Saturday Edition
The Way It Is: HBO’s The Curious Case Of Curt Flood
by Nasir Muhammad & Stephane Dunn | special to NewBlackMan
HBO’s project was long overdue and an exciting prospect – an overview of Curt Flood’s life and exploration of the historic stand he launched against Major League Baseball’s reserve clause in 1969. While the documentary introduces Flood and his infamous suit against baseball to those who are unfamiliar and tries to fill in some blanks about what led to it, The Curious Case of Curt Flood condenses a complex personality and history so much that it distorts some essential details about Flood’s long struggle for players’ rights in MLB. It also commits a serious error in steering clear from dealing with the ‘elephant’ that remains in the room when it comes to Curt Flood’s legacy in MLB history: Despite free agency’s defining role in contemporary MLB, the league is still uneasy about Curt Flood’s challenge to the hierarchy of America’s Pastime - so uneasy that the respect that Flood really deserves as a player and a trailblazer in the Civil Rights struggles of the time continues to be denied.
MLB’s measure of legacy is integrally tied to election into hallowed historic ground, the Baseball Hall of Fame. So far, Flood has not been so honored. Through a select array of photographs and video clips that offer a close-up primarily of Flood at his worst, the documentary mostly presents a strikingly sad portrait of a man headed for self-destruction. Curious Case raises the issue of Flood’s legacy but doesn’t really go there, preferring instead to overshadow and fill in the more significant aspects of Flood’s challenge to the power status quo with sensationalist gossip about his legitimacy as an artist, financial troubles, and a demon [alcoholism] he shared with a long line of sports greats, including Babe Ruth.
The problem with HBO’s effort begins with it’s obvious over reliance on one dominant source, Brad Snyder and his book on Curt Flood, A Well-Paid Slave: Curt Flood’s Fight For Free Agency. What’s curious is the documentary’s neglect of Flood’s own thoughtful examination of his journey to suing MLB, The Way It Is (1970), an autobiography published during the time period encompassing his suit. While the documentary smatters in Flood quotes from interviews and some of his most frequently used statements, Flood’s very detailed take on his experiences and opinions about the inner workings of MLB in The Way It Is hardly appear and the book is generally invisible save for widow Judy Flood’s liberal borrowing from the text to inform some of her comments.
Missing too is mention of such key defining relationships as Flood’s extraordinary relationship with Johnny and Marian Jorgensen, a white couple, who became family to Flood and his brother Carl. Marian came to live with him some time after Johnny’s brutal murder and basically took care of Flood, his home, and affairs during some of his roughest times. In relying overly on Snyder and Flood’s widow, who became his wife in his later years, the documentary suffers in not putting into context enough how Flood’s experience with owners’ tyrannical mistreatment of players generally and the racial discrimination that confronted black players helped lead to his resolve to resist the reserve clause despite being a major, well-paid star. For example, the documentary fails to accurately connect Flood’s support of players’ collective efforts to improve players’ lot with the fall out that led to owner August A. Busch’s trading of Flood.
Much is made of the ’68 World Series loss attributed to Flood; Snyder offers this and Flood’s demand for more money as Busch’s main motivation. However, Busch’s anger with his “favorite” player was most certainly tied as well to Curt acting in concert with other players in the MLB Players Association in ’69 against owners efforts to in his words “sever the traditional link between the pension fund” and money from radio and television. According to Flood, the players refused to sign their contracts until the owners agreed to better pensions for players and key Cardinal players, among them Lou Brock, Tim McCarver, Bob Gibson, and Flood demanded substantial salary increases. This incensed Busch, who blasted his players at a public meeting with media present.
Toward its conclusion, the documentary chooses to focus heavily on Flood’s personal downward spiral into alcoholism and the tragic portrait he presented of his former self. It ends by concentrating on his journey back into living a functional life and fashions a sort of triumphant recognition of his historic stand before his death from cancer in 1997. The documentary offers those watching who don’t know much about Flood a deceptive reason to feel moved and ultimately good about the seeming respect it suggests he finally received. Yet, the absence of two of the greatest living legendary baseball players, Hank Aaron and Willie Mays, and the current commissioner of MLB suggests the truth. The scorching Philadelphia Daily News review of sportswriter Stan Hochman, who was interviewed for the documentary but whose insights do not appear at all, isn’t too off base in summing up the E’ Hollywood like treatment of Flood:
The courageous athlete who dared to challenge an unfair system is depicted as an alcoholic, a womanizer, a woeful husband, a dreadful father, a lousy businessman and a fraud who never really painted those portraits he churned out that enhanced his image as an artist . . . .In the history of warts-and-all biographies, this one slithers near the top of the list.
