Regular
readers of this blog know a little of my background. I came to
sports awareness in the late 1970s. My touchstones – whether their teams every were, or stayed, my
favorites, or not – were guys like Reggie Jackson, Thurman Munson, Catfish
Hunter, Goose Gossage, Tom Seaver, Mike Schmidt, Johnny Bench, Pete Rose, Terry
Bradshaw & the Steel Curtain, Roger Staubach and his Cowboys, Phil
Esposito's Rangers (but not his Bruins, I was too young to see them), Denis Potvin's
Islanders (there was no Devils yet), and the Canadiens of Guy Lafleur, Larry Robinson and
Ken Dryden.
Because
of who he was, where he was, and what he did at that time, Mr. Reginald
Martinez Jackson became my first favorite athlete – and no one has ever
replaced him as that. Not Derek Jeter or any other Yankee. Nor any other baseball player. Nor any other athlete.
Reggie was a Yankee for
5 years. He helped them reach the postseason 4 times. 3
Pennants. 2 World Championships. For good or ill – and
when he was good, he was illin' – he gave us some epic moments. From
The Bronx to Chavez Ravine, from Fenway to Kansas City, he didn't just shine
when the lights were brightest, he brightened them.
He is in the Baseball
Hall of Fame, the 500 Home Run Club, and Yankee Stadium's Monument Park. Deservedly,
in all three.
He is also in the
current issue of Sports Illustrated:
He
believes that the Baseball Writers Association of America, whose members vote
for the Hall, have adopted too low a standard.
"I didn't see Kirby Puckett as a Hall of Famer," he
says. "I didn't see Gary Carter as a Hall of Famer. I didn't see Don
Sutton as a Hall of Famer. I didn't see Phil Niekro as a Hall of Famer. As much
as I like Jim Rice, I'm not so sure he's a Hall of Famer." What about Bert
Blyleven? "No. No, no, no, no," Jackson says. "Blyleven wasn't
even the dominant pitcher of his era — it was Jack Morris."
I
disagree with him on most of those. Sutton and Niekro are in
both the 300 Win Club and the 3,000 Strikeout Club. Only 10 guys are in both. The others are Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson, Roger
Clemens, Steve Carlton, Tom Seaver, Gaylord Perry, Walter Johnson and Greg
Maddux.
If
you want to cite Clemens for steroids (even though it still hasn't been
proven), or Perry for doctoring the ball, that's understandable; but the rest
are legit. I don't want to hear that Sutton and Niekro "were just
guys who hung around a long time amassing a lot of stats." I never liked
Sutton, but he's a Hall-of-Famer. So is Niekro.
Carter
is one of the 10 best catchers in history – and that was true before we knew he
was dying. Puckett had to retire early due to his eyes, so he
probably shouldn't have been a first-ballot Hall-of-Famer, but he
belongs. As for Rice, well,
he's a borderline case. But if
character is what determines whether he falls to the yes or the no side, then he
falls to the yes.
Wally
Backman, a teammate of Carter's on the 1986 World Champion Mets, is now the
manager of the Flushing club's Triple-A team, the Buffalo Bisons. And he
was not happy about Reggie's comments:
He is going a long ways saying something like that. Especially with a guy like Gary and his status. It's not only the player, it’s
the person, too. That's going overboard. To me, it's a disgrace to the
Yankee family with him saying that.
Well, excuse me, Mr. 94 Career OPS+ whose peak year for home runs,
3, was matched by Reggie in one World Series game.
Sure, Backman is entitled to defend his teammate. In
fact, if I were another teammate, I'd insist.
But who the hell is Wally Backman to decide what is, or is not, "a
disgrace to the Yankee family"? He has never been a part of it. Worry about the Met family, Wally.
*
The SI article goes
on:
He isn't silent on the subject of steroids in baseball
either. Jackson makes no secret of his displeasure that since his retirement in
1987, he has been passed on the home run list by seven players, five of whom,
Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro and Sammy Sosa, have been
linked to performance-enhancing drugs.
"I don't think the fans really count them, and I
agree," he says. "I believe that Hank Aaron is the home run king, not
Barry Bonds, as great a player as Bonds was." Jackson was a supporter of
Bonds (who is a distant cousin) as recently as 2007, when he said, "They
tried to get this guy more than anybody ... and they've got nothing on
him." But he says now that the volume of evidence against Bonds is so
great that he has changed his mind.
And
A-Rod? "Al's a very good friend," Jackson says. "But I think
there are real questions about his numbers. As much as I like him, what he
admitted about his usage does cloud some of his records."
Read
the line again: "What he admitted about his usage does cloud his records."
Not "renders his achievements invalid." Not "should keep him out of the Hall of
Fame." Not "should make Yankee fans (or anyone else) who admires him stop admiring him."
"Does cloud his records."
"Does cloud his records."
We're
not talking about a guy with 10 career home runs (as Backman has) yapping about
a guy with 563 career home runs. We're talking about a guy
with 563 analyzing a guy with, at the moment, 642.
