Ban the Beanball, Says Torture Advocate

Harvard Law professor and torture enthusiast Alan Dershowitz ran nearly 700 words in today's Globe about the injustice of the beanball. Using the most recent beaning of ball magnet Kevin Youkilis as a case study, Dershowitz points out the obvious: a team that beans a great hitter—and enrages him to the point where he draws a five game suspension—actually benefits from the infraction. In the case of the Youkilis beaning, Youk sat out for five games, during which the Sox went 1-4, and the offending Tigers' pitcher, Rick Porcello, merely had his next scheduled start pushed back a game.

Dershowitz doesn't want to torture pitchers who bean batters—at least not without a warrant—but he does want to make the penalty for headhunting much harsher:

The minimum penalty for a manager must be suspension for an entire season, perhaps even for life. For the pitcher, suspension for the season should be mitigated only if the pitcher turned in the manager. There should also be penalties for any baseball player who hears the manager or coach order the beaning of a player without reporting it.

These aren't recommendations that, say, Ozzie Guillen or Josh Beckett will quickly endorse, and baseball fans like their beanballs as much as hockey fans like their haymakers. When batters like Youk, who has been hit by 10 pitches this season, get beaned at something other than random, it's clear that throwing at a batter is a strategy on the books. But with the high likelihood of serious injury from a beanball, is it a legitimate one? And, if not, what can be done to stop it?

Bostonist notes that in the National League, headhunting pitchers have to take their swing in the batter's box, just like everybody else. Perhaps American League pitchers who hit a batsman could courteously replace the DH for an at-bat or two.