title: Philip Larkin

text: Larkin's earliest work showed the influence of Eliot, Auden and Yeats, and the development of his mature poetic identity in the early 1950s coincided with the growing influence on him of Thomas Hardy. The "mature" Larkin style, first evident in "The Less Deceived", is "that of the detached, sometimes lugubrious, sometimes tender observer", who, in Hartley's phrase, looks at "ordinary people doing ordinary things". He disparaged poems that relied on "shared classical and literary allusions – what he called "the myth-kitty", and the poems are never cluttered with elaborate imagery." Larkin's mature poetic persona is notable for its "plainness and scepticism". Other recurrent features of his mature work are sudden openings and "highly-structured but flexible verse forms".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Terence Hawkes has argued that while most of the poems in "The North Ship" are "metaphoric in nature, heavily indebted to Yeats's symbolist lyrics", the subsequent development of Larkin's mature style is "not ... a movement from Yeats to Hardy, but rather a surrounding of the Yeatsian moment (the metaphor) within a Hardyesque frame". In Hawkes's view, "Larkin's poetry ... revolves around two losses": the "loss of modernism", which manifests itself as "the desire to find a moment of epiphany", and "the loss of England, or rather the loss of the British Empire, which requires England to define itself in its own terms when previously it could define 'Englishness' in opposition to something else."


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1972, Larkin wrote the oft-quoted "Going, Going", a poem which expresses a romantic fatalism in its view of England that was typical of his later years. In it he prophesies a complete destruction of the countryside, and expresses an idealised sense of national togetherness and identity: "And that will be England gone ... it will linger on in galleries; but all that remains for us will be concrete and tyres". The poem ends with the blunt statement, "I just think it will happen, soon."


title: Philip Larkin

text: Larkin's style is bound up with his recurring themes and subjects, which include death and fatalism, as in his final major poem "Aubade". Poet Andrew Motion observes of Larkin's poems: "their rage or contempt is always checked by the ... energy of their language and the satisfactions of their articulate formal control". Motion contrasts two aspects of his poetic personality—on the one hand, an enthusiasm for "symbolist moments" and "freely imaginative narratives", and on the other a "remorseless factuality" and "crudity of language". Motion defines this as a "life-enhancing struggle between opposites", and concludes that his poetry is typically "ambivalent": "His three mature collections have developed attitudes and styles of ... imaginative daring: in their prolonged debates with despair, they testify to wide sympathies, contain passages of frequently transcendent beauty, and demonstrate a poetic inclusiveness which is of immense consequence for his literary heirs."


title: Philip Larkin

text: Larkin was a critic of modernism in contemporary art and literature. His scepticism is at its most nuanced and illuminating in "Required Writing", a collection of his book reviews and essays, and at its most inflamed and polemical in his introduction to his collected jazz reviews, "All What Jazz", drawn from the 126 record-review columns he wrote for "The Daily Telegraph" between 1961 and 1971, which contains an attack on modern jazz that widens into a wholesale critique of modernism in the arts. Larkin (not unwillingly) acquired a reputation as an enemy of modernism, but recent critical assessments of Larkin's writings have identified them as possessing some modernist characteristics.


title: Philip Larkin

text: When first published in 1945, "The North Ship" received just one review, in the "Coventry Evening Telegraph", which concluded "Mr Larkin has an inner vision that must be sought for with care. His recondite imagery is couched in phrases that make up in a kind of wistful hinted beauty what they lack in lucidity. Mr Larkin's readers must at present be confined to a small circle. Perhaps his work will gain wider appeal as his genius becomes more mature?" A few years later, though, the poet and critic Charles Madge came across the book and wrote to Larkin with his compliments. When the collection was reissued in 1966, it was presented as a work of juvenilia, and the reviews were gentle and respectful; the most forthright praise came from Elizabeth Jennings in "The Spectator": "few will question the intrinsic value of "The North Ship" or the importance of its being reprinted now. It is good to know that Larkin could write so well when still so young."


title: Philip Larkin

text: "The Less Deceived" was first noticed by "The Times", who included it in its "List of Books of 1955". In its wake many other reviews followed; "most of them concentrated ... on the book's emotional impact and its sophisticated, witty language." "The Spectator" felt the collection was "in the running for the best published in this country since the war"; G. S. Fraser, referring to Larkin's perceived association with The Movement felt that Larkin exemplified "everything that is good in this 'new movement' and none of its faults". "The Times Literary Supplement" called him "a poet of quite exceptional importance", and in June 1956, the "Times Educational Supplement" was fulsome: "As native as a Whitstable oyster, as sharp an expression of contemporary thought and experience as anything written in our time, as immediate in its appeal as the lyric poetry of an earlier day, it may well be regarded by posterity as a poetic monument that marks the triumph over the formless mystifications of the last twenty years. With Larkin poetry is on its way back to the middlebrow public." Reviewing the book in America, the poet Robert Lowell wrote: "No post-war poetry has so caught the moment, and caught it without straining after its ephemera. It's a hesitant, groping mumble, resolutely experienced, resolutely perfect in its artistic methods."


title: Philip Larkin

text: In time, there was a counter-reaction: David Wright wrote in "Encounter" that "The Less Deceived" suffered from the "palsy of playing safe". In April 1957, Charles Tomlinson wrote a piece for the journal "Essays in Criticism", "The Middlebrow Muse", attacking The Movement's poets for their "middle-cum-lowbrowism", "suburban mental ratio" and "parochialism"—Larkin had a "tenderly nursed sense of defeat". In 1962, A. Alvarez, the compiler of an anthology entitled "The New Poetry", accused Larkin of "gentility, neo-Georgian pastoralism, and a failure to deal with the violent extremes of contemporary life".


title: Philip Larkin

text: When "The Whitsun Weddings" was released, Alvarez continued his attacks in a review in "The Observer", complaining of the "drab circumspection" of Larkin's "commonplace" subject-matter. Praise outweighed criticism; John Betjeman felt Larkin had "closed the gap between poetry and the public which the experiments and obscurity of the last fifty years have done so much to widen." In "The New York Review of Books", Christopher Ricks wrote of the "refinement of self-consciousness, usually flawless in its execution" and Larkin's summoning up of "the world of all of us, the place where, in the end, we find our happiness, or not at all." He felt Larkin to be "the best poet England now has."


title: Philip Larkin

text: In his biography, Richard Bradford writes that the reviews for "High Windows" showed "genuine admiration" but notes that they typically encountered problems describing "the individual genius at work" in poems such as "Annus Mirabilis", "The Explosion" and "The Building" while also explaining why each were "so radically different" from one another. Robert Nye in "The Times" overcame this problem "by treating the differences as ineffective masks for a consistently nasty presence".


title: Philip Larkin

text: In "Larkin at Sixty", amongst the portraits by friends and colleagues such as Kingsley Amis, Noel Hughes and Charles Monteith and dedicatory poems by John Betjeman, Peter Porter and Gavin Ewart, the various strands of Larkin's output were analysed by critics and fellow poets: Andrew Motion, Christopher Ricks and Seamus Heaney looked at the poems, Alan Brownjohn wrote on the novels, and Donald Mitchell and Clive James looked at his jazz criticism.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1980, Neil Powell wrote: "It is probably fair to say that Philip Larkin is less highly regarded in academic circles than either Thom Gunn or Donald Davie". But since the turn of the century, Larkin's standing has increased. "Philip Larkin is an excellent example of the plain style in modern times", writes Tijana Stojkovic. Robert Sheppard asserts: "It is by general consent that the work of Philip Larkin is taken to be exemplary". "Larkin is the most widely celebrated and arguably the finest poet of the Movement", states Keith Tuma, and his poetry is "more various than its reputation for dour pessimism and anecdotes of a disappointed middle class suggests".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Stephen Cooper's "Philip Larkin: Subversive Writer" and John Osborne's "Larkin, Ideology and Critical Violence" suggest the changing temper of Larkin studies, the latter attacking eminent critics such as James Booth and Anthony Thwaite for their readiness to reduce the poems to works of biography, and stressing instead the genius of Larkin's universality and deconstructionism. Cooper argues that "The interplay of signs and motifs in the early work orchestrates a subversion of conventional attitudes towards class, gender, authority and sexual relations". Cooper identifies Larkin as a progressive writer, and perceives in the letters a "plea for alternative constructs of masculinity, femininity and social and political organisation". Cooper draws on the entire canon of Larkin's works, as well as on unpublished correspondence, to counter the image of Larkin as merely a racist, misogynist reactionary. Instead he identifies in Larkin what he calls a "subversive imagination". He highlights in particular "Larkin's objections to the hypocrisies of conventional sexual politics that hamper the lives of both sexes in equal measure".


title: Philip Larkin

text: In similar vein to Cooper, Stephen Regan notes in an essay entitled "Philip Larkin: a late modern poet" that Larkin frequently embraces devices associated with the experimental practices of Modernism, such as "linguistic strangeness, self-conscious literariness, radical self-questioning, sudden shifts of voice and register, complex viewpoints and perspectives, and symbolist intensity".


title: Philip Larkin

text: A further indication of a new direction in the critical valuation of Larkin is Suniti Kumar Chatterji's statement that "Larkin is no longer just a name but an institution, a modern British national cultural monument".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Chatterjee's view of Larkin is grounded in a detailed analysis of his poetic style. He observes a development from Larkin's early works to his later ones, which sees his style change from "verbal opulence through a recognition of the self-ironising and self-negating potentiality of language to a linguistic domain where the conventionally held conceptual incompatibles – which are traditional binary oppositions between absolutes and relatives, between abstracts and concretes, between fallings and risings and between singleness and multiplicity – are found to be the last stumbling-block for an artist aspiring to rise above the impasse of worldliness". This contrasts with an older view that Larkin's style barely changed over the course of his poetic career. Chatterjee identifies this view as being typified by Bernard Bergonzi's comment that "Larkin's poetry did not ... develop between 1955 and 1974". For Chatterjee, Larkin's poetry responds strongly to changing "economic, socio-political, literary and cultural factors".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Chatterjee argues: "It is under the defeatist veneer of his poetry that the positive side of Larkin's vision of life is hidden". This positivity, suggests Chatterjee, is most apparent in his later works. Over the course of Larkin's poetic career: "The most notable attitudinal development lay in the zone of his view of life, which from being almost irredeemably bleak and pessimistic in "The North Ship", became more and more positive with the passage of time".


