22:20] <Sev> lol
[22:20] <Seker> He then tried out for the Anniston Steelers of the semipro Tennessee-Alabama League, with his father's stern admonition ringing in his ears: "Don't come home a failure!
[22:21] <Sev> "Cobb did everything better than anyone ever. He hit better than anyone for more base hits and a higher average. He scored runs better than anyone. He stole home better than anyone. He could also hate better than anyone. He hated everyone. He was overflowing with that emotion. He withheld a certain type of hate for pitchers. They were the enemy. He would stare them down as he walked toward the plate. Glare at them. Scowl. He would
[22:21] <Sev> tell himself "this poor son of a bitch has to face the great Ty Cobb." Then he would do what he wanted."
[22:21] <Seker> He hated everyone
[22:21] <Seker> LOL
[22:21] <Seker> LOOOOL
[22:21] <Sev> From: http://baseballeras.blogspot.com/2013/1 ... ycobb.html
[22:21] <Seker> it's hilarious because this seems like a character, not a real person
[22:22] <Seker> . As described in Smithsonian Magazine, "In 1907 during spring training in Augusta, Georgia, a black groundskeeper named Bungy, whom Cobb had known for years, attempted to shake Cobb’s hand or pat him on the shoulder."[18] The "overly familiar greeting infuriated" Cobb, who attacked Bungy. When Bungy's wife tried to defend him, Cobb choked her
[22:22] <Sev> LOL
[22:23] <Llamas> ...
[22:23] <Sev> That's it... I have to find a biography on him and read it.
[22:23] <Llamas> The fact that you find this funny is disturbing.
[22:23] <Seker> "Cobb had no friends. The people that he called friends were usually more business associates than friends. They really didn't like him. He had few reasons to smile and he could care less."
[22:23] <Sev> Llamas... it's funny in that "there's no way this is true"
[22:23] <Seker> ^
[22:23] <Seker> it's not funny that he choked a woman
[22:23] <Seker> it's funny that he is so outlandish
[22:23] <Seker> He was the top paid athlete in America at one point.
[22:24] <Seker> While all of this was public.
[22:24] <Seker> Imagine that now.
[22:24] <Sev> Like... how would this go over today?
[22:24] <Sev> Yeah
[22:24] <Seker> Like, he was openly fighting amputees during ballgames, while making modern day millions, and no one could do anything about it because he was Ty Cobb.
[22:24] <Seker> They suspended him once.
[22:24] <Seker> But then they realized that you can't suspend Ty Cobb.
[22:24] <Seker> and they lifted it
[22:24] <Sev>
<-- Check that out[22:24] <Seker> LOOOOL
[22:25] == Andre|wachinamovie has changed nick to Andre|WatchinAMovie
[22:25] <Sev> ikr
[22:25] <Seker> that's literally a jumpkick to the nuts
[22:25] <Llamas> This guy sounds like the world's supreme douchebag
[22:26] <Llamas> in a close third after Cormac and Funk
[22:26] <Sev> wooooow
[22:26] <Cormac> ;c;
[22:26] <Cormac> Wait what am I saying
[22:26] <Cormac> that's the best compliment ever.
[22:26] <Andre|WatchinAMovie>
[22:26] * Llamas claps
[22:26] <Llamas> You're a douchebag in a good way.
[22:26] <Seker> Ty Cobb wrote newspaper articles telling people how good he was so that he would get signed by a MLB team.
[22:26] <Seker> When he still sucked.
[22:27] <Llamas> lol
[22:27] <Seker> He did it under tons of aliases.
[22:27] <Seker> to get noticed by scouts
[22:27] <Seker> rofl
[22:28] <Seker> He eventually returned to full form on the field, but his confrontations with his teammates continued, frequently concluding in vicious physical brutality on Cobb's part. With so many enemies, both real and imagined, he started a lifelong practice of keeping a loaded pistol nearby at all times.
[22:28] <Seker> ...
[22:28] <Seker> ARE YOU SERIOUS
[22:28] <Llamas> OK I've got to admit now that he's a bit funny
[22:30] <Seker> Imagine how Roger Goodell would take this on.
[22:31] <Sev> Hah
[22:32] <Seker> He was accused of deliberately sharpening his spikes with a knife to intimidate opposing infielders. Cobb occasionally denied such allegations, but in general he let them stand—they served too well the psychological warfare he practiced on the diamond. Whether or not he sharpened his spikes, Cobb felt no compunction about sliding into base with spikes high, deliberately colliding with a defender to dislodge the baseball.
[22:33] <Seker> In 1909, for example, Cobb's no-holds-barred play drew him into controversy at the height of a pennant race with the Philadelphia Athletics. Sliding into third, Cobb's spikes caused a small cut in the arm of Athletics third baseman Frank Baker. A fight was averted, but later in the game Cobb knocked over second baseman Eddie Collins. After the Tigers swept the series to take first place from Philadelphia, Connie Mack , the normally soft-spoken Athletics' owner, responded by calling Cobb the dirtiest player
[22:33] <Seker> player in the history of the game. As so often happened during his career, the notoriety Cobb gained from the incident only seemed to inspire him to better play. During that period, he hit at a .640 pace and stole one base or more per game. By the end of the season he had racked up an average of .377, hit 107 RBIs and nine home runs, and stolen 76 bases, leading the league in virtually every offensive category.
[22:33] <Seker> IDK if you guys know much about baseball.
[22:33] <Seker> But a .640 batting average is BEYOND insane.
