A while back, I said I would do posts about Lou, the baseball player, because I think it is sad that he got a disease named after him. There was so much more to him than the way he died. Here is a quote from him that I find interesting:
“Lets face it. I’m not a headline guy. I always knew that as long as I was following Babe to the plate I could have gone up there and stood on my head. No one would have noticed the difference. When the Babe was through swinging, whether he hit one or fanned, nobody paid any attention to the next hitter. They all were talking about what the Babe had done.”
I guess it would have been difficult to be a baseball player in Babe’s day, if you did not want to melt into the background. I think it would have been awesome if Lou would have tried standing on his head.
acilius
believer1
lefalcon
losthunderlads
vthunderlad
Panther Red 
acilius
/ February 10, 2010Yes, that would have been something.
vthunderlad
/ February 11, 2010Definitely it’s a shame to associate a disease’s name with a person’s legacy so closely. Someone must have thought that was wise at the time (maybe for raising awareness) but it’s a mistake.
Thinking about fame and athletes, I wonder if Gehrig and others before, say, 1970, were more or less famous than similar stars today. Just in a general sense: were people more involved with sports and their sports idols?
I have the impression that there were fewer sports and athletes known nationwide, since TV and radio were more limited than all of today’s outlets. So giant athletes of 50 years ago were probably “more famous” than any given sports hero is today.
There are exceptions, for sure. There are stars today who are global phenomena – Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, Rubens Barrichello, are names that’d be understood all over the place.
OK, maybe Formula 1 racing stars like Rubens aren’t household names – but I’m still interested in this whole topic. In 50 more years, how many athletes in our unlimited-channel universe will be so famous as Gehrig, or Jordan?