title: Philip Larkin

text: The view that Larkin is not a nihilist or pessimist, but actually displays optimism in his works, is certainly not universally endorsed, but Chatterjee's study suggests the degree to which old stereotypes of Larkin are now being transcended. Representative of these stereotypes is Bryan Appleyard's judgement (quoted by Maeve Brennan) that of the writers who "have adopted a personal pose of extreme pessimism and loathing of the world ... none has done so with quite such a grinding focus on littleness and triviality as Larkin the man". Recent criticism of Larkin demonstrates a more complex set of values at work in his poetry and across the totality of his writings.


title: Philip Larkin

text: The debate about Larkin is summed up by Matthew Johnson, who observes that in most evaluations of Larkin "one is not really discussing the man, but actually reading a coded and implicit discussion of the supposed values of 'Englishness' that he is held to represent". Changing attitudes to Englishness are reflected in changing attitudes to Larkin, and the more sustained intellectual interest in the English national character, as embodied in the works of Peter Mandler for instance, pinpoint one key reason why there is an increased scholarly interest in Larkin.


title: Philip Larkin

text: A summative view similar to those of Johnson and Regan is that of Robert Crawford, who argues that "In various ways, Larkin's work depends on, and develops from, Modernism." Furthermore, he "demonstrates just how slippery the word 'English' is".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Despite these recent developments, Larkin and his circle are nonetheless still firmly rejected by modernist critics and poets. For example, the poet Andrew Duncan, writing of The Movement on his pinko.org website, is of the opinion that "there now seems to be a very wide consensus that it was a bad thing, and that Movement poems are tedious, shallow, smug, sententious, emotionally dead, etc. Their successors in the mainstream retain most of these characteristics. Wolfgang Gortschacher's book on Little Magazine Profiles ... shows ... that there was a terrific dearth of magazines during the 50s—an impoverishment of openings which correlates with rigid and conservative poetry, and with the hegemony of a few people determined to exclude dissidents." Peter Riley, a participant in the British Poetry Revival, which was a reaction against The Movement's poets, has also criticised Larkin for his uncritical and ideologically narrow position: "What after all were Larkin and The Movement but a denial of the effusive ethics of poetry from 1795 onwards, in favour of 'This is what life is really like' as if anyone thought for a second of representing observable 'life'. W.S. Graham and Dylan Thomas knew perfectly well that 'life' was like that, if you nominated it thus, which is why they went elsewhere."


title: Philip Larkin

text: Larkin's posthumous reputation was deeply affected by the publication in 1992 of Anthony Thwaite's edition of his letters and, the following year, his official biography, "Philip Larkin: A Writer's Life" by Andrew Motion. These revealed his obsession with pornography, his racism, his increasing shift to the political right wing, and his habitual expressions of venom and spleen. In 1990, even before the publication of these two books, Tom Paulin wrote that Larkin's "obscenity is informed by prejudices that are not by any means as ordinary, commonplace, or acceptable as the poetic language in which they are so plainly spelled out." The letters and Motion's biography fuelled further assessments of this kind, such as Lisa Jardine's comment in "The Guardian" that "The Britishness of Larkin's poetry carries a baggage of attitudes which the "Selected Letters" now make explicit". On the other hand, the revelations were dismissed by the novelist Martin Amis in "The War Against Cliché", arguing that the letters in particular show nothing more than a tendency for Larkin to tailor his words according to the recipient. A similar argument was made by Richard Bradford in his biography on Larkin from 2005. Commenting on "Letters to Monica"


title: Philip Larkin

text: (2010) Graeme Richardson states that the collection went "some way towards the restoration of Larkin's tarnished image...reveal(ing) Larkin as not quite the sinister, black-hearted near-rapist everyone thought it was OK to abuse in the 90s."


title: Philip Larkin

text: Trying to resolve Larkin's contradictory opinions on race in his book "Such Deliberate Disguises: The Art of Philip Larkin", the writer Richard Palmer quotes a letter Larkin wrote to Betjeman, as if it exposes "all the post-Motion and post-Letters furore about Larkin’s 'racism' as the nonsense it is":


title: Philip Larkin

text: The American Negro is trying to take a step forward that can be compared only to the ending of slavery in the nineteenth century. And despite the dogs, the hosepipes and the burnings, advances have already been made towards giving the Negro his civil rights that would have been inconceivable when Louis Armstrong was a young man. These advances will doubtless continue. They will end only when the Negro is as well-housed, educated and medically cared for as the white man.


title: Philip Larkin

text: a less forgiving reader could counter by asking if this does not qualify as the thought of a "true racist": I find the state of the nation quite terrifying. In 10 years' time we shall all be cowering under our beds as hordes of blacks steal anything they can lay their hands on. Or this: We don’t go to cricket Test matches now, too many fucking niggers about.


title: Philip Larkin

text: Despite controversy about his personal life and opinions, Larkin remains one of Britain's most popular poets. In 2003, almost two decades after his death, Larkin was chosen as "the nation's best-loved poet" in a survey by the Poetry Book Society, and in 2008 "The Times" named Larkin as the greatest British post-war writer. Three of his poems, "This Be The Verse", "The Whitsun Weddings" and "An Arundel Tomb", featured in the "Nation's Top 100 Poems" as voted for by viewers of the BBC's "Bookworm" in 1995. Media interest in Larkin has increased in the twenty-first century. Larkin's collection "The Whitsun Weddings" is one of the available poetry texts in the AQA English Literature A Level syllabus, while "High Windows" is offered by the OCR board. Buses in Hull displayed extracts from his poems in 2010.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1959, the Marvell Press published "Listen presents Philip Larkin reading The Less Deceived" (Listen LPV1), an LP record on which Larkin recites all the poems from "The Less Deceived" in the order they appear in the printed volume. This was followed, in 1965, by "Philip Larkin reads and comments on The Whitsun Weddings" (Listen LPV6), again on the Marvell Press's record label (though the printed volume was published by Faber and Faber). Once again the poems are read in the order in which they appear in the printed volume, but with Larkin including introductory remarks to many of the poems. A recording of Larkin reading the poems from his final collection, "High Windows", was published in 1975 as "British poets of our time. Philip Larkin; High Windows: poems read by the author" (edited by Peter Orr) on the Argo record label (Argo PLP 1202). As with the two previous recordings, the sequencing of the poems is the same as in the printed volume.


title: Philip Larkin

text: Larkin also appears on several audio poetry anthologies: "The Jupiter Anthology of 20th Century English Poetry – Part III" (JUR 00A8), issued in 1963 and featuring "An Arundel Tomb" and "Mr Bleaney" (this same recording was issued in the United States in 1967 on the Folkways record label as "Anthology of 20th Century English Poetry – Part III" (FL9870)); "The Poet Speaks" record 8 (Argo PLP 1088), issued in 1967 and featuring "Wants", "Coming", "Nothing to be Said", "Days" and "Dockery and Son"; "On Record" (YA3), issued in 1974 by Yorkshire Arts Association and featuring "Here", "Days", "Next, Please", "Wedding-Wind", "The Whitsun Weddings", "XXX", "XIII" (these last two poems from "The North Ship"); and "Douglas Dunn and Philip Larkin", issued in 1984 by Faber and Faber (A Faber Poetry cassette), featuring Larkin reading 13 poems including, for the first time on a recording, "Aubade".


title: Philip Larkin

text: Despite the fact that Larkin made audio recordings (in studio conditions) of each of his three mature collections, and separate recordings of groups of poems for a number of audio anthologies, he somehow gained a reputation as a poet who was reluctant to make recordings in which he read his own work. While Larkin did express a dislike of the sound of his own voice ("I come from Coventry, between the sloppiness of Leicester and the whine of Birmingham, you know—and sometimes it comes out"), the evidence indicates that this influenced more his preference not to give public readings of his own work, than his willingness to make audio recordings of his poems.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1980, Larkin was invited by the Poets' Audio Center, Washington, to record a selection of poems from the full range of his poetic output for publication on a Watershed Foundation cassette tape. The recording was made in February 1980 (at Larkin's own expense) by John Weeks, a sound engineer colleague from the University of Hull. Although negotiations between Larkin, his publishers and the Watershed Foundation collapsed, the recording (of Larkin reading 26 poems selected from his four canonical volumes of poetry) was sold – by Larkin – to Harvard University's Poetry Room in 1981. In 2004, a copy of this recording was uncovered in the Hornsea garage studio of the engineer who had made the recording for Larkin. (Subsequently, Larkin's own copy of the recording was found in the Larkin Archive at the University of Hull.) News of the “newly discovered” recording made the headlines in 2006, with extracts being broadcast in a Sky News report. A programme examining the discovery in more depth, "The Larkin Tapes", was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in March 2008. The recordings were issued on CD by Faber and Faber in January 2009 as "The Sunday Sessions".


title: Philip Larkin

text: In contrast to the number of audio recordings of Larkin reading his own work, there are very few appearances by Larkin on television. The only programme in which he agreed to be filmed taking part is "Down Cemetery Road" (1964), from the BBC "Monitor" series, in which Larkin was interviewed by John Betjeman. The filming took place in and around Hull (with some filming in North Lincolnshire), and showed Larkin in his natural surroundings: his flat in Pearson Park, the Brynmor Jones Library; and visiting churches and cemeteries. The film was broadcast on BBC Four. In 1981, Larkin was part of a group of poets who surprised John Betjeman on his seventy-fifth birthday by turning up on his doorstep with gifts and greetings. This scene was filmed by Jonathan Stedall and later featured in the third episode of his 1983 series for BBC2, "Time With Betjeman".


