Verducci with a darn good piece about A-Rod

that was the series giambi called a-rod out on. a typical example of a-rod's phony numbers. soft broken bat hits. whatever.

choke on these numbers: from seventh-inning on in close games:

a-rod: 2 homers, 17 rbi, .227.

ortiz: 11 homers, 28 rbi, .305

 

Yeah, because those runs in the first six innings mean less. Gotcha. And box scores don't differentiate between soft hits and hard hits. The numbers are the numbers: .333, an RBI a game pace. I guess you'd dis him for a 162-RBI season. Then again, I guess you'd dis him for saving children from a burning house because that's the fire department's job or something.

It really is possible to like and appreciate A-Rod and Jeter. Really. And would you start Nick Green at third over A-Rod? You know you're stuck with A-Rod forever because of the contract. What would you propose the Yankees do to solve this apparent cancer who hits more homers and drives in more runs than anybody else on the team. You know, driving in runs...the things that if you get more than the other team, you win.

 

Sorry, I spent a formative summer in the early '70s in Oakland, and from Charley Finley's A's I learned that teammates' interpersonal opinions of each other had absolute zero to do with how they played ball together. When the A's had one of their semi-regular clubhouse fistfights, people would immediately travel to Nevada to put down big bets on the team in their next games.
As you all undoubtedly know, the sainted Ruth and Gehrig were estranged until the latter's illness, because the henpecked Iron Horse felt obliged to stand with his wife who detested the second Mrs. Babe and the Ruth family's freewheeling style (enough euphemisms in that sentence?). My parents were on a cruise ship with Mrs. Gehrig in the '50s and she STILL hated Ruth.
A-Rod is having the worst season of his career. That speaks more to the career than the season. His home run and RBI totals are remarkably close to those of very legitimate MVP candidate Justin Morneau (34-116 vs. 33-123). As for the clutch hitting concept, I'm sad to see a perceptive soul like Shockey fall for some old fallacies-assuming all runs are not created equal, and that all failures by a big star are proof of choking.
As for choking, wasn't Giambi's last homer one month ago today?

 

dools

believe it or not, i'm not a guy who can't appreciate both jeter and a-rod. simply speaking as someone who sees just about every game, all i can tell you is that a-rod has been gawdawful this season.

gawdawful by mortal standards? of course not. but we all know that there are guys who put up on-the-surface huge numbers and others who put up both on-the-surface huge numbers AND in the heat of battle huge numbers.

ortiz has done the latter. jeter is always the same player no matter the situation.

a-rod this season? he's been awful in important situations. so much so that giambi had to get an intervention going. so much so that his teammates wonder, "wtf?" so much so that torre had to do some tough talking to him, not joe's style.

if you just want to use the overall numbers as a gauge, be my guest. but a-rod's been a basketcase both at the plate and at third for much of the season. his numbers, when people look back years from now, will make people think he was done wrong by critics this season, but he hasn't been. anyone paying attention can attest to that.

it's a testament to the great talent of a-rod that he can suffer through his worst season and still put up hall of fame numbers. that doesn't mean he's at all played at a hall of fame level.

and of course the first six innings count. but anyone can see that late-game, close-game numbers separate the men from the headcases.

i'm done on this subject. we apparently disagree. that's what makes for good, healthy debate. i totally support your right to be wrong. ;D ;D ;D

p.s. -- michael, all runs are NOT created equal. that's how some hitters become known as "clutch" and others gain reps as "compilers." it's what makes stats vs. watching how someone plays the game such a compelling debate.

 

dools, you always seem to take the A-Rod stuff really personally...why? Why is THIS the argument that stirs your stew?


Oh, and great piece by Verducci. I do hate A-Rod, but not because of numbers or post-sixth-inning production or any of that...he just comes off as so fake that I can't stand him.

 

Giambi has no shame.

 

Spoken like spnited.

I will never, EVER, understand the soft argument. And I couldn't care less about A-Rod, the Yankees, Jeter, Ortiz, etc. I'm unbiased in this argument.

But as Dooley says, the first-inning runs count just as much as the late ones, just as April games count just as much as September.

Just ask the Indians or Pirates.

 

I'm REALLY not getting the vitriol toward Giambi on this one. He sounds like a veteran who isn't afraid to say what needs to be said to get things turned in the right direction.

Maybe we were reading a different story. Or maybe y'all have steroids on your brain.

 

All runs are created equal.
They each count one point.
Jesus, this is the kind of crap they used to sling at Ted Williams, too.

 

In this case, it was the first time Jeter swung at a 3-0 count since 2002 (a total of 115 opportunities). That was the issue, and it's a pretty telling stat (thank God some people have nothing better to do than compile stats like that. They're tremendous).

 

Well, it should be chilly in the Yankee clubhouse for the foreseeable future...

 

It should also be noted that as soon as the next opportunity approached Jeter did the exact same thing. The result, however, was different. Instead of grounding out, Jeter crushed a 2-run home run that gave the Yankees the lead.