Curt Schilling's first season in Boston was 2004, and he went 21-6 with a 3.29 ERA in the regular season and 3-1 with a 3.57 ERA (and one bloody sock) in the playoffs as the Red Sox won their first World Series since 1918.
Three seasons later a 40-year-old Schilling went 3-0 with a 3.00 ERA in the playoffs as the Red Sox won another title. Normally that type of performance from a Hall of Fame-caliber player in a baseball-obsessed, championship-starved place earns someone key-to-the-city status for life. But apparently politics outweigh baseball, even in Boston.
Schilling, who's a Republican, has made noise recently about possibly running for public office at some point, so a new poll in Democrat-heavy Massachusetts asked, "Is your opinion of Curt Schilling generally favorable or generally unfavorable?" As Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com notes, 39 percent of respondents answered "unfavorable" and another 12 percent had never even heard of Schilling.
Meanwhile, just 29 percent replied "favorable." Now don't get me wrong, people caring about something more than fame when it comes to choosing politicians is a very positive thing. However, as someone who lives in a state where Jesse Ventura was elected governor more or less for being famous 20 years earlier in a fake sport the Schilling data shocks me.
He could be Ted Williams and if he was Republican the state of Massachusetts wouldn't elect him to golden boy's seat of Ted Kennedy.
He is a fraud & a know it all, thinks he is better than anyone else & sold out to the highest bidder every time, why would he have a high approval?
All it shows me is that people still know how to separate politics from entertainment. Amazing, really.
Kurt publicly supported Bush over Kerry in 2004. Not a good way to endear yourself to Mass. voters, not to mention that anyone who voted for Bush in 2004 is an idiot.
Curt Schilling ultimatey has two things going against him: 1. he is
a republican in the bluest of blue states. and 2. a number of
people believe he signed his last contract after he knew
he was injured.
I lived in Minnesota in the late nineties. Jessie Ventura wasn't that popular. He won 37% of the vote in a three-way race, yes, 63% of the people knew he was a laughing stock. Schilling would actually be an improvement over that disaster, but he would never, evvvvvvvverrr get my vote.
If he runs for anything anywhwere in this country I am going to move whereever that is and establish residence for the sole purpose of casting my vote for his opponent.
I second the "All it shows me is that people still know how to separate politics from entertainment. Amazing, really." I am heartened to see that people can say "he throws a hell of a game, and can play through pain (which is not the same as "courage", despite what everyone wrote at the time of the bloody sock), but he's still a combative blowhard."
Curt Shilling should stick to baseball. Maybe he can make it as a pitching coach somewhere. It offended me terrifically when, in the middle of the election campaign, he came out for George Bush in a big way. I rooted against him from that moment on. He has a very high opinion of himself and likes to be in the limelight, typical politicians' traits. But if he wants to run for anything, he had better get out of Massachusetts. They know a loser (in politics) when they smell one.
Shilling is a creep. I wouldn't be surprised to find out the blood on the sock was fake as he is. He needs to just go away.
But that Obama 08 vote- well that's just the business.
By the way anyone who would have wanted FrankenKerry as president is a freaking moron.
Bravo, GWB was a very, very, very bad president, and is not even a particularly nice person, either. Anyone would have been a better president than Bush. You, me, Al Gore, John Kerry. Vladimir Putin would have been a better president than GWB. If you voted for Bush in 2000, you are an idiot. If you voted for Bush in 2000 and 2004, you are a freaking idiot. If you voted for Bush in 2000, 2004, and still think that was the right thing to do, you are colossal moron.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Politicians/Bush_accomplishments.html