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1982, as part of the celebrations for his sixtieth birthday, Larkin was the subject of "The South Bank Show". Although Larkin declined the invitation to appear in the programme, he recorded (on audio tape) "a lot of poems" specifically for it. Melvyn Bragg commented, in his introduction to the programme, that the poet had given his full cooperation. The programme, broadcast on 30 May, featured contributions from Kingsley Amis, Andrew Motion and Alan Bennett. Bennett was also filmed reading several Larkin poems a few years later, in an edition of "Poetry in Motion", broadcast by Channel 4 in 1990.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 1999, Oliver Ford Davies starred in Ben Brown's play "Larkin With Women" at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, reprising his role at the Orange Tree Theatre, London, in 2006. The play was published by Larkin's usual publishers, Faber and Faber. Set in the three decades after Larkin's arrival in Hull, it explores his long relationships with Monica Jones, Maeve Brennan and Betty Mackereth. Another Larkin-inspired entertainment, devised by and starring Sir Tom Courtenay, was given a pre-production performance on the afternoon of Saturday 29 June 2002 at Hull University's Middleton Hall. Courtenay performed his one-man play "Pretending to Be Me" as part of the Second Hull International Conference on the Work of Philip Larkin. In November that year, Courtenay debuted the play at the West Yorkshire Playhouse, later transferring the production to the Comedy Theatre in London's West End. An audio recording of the play, which is based on Larkin's letters, interviews, diaries and verse, was released in 2005. In June 2010, Courtenay returned to the University of Hull to give a performance of a newly revised version of "Pretending to Be Me" called "Larkin Revisited" in aid of the Larkin statue appeal as part of the Larkin 25 festival.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In July 2003, BBC Two broadcast a play entitled "Love Again"—its title also that of one of Larkin's most painfully personal poems—dealing with the last thirty years of Larkin's life (though not shot anywhere near Hull). The lead role was played by Hugh Bonneville, and in the same year Channel 4 broadcast the documentary "Philip Larkin, Love and Death in Hull".


title: Philip Larkin

text: In April 2008, BBC Radio 4 broadcast a play by Chris Harrald entitled "Mr Larkin's Awkward Day", recounting the practical joke played on him in 1957 by his friend Robert Conquest, a fellow poet.


title: Philip Larkin

text: The Philip Larkin Society is a charitable organization dedicated to preserving the memory and works of Philip Larkin. It was formed in 1995 on the tenth anniversary of Larkin's death, and achieved charity status in the United Kingdom in 2000. Anthony Thwaite, one of Larkin's literary executors, was the society's president until his death in 2021. Professor Eddie Dawes and Professor James Booth are Honorary Vice-Presidents and Honorary Life Members. The current Society president is Rosie Millard OBE. The Society's Chair is Graham Chesters and Deputy Chair is Lyn Lockwood.


title: Philip Larkin

text: The society carries out various activities, such as lectures, walking tours and events for Larkin and his literary contemporaries. It hosted the Larkin 25 art festival from June to December 2010 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Larkin's death and in 2016 Larkin's commemoration in Poet's Corner Westminster Abbey.


title: Philip Larkin

text: Memorials to Larkin in Kingston upon Hull, where he worked and wrote much of his poetry, are the Larkin Building at the University of Hull housing teaching facilities and lecture rooms and the Philip Larkin Centre for Poetry and Creative Writing which hosts a regular programme of literary events.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In May 2022 Larkin's childhood school, King Henry VIII School, dedicated a memorial room, called 'The Philip Larkin Room', next to the main school hall, otherwise known as Burgess Hall.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In 2010, the city marked the 25th anniversary of his death with the Larkin 25 Festival. A video was commissioned to illustrate Larkin's poem "Here", his hymn to Hull and the East Riding of Yorkshire. Forty decorated toad sculptures entitled "Larkin with Toads" were displayed in the city in tribute to Larkin's poem "Toads" on 17 July 2010.


title: Philip Larkin

text: A larger-than-life-size bronze statue of Larkin by sculptor Martin Jennings was unveiled at Hull Paragon Interchange on 2 December 2010, closing the Larkin 25 events. It is inscribed, "That Whitsun I was late getting away", from the poem, "The Whitsun Weddings". Funding for the £100,000 statue, designed by Martin Jennings, was raised at charity events and auctions with support from Hull City Council. The unveiling was accompanied by Nathaniel Seaman's "Fanfare for Larkin", composed for the occasion. Five plaques containing Larkin's poems were added to the floor near the statue in 2011. In December 2012, a memorial bench was installed around a pillar near the statue.


title: Philip Larkin

text: In June 2015, it was announced that Larkin would be honoured with a floor stone memorial at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey. The memorial was unveiled on 2 December 2016, the 31st anniversary of his death. Actor Sir Tom Courtenay and artist Grayson Perry both read from Larkin's work during the unveiling ceremony and an address was given by poet and author Blake Morrison. The memorial includes two lines quoted from his poem "An Arundel Tomb":Our almost-instinct almost true:What will survive of us is love.


