What's To Be Done With Bill Conlin?

Let’s say these allegations had come out a year ago, before the voting for the 2011 Spink Award.

Would Conlin have been voted the award by the BBWAA under those circumstances? I think not. As you note, he’s currently “featured” at the Hall of Fame.

The speech he gave at the Hall last summer is done. It cannot be undone. But I do not think you and the other BBWAA voters would have given him this honor if you had known about these decades-old events before the voting.

It would seem to me that this honor is a slap in the face of those who were allegedly abused.

As I was writing this comment, I went back and forth like you apparently did, Rob. It’s not a black & white issue, but as of now, I’d lean toward taking this honor away.

Even after he lost that civil case to the Goldman family, and after all his more recent legal problems, he’s still in the football Hall.

Your suggestions make sense: Don’t retract Conlin’s award, but change the current display at Cooperstown.

Does anyone know if the statute of limitations applies to a civil case, as well? Could the victims bring a civil suit against Conlin, in which case testimony could be presented against, and in defense of, him?

I mean, on the one hand, it seems very likely that he molested seven children (now adults) and has just been given an award, and it looks incredibly bad. On the other hand, do we want to set that precedence? I mean, I think it’s Ty Cobb has been accused of killing a man. Should we take away his plaque? No, and I don’t think anyone has even thought about that. How do we know where to draw the line?

“…Ty Cobb has been accused of killing a man”??? You THINK? Do you think you might want to get your facts straight before you allege in print that you THINK someone may have killed someone else? Ty Cobb is often portrayed as a vicious, angry brawler and racist, but a killer? it was his MOTHER, not he, who killed a man; she defended her actions by saying that she believed the man she killed (Cobb’s father) was an intruder breaking into the house. I find it interesting and ironic that a commenter would raise such a point based on a complete misunderstanding of the known facts in order to defend someone who may or may not be guilty of the crimes of which he stands accused.

So Bill Conlin is being painted as a sexual predator by the victims he allegedly preyed upon decades ago. His reaction – insulting those accusers in an effort to portray them as unstable and unreliable, rather than directly refuting their charges – is typical of predators who have been exposed by the survivors of their predations. One accusation might leave some room for doubt, but seven? You’d have to believe that Conlin was himself the victim of a large and far-reaching conspiracy to discount the veracity of those seven claims – and that’s just the number so far. As with Jerry Sandusky’s ever-increasing cadre of accusers, those seven are probably the tip of the iceberg, because predators who use their status within a social or professional hierarchy to shield their depraved acts from any meaningful scrutiny have probably been committing their crimes with a fair degree of impunity for a long, long time.

Conlin is NOT a “Hall of Famer”; the bestowing of the Hall’s Spink Award upon him does not render him an inducted member of the Hall of Fame. Ty Cobb is a “Hall of Famer;” Conlin is merely a winner of an award for sports journalism. As such, I cannot even fathom that the Hall would countenance any further celebration or acknowledgment of his so-called achievement, and his image should be deleted from any exhibit or display there. And anyone who believes that a person’s private acts have nothing to do with his or her professional qualifications and accomplishments is living in a dream world. You can’t separate a person’s public and private acts; people are not the church and state, we are whole, integrated beings, and what each of us does when the lights and cameras are turned off is often far more revelatory of our true natures than what we do when we know someone else is watching. Conlin has been exposed for what he is, finally, and now he’s trying to wiggle out of his nasty predicament and downplay the seriousness of the charges against him by invoking some pretty standard tactics and canards. If the court of public opinion is all there is left to convict him, he’ll soon be getting an entirely justified “life sentence,” at least from me.

I think the Hall of Fame should have a big display dedicated to Conlin and in it they should mention the alleged claims so that everyone who enters will know that Bill Conlin is a child molester. If they have the information available, I would even include his address, home phone number and email.