Sitting at a blackjack table inside the Chumash Casino, Alex realized by winning his next hand he could pay for a semester of his son’s tuition. He was up, way up, the perfect time to walk away. But ever since injury ended his career in 2020 he was cursed with the urge to win at all costs. He went all in, doubling down on a seven. The dealer pulled a ten of spades and a five of clubs. Alex went bust.

George looked down into her wounded blue eyes and told her how much he loved her, repeating how sorry he was for sleeping with their best friend’s daughter. She forgave him, again, but the hollow feeling of despair would hang over their marriage like a fog of bitter tea.

With his grandson playing in the living room upstairs, Jose was standing on the edge of a chair in his basement, a noose around his neck. He only thought about the cheating for a moment. What tormented him most wasn’t the permanent guilt, but the years of relentless shame. He had slowly convinced himself he was no longer worthy of being alive. The chair tipped over.

Yes, MLB should have punished the implicated players with a suspension. Twenty games would have been nice, ten would have been fine. By not directly holding them accountable for their actions they have left these players in the hysterical hands of the mob, a punishment far more severe, even in light of the empty stadiums.

Baseball is a game. It is sold and accepted as entertainment. Inextricably tied to bulging corporate profits, cheating is only one of the venal standbys that plagues the modern game. Fans expect and look forward to unsavory plot points as requisite scenes in the aptly named Show. We also get attempted murder, childish indignation, moldy peanuts, and mesmerizing analytics. Under corporate cover the mandated facade of so called manly decency safeguards an unwritten and outdated code of honor. Our ignoble pastime plays on.

The responsibility to punish these players rests with the league, not the players or fans. By failing to direct our anger at the top, fans succumb to the bad scene that takes our money in exchange for catering to our baser instincts. We will gladly exchange legal tender for a beloved distraction, but we deserve to know our product at least aspires to a higher standard.

During a time of national loss and transformation, a time when kindness and emotional intimacy flickers like a candle in the dark, the sporting public reacts by taking part in mob hatred, which the sporting press in turn endorses as good clean fun? I’m referring to the “2020 Astros Shame Tour” twitter account with 300,000 followers and the NY Times article lending credence to the cause.

When we equate emotional violence with fun, what happens? Will one of these players be so hounded by shame their OPS drops to .600, forcing them to retire in disgrace? Will years down the road they take their own life because they can’t recover? Everybody is within at least a few degrees of separation from a suicide. All of us have asked ourselves why.

We have proof of at least one reason why. Hatred from a mob comprised of thousands of fallible individuals directed at one fallible individual, be they famous or anonymous, an individual who made a public mistake, can drive said individual to the extremes of psychic pain. Perhaps, god willing, they forego the nuclear option, but any number of social ills – from depression to addiction – takes root in similar soil.

We mistake and equate the spectacle and simulacra of baseball with the more important – and real – aspects of honorable American life. In real life, depending on your morality, real honor is at stake. In real life, depending on your choices, real self worth is at stake. In real life, real love is waiting if you balance self interest with devotion towards others. Baseball is not real life. It is a game. Nothing is at stake except a win or a loss. It is a show put on by vulnerable people who want money from vulnerable people who need a reprieve, sinners all of us no less, but no worse than those of us who cry malfeasance when the facade breaks.

But baseball, despite itself, is good enough and important enough to warrant our love, respect, and demands for decorum. A symbolic proxy of American society that needs just as much tending and change. Above all, much like our culture, it deserves less violence. Less violence from the fans towards the players. Less violence from the players towards each other. Less acceptance of milquetoast accountability from the league.

The intentional throwing of 100 mph fastballs behind the heads of hitters – I’m looking at you Joe Kelly – is essentially attempted manslaughter. Indeed, better angels abound in 2020 – I’m looking at you Stephen Pinker – but demons still walk among us in professional sports – I’m looking at you mob shaming – whispering insidious nothings to the malnourished and unseen.

Taking up the mantle of shame against those who have cheated at a game – something we have all done – something that is inherent to human nature – a byproduct of evolution and social clans – is a careless act of violence that leads to mutual suffering. No, we shouldn’t cheat at games, although it is arguably only important not to cheat at life – jobs, the law, college admissions, vaccine hoarding, etc. But yes, the catharsis experienced by the twitter mob of 300,000 might feel good and just, but it stokes anger, victimization, and grievance. All poisonous love killers against the loving forgiveness of patience, acceptance, and grace.

Does baseball fairness even exist when teams like the Dodgers and Yankees have payrolls in excess of 400% higher than teams like the Pirates and Orioles? We are righteous about something that doesn’t even exist in the first place. That doesn’t mean baseball should abandon efforts to maximize fun, competition, and objective fairness – fluid within the societal changes that keep pace with emerging values – but the reality of its limitations serves a reminder that if you put too much time and faith into a mere game – the players aren’t the only one’s getting played.

Which brings us back to the central problem of not punishing the players. As problematically symbolic as baseball may be, it will forever remain so. As such, punishment needs to be meted out to all guilty parties. Just like it did when we were kids and we cheated on a test. Or when we were middle age white collar criminals serving our two months for skimming off the top. Or when we were elderly and alone because our inability to change made us cruel and blind to the racism guiding our hate.

Accountability never stops, and it is the responsibility of everyone, rich and poor, ugly and beautiful, athletic and clumsy, smart and stupid, to own up to our mistakes. With baseball, that means having the compassion and integrity to make the guilty do the time. Failing that, we sacrifice the claim that effective deterrents remain in place against the spectacle.

Public shaming is a twisted outgrowth of online virtue signaling. The creator of the aforementioned twitter account was quoted as, “finding people who feel the same way is really cool.” According to the NY Times, the daily dose of mockery and sarcasm is intended to remind the Astros players of their transgressions. By endorsing or participating in this behavior, we elevate grievance culture within the identity chamber, the place where mental illness goes to breed and individual accountability goes to die.