title: Philip Larkin

text: From 5 July to 1 October 2017, as part of the Hull UK City of Culture 2017 celebrations, the Brynmor Jones Library at Hull University mounted the exhibition "Larkin: New Eyes Each Year". It featured objects from Larkin's life, as well as his personal collection of books from his last home at Newland Park, in the original shelf order in which he had Larkin arranged them. Also in 2017, in the Burgess district of Coventry, the pub known as The Tudor Rose was renamed The Philip Larkin.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The New Orleans Saints bounty scandal, formally known as "Bountygate," was an incident in which members of the New Orleans Saints team of the National Football League (NFL) were accused of paying out bonuses, or "bounties," for injuring opposing team players. The pool was alleged to have been in operation from 2009 (the year in which the Saints won Super Bowl XLIV) to 2011.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: League commissioner Roger Goodell responded with some of the most severe sanctions in the league's 92-year history, and among the most severe punishments for in-game misconduct in North American professional sports history. Defensive coordinator Gregg Williams was suspended indefinitely, though this would be overturned the following year. Head coach Sean Payton was suspended for the entire 2012 season—the first time since Chuck Fairbanks in 1978 that a head coach had been suspended. General manager Mickey Loomis was suspended for the first eight games of the 2012 season. Assistant head coach Joe Vitt was suspended for the first six games of the 2012 season. The Saints organization was penalized with a $500,000 fine and forced to forfeit their second-round draft selections in 2012 and 2013. In May 2012, four current and former Saints players were suspended after being named as ringleaders in the scandal, with linebacker Jonathan Vilma also being suspended for the entire 2012 season. However, former commissioner Paul Tagliabue overturned all sanctions against the players in December 2012 after finding that despite the players being "very much involved," the coaches and the Saints organization were primarily responsible for the scandal.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFL has long frowned upon bounties, or "non-contract bonuses" as it officially calls them; but an underground culture of bounties is alleged to exist, with teams, it is claimed, turning a blind eye to the practice. The league constitution specifically forbids payment of bonuses based on performances against an individual player or team, as well as bonuses for on-field misconduct; the NFL holds that such practices undermine the integrity of the game, and also would allow teams to use such payments to circumvent the salary cap. The collective bargaining agreement with the NFL Players Association also forbids this practice, as does the standard NFL player contract. Every year, the NFL sends a memo reiterating this ban to every team before training camp opens. However, according to many former players, bounty systems of some sort have been around the NFL for decades, with the percentage of players participating speculated to be between 30 and 40 percent. According to these players, such bounty programs were usually informal and often between players only, more with intent at locker-room braggadocio than systemic malice. What would draw attention to the Saints' bounty program was the alleged practice of methodically organizing such a concept at the coaches' level, with the primary intent to systematically and routinely injure opposing star players.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: After the Saints defeated the Minnesota Vikings in the in what has become a heated rivalry, several Vikings players and coaches claimed that the Saints were deliberately trying to hurt Vikings quarterback Brett Favre. The Vikings were particularly angered when Saints defensive end Bobby McCray and defensive tackle Remi Ayodele knocked Favre to the ground with a high-low hit. McCray hit Favre below the knees, briefly knocking Favre out of the game with an ankle injury. No penalty was called on the play, though NFL vice president of officiating Mike Pereira said one should have been called, saying it was "the type of hit we don't want." Vikings coach Brad Childress later said that there were at least 13 instances where he felt the Saints deliberately went after Favre. Later, CBSSports.com NFL columnist Clark Judge said several Vikings assistants told him they believed McCray was acting on direct orders from Williams, with at least one being so outraged that he threatened to "punch [Williams] in the face" the next time they met. Vikings owner Zygi Wilf even went as far as to complain to the league about what happened to Favre, though no action was taken at the time. Favre took such a severe beating that Vikings punter Chris Kluwe and placekicker Ryan Longwell wondered during the game if someone had put a bounty on him.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Favre's agent, Bus Cook, later said that he also felt the Saints were deliberately trying to knock Favre out of the game, and claimed that several hits on Arizona Cardinals quarterback Kurt Warner in the divisional round a week earlier crossed the line as well. It initially appeared that Cook's argument was strengthened by the fact that Warner was knocked out of that game with a chest injury (although he later returned), and retired two weeks later. However, Warner later said that the hit which knocked him out was legal, and had nothing to do with his decision to retire.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: In the 2010 offseason, an anonymous player told NFL officials that the Saints had targeted Favre and Warner as part of a bounty program administered by Williams; the NFL's security department found the allegations credible enough to open an investigation. However, the players and team officials interviewed all denied that any bounty program existed, and the player who made the initial report subsequently recanted his allegations.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFL began investigating the Saints in 2010 in response to allegations of deliberate attempts to injure players during the 2009–10 playoffs, but the investigation stalled until late in the 2011 season. On March 2, 2012, the NFL announced that it had evidence that defensive coordinator Gregg Williams had created the program soon after his arrival in 2009, and alleged that "between 22 and 27 Saints players" were involved. Williams and the players pooled their own money to pay out performance bonuses. It also asserted that head coach Sean Payton tried to cover up the scheme, and that he and general manager Mickey Loomis failed to shut it down when ordered to do so by team owner Tom Benson. Since then, Williams has been accused of operating similar schemes during his tenure as defensive coordinator of the Tennessee Oilers/Titans and (since renamed) Washington Redskins and as head coach of the Buffalo Bills; the NFL briefly investigated these allegations but elected to focus on the Saints.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: In 2012, ESPN reported that former New Orleans Saints defensive assistant Mike Cerullo contacted the NFL regarding a bounty program after the 2009 postseason. Cerullo was released after the 2009 postseason for poor performance and lying about personal leave according to the New Orleans Saints. Cerullo testified that he kept track of payments and pledges made. Cerullo also states in the article, "I was angry for being let go from the Saints". In the summer of 2017, the NFL hired Mike Cerullo as Director of Football Administration. Cerullo is currently director of football operations at Princeton University.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Late in the 2011 season, the NFL received what it called "significant and credible new information" that suggested there was indeed a "bounty" program in place. League officials, convinced that this information was irrefutable evidence a program was indeed in place, alerted Benson of their findings just before the Saints' first-round playoff game against the Detroit Lions. The investigation continued during the 2011–12 playoffs and continued through the 2012 offseason.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On March 2, 2012, ESPN's Adam Schefter reported that the NFL had indeed found evidence of a bounty program. Later that day, the NFL announced it had obtained irrefutable proof of a bounty pool dating back to the 2009 season, based on a review of 18,000 documents. It determined that Williams had initiated the fund soon after he arrived in New Orleans in 2009, in hopes of making the defense more aggressive. Between 22 and 27 Saints defensive players were involved. The players and Williams contributed their own cash to the pot, and received cash payments based on their performance in the previous week's game. For instance, a special teamer who downed a kick returner inside the receiving team's 20-yard-line earned $100. Players could also be fined for mental mistakes and penalties. Players also received "bounties" for "cart-offs" (plays in which an opponent was removed from the field on a stretcher or cart) and "knockouts" (plays that resulted in a player being unable to return for the rest of the game). Players usually earned $1,000 for cart-offs and $1,500 for knockouts during the regular season, though they were encouraged to put their winnings back into the pot in order to raise the stakes as the season went on. Payments were known to double or even triple during the playoffs.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFL sent a confidential and detailed memo to all 32 teams detailing its findings. It revealed that the Saints had not only targeted Warner and Favre during the 2009 playoffs, but had also targeted Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton during the 2011 regular season. According to that memo, Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma offered $10,000 cash to any teammate who knocked Favre out of the NFC Championship Game. Another source told CBSSports.com's Mike Freeman that Reggie Bush's agent at the time, Michael Ornstein, was closely involved in the scheme from the beginning. Ornstein contributed $10,000 to the pot in 2009, and an undisclosed amount in 2011.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: After later investigations in the 2012 offseason, the NFL also found evidence that the Saints put a bounty on then-Seattle Seahawks quarterback Matt Hasselbeck during their 2011 wild-card playoffs game.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The league found that Payton not only knew about the scheme, but tried to cover it up during both league investigations. During the 2010 investigation, Payton told Williams and Vitt to "make sure our ducks are in a row" when the league interviewed them. Before the start of the 2011 season, Payton received an email from Ornstein detailing the broader lines of the scheme. In that same email, Ornstein offered $5,000 to anyone who knocked Rodgers out of the 2011 season opener. Payton initially denied knowing that this email existed, but subsequently admitted that in fact he had read it.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: When Benson was informed of the league's findings, he called in Payton and Loomis and ordered the program shut down immediately. However, they did not do so. Loomis had been interviewed during the 2010 investigation as well, and had stated that he knew of no such scheme and would stop it immediately if it was taking place. The league also found that Vitt, whom Payton had assigned to monitor Williams (the two reportedly didn't get along very well), also knew about the broader lines of the scheme and even witnessed Williams handing out payments to players. However, Vitt failed to tell anyone about it.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFL found that Payton and Loomis' misfeasance amounted to "conduct detrimental" to the league. The NFL found no club money had been used to fund the bounty pool, and praised Benson for doing what he could to shut down the slush fund. Nonetheless, it found the Saints organization as a whole guilty of conduct detrimental to the league as well due to Williams and the players' maintenance of the bounty pool, as well as Loomis and Payton's failure to act "in a responsible manner" to stop it.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Several Chicago Bears players and fans believe that the Bears were targets of this program during the second game of the 2011 season, a 30–13 loss to the Saints. Quarterback Jay Cutler was sacked six times, and nearly lost his voice when a Saints player kicked him in the throat. Later in the game, offensive tackle Frank Omiyale yanked a Saints defender off Cutler when he saw what he later called "some dirty stuff." Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Josh Freeman reported that the Saints tendency toward illegal hits was common knowledge among the Tampa Bay coaching staff. Preparations for Saints games included warnings to offensive players to keep their knees protected, especially on plays near the sidelines.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: In June 2012, the league revealed that it possessed a ledger detailing the weekly earnings of the players, which are earned for cart-offs ($1000) and "whacks" ($400) and deducted for "mental errors."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: However, on July 26, 2012, Vilma and seven witnesses from the Saints testified in front of a federal judge in New Orleans that NFL commissioner Roger Goodell got his facts wrong in the bounty scandal. "Everybody was sworn in under oath in front of a judge with the risk of perjury and jail time if we were lying, and categorically denied there was a bounty," Vilma said in a text message to ESPN's Ed Werder. "Seven people testified, 2 sworn affidavits all saying the same thing. I ask that you and ESPN report the facts. No more bias or b.s. or hearsay. I gave you facts that you can report if so choose." Tulane University Sports Law Program Director Gabe Feldman (who attended the hearing in court) said, "Clearly the judge, by her questions, indicated she thinks Goodell overstepped his authority, and this case was always going to be about if he executed his power fairly... The NFL's retort is that with all due deference, you don't get to second guess (Goodell). Judges only have limited jurisdiction over arbitration issues."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Shortly after the Saints' bounty system came to light, four former Washington Redskins players, as well as a coach, told "The Washington Post" that Williams operated a similar system while he was the Redskins' defensive coordinator from 2004 to 2007. The players said that Williams paid his crew thousands of dollars for aggressive play, with the biggest payouts—as much as $8,000—coming for "kill shots" that knocked opposing players out of games. "Chicago Tribune" NFL analyst Matt Bowen, who played for the Redskins at the time, later wrote in one of his regular columns that the bounty pool was funded by fines for mistakes made during practice and in games, and insisted similar systems operated on other teams. On March 4, "The Post" reported that the NFL was investigating the allegations against Williams with the Redskins.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Several former Bills players subsequently told "The Buffalo News" of a similar system during Williams' tenure as Bills' head coach from 2001 to 2003. However, they didn't agree on whether there were rewards for intentionally injuring players. Coy Wire, a safety during Williams' tenure, said that Williams gave bonuses for hits that left opponents seriously injured, and two other players said that bonuses were also awarded for "knockouts." However, linebacker Eddie Robinson, who played for Williams in Houston and Tennessee as well as in Buffalo, acknowledged an incentive pool but said he never heard Williams favor deliberately injuring other players. Ruben Brown, a guard for the Bills during Williams's time as coach there, denied there was any sort of bounty system in place in Buffalo, a position reiterated by linebacker London Fletcher and then-general manager Tom Donahoe. Chidi Ahanotu, who played one year under Williams in Buffalo, indicated that such a program was not within his character at the time and that Williams was "the softest coach I've been around."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Former NFL coach Tony Dungy later told Profootballtalk.com he was certain that Williams operated a similar bounty system while he was defensive coordinator of the Oilers/Titans from 1997 to 2000. He also believes that Williams put a bounty on Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning during Super Bowl XLIV, and targeted Manning on several occasions while with the Titans. The revelation of the bounty system also caused renewed speculation about a 2006 game between the Redskins and Colts, in which Manning was knocked down by a high-low hit from the Redskins' Phillip Daniels and Andre Carter and appeared to lose some feeling in his neck. While Dungy did not speculate at the time about whether the Redskins targeted Manning on that play, he believes that hit ultimately caused the neck problems that sidelined Manning for the entire 2011 season and led to his departure for the Denver Broncos afterward.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Former safety Ryan Clark, who played under Williams in Washington from 2004–2005 and himself was fined by the NFL $40,000 for a helmet-to-helmet hit against Baltimore Ravens tight end Ed Dickson during the 2011 season, defended Williams, saying that he never ran a bounty program with the Redskins and has yet to see one during his time in the NFL. Clark added that he would have reported Williams or any coach that offered to run such a program. The Steelers released a statement on their official web site mentioning that the team does not condone any sort of bounty program.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Williams, who left after the season to become defensive coordinator of the St. Louis Rams, was summoned to NFL headquarters after the investigation concluded in mid-February. He initially denied any involvement, but recanted and admitted everything in a meeting with Goodell. After the story broke, Williams issued a statement calling his involvement "a terrible mistake." Williams said that he knew all along the slush fund broke the rules, and that "I should have stopped it" rather than get further involved. Goodell said in a statement that he found it "particularly disturbing" that the Saints were deliberately trying to injure other players. He said that players and coaches involved in the scheme could face fines or suspensions, and the Saints could be docked picks in the 2012 NFL Draft and future drafts.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Benson issued a statement on the Saints' Website saying, "I have been made aware of the NFL’s findings relative to the “Bounty Rule” and how it relates to our club. I have offered and the NFL has received our full cooperation in their investigation. While the findings may be troubling, we look forward to putting this behind us and winning more championships in the future for our fans."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On March 3, Fox Sports' Jay Glazer reported that the NFL intended to hand down penalties before the owners' meeting in late March. The NFLPA asked the league to delay any sanctions until the union could conduct its own investigation.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: CBSSports.com's Pat Kirwan tweeted that within hours of the NFL releasing its report, lawyers for several players were already telling him that their clients were considering legal action against the Saints and Williams. Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Steve Young, who has a law degree from BYU, suggested that anyone who had been injured during a Saints game during the scheme's existence has grounds for a lawsuit. Louisiana State University law professor William Corbett told Fox Sports that any legal action by players has a chance of succeeding. He cited a 1977 case in which Denver Broncos defensive back Dale Hackbart sued the Cincinnati Bengals for a late hit to the back by running back Boobie Clark that fractured three vertebrae four years earlier and ended his career. A Colorado court ruled against Hackbart, saying violence was part of the game. However, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed, saying that "the general customs of football" do not include deliberately attempting to injure opposing players.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On March 6, Payton and Loomis issued a statement taking "full responsibility" for not stopping the alleged "bounty" program. Payton and Loomis also apologized to Benson and the Saints fans, and promised that such behavior would never happen again. Three days later, Drew Brees, the starting quarterback for the Saints, issued a statement denying any knowledge of or involvement in the program. On March 12, WWL-TV in New Orleans reported that Payton and Benson met with Goodell in New York for much of the morning to reiterate that the Saints would continue to cooperate fully with the NFL's investigation. On March 22, U.S. Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois announced he would invite Goodell and the heads of the other major American sports leagues to a hearing on bounty systems. He also said that unless the leagues themselves "come up with standards to make sure this isn't going to happen again," he may consider drafting legislation that would extend federal sports bribery laws to cover bounties.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On April 5, documentary filmmaker Sean Pamphilon released audio of a meeting Williams held with his defense before their 2012 divisional playoff game against the San Francisco 49ers. In a profanity-laced speech, Williams instructed his players to deliberately try to injure several 49ers players. He ordered his men to try to knock out running back Kendall Hunter, even if it meant hitting him out of bounds. He specifically directed them to try to tear wide receiver Michael Crabtree's ACL, injure tight end Vernon Davis' ankles and go after kick returner Kyle Williams specifically because he had a history of concussions. He also appeared to put a bounty on quarterback Alex Smith; according to Pamphilon, after Williams told his men to hit Smith in the chin, "then he rubs his thumb against his index and middle fingers – the cash sign – and says, "I got the first one. I got the first one. Go get it. Go lay that motherfucker out."" Pamphilon, who was doing a documentary on Steve Gleason and his fight against Lou Gehrig's Disease, released the audio to Yahoo! Sports without Gleason's approval. However, the Saints were not penalized for illegal hits during that game, which they lost 36–32.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On March 21, 2012, the NFL issued sanctions to Saints coaches and front-office personnel for their roles in the scandal.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The Saints were also fined $500,000—the maximum fine permitted under the league constitution, and had to forfeit their second-round draft picks in 2012 and 2013 (their first-round pick in 2012 had already been traded to the New England Patriots, and therefore, could not be forfeited; after the penalty; the Saints' first pick in the 2012 NFL Draft is a third-rounder). He also gave the league's clubs until March 30, 2012 to certify in writing that they do not have bounty programs. Clubs will also be required to certify that no bounty systems exist as part of the yearly certifications they must make under the league's Integrity of the Game Policy.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: In a statement, Goodell said that the NFL would not tolerate "conduct or a culture" that put player safety at risk. He also said that the fact that the scheme went on for three years demanded that "a strong and lasting message must be sent that such conduct is totally unacceptable and has no place in the game." He was particularly upset that those involved had lied about the scheme on two separate investigations, and had denied that there was ever a bounty program in place. In an interview with NFL Network's Rich Eisen, Goodell said that the threat to player safety, as well as the fact the Saints lied about it, demanded significant punishment. "I don't think you can be too hard on people that put at risk our players' health and safety," Goodell told Eisen. He reiterated this in an interview later that day with ESPN's Schefter, saying that the fact those involved "continued to mislead" the league about it was a significant factor in the sanctions. "You have to be accountable and responsible in the NFL," Goodell said. Goodell also implied that Payton would have faced significant punishment in any event, since his contractual obligation to supervise his assistants meant that he at least should have known about the scheme. He also said that there would be zero tolerance for payments for in-game performance in the future, saying that payments for good play eventually escalate to bounties for deliberately injuring players. Later, Schefter said on ESPN's SportsCenter that league officials felt Payton was at least as guilty as Williams, despite initial focus on Williams' role as the mastermind in the scheme.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On March 30, Payton, Vitt and Loomis appealed their suspensions, and the Saints also appealed the fine and loss of draft picks. Payton, Vitt and Loomis met with Goodell on April 5. After that meeting, Vitt's lawyer, David Cornwell, said that Payton and Loomis met with Williams before the divisional playoff game and ordered him to shut down the bounty program immediately. Cornwell contended that Williams was a "rogue coach," and the recently released audio of his meeting with the defense only proved it.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Goodell denied the appeals on April 9, meaning that Payton's suspension began as of April 16. However, depending on the Saints' cooperation and that of the individuals involved, Goodell could restore the Saints' second-round pick in 2013 (though the Saints would still lose a lower-round pick), as well as reduce the fine on the Saints and restore Payton, Vitt and Loomis' lost pay. However, all appeals were denied.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFLPA requested that the league should hold off on any punishments for the players until it conducts its own investigation. Goodell told Schefter, however, that he would hand down punishments to the players involved very soon once he gets feedback from the NFLPA.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Hours after the sanctions were announced, Kluwe went on KSTP in the Twin Cities and demanded that any players involved in the scheme be severely punished, and that the NFLPA let it be known that "there's no place in the league for that kind of behavior." He even went as far as to call for Vilma—the only player specifically named as being involved in the scheme in the NFL's initial announcements—to be banned from the league for life. His sentiments were echoed a day later by Vikings center John Sullivan, who told KFXN-FM in the Twin Cities that any Saint who deliberately tried to hurt Favre in that game should get a lifetime ban. Sullivan called the Saints' treatment of Favre "despicable" and "the exact opposite of sportsmanship," and even called for the league to take some sort of action against players involved in that game who had since retired, such as McCray.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On May 2, 2012, the NFL suspended four then-current or former Saints players for their involvement in the bounty scandal:


