>><<A-Rod, Tex Announce Retirements; Ichiro Gets to 3000>><<
Oddball couple of weeks for our Yankees, there dad.
Soon I'll put a few pictures from your visit up, but until then...
YANKEES!
So we started the rebuild in earnest, selling off Chapman, Miller, Beltran, and Nova, three of our best players and a pitcher we all rooted for. Then Texeira announces that this year will be his last. For the Yanks, I always figured for sure, but as a career? Kinda makes me lament all those times I doubted your game, Tex.
A consummate teammate and all-world defensive first basemen, his 400+ homers/400+ doubles/5 Gold Gloves will get him plenty of attention in Hall of Fame conversations. If not right away, then eventually. Is he a first balloter? Am I whacky for not just saying it?
Why is it that all I can remember from his time in pinstripes, aside from the Ring in his first year, is him hitting like ass until July, getting white-hot until September, and then getting hurt, and being a shell of himself until the next season, then repeating the process.
See what a bubble we live in out here on the edge of the continent, so far from the Bronx?
Then A-Rod, mostly pushed out.
I never had a hat-on for the guy, always kinda liked him in Seattle, never hated him when he went to Texas, but found it amusing that he created so much animosity. When the Yankees traded Soriano for him before the 2004 season, like us rare level-headed Yankee fans, I sorta smiled and shook my head in disbelief.
This is why everybody hates us, we all collectively nodded to each other.
I was at games where fan jeered him for hitting a home run. "Hit it when it matters!" she hollered. I just laughed. What can a guy do?
Then I read the A-Rod bio, the one he bitched about even though he never sued the author for slander. It claimed he was doing steroids while in high school. It paints a very unflattering picture of a tragic figure who was profoundly affected by the absence of his father.
Whatever. A-Rod doesn't get the steroid pass that Bartolo Colon and David Ortiz get. Sometimes life is just like that.
But now the game will fully belong to the Trouts and Harpers and Machados and Kershaws of the world.
ICHIRO!
I always liked Ichiro, and getting to read about him a lot as he approached 3000 hits has been a pleasure. Congrats to the elder statesmen from Japan, and eventually the first Japanese born Hall of Famer.
But with Ichiro getting to 3000, A-Rod getting ousted, Tex making his announcement, and the Yankees embracing the rebuild, a page feels like it has turned.
A page definitely has been turned, I couldn't agree more. It usually doesn't happen with this suddenness, though. The Yanks in particular are facing big changes. The A-Rod-Tex-CC Sabathia Yanks are passing on, to become what? The Sanchez-Judge-Clint Frazier-Severino Yanks? I guess that would be one solid possibility. Here's hoping Doug Bird returns to full strength. If he does, what of Tyler Austin?
ReplyDeleteOK, Pat, my favorite Yankee right now? Might just be Sir Didi. How many shortstops hit in the 3 and 4 slot, hm? Of course, Sanchez and Judge are pushing him down a little in the order, or will, once they're more established.
One cute thing you should be aware of if you weren't already. When Judge came back to the dugout after his first homer, somebody, I think it was Castro, picked up the very short Ronald Torreyes, off the dugout floor, so he could reach high enough to high-five (which they seem to do with forearms now) Judge. I guess it's become a thing, because I've seem them do it two or three times.
Do you understand - they're going to think twice about running on Sanchez. He's thrown out 5 of 7 would-be base stealers, and the only successful ones ran on Betances, whose move to the plate we time with a calendar, not a stopwatch.
Enough of the wandering around aimless now ... talk to you soon.