Tommas Deever, Ed Duffy, and William Wandsley hold the distinction of being the first three

men banned from baseball.

They were accused of being associated with gamblers while playing for the New York Mutuals

in 1865, but they were all reinstated within a few years.

The dubious honor of being the first man banned for life goes to George Bechtel, who conspired

with teammates to lose a game for $500.

That was in 1876, when he played for the Louisville Grey's.

One year later, four of his teammates joined him on the list of players banned for life.

The 1877 Louisville Grey's scandal was the first major gambling scandal in baseball history,

but it was far from the last.

Forty years later, arguably the most infamous scandal in American sports history rocked

organized baseball.

It led to sweeping changes within the framework of the game and ultimately led to the banishment

of two of the greatest hitters to ever play the sport.

Joe Jackson and Pete Rose.

They are still excluded from the Hall of Fame to this day.

This is the true story of the 1919 Chicago White Sox and a conspiracy by a group of players

to lose the World Series.

Those players were banned from the game they loved, and today they're known simply as

the Black Sox.

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