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Vilma's suspension took effect immediately, while the other three players are allowed to attend training camp. In announcing the suspensions, Goodell said that while a large number of players took part in the program, he chose to suspend those players who "were in leadership positions at the Saints; contributed a particularly large sum of money toward the program; specifically contributed to a bounty on an opposing player; demonstrated a clear intent to participate in a program that potentially injured opposing players; sought rewards for doing so; and/or obstructed the 2010 investigation." The NFL determined that Vilma and Smith helped Williams start the bounty program. Hargrove lied to league officials during the 2010 investigation, but later signed a letter to the NFL admitting that he was an active participant in the scheme. He also told at least one other player that the Saints had put a bounty on Favre in the 2009 NFC title game. Fujita, who left the team for the Browns immediately after the Saints won Super Bowl XLIV, pledged "a significant amount of money" into the bounty program.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Earlier, Goodell had indicated that he was going to come down hard on the players involved, telling Eisen that they "enthusiastically embraced" the scheme. "They are on the field, so I don't think they are absolved from any responsibility because of that," he said.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The NFLPA released a statement calling the suspensions unjustified, claiming that Goodell had not furnished them with any evidence supporting the sanctions. The union lodged a formal grievance on May 4, contending that since the suspensions were for on-field misconduct, the players' appeals should be heard by Ted Cottrell and Art Shell, whom the collective bargaining agreement designates as the hearing officers for on-field sanctions. It also contended that since the alleged conduct took place before the most recent CBA was signed in August, Goodell should have deferred to NFL special master Stephen Burbank in ruling on the players' actions. Goodell issued the suspensions as part of his power to sanction any "conduct detrimental to the integrity and public confidence in the NFL," a violation of Article 46 of the CBA. This provision is normally used to sanction off-field conduct. However, a league source told CBSSports.com's Judge that it also gives Goodell the power to rule on in-game conduct if he feels that it runs counter to the integrity of the game.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On July 26, 2012, Jonathan Vilma and seven witnesses from the Saints testified in front of a federal judge in New Orleans that Goodell got his facts wrong in the bounty scandal. "Everybody was sworn in under oath in front of a judge with the risk of perjury and jail time if we were lying, and categorically denied there was a bounty," Vilma said in a text message to ESPN's Ed Werder. "Seven people testified, 2 sworn affidavits all saying the same thing. I ask that you and ESPN report the facts. No more bias or b.s. or hearsay. I gave you facts that you can report if so choose." Tulane University Sports Law Program Director Gabe Feldman (who attended the hearing in court) said, "Clearly the judge, by her questions, indicated she thinks Goodell overstepped his authority, and this case was always going to be about if he executed his power fairly... The NFL's retort is that with all due deference, you don't get to second guess (Goodell). Judges only have limited jurisdiction over arbitration issues."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: All four players appealed their suspensions. On September 7, 2012, the Burbank appeals panel vacated the suspensions imposed on the four, and the NFL confirmed that the ruling reinstated them in time for their first games of the 2012 season two days later. Two days after the fifth game of the season, on October 9, 2012, the league re-issued the suspensions without any changes or reductions; the players' appeals continued.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: On October 27, 2012, former league commissioner Paul Tagliabue postponed the bounty appeals hearing, expecting to set a new schedule on October 29, 2012. On December 11, with three games left in the regular season, Tagliabue vacated the players' suspensions, saying in his ruling, "I affirm Commissioner Goodell's factual findings as to the four players. I conclude that Hargrove, Smith and Vilma—but not Fujita—engaged in 'conduct detrimental to the integrity of, and public confidence in, the game of professional football ..." He laid primary responsibility for the scandal on Williams and Payton.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Had the suspensions of Vilma and Hargrove been upheld, they would have been the longest for an on-field incident in modern NFL history, topping the previous record set in 2006, when then-Titans defensive end Albert Haynesworth was given a five-game suspension for stomping on the head of Dallas Cowboys offensive lineman Andre Gurode.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Vilma played the final 11 games of the 2012 season for the Saints; Smith played all 16. Fujita played the first four games of the season for the Browns before suffering a season-ending (and ultimately, career-ending) neck injury; he would sign a ceremonial one-day contract with the Saints in the offseason and retire with the team. Hargrove, signed as a free agent by the Green Bay Packers in March 2012, did not play during the 2012 season. Nonetheless, the loss of Payton, combined with the distractions caused by the scandal, proved too much for the Saints to overcome. After finishing 13–3 and reaching the Divisional round of the playoffs a year earlier, they finished 7–9 and missed the playoffs.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The behavior detailed in the report was almost universally condemned in the press. In an editorial, New Orleans' local paper "The Times-Picayune" called the revelations "an embarrassment for one of the most successful and beloved sports organizations of recent years," and that they were "particularly hard to take for (Saints') fans" in light of the Saints' rebound after Hurricane Katrina. ESPN columnist Gregg Easterbrook claimed that the Saints' behavior threatened the very integrity of the sport since high school and youth players have long emulated what they see in the NFL. He also claimed that NFL Network yanked its planned replay of the 2009 NFC Championship Game due to concern that fans might look more closely for late hits that should have been called.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Most of the players who were the targets of questionable hits by the Saints, including Favre and Warner, claimed the bounties were merely part of the game. However, several former players interviewed by "Sports Illustrated" said that while payments for good hits and sacks were indeed considered part of the game, bounties for intentionally injuring opponents violated an unwritten code. One of those interviewed, Junior Seau, bluntly said that such practices crossed the line into threatening a person's livelihood. (Seau would commit suicide less than two months after the interview was published; it was discovered after his death that he suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) as a result of the numerous head injuries Seau suffered during his 20-year NFL career.) Seau's sentiments were echoed by Hall of Fame quarterback Fran Tarkenton. In an op-ed for "The Wall Street Journal", Tarkenton wrote that he played against the likes of Mean Joe Greene, Ray Nitschke and Dick Butkus, and none of them even considered deliberately trying to hurt him. He also said that he discussed the issue with several players from his era, and they unanimously agreed that players who put bounties on opponents were "cowards."