[22:33] <Salaxalans> One of those cut off
[22:33] <Salaxalans> "Connie Mack , the normally sof"
[22:34] <Seker> soft-spoken Athletics' owner, responded by calling Cobb the dirtiest player
[22:34] <Salaxalans> Ah
[22:34] <Seker> All-star baseball players hit for .300 usually.
[22:34] <Salaxalans> Yeah, .640 is a little crazy
[22:34] <Seker> No one has hit .400 in nearly 100 years now.
[22:34] <Sev> "When he died, just five months short of his 75th birthday, he still swore he could hit .300 against the pitchers at that time."
[22:35] <Sev> lol this guy
[22:35] <Seker> Cobb is less a traditional baseball movie than a compelling character study of a man who happened to be both the greatest baseball player in history and a monster of epic proportions
[22:39] <Seker> At the end of the sixth inning, after being challenged by teammates Sam Crawford and Jim Delahanty to do something about it, Cobb climbed into the stands and attacked Lueker, who it turns out was handicapped (he had lost all of one hand and three fingers on his other hand in an industrial accident). When onlookers shouted at him to stop because the man had no hands, he reportedly retorted, "I don't care if he got no feet!"
[22:40] <Seker> Cobb, during his career, was involved in numerous other fights, both on and off the field, and several profanity-laced shouting matches. For example, Cobb and umpire Billy Evans arranged to settle their in-game differences through fisticuffs under the grandstand after the game. Members of both teams were spectators, and broke up the scuffle after Cobb had knocked Evans down, pinned him and began choking him.
[22:41] <Sev> this just gets more and more surreal
[22:42] <Seker> As Ruth's popularity grew, Cobb became increasingly hostile toward him. He saw the Babe not only as a threat to his style of play, but also to his style of life. While Cobb preached ascetic self-denial, Ruth gorged on hot dogs, beer and women
[22:42] <Seker> After enduring several years of seeing his fame and notoriety usurped by Ruth, Cobb decided that he was going to show that swinging for the fences was no challenge for a top hitter. On May 5, 1925, he began a two-game hitting spree better than any even Ruth had unleashed. Sitting in the Tiger dugout, he told a reporter that, for the first time in his career, he was going to swing for the fences. That day, he went 6 for 6, with two singles, a double and three home runs
[22:42] == Vac|store has changed nick to Vac
[22:43] <Salaxalans> "6 for 6, with two sing"
[22:43] <Salaxalans> cut off there
[22:43] <Seker> The next day he had three more hits, two of which were home runs. Cobb wanted to show that he could hit home runs when he wanted, but simply chose not to do so. At the end of the series, the 38-year-old veteran superstar had gone 12 for 19 with 29 total bases and then went happily back to his usual bunting and hitting-and-running.
[22:43] <Seker> two singles, a double and three home runs Salaxalans @
[22:44] <Salaxalans> That’s nuts
[22:45] <Seker> After Johnson hit Detroit's Ossie Vitt with a pitch in August 1915, seriously injuring him, Cobb realized that Johnson was fearful of hitting opponents. He used this knowledge to his advantage by standing closer to the plate
[22:46] <Seker> Cobb's competitive fires continued to burn after retirement. In 1941, he faced Babe Ruth in a series of charity golf matches at courses outside New York, Boston and Detroit and won two out of three. At the 1947 Old Timers' Game in Yankee Stadium, he warned catcher Benny Bengough to move back, claiming he was rusty and hadn't swung a bat in almost 20 years. Bengough accordingly stepped back to avoid being struck by Cobb's backswing. Having repositioned the catcher, Cobb cannily laid down a perfect bunt in fr
[22:47] <Seker> Having repositioned the catcher, Cobb cannily laid down a perfect bunt in front of the plate and easily beat the throw from a surprised Bengough
[22:47] <Seker> that's hilarious
[22:47] <Sev> lol
[22:48] <Salaxalans>
[22:52] <Seker> yo wtf
[22:52] <Seker> Right after that, he developed a bad case of tonsillitis, and had his tonsils removed, without anesthetic, by a physician who the next year, was committed to an insane asylum. Then back to his team.
[22:56] <Sev> haha
[22:56] <Vac> lol
[22:56] <Seker> "Ty Cobb was still fighting the Civil War, and as far as he was concerned, we were all damn Yankees." - Sam Crawford
[22:57] <Seker> Ty Cobb was born in a farming community called "The Narrows". There was and is no community in Georgia actually called "Narrows". The area was called "The Narrows" because it lay in an area where the valley narrowed near a river or stream. There were roughly a dozen homes or homesteads in that small area.
[22:58] <Seker> (regarding Cobb beating an amputee during a game) American League President Ban Johnson was appalled when he heard about the incident and suspended Cobb indefinitely.
[22:58] <Seker> Fearful that the season would turn into a farce, Johnson relented and reduced Cobb's suspension to 10 days.
[23:00] <Seker> on the way to the park in Detroit one day, Cobb was attacked by a couple of men. He fought them off and chased them away. He caught one and beat him into such a bloody pulp that the man's face was impossible to distinguish and he was having trouble breathing. Cobb went to the park, and, despite a knife wound in the back, played that game and got a few hits.
[23:01] <Seker> He was famously known for refusing autograph requests (the story usually told is that if the autograph seekers sent him a self-addressed stamped envelope, he would steam off the stamp to re-use it and throw the envelope away) and turning back any admirers who wanted to pay hommage or meet him.
