Stone on Beltre
DMZ · March 6, 2005 at 11:12 am · Filed Under Mariners
Larry Stone writes in today’s Seattle Times about how much his old Dodger teammates (and coaches and everyone else) like Adrian Beltre. It’s a good light read.
Comments
26 Responses to “Stone on Beltre”
Beltre is, the next Ciillo!!!!!!!! He is la-z bum wit no life and his work ethical is going downward spirall quickly.
STERRRRRRRRRRRRROIDDDS!!!!!!! BALLLLLLLCO!!!!!!
Shoot! My 10 year old cousin found this. Sorry guys. Delete those and this posts. That won’t happen again.
I’m not in the business of cleaning up after you and yours, if that’s indeed what happened.
Welcome to the moderation queue again, Mr. Corcoran.
Just for the day, please? My cousin is leaving in an hour.
And I’m not in the trolling business.
I used to tell Belly, ‘Your father is better than you.’ “I spent so much time with Belly, so many years
Please don’t let Rick Rizz read this article. I can’t deal with 5 years of “Belly at the plate” that would just be too much.
He sounds like the M’s kind of a guy. All lovey-duvey oo kind of people… At least he can hit good too.
I enjoyed that article, thanks.
You know, if the M’s penchant for drafting good people also always had the stipulation that they be good baseball players… I would really respect it.
It does mean a lot to me as a fan when I am able to root for a good guy. I enjoyed that a lot about Edgar, for example. And there are some ridiculously good players that I just wouldn’t want on my team.
It’s linear, of course, and not absolute. I like my crusty ball players, too. Just not the actually despicable.
Ben Christensen, anyone?
I try to give the M’s the benefit of the doubt, and think that Ben Christensen made a convincing plea for forgiveness and showed the signs of rehabilitation.
Then I recall what he did, and it really sucked. No baseball job for you, Ben.
Ben Christensen’s actions were inexcuseable. I can’t believe any team would sign him. I can’t believe he passed the psychology test.
When, exactly, did he ever make that plea, or show any sign of rehabilitation? Take full responsibility for his actions?
Did he, for instance, apologize directly to Molina?
Because having followed the story closely for ages, I never came across any of that.
Ben Christensen ought to be in jail for what he did.
Off-topic: is Shin-Soo Choo just suffering horribly from nerves, or is he really as bad a fielder as he seems to be? Dude looks like a future DH.
I tried to imagine that he must have, to Important People, sometime. Otherwise, it makes no sense at all. It was an attempt to try and justify the move, but of course I can’t actually believe it.
Re: Ben Christensen
One culprit not mentioned yet in this thread was Christensen’s pitching coach at Wichita State, Brent Kemnitz. Kemnitz was quoted in a U of Washington student publication on May 11, 1999:
“If the on-deck hitter is standing too close to home plate, you brush him back. I teach that.â€
Molina wasn’t merely “brushed back.†While he was standing 30 feet from home plate, a 91-mph fastball caught him full in the face, permanently damaging his vision and effectively ending any chances he had to advance in baseball.
Still a respected coach at WSU (see http://goshockers.com/baseball/coaches.aspx), Kemnitz apparently also hosts a radio show in the area (KNSS 1330).
Molina apparently settled out-of-court with Christensen. (Christensen’s agent—not Ben himself—expressed the depth of remorse the pitcher had.) A negligence suit against Kemnitz and the WSU head coach was in progress according to this article in 2002:
http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/news/020205christensen.html
Here is another article on the incident:
http://www.yaleherald.com/archive/xxviii/1999.09.03/sports/p25bialik.html
Re: #12
Sorry, that WSU link should be:
http://goshockers.com/baseball/coaches.aspx
Look out for Willie Boom Boom, folks — I was just listening to the archived radio broadcast of today’s M’s game and Dave Niehaus reported that he spoke with Wille Bloomquist yesterday and Willie said “I just feel like this is my year. I feel like I’ve found my stroke”. Stroke or no stroke, I’ll be amazed if “Bloomy” ever has a season with an OPS over .700 (he was at .638 and .613 the last two years).
Just once, I want to see a player start spring training with a quote along the lines of this: “I just feel like last year was my career year. My stroke is just a mess right now.”
Jon, there’s just one shot for Willie to do what you suggest. If Bloomquist is near the end of the season and is sitting at a .700 OPS, Hargrove should just sit him the rest of the way, like Joe Cronin wanted to do with Ted Williams.
If this requires Bloomquist to be benched for two, three — heck, four or five — months, so be it. It’s the only way to be sure.
Willie’s going to get a .700 OPS one of these years. Seems to fit in nicely with that law of backup catchers, that they’ll have one season of good offensive numbers in a limited amount of playing time that ensures them financial security for the rest of their lives.
Are Jeff and Jeff Sullivan different persons?
My favorite sports blogs: LookoutLanding/LeoneForThird/FireBavasi, USS Mariner, Sports and Bremertonians.
Yup, we’re different. I’m Jeff Shaw. Sully’s my evil twin. Or vice versa.
I’m thinking about removing the “Sullivan” part when I post comments, just to encourage further confusion.
Speaking in a strictly biological sense, yes, Jeff Shaw and I are different people.
Ah yes, San Shin! Thanks!
Willie Bloomquist is a career minor-leaguer who has made the majors because he is a local kid, he plays hard (albeit not that well), he does the community gigs the team asks him to do, and he is as non-threatening a ballplayer as you will find. I just thought Vanilla Melvin was enamored with the kid, sounds like Grover too now.
Sullivan’s Law: as an online discussion of the Mariners grows longer, the probability of the topic turning towards the merits of Willie Bloomquist approaches one.