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Kevin Seifert, who blogs on the NFC North for ESPN.com, wrote that neither he nor most Vikings fans were surprised at the discovery of the bounty program. Seifert argued that even before the findings were revealed, it was obvious that the Saints were determined to inflict a severe beating on Favre, even if it meant breaking the rules. The only difference in Seifert's mind was that he no longer believed the Saints were out of control. Rather, he wrote, they were acting as "part of a larger mentality" instilled by Williams.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Speculation quickly abounded about how severely Goodell, who has made player safety and the overall integrity of the game a point of emphasis during his six years as commissioner, would punish Williams and the Saints. In his weekly "Monday Morning Quarterback" column on March 5, "SI"s Peter King wrote that he believed Williams faced at least an eight-game suspension, and that Payton and Loomis would almost certainly be suspended as well. He also argued that Goodell would have no choice but to come down hard on the Saints, given that the league was facing numerous lawsuits brought by former players who suffered head injuries. Given the circumstances, King said, Goodell had a lot of incentive to "issue a string of suspensions the likes of which the league has never seen." In an article written for the March 12 edition of "SI", King wrote that league officials were so outraged that they were likely to hand down penalties similar to the season-long bans Paul Hornung and Alex Karras received in 1963 for gambling. Freeman wrote that his sources in the league office had told him that the players, Williams, Payton and Loomis would all face suspensions of at least six games, as well as heavy fines. Freeman's sources also said that Payton's sanctions were likely to dwarf those handed down to the New England Patriots' Bill Belichick in the wake of the 2007 "Spygate" affair. He also believed that Goodell was going to use the scandal to "end the practice of bounty football forever," much like the penalties imposed against the Patriots after "Spygate" effectively ended the longstanding practice of illicit videotaping.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: After the sanctions were announced, CBSSports.com's Gregg Doyel wrote that the severity of the punishments handed down to Williams, Payton and Loomis proved that Goodell was truly sincere in his desire to "take the thuggishness out of the NFL." Doyel also said that while many players had chafed at what they saw as Goodell's heavy-handed approach to discipline, he was actually standing up for their safety in the Saints' case. Pereira, now an analyst for Fox Sports, wrote that based on his experience in the league office, he wasn't surprised that Goodell came down hard on the Saints. He recalled that Goodell was always upset when officials didn't penalize hits on defenseless players.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: The revelation of Williams' pregame speech was also greeted with revulsion. ESPN NFL analyst and former Dallas Cowboys safety Darren Woodson said that much of Williams' speech was standard pregame rhetoric. According to Woodson, when Williams called for his men to "attack the head" of running back Frank Gore, he was saying that the 49ers' offense would be rendered ineffective if they managed to shut Gore down. However, Woodson felt that several parts of Williams' speech—particularly his calls to go after Crabtree's ACL and target Williams specifically because he had concussions in the past—went too far. His former teammate, NFL Network analyst Michael Irvin, said that he "almost threw up" when he heard Williams tell his men to go after Crabtree's ACL, saying that players are taught from youth football onward to "never take out a man's knees." Fox Sports' Mark Kriegel argued that the tape proved Williams was "woefully underpunished," especially since he made the speech after being alerted that the NFL had reopened its investigation. He called for Goodell to ban him from the league for life.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: NFL Network analyst Michael Lombardi wrote that the scandal happened in part because during Williams' previous stops as a defensive coordinator, the head coaches under which he worked—Fisher, Joe Gibbs and Payton—essentially ceded him complete authority over the defense. Lombardi claimed that as a result, Williams operated essentially as "an independent contractor." Lombardi argued that such a situation is "never fully sustainable," as it can easily lead to the head coach losing control.


title: New Orleans Saints bounty scandal

text: Despite the media outcry, an independent study speculated that Saints' players may have pretended to participate off the field but not put the tactics into action on the field. "If the Saints tended to injure more players, then teams that played them would tend to list more injuries the following week. To test whether the Saints injured more players than a typical team, one need only compare the number of players added to injury reports after a Saints game to the league-wide average. Did the New Orleans Saints injure more players? The data-driven answer is a resounding 'no.' The Saints appear to have injured far fewer players over the 2009, 2010 and 2011 seasons. The numbers are striking."


title: Butch Hartman

text: Elmer Earl "Butch" Hartman IV (born January 10, 1965) is an American animator, director, producer, writer, and voice actor. He is most known for creating the Nickelodeon series "The Fairly OddParents", "Danny Phantom", "T.U.F.F. Puppy", and "Bunsen Is a Beast". Hartman also owns a production company, Billionfold Inc., which he uses primarily to produce his shows. Hartman was an executive producer on "The Fairly OddParents" for the entirety of its 16-year run.


title: Butch Hartman

text: On February 8, 2018, Hartman announced in a YouTube video that he had left Nickelodeon on February 2 after having worked at the studio since December 1997; he confirmed that this resulted in the end of production on "Bunsen Is a Beast" after one season. His latest animated program, "The Garden", premiered in 2019. In 2021, he returned to Nickelodeon to produce a live-action "Fairly OddParents" reboot show, "", which premiered on Paramount+ on March 31, 2022.


title: Butch Hartman

text: Hartman was born in Highland Park, Michigan. He received the nickname Butch as a young boy and continued to use it as an adult. Hartman spent his childhood in Roseville, Michigan and his teenage years in New Baltimore, Michigan. He graduated from Anchor Bay High School in New Baltimore in 1983, and subsequently attended the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, California. He graduated in 1987 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree.As a young student he appeared on "The Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour" winning close to $3,000.


title: Butch Hartman

text: While still attending CalArts, Hartman interned as an in-between animator on the Don Bluth film "An American Tail". Before graduating, he was a contestant on the Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour for three episodes and shortly after graduating, he was hired as a character designer and storyboard artist for an unidentified "My Little Pony" animated series. As he had no previous experience with storyboards, he was soon fired. Afterwards, he found work with Ruby-Spears, where he worked on "It's Punky Brewster" and "Dink, the Little Dinosaur". He was also a member of the video reference crew for the Disney film "Pocahontas".


title: Butch Hartman

text: In the early 1990s he was hired as an artist in the model department at Hanna-Barbera, and was eventually contacted by studio president Fred Seibert to make the shorts "Pfish and Chip" and "Gramps" for the "What a Cartoon! Show". Eventually, he became a writer, director and storyboard artist for several of the early Cartoon Network shows, including "Dexter's Laboratory", "Johnny Bravo", "Cow and Chicken", and "I Am Weasel". After his contract with Hanna-Barbera expired, he went to work with Seibert at his new studio, Frederator, on the "Oh Yeah! Cartoons" show for Nickelodeon.


title: Butch Hartman

text: During his time working at Hanna-Barbera, he became friends with future "Family Guy" creator Seth MacFarlane. The two would later go on to make the short "Zoomates" together for Oh Yeah! Cartoons. The character Dr. Elmer Hartman in "Family Guy" was named after Hartman. He also voiced various characters in the show's first few seasons.


title: Butch Hartman

text: His biggest success came in December 1997, when he created "The Fairly OddParents". The series originally started out as a series of shorts on the anthology show, "Oh Yeah! Cartoons". Eventually, Nickelodeon decided to pick the shorts up as a full series. Premiering in 2001, the adapted series ended up becoming a huge hit, second only in the ratings to "SpongeBob SquarePants" (and it briefly even passed "SpongeBob"s ratings). Following the third "The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius" crossover "The Jimmy-Timmy Power Hour 3: The Jerkinators", the series ceased production in 2006, but it was announced on Hartman's forum on February 2, 2007, that 20 more episodes would be produced; the 6th season of "Fairly OddParents" aired on February 18, 2008, starting with the 1-hour special "Fairly OddBaby". From May 1, 2009, to May 3, 2009, the 3-part special "Wishology" aired; although that too was originally intended as a series finale, the series was renewed for another season. A tenth season was eventually ordered in 2015. "The Fairly OddParents" is Nickelodeon's second longest-running animated show behind "SpongeBob".