To
put it another way: If A-Rod's career home runs are prorated to 100, Reggie is
at 87.7. And Backman is at 1.6.
What
Reggie said about A-Rod, like it or not, is true. His
achievements are clouded. This
should hardly be controversial, since it's not original. We've known it
since Spring Training 2009.
But
it was embarrassing, to A-Rod and to the Yankee organization.
As a
result, the club, for whom Reggie is a special adviser to owners Hank and Hal
Steinbrenner, has effectively suspended him from interacting with Yankee
personnel.
Prior
to this, Reggie called Alex to apologize and clear the air. That
should do it: If Alex accepts Reggie apology, then that should be the end of
it.
Still,
I can't help but think that the Yankees are overreacting.
Reggie
also starred with the Oakland Athletics. No team is more identified
with steroids, due to Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire and Jason Giambi. If Reggie were currently employed by the A's, and had
said something about them, would they have suspended him?
Would
the San Francisco Giants have suspended Willie Mays or Willie McCovey, if one
of them had said similar things about Bonds?
Would
the Chicago Cubs have suspended Ernie Banks if he'd said it about Sammy Sosa?
Would
the Baltimore Orioles have suspended Brooks Robinson, or Frank Robinson, or,
Lord have mercy, Cal Ripken, if one of them had said it about Rafael Palmeiro
or Brady Anderson?
What
if Nolan Ryan had said it about Juan Gonzalez, Ivan Rodriguez, and Palmeiro?
What would the Texas Rangers do with him? Almost certainly nothing – even
before he became a part-owner.
What
about the Boston Red Sox? Suppose Carl Yastrzemski had said, "What David Ortiz
and Manny Ramirez did was wrong, and they should have been banned from baseball
for life." No, Yaz hasn't said anything like that. I don't
think he would. He's a very private guy. He hasn't said anything controversial since he
retired. But he has the right.
Then
there's Pete Rose. His former teammates are divided on whether he should
be reinstated into baseball, and thus made eligible for the Hall of Fame. His Cincinnati Reds teammate Johnny Bench says he
should not. His Philadelphia
Phillies teammate Mike Schmidt says he should. There's no need for the Phillies to suspend Schmidt: What Rose did
involved that team in no way. But the Reds have never suspended Bench for his remarks. Nor should they have done so.
Most
likely, this story will be resolved, probably before October, so that Reggie
can throw out a ceremonial first ball before a postseason game. If not
then, surely, Reggie will be invited back for next year's Old-Timers' Day, and
that will be the end of it. You
don't just tell a Hall-of-Famer for your club that he can't show up on
Old-Timers’ Day.
*
I was on Twitter and I
saw a conversation between ESPN's Buster Olney, author of The Last
Night of the Yankee Dynasty, and Marcos Breton, a writer and a big Giants
fan who appeared on the "Tenth Inning" segment of Ken Burns' miniseries Baseball. I
asked Breton, point blank: If Mays had said something like that about Bonds,
would they have told him to stay away? "No." Plain and simple. (I
decided discretion was the better part of valor, accepted Breton's one-word
answer, and left it at that. I didn't want to further touch a nerve
with a writer I like.)
But I
also unfollowed a man I follow on Twitter, for his remarks about Reggie, which
were nasty. (There's no need to identify him; if he's someone you
also follow, I won't ask you to unfollow him.)
I
really shouldn't take this personally… but it's my guy. The guy whose
exploits got me through a childhood that scarred me in ways from which I may
never fully recover.
This
is the way some guys treated Jim Bouton after he said uncomplimentary – but
totally true – things about Mickey Mantle in his book Ball Four.
And I
don't want to hear that A-Rod is better, or was better at his peak, than Reggie
was, or even better than Mickey was. Even if he was, even without
steroids, that's not the point.
The
point is, I got a right to defend my guy, every bit as much as A-Rod's fans
have a right to defend him, as Backman and Met fans have to defend Carter over Reggie's
assessment of Carter's HOF credentials.
While
I disagree with Reggie's suggestions about those guys not deserving their HOF
elections, I stand by him on the A-Rod question.
If
A-Rod didn't want to be embarrassed like this, he never should have used the
damn stuff. Simple as that, baby.
And
how long does A-Rod get punished for using the stuff? I don't know. Rose
admitted his wrongdoing; 23 years later, he's still out. Shoeless Joe
Jackson was acquitted of trying to throw a World Series; 91 years after that
acquittal, he's still out.
But
how much has A-Rod really been punished? He wasn't suspended for his steroid
use. Not for one game.
Reggie's
being, effectively, suspended from his front-office job with the Yankees, for
comments which, while ill-advised, were not defamatory -- we already knew A-Rod's
achievements were clouded -- and were never meant to upset him.
This
is ridiculous.
And
some Yankee Fans are talking about how Reggie's got a big ego? And a big mouth?
