Okay, that's reassuring, and consistent with everything we know about the Indians' front office. At the same time, given his obvious athleticism, I was surprised that they left him exposed to the Rule 5 draft.

It might be interesting to see how Barton and Tony LaRussa get along.

I read the original note as saying that the 'concerns' came during his final year in Miami. Either way, racial profiling certainly does occur (and clearly not only in baseball!) but great to see the Indians' defended in this way.

Now for that dang Chief Wahoo . . .

Dennis Nosco has a nice piece on Barton and Matt Whitney over on Swerb's Blurbs: http://www.swerbsblurbs.com/article_detail.php?blgId=3056

Also, Barton got his first major league hit last night.

I'm a fan of KG, but nothing at all impressed me about this.

My guess is that if there's a bias involved with Barton, it's not racial, it's his being not just smart, but exceptionally smart. There's a pretty rich vein of anti-intellectualism in this country to begin with. Add that to the usual suspicions against "thinking" in baseball, and it may well be that exceptional intellect is viewed as a possible makeup issue. And I'm not sure that's all wrong.