title: Butch Hartman

text: Due to the success of "The Fairly OddParents", Hartman was asked to create another show for Nickelodeon; Hartman says the President of Nickelodeon asked him if he had an idea, and before he could say the title he was given the greenlight. The show would later become "Danny Phantom". To produce the show, in 2003, Hartman founded his own production company Billionfold Inc., which he also used, and still uses today, to produce his other projects. "Danny Phantom" received critical acclaim and is considered Hartman's best show, with Hartman himself acknowledging it as perhaps the best of his programs. "Danny Phantom" ended production in early 2007.


title: Butch Hartman

text: Around 2008–2009, Hartman began production his third show for Nickelodeon, "T.U.F.F. Puppy", which premiered in 2010 alongside the "Jimmy Neutron" spin-off "Planet Sheen". The series received mixed to positive reviews and ran for 3 seasons before being cancelled.


title: Butch Hartman

text: His final show, "Bunsen Is a Beast", aired on Nickelodeon and Nicktoons from January 16, 2017, to February 10, 2018. On February 8, 2018, Hartman announced on his Twitter and YouTube accounts that he had left Nickelodeon as of February 2 after a 20-year run.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In 2015, Hartman launched a "kid-safe [online] network of live shows and cartoons" called the Noog Network.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In October 2017, Hartman started a podcast called "Speech Bubble", on which he talks about cartoons, movies, pop culture, and various other topics. Several voice actors have appeared on the podcast, including Rob Paulsen, Tara Strong, Jerry Trainor, Grey Griffin, and Vic Mignogna. After initially posting excerpts on his primary YouTube channel, the podcast videos were later moved to its own dedicated YouTube channel, now including full episodes.


title: Butch Hartman

text: On June 22, 2019, Hartman released the animated web series, "HobbyKids Adventures". This series, produced by PocketWatch, Inc., was created for YouTube channel HobbyKidsTV. On 13 July, Hartman released a book, "Mad Hustle", which details the ins and outs on pitching and selling a show in Hollywood.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In 2019, Hartman created, wrote, and produced a Christian animated web series for preschoolers called "The Garden", along with his wife, Julieann. The Hartmans have already planned at least two seasons of the series and plan to launch a subscription-based app for "The Garden" in late 2022. Hartman's further plans for the property include creating a VBS curriculum for churches and illustrating a children's bible published by Thomas Nelson, entitled "The Garden Children's Bible", which stars the characters from "The Garden" and is scheduled to release in 2023.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In February 2021, Hartman was announced to be returning as a producer of "" a live-action/animated reboot of his original show. The show premiered on March 31, 2022.


title: Butch Hartman

text: Hartman currently lives in Bell Canyon, California, with his wife, Julieann, and daughters, Carly and Sophia Hartman. He also has three younger brothers. Hartman is also an openly devout born-again Christian and young-Earth creationist, converting in 2000 after hearing a sermon by Frederick K. C. Price.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In 2005, Hartman, along with his wife, founded Hartman House, a non-profit organization that supports those in developing nations, as well as some of the most poverty stricken areas in the United States. Hartman House has built two homes for families in Guatemala, fed nearly 7,200 families with Thanksgiving meals in the U.S., and is in the midst of funding a school in Uganda. At Hartman House events, Hartman usually draws and autographs items related to his work for children.


title: Butch Hartman

text: Hartman started a Kickstarter campaign for OAXIS Entertainment, a streaming service stated to be a "family-friendly" alternative. After the fundraising goal had been reached, it was then revealed the network was meant to be specifically a Christian one, which was never disclosed on the page. However, he later claimed that while faith would continue to be a part of his life, OAXIS would not be a faith-based service.


title: Butch Hartman

text: In February 2021, Hartman was accused of plagiarism when he published his commissioned artwork of "Attack on Titan" character Mikasa Ackerman, in which similarities were noted to a 2018 artwork of a Japanese artist. The artist confirmed Hartman did not receive permission.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Carlos Javier Correa Oppenheimer Jr. (born September 22, 1994) is a Puerto Rican professional baseball shortstop who is a free agent. He has played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Houston Astros, who selected him first overall in the 2012 MLB draft, and for the Minnesota Twins.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa made his MLB debut with the Astros in 2015, and won the American League (AL) Rookie of the Year Award. In 2017, Correa appeared in the World Baseball Classic, won the AL Player of the Month Award for May, was named an MLB All-Star, and won the World Series. In 2021, he was named to his second All-Star Team and won the Gold Glove and Platinum Glove Awards. After seven seasons with Houston, he entered free agency and signed a three-year deal with the Twins.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, to Carlos Correa Sr. and Sandybel Oppenheimer. Although the family's income was low, they had enough money to build a small house in Barrio Velázquez, a fishing village located in Santa Isabel, Puerto Rico, where Correa was raised. From an early age, Correa often played catch in an alley adjacent to his home, which prompted a neighbor to suggest enrolling him in a youth league, the parent-pitch category, when he was five years old. Correa was assigned to play as a first baseman due to his hitting ability, while his father continued training him every day during their free time. In 1998, Hurricane Georges caused heavy damage to the family's house. This forced his father to take several odd jobs, but he continued training Correa Jr. on a daily basis.


title: Carlos Correa

text: When he was seven years old, Correa was performing solidly in Santa Isabel's Playita Cortada American Baseball Congress affiliate, hitting up to 150 home runs. When the team was eliminated, the league's champion, Rio Grande, recruited Correa to play in the championship series held in Atlanta. However, the distance between Santa Isabel and the municipality of Rio Grande made this difficult for the family. His mother worked as well, but when this was not enough, she began selling food. The citizens of Santa Isabel began helping them organize charity games and his original team donated their sales income to help pay for the travel. Correa was Rio Grande's pitcher and was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player after striking out eight batters in a team comeback. By the time that he was 11 years old, the family was traveling to the municipality of Caguas to have him practice with higher-level teams. Correa was also an honor student and received a scholarship to attend Raham Baptist Academy.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Three years later, the family moved from Barrio Velázquez due to recurrent floods, but kept close ties with those who stayed behind. Joined by his brother, Jean Carlos, in baseball practices, the family once again was forced to work more odd jobs. Soon after, the Puerto Rico Baseball Academy and High School (PRBAHS) brought Correa in as a scholarship student. His discipline and talent prompted his coaches to work extra hours to improve his bat and they helped by offering transportation when the family's car was totaled in an accident. In 2010, Correa participated in the Perfect Game BCS Finals and the WWBA PG Underclassman World Championships. After attending one of these Perfect Game events, Correa made adjustments to his batting swing with his hitting coach, José Rivera. The following year he appeared at the 2011 PG BCS Under-18 Finals and East Coast Professional Showcase. However, it was Correa's performance at the 2011 PG World and National Showcases that promoted him to the top of his class, earning him a spot in the Aflac-PG All-American Game, where he was named Rawlings' Defensive Player of the Year. He closed the year with an appearance in the PG WBAA World Championships.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa opened 2012 by being selected the MVP in the Víctor Pellot Excellence Tournament, following an extraordinary performance for a shortstop that included a two-home run game. At the 2012 PG World Showcase, he established a PG record with a 97-miles per hour throw across the infield. After graduating from the PRBAHS, Correa signed a letter of commitment with the University of Miami. Besides competing for the PRBAHS, Correa was also a member of Team Mizuno and the Puerto Rico National Baseball Team that participated in the youth Pan-American tournament.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Despite being the youngest high-profile player to enter the 2012 Major League Baseball draft, in the months leading up to the event the 17-year-old Correa was already projected as a top-ten pick by several major sources, including "Sports Illustrated" and ESPN. His stock rose during the month before the draft, with outstanding performances in team workouts, including one that reportedly left the Houston Astros' scouts "blown away".


title: Carlos Correa

text: On June 4, 2012, the Astros selected him as the first overall pick, ahead of the projected top pick, pitcher Mark Appel. Correa was incredulous, only saying that he must have been dreaming, after entering the stage while hoisting the flag of Puerto Rico. With his selection, Correa became the highest-selected player to be drafted directly from a Puerto Rican high school, besting Ramón Castro's 17th pick in 1994, while joining several other top-10 Puerto Rican picks such as Francisco Lindor and Javier Báez, all of whom had moved to the mainland United States to complete their high school or college education after developing in the local youth leagues. Correa became the third Latino to be the first overall selection in the MLB Draft, after Alex Rodriguez and Adrián González, as well as the first Puerto Rican and Latin American-born player to do so. During the ceremony, he was congratulated by Puerto Rican great Iván Rodríguez. Upon returning to Puerto Rico the following day, Correa was greeted by a victory parade in his native Santa Isabel, which was attended by hundreds of people.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa signed with the Astros on June 7, 2012, agreeing to a $4.8 million signing bonus. He chose to wear the number 12 in his introduction to the media, donning it in homage to Hall of Famer Roberto Alomar, but abandoned it afterwards. The organization assigned him to their extended spring training team in Kissimmee, Florida. He began his professional career with the Gulf Coast Astros of the Rookie-level Gulf Coast League, and was promoted to Greeneville Astros of the Rookie-level Appalachian League, and batted a combined .258/.305/.400 in 190 at bats. He opened the 2013 season with the Quad City River Bandits of the Class A Midwest League.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa was ranked the top prospect in the Astros' farm system prior to the 2013 season and opened the year on a ten-game hitting streak that was halted by injury. He was selected the team's Player of the Month during this run and became the youngest player selected to play in the 2013 Midwest League All-Star Game, where he represented the Western Division All-Stars. Correa became the first player in the history of the All-Star Futures Game to be selected by popular vote to complete the World Team. He also became the first position player in the River Bandits' history to be selected in his first year with the team. The youngest player in the event, Correa entered the game as a defensive backup in the eighth inning. Despite not having an official at-bat, his pre-game batting practice was scouted as impressive, including some home runs that reached the second deck of Citi Field.