Yeah,
he does. We already knew that, too. So what?
Without
Reggie Jackson, we're talking about that "straw that stirs the drink"
not being there to stir it in 1977, and while the Yankees won the American
League Championship Series over the Kansas City Royals without Reggie being an
especially big factor, it's possible they wouldn't have even gotten that far,
as Reggie hit like hell down the stretch, and beat the Red Sox and Orioles by 2
1/2 games each. And if they had still won the Pennant, do they beat the
Dodgers in the World Series? I don't think so. He was the reason they won
Game 6, and a pretty big reason why they won Game 4; without him, the Dodgers
probably win in 6 or 7 games.
Without
Reggie, the Yankees don't win it in 1978, either. That great comeback
from 14 games down against the Red Sox on the morning of July 20 to catching
them on September 10 and then having that Playoff game...
You remember who hit the winning home run? It was Bucky Dent who hit a home run that gave them a lead they would never relinquish, 3-2, but the game ended 5-4 to the Yankees. Who gave them the 5th run? Reggie, on a blast to the camera stand in dead center field at Fenway Park.
He also took Al Hrabosky deep in Game 1 of the ALCS, proving he could hit lefthanders, even in Kansas City, in the postseason. He also put the exclamation point on he World Series by taking Bob Welch very deep in Game 6, revenge for Welch striking him out to end Game 2.
You remember who hit the winning home run? It was Bucky Dent who hit a home run that gave them a lead they would never relinquish, 3-2, but the game ended 5-4 to the Yankees. Who gave them the 5th run? Reggie, on a blast to the camera stand in dead center field at Fenway Park.
He also took Al Hrabosky deep in Game 1 of the ALCS, proving he could hit lefthanders, even in Kansas City, in the postseason. He also put the exclamation point on he World Series by taking Bob Welch very deep in Game 6, revenge for Welch striking him out to end Game 2.
Without
Reggie, and his league-leading 41 homers in 1980 -- most by a Yankee between
1961 and 1997 -- they don't win the AL Eastern Division. Granted, Reggie
had a bad year in 1981, but he came up big in the strike-forced Division Series
against the Milwaukee Brewers, so they wouldn't have won that series without
him, and thus they wouldn't have won the Pennant without him.
Without
those Pennants, attendance wouldn't have risen much. The Yankees might
still have been getting only 14,000 fans per game, as they were before the
Stadium was renovated, as the South Bronx neighborhood got worse and worse. Don't forget, 1981 was the year the Paul Newman cop film Fort
Apache: The Bronx was released. Without Reggie, George Steinbrenner might have made a lot more noise
about how the renovation of the Stadium was a waste, and that he wanted out.
Without
Reggie Jackson, the Yankees might now be playing in an antiseptic facility out
in the Meadowlands. Worse still, they might have to share it with the
Mets!
Without
Reggie Jackson, and what he added to the Yankee Mystique, the revival of the
1990s might not have happened. Don't forget, it was George's anger over
Dave Winfield not measuring up to Reggie (or so he thought) that led George to
investigate Dave, which led to George being suspended by Commissioner Fay
Vincent, which led to Gene Michael rebuilding the team. Without Reggie,
George might have just traded Winfield sooner, and would have died in 2010
without ever having won a World Series.
Without
Reggie Jackson, and the ego that allowed him to be one of the biggest sluggers
of his time, or any other time, the Yankees would not have won a World Series
since 1962.
That's
50 years. Half a century.
He,
as much as any other player on the 1977 and '78 World Champions -- Thurman,
Catfish, Sparky, Guidry, Nettles, take your pick -- is the difference between
the Yankees being the Yankees as we know them today, with 27 World
Championships, a sparkling new Stadium, and admiration (and hatred) around the
world -- and the Yankees being the Toronto Maple Leafs of baseball. (For
all their money, reach and hype, the Leafs haven't won a Stanley Cup, or even
reached the Finals, since 1967.)
Without
Reggie, we're talking about the Curse of Moose Skowron.
(The
Yankees saw Joe Pepitone as the 1st baseman of the future, so they traded
Moose to the Los Angeles Dodgers after the 1962 season, for pitcher Stan
Williams. The trade backfired, as the Dodgers beat the Yankees in the
1963 World Series, and Moose homered off the Yankees. And while Pepitone
was more talented than Moose ever was, he achieved much less.)
To sum
up: A, Reggie may have told the truth, when keeping the truth to himself may
have been more prudent, but he did tell the truth about A-Rod; and, B, Show some
respect.
That
goes for you, too, Hank and Hal. Yes, your dad made Reggie a Yankee. But Reggie made your dad a World Champion. (Remember, Reggie
already was one, 3 times over, in Oakland.) If it wasn't for Reggie making your
dad a World Champion, nobody would give a damn about either of you, or the
Steinbrenner name, today.
And you wouldn't have been able to afford A-Rod in the first place.
No comments:
Post a Comment