February 17, 2006
Belle Arrested
Albert Belle is in jail:
Scottsdale police arrested former baseball star Albert Belle on Thursday on suspicion of stalking an ex-girlfriend.
Belle, who lives in Scottsdale, was taken into police custody at 10 a.m. and charged with felony stalking/harassment, police said.
I assume this is his mug shot. According to the report, Albert is accused of threatening to kill the woman.
First of all, if this proves to be true, I hope the woman takes measures to protect herself.
Second, it's always sad to see a great ballplayer end up in jail. When they're playing, I take a lot of the stories of bad behavior with a grain of salt. It's real easy to dislike someone as hyper-competitive as a major league ballplayer. But when the game is over, that competitiveness should moderate. Given this accusation, it looks like it didn't for Albert.
It didn't work out for the great Jim Brown, either. Male athletes are steeped in a tradition that rewards aggressiveness. It has to be hard to put that to rest upon retirement.
Given Belle's surly past, this seems more likely just to be his nature; (though Kirby Puckett had us all fooled.)
