Talk:1912 suspension of Ty Cobb

Problem with source

Alexander, Charles (1984). Ty Cobb. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-8032-6359-8.

The ISBN references My Life in Baseball: The True Record by Ty Cobb and Al Stump. The references through the whole of the article reference pages such as 436, 825, 827–832, 832–833, and 857. However, archive.org reports the book by Alexander to only have 316 pages. https://archive.org/details/tycobb0000alex/

My Life in Baseball also only has 315 pages according to Goodreads. I'm not sure where the information is coming from.

The reason I wanted to check the source is that the article characterization of Cobb "had a reputation as mild-mannered" seems at odds with many articles and books about Ty Cobb. For example "The Knife in Ty Cobb’s Back" by Gilbert King, Smithsonian Magazine calls him "fiery, belligerent, mean-tempered and capable of violence." Or "their tempestuous teammate" in Ty Cobb, The Greatest by Robert Rubin, p. 103.

Borrow is unavailable on archive.org for Ty Cobb by Alexander, but the word "mild" in there only four times. Only once about his reputation in a passage on page 40.

Lonely, bitter, no longer trusting anybody, Cobb started carrying a pistol and sleeping with it close at hand. "I was just a mild-mannered Sunday School boy," he said many years later about that period. "But those oldtimers turned me into a snarling wildcat."

What is going on here? 🌿MtBotany (talk) 16:16, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

The books you speak of, I worked from the e-Book editions, which have different paginations. Cobb is not described as mild in this article, that was Cy Young. Wehwalt (talk) 16:20, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for the response. Since you were using an e-Book edition I think it may be good to remove the link to archive.org to reduce confusion and use the ISBN of the e-Book since it currently is confused with another title. 🌿MtBotany (talk) 18:36, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Inflation between 1912 and 2023

In one place $50 in 1912 is mentioned to be like $1,600 2023. Why is then the $5,000 fine in 1912 mentioned to be like $114,000 in 2023? It should be like $160 000 instead. Calle Widmann (talk) 17:06, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Because the people who keep adding inflation templates to articles aren't being careful about being consistent Wehwalt (talk) 17:19, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

@Calle Widmann: I used the standard "US" CPI-based multiplier for the $50 fine since (by today's standards, anyway) it's within typical pocket money amounts. For the $5,000 fine, I used "US-GDP" (fraction of GDP multiplied) as we are advised to do for large amounts of money that aren't typically carried around and spent since inflation affects capital costs differently than it does everyday bread-and-butter prices. Daniel Case (talk) 21:08, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you! Calle Widmann (talk) 21:11, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Cobb's racial attitudes

"A native of Georgia, he had the racial attitudes of many whites of his state at the time, although in later life, he expressed support for the integration of baseball" is unnecessarily indirect. The hyperlink to the article on Jim Crow reveals nothing about Cobb's personal views. While these views aren't the topic of this article, they're certainly material: Cobb had a reputation for violence, and the source cited here is explicit that many of his most well-known acts of violence were directed at African-Americans. Why deflect from the centrality of prejudice to these incidents? 35.1.7.216 (talk) 19:23, 24 July 2024 (UTC)