title: Carlos Correa

text: When Mark Appel joined the River Bandits in July, this marked the first time that two consecutive first overall draft picks played for the same minor league team. For the 2013 season, he batted .320/.405/.467 in 450 at bats. After the team prevented him from playing for Gigantes de Carolina in Puerto Rico, Correa began a training camp to improve his physique and add speed, which lasted from October to February.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On January 14, 2014, the Astros invited Correa to spring training as a non-roster player. They assigned him to the Lancaster JetHawks of the Class A-Advanced California League to start the 2014 season. On June 21, Correa fractured his right fibula, requiring surgery that ended his season. He batted .325/.416/.510 in 249 at bats over 62 games for Lancaster.


title: Carlos Correa

text: The Astros invited Correa to spring training in 2015, and assigned him to minor league camp in late March to prepare for an assignment with the Corpus Christi Hooks of the Class AA Texas League. After Correa hit .385/.459/.727 in 117 at bats over 29 games for Corpus Christi, the Astros promoted him to the Fresno Grizzlies of the Class AAA Pacific Coast League on May 11. In 24 games with the Grizzlies, he hit .276/.345/.449 in 98 at bats with three home runs and 12 RBIs.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On June 8, 2015, the Astros promoted Correa to the major leagues. He debuted in a 3–1 loss to the Chicago White Sox, going 1-for-4 with a RBI single off of Chris Sale. On June 9, Correa stole his first career base and hit his first MLB home run off of Zach Duke. By stealing three bases in his ninth game, he became the second-youngest player to do so in a century, only trailing Rickey Henderson by 21 days. Correa established a new franchise record for most hits during his first ten games by batting 14. He went on to also break the franchise record for most hits through 15 career games with 20. Correa set a franchise record for most doubles during his first 20 games, batting 9. Five home runs were also hit during this timeframe for a total of 14 extra-base hits, tied for the second-most since the 1993 MLB expansion. Correa also tied two other players by reaching base safely in 18 of these games. He won the American League's Rookie of the Month award for June.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On July 5, 2015, Correa became the first player since 1914 to record five games with a minimum of three hits and a home run in 25 plate appearances since his debut. By his 42nd game he was leading the American League in home runs by shortstops. This game was also Correa's seventh with at least three hits, a record for rookies in this league. By hitting nine home runs during this timeframe, he also became the first shortstop in a century to accomplish this in his first 42 games. On August 1, Correa recorded his first multi-homer game, also setting a franchise record by hitting 12 home runs in his first 46 games. By his 50th game he had batted more home runs in that number of games than any other shortstop in history, recording four more than the previous record-holder. On August 19, Correa delivered his first walk-off hit with a single off Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Matt Andriese.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On October 12, 2015, Correa became the youngest shortstop to hit a home run in playoff competition, as well as the second youngest player to record a postseason multi-homer game.


title: Carlos Correa

text: For the 2015 season with Houston, he batted .279/.345/.512 in 387 at bats. He had the 7th-best Power-Speed # in the American League, at 17.1. Playing 99 games at shortstop, he had a fielding percentage of .967.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Following the conclusion of the season, Correa was selected as the Sporting News AL Rookie of Year. At the 2015 Players Choice Awards he received the AL Outstanding Rookie Award. On November 16, 2015, MLB and the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) recognized Correa as the AL Rookie of the Year. He became the first Astro to win a Rookie of the Year award since Jeff Bagwell did in 1991.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa began the 2016 season by becoming the youngest player in the Astros' history to hit a home run on Opening Day. He missed playing time in September due to a shoulder injury. Correa ended the season with a .274 batting average, a .361 on-base percentage, a .451 slugging percentage, 36 doubles (10th in the AL), 20 home runs, and 96 RBIs in 577 at bats. He hit one ball with an exit velocity of 118.2 mph; the only major leaguer to hit a ball harder in 2016 was Giancarlo Stanton. Baseball-Reference.com calculated that Correa's 2016 season was worth 5.9 wins above replacement. He had four walk-off hits during the season, the most in MLB.


title: Carlos Correa

text: For May 2017, Correa was named the AL Player of the Month. He delivered a career-best five consecutive multiple-hit games from May 25–29, and totaled 14 such games on the month. In 26 games, he batted .386, eight doubles, seven home runs, 26 RBI and a 1.130 OPS. His batting average and RBI total led the AL, on-base percentage ranked third, hits and OPS fifth, and slugging tied for sixth. He was selected to play in his first MLB All-Star Game, held at Marlins Park in Miami. On July 18, it was revealed that he had suffered a torn ligament in his left thumb. He was ruled out for six to eight weeks.


title: Carlos Correa

text: For the 2017 regular season, Correa batted .315/.391/.550 in 422 at bats with 24 home runs and 84 RBIs. At shortstop, he had a .978 fielding percentage.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On October 6, 2017, Correa hit his first home run of the 2017 postseason against the Boston Red Sox in Game 2 of the American League Division Series. Two days later, he would hit his second home run of the postseason. On October 14, he hit his third home run of the post season including a walk-off double leading the Astros to their second win of the ALCS series against the Yankees. Correa and the Astros offense slumped as they lost all three middle games at Yankee Stadium. The Astros won Game 7 by a score of 4–0, advancing to their second World Series in franchise history, to face the National League pennant-winning Los Angeles Dodgers. In Game 2, Correa, along with two Astros teammates–José Altuve and George Springer—and two Dodgers players–Charlie Culberson and Yasiel Puig—all homered in extra innings as the Astros prevailed, 7–6. The five home runs accounted for the most hit in extra innings of any single game in major league history.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa went 3-for-5 in Game 5 including an RBI double and one of the five home runs by the Astros helping them beat the Dodgers 13–12. His effort helped setting the new record of most total home runs in a World Series. The game lasted over five hours, becoming the second-longest World Series game in history. The Astros won the World Series in Game 7 giving them their first title in franchise history.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Three years later, it was revealed in the Houston Astros sign stealing scandal that the Astros had broken MLB rules during their championship season. The team was punished with a $5 million fine and the loss of top draft picks in 2020 and 2021. Correa admitted that his team illegally stole signs to gain an advantage and apologized, saying "We were wrong for everything we did in 2017. It's not what we stand for. It's not what we want to portray as an organization, and we were definitely wrong about all that and we feel really sorry. We affected careers, we affected the game in some way, and looking back at it, it was just bad."


title: Carlos Correa

text: On June 28, Correa was placed on the 10-day disabled list due to back ailment. He was activated from the 10-day disabled list on August 10. On November 10, he underwent surgery to fix a deviated septum, which caused breathing problems while running the bases. In 2018 he batted .239/.323/.405 in 408 at bats with 15 home runs, 65 RBIs, and 11 sacrifice flies (leading the AL), and was 10th in the league in double plays grounded into (17). On defense, he was second in the league with a .984 fielding percentage at shortstop.


title: Carlos Correa

text: Correa missed Opening Day in 2019 due to neck stiffness. On April 3, in a game against the Texas Rangers, he got the 500th hit of his career. Correa was placed on the injured list on May 29 after suffering a rib fracture during a massage at home. On July 12, he was transferred to the 60-day injured list; he was later activated on July 26. On August 15, Correa hit his 100th career home runs in 7–6 loss to the Athletics at Oakland Coliseum. He joined Cal Ripken Jr. and Alex Rodriguez as the only major league shortstops to hit 100 career home runs before their 25th birthday. He was also the youngest Astro to hit the milestone home run. For the regular season, Correa slashed .279/.358/.568 with 21 home runs and 59 RBIs in 280 at bats. On October 13, he hit a walk-off home run in the 11th inning of the second game of the ALCS against the New York Yankees to tie the series at 1–1.


title: Carlos Correa

text: In 2020, Correa batted .264/.326/.383 with five home runs and 25 RBIs in 201 at bats. Opposing defenses began to deploy the infield shift in nearly 20% of his plate appearances in 2020, whereas, in previous years, shifts were rarely used when he batted. He led AL shortstops with a fielding percentage of .995.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On October 15, in Game 5 of the ALCS, Correa hit a walk-off home run in the 9th inning against the Tampa Bay Rays to force Game 6 of the series. He became only the third player, after David Ortiz and Bernie Williams, to have hit multiple postseason walk-off home runs.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On July 4, 2021, Correa was named a reserve to the MLB All-Star Game, his second career selection. He ranked fifth in the AL in OPS (.926) at the time. On September 21, Correa scored his 100th run on the season. He became the first Astro shortstop to ever score 100 runs in a season. Opposing teams continued to deploy shifts when Correa was batting, but he neutralized the strategy, significantly improving his results.


title: Carlos Correa

text: In 2021, Correa batted .279/.366(9th in the AL)/.485 with 104 runs (7th), 26 home runs, and 92 RBIs, and grounded into 16 double plays (10th). He appeared in 148 games, his most since 2016. He established career highs in home runs, with 104 runs scored, and with 269 total bases, and tied his career high with 75 walks. On defense, Correa led the AL with +21 defensive runs saved (DRS) and ranked third among shortstops with 579 total chances, 384 assists and a .981 fielding percentage. Following the regular season, he was awarded both of his first career Gold Glove and AL Platinum Glove Awards in a season in which the Astros were also named the AL Gold Glove Team. The Houston chapter of the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) named Correa the Astros' team Most Valuable Player, his first such award. He also won his first Fielding Bible Award and was named a "Sporting News" AL All-Star at shortstop.


title: Carlos Correa

text: On October 12, Correa moved into sixth all-time in postseason runs batted in (RBI) with 54 (tied with Albert Pujols) with his two-run single in Game 4 of the ALDS versus the Chicago White Sox. In Game 6 of the World Series, Correa made his 73rd postseason start as part of the infield unit of José Altuve, Alex Bregman, and Yuli Gurriel, which was more postseason starts by any quartet of teammates in major league history, surpassing the Yankees' Derek Jeter, Tino Martinez, Paul O’Neill, and Bernie Williams, with 68 postseason contests started together. On November 3, 2021, Correa was declared a free agent for the first time in his career. The Astros extended Correa a qualifying offer, valued at $18.4 million for one year, which he rejected.