Curt Flood’s historic Christmas Eve letter to Commissioner Bowie Kuhn is in the Baseball Hall of Fame Museum, but Flood is not in the Hall of Fame. This fall, the Baseball Writers Association has the power to select Flood as one of ten players to appear on the Golden Era ballot where that sixteen member committee can finally genuinely welcome Flood back into MLB. The documentary raises the issue of Flood’s legacy but it shies away from probing two vital questions critical to a film presuming to treat this major chapter in Flood’s and baseball’s history: Is MLB ready to reconcile its important history with Curt Flood and do the right thing? Or will the silent punishment of Curt Flood be allowed to continue?
MLB’s measure of legacy is integrally tied to election into hallowed historic ground, the Baseball Hall of Fame. So far, Flood has not been so honored. Through a select array of photographs and video clips that offer a close-up primarily of Flood at his worst, the documentary mostly presents a strikingly sad portrait of a man headed for self-destruction. Curious Case raises the issue of Flood’s legacy but doesn’t really go there, preferring instead to overshadow and fill in the more significant aspects of Flood’s challenge to the power status quo with sensationalist gossip about his legitimacy as an artist, financial troubles, and a demon [alcoholism] he shared with a long line of sports greats, including Babe Ruth.
The problem with HBO’s effort begins with it’s obvious over reliance on one dominant source, Brad Snyder and his book on Curt Flood, A Well-Paid Slave: Curt Flood’s Fight For Free Agency. What’s curious is the documentary’s neglect of Flood’s own thoughtful examination of his journey to suing MLB, The Way It Is (1970), an autobiography published during the time period encompassing his suit. While the documentary smatters in Flood quotes from interviews and some of his most frequently used statements, Flood’s very detailed take on his experiences and opinions about the inner workings of MLB in The Way It Is hardly appear and the book is generally invisible save for widow Judy Flood’s liberal borrowing from the text to inform some of her comments.
Missing too is mention of such key defining relationships as Flood’s extraordinary relationship with Johnny and Marian Jorgensen, a white couple, who became family to Flood and his brother Carl. Marian came to live with him some time after Johnny’s brutal murder and basically took care of Flood, his home, and affairs during some of his roughest times. In relying overly on Snyder and Flood’s widow, who became his wife in his later years, the documentary suffers in not putting into context enough how Flood’s experience with owners’ tyrannical mistreatment of players generally and the racial discrimination that confronted black players helped lead to his resolve to resist the reserve clause despite being a major, well-paid star. For example, the documentary fails to accurately connect Flood’s support of players’ collective efforts to improve players’ lot with the fall out that led to owner August A. Busch’s trading of Flood.
Much is made of the ’68 World Series loss attributed to Flood; Snyder offers this and Flood’s demand for more money as Busch’s main motivation. However, Busch’s anger with his “favorite” player was most certainly tied as well to Curt acting in concert with other players in the MLB Players Association in ’69 against owners efforts to in his words “sever the traditional link between the pension fund” and money from radio and television. According to Flood, the players refused to sign their contracts until the owners agreed to better pensions for players and key Cardinal players, among them Lou Brock, Tim McCarver, Bob Gibson, and Flood demanded substantial salary increases. This incensed Busch, who blasted his players at a public meeting with media present.
Toward its conclusion, the documentary chooses to focus heavily on Flood’s personal downward spiral into alcoholism and the tragic portrait he presented of his former self. It ends by concentrating on his journey back into living a functional life and fashions a sort of triumphant recognition of his historic stand before his death from cancer in 1997. The documentary offers those watching who don’t know much about Flood a deceptive reason to feel moved and ultimately good about the seeming respect it suggests he finally received. Yet, the absence of two of the greatest living legendary baseball players, Hank Aaron and Willie Mays, and the current commissioner of MLB suggests the truth. The scorching Philadelphia Daily News review of sportswriter Stan Hochman, who was interviewed for the documentary but whose insights do not appear at all, isn’t too off base in summing up the E’ Hollywood like treatment of Flood:
The courageous athlete who dared to challenge an unfair system is depicted as an alcoholic, a womanizer, a woeful husband, a dreadful father, a lousy businessman and a fraud who never really painted those portraits he churned out that enhanced his image as an artist . . . .In the history of warts-and-all biographies, this one slithers near the top of the list.
Curt Flood’s historic Christmas Eve letter to Commissioner Bowie Kuhn is in the Baseball Hall of Fame Museum, but Flood is not in the Hall of Fame. This fall, the Baseball Writers Association has the power to select Flood as one of ten players to appear on the Golden Era ballot where that sixteen member committee can finally genuinely welcome Flood back into MLB. The documentary raises the issue of Flood’s legacy but it shies away from probing two vital questions critical to a film presuming to treat this major chapter in Flood’s and baseball’s history: Is MLB ready to reconcile its important history with Curt Flood and do the right thing? Or will the silent punishment of Curt Flood be allowed to continue?
