The resurrection and advancement of convicted, incarcerated criminal Craig Carton offers conspicuous proof that anyone can be forgiven.
Well, almost anyone. And for almost anything.
Certain sins, real or imagined, can never be forgiven or forgotten. There’s no coming back from them. Even if the accused broke no law or is abundantly innocent, he will be sentenced to life.
Carton, on the other hand, spent a year in prison and was ordered to pay $4.8 million in restitution for defrauding clients and blowing a fortune on a gambling habit.
Last week, Carton announced that he will soon reside on Fox’s FS1 as a fully national TV and radio figure. His WFAN days will be ending as his career has not only been retrieved, it has been, for better or worse, considerably improved — depending on taste and modern standards of public discourse and forgiveness.
And good for him. I’ve long maintained he doesn’t need the raunch and silly name-calling to be a popular talk-show host. He could rely strictly on his better side and quick wit to be as successful.
But he can’t dare risk it. The modern broadcast media code demands raunch, easy name-calling and even obligatory defamation over clean and clever discourse. What better way to attract and sustain the socially deprived?
Besides, FS1 hired him, so why try to convince him that he’s going about it the wrong way? He knows the not-so secret formula, even if it leaves the world in a lower place.
Others in broadcasting have paid far greater prices for far lesser misconduct, even if the misconduct seems minor, unintended or even nonexistent. It depends on the targets, real or imagined.
Among those deemed unforgivable and sentenced to a life of ignominy, are Grant Napear.
For more than 30 years, he was the voice of the NBA’s Kings. Then, in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd, Black Lives Matter demonstrations and looting, he was baited by former Kings center DeMarcus Cousins, a disreputable man on and off the court.
When Napear responded to Cousins’ tweet of “what’s your take on BLM?” with, “ALL LIVES MATTER…EVERY SINGLE ONE!!!” Napear was fired for racial insensitivity. Branded a racist, he’s done. He’s suing, but his reputation has been recklessly destroyed.
Then there’s Thom Brennaman, son of beloved Reds voice Marty Brennaman. A Fox regular and reliable play-by-play man, the younger Brennman thought he was off-air when he was heard speaking a slur for homosexuals. Caught and guilty as charged, Brennaman apologized profusely and convincingly. He seemed ashamed of himself. No matter, he lost all his gigs. That was three years ago. He’s still on the “Pariah, Don’t Approach List.”
It’s time Brennaman was allowed up, allowed to work in an industry in which he well served sports fans except for one, fleeting, unintended, but “gotcha!” moment.
Doug Adler you likely know about. The veteran ESPN tennis analyst, who volunteered to coach tennis for poor, black Washington kids, was summarily fired as a racist for supposedly calling Venus Williams “a gorilla” when he most certainly and clearly did not. He was complimenting her for using whet he termed “the guerrilla effect.” That was in 2017. Adler’s life, his career and reputation have been destroyed over a lie. Lucky man, that Craig Carton.
In 2019, 22-year University of Iowa basketball voice Gary Dolphin was “suspended indefinitely” for complimenting a black Maryland center for controlling the boards like “King Kong.” He’d never before said anything racist or he wouldn’t have been 22 years the basketball and football teams’ voice, and his backers claimed his comment wasn’t racist but flattery. Yet “racist” is now on his permanent record.
In other words, all of the above noted broadcasters couldn’t have done any worse had they been convicted of a multimillion-dollar ticket business fraud to help feed a gambling addiction, then sentenced to prison time, then released to improve on their previous vocation.
And why exclude George Steinbrenner? First, he was suspended from baseball after two felony convictions: trying to buy influence in the Nixon White House, then for ordering his employees to lie to investigators about it.
The other suspension was for paying off a pathetic, delusional, mentally impaired Howard Spira, to deliver defamatory goods on Dave Winfield.
Eventually, however, Steinbrenner was resurrected, chosen as a member of the board of directors of the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Can’t begrudge Craig Carton for being a lucky man. Great country he lives in … indivisible with liberty and justice for some.
Reader Len Geller reminds us that it was nearly 50 years ago — June 14, 1974 — when the Red Sox lost to the Angels, 4-3, in 15 innings.
In that one, Nolan Ryan went 13 inning for the Angels, throwing at least 250 pitches (there were no official pitch counts then). Boston’s Luis Tiant, the “loser,” went all 15 innings.
And now we skip ahead to this past Wednesday, June 14, Yankees at Mets. The two starters, Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole, being paid a combined $79 million this season, were removed after six innings each, having allowed one run apiece.
And on ESPN, among other media, we were told that we just witnessed a modern pitching classic. And that’s pretty close to the modern truth.
Anything even a tick above the ordinary is now classified as extraordinary.
All-Or-Nothing Stats of the Week: Diamondbacks DH Lourdes Gurriel, in a 5-4 loss to the Phillies, batted four times. He struck out four times.
Perused all four MLB box scores from that appeared on Page 40 in Friday’s Metro edition of The Post. Each had at least 20 strikeouts. From a total of 72 ¹/₂ innings, 38 pitchers struck out 92 batters.
Perhaps the excessive prattle in Fox’s both with Joe Davis and John Smoltz would be easier on the central baseball nervous system if they spent far less time talking and more time paying attention to the game in front of them.
On June 10, the Yankees took a 3-1 lead on the Red Sox when Kyle Hagashioka hit one up the middle that was deflected into the outfield. Hagashioka was able to take second base when the throw home skipped past catcher Reese McGuire. Hagashioka could’ve crawled to second, as pitcher Josh Winckowski didn’t bother to back up the plate.
Neither Davis nor Smoltz (the latter of whom can identify a four-seam fastball from 100 yards), with a detailed examination to follow, said a thing about what was nearly impossible to miss.
ESPN continues to report that Britney Griner was “wrongfully detained” by Russian authorities. No, she was arrested for indisputably violating Russia’s drug laws, but then sentenced to an incredibly harsh nine years in prison.
Ed Randall’s “Fans for the Cure” to detect and treat prostate cancer, will host Roy White at a book signing June 28, 5:30-8:30 p.m., at the Capital Grille in Midtown, on 42nd Street. Details: info@fansforthecure.org.
Reader Pete Kruimer: “The NBA is the only sport where players intentionally move as far away as they can from the goal in an attempt to score.”