I’ll keep this plain and simple.
I don’t like Matt Holliday.
Baseball is a game of giving 100 percent effort at every moment of the game between the first pitch and the final out. You don’t have to be perfect, you don’t have to be the most amazing player in the world. If you show that you’re trying, show that you’re battling to play and help your team win, you’re an appreciated ballplayer.
Matt Holliday isn’t one of those players. He’s good when he wants to be and just a Plain Jane in Cardinals lineup the rest of the time. He displays no desire to play baseball. From my vantage point he looks like some guy who’s trying to find the quickest way to have his three-hour, nine-inning work day done as quickly as possible. That’s not a model employee, that’s certainly not a baseball hero; that’s a waste of time and money.
He doesn’t hustle in the outfield anymore. He won’t do whatever it takes to quickly retrieve a ball and get it in to hold the runners. He won’t even dive and turn a simple base hit into an out.
...I don’t need hear anything about numbers either. He puts those numbers up to look good and then just slacks off — thus proving my point that Holliday is good when he wants to be.
...You’re certainly not playing for the fans, you’re just there to do a half-donkey job in the game most of us can only dream of playing.
Bring on Adron Chambers and put him in the outfield. He’s got the speed, shows the effort and works hard.
Repoz
Posted: October 02, 2012 at 12:03 PM |
34 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Tags:
cardinals
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. cardsfanboyThe strangest thing is that you could insert any power hitter's name into the rant. There is absolutely zero specific information about Holliday in it (other than that he's from Oklahoma and plays left field). That's what makes it come off as just a crazy ramble.
What kind of statement is that? And who has ever viewed Holliday as that kind of talent, anyway?
WHAT??
Really weird.
LOOK AT ME!!
October 2, 2012
Look at me. Please, look at me. Give my little slice of the web page views so my boss won't fire me.
Look at me, really, just look at me. Pay attention to me. Acknowledge me.
I exist. I am someone important. You know this because I get paid for writing. Look at me. Give me attention.
Seriously, if you don't pay attention I will hold my breath until I turn blue and die and then how will you feel? Look at me. E-mail me around. Give me Twitter hits. Now retweet me. Now respond to my Twitter account (@lookatme) so I can write a follow article about how rude people were who looked at me.
Are you paying attention yet? I write for a major metropolitan newspaper. I may even receive a major award that is better than a leg lamp. Please, just whatever you do, make sure you look at me.
Dominic Genetti can be reached at look@me.com
DiMaggio, Mantle, whatever. It's just a column- nothing to work too hard on.
i actually think mantle played hard. that's how he got injured so much. but he didn't do himself any favors by the way he took care of himself off the field.
second, what worries me about this article is if this idiot reflects some of the fan feeling towards holliday. is there a lot of complaining about him in st. louis? to me, he looks very composed and quiet as a player and i wonder if fans see that as just not trying hard enough or something.
Poor guy. In Game 7 of last year's World Series they put in a defensive substitute for everybody except LF, where they left in Allen Craig instead of bringing in Chambers and Craig caught the final out.
I went to a Padres/Cardinals game at Petco in May 2011 with my GF, and since our seats were just over the left field fence, we arrived early to watch Pujols hit in BP. He was peppering the seats with homers, so my GF and I (and a bunch of other people) were trying to catch some mementos (without gloves). Holliday was on the DL at the time, but he was shagging flies in LF right in front of us. Anyway, the GF and I were both hit HARD (stupidly) trying to catch Pujols homers without a glove. Hers hit her in the upper thigh and left a nasty bruise, but at least it fell straight to the ground after and she was able to pick it up and keep it as a souvineer. Mine hit me in the chest and bounced way back over the LF fence. I leaned over the fence and was calling to Holliday to toss it to me, but he threw it to the lady on the other side of me instead. So while the GF and I both got nasty bruises, only she got a Pujols ball to show for it. All because of Matt Holliday.
So yeah, he can go to hell.
Nevertheless, there's some chatter out there on the dumber Cardinal sites (like the P-D) that he's not clutch, only drives in runs when it doesn't matter, blah blah blah. Horse-hockey.
The only reason Chambers was on the roster was because Holliday couldn't stop sharting all over himself in Game 6. Holliday dropped this, which put the go-ahead run in scoring position with nobody out. Holliday later got picked off 3rd when he represented the go-ahead run after Ogando had just walked in the tying run (Ogando would throw a wild pitch, and then walk Nick Punto - so Holliday almost surely cost them the lead).
Allen Craig deserved to catch the final out as much as anyone. There's a case to be made he was just as if not more valuable than Freese in the WS.
If it wasn't for Allen Craig and David Freese, Matt Holliday's game 6 blunders (on top of the 2009 gaffe in LA) would have defined his career.
all of that being said, Holliday has been much better in the field and on the bases this year.
I have no idea if the man "hustles" or not. I do know he has 1046 games played 2006-12 which is the 18th most in baseball over that time span.
It's kind of a funny list, with plenty of guys with a "doesn't care", "doesn't hustle", "doesn't take it serious", "out of shape" sort of rep:
Fielder, Cabrera, Uggla, Dunn, Swisher, Carlos Lee, Rios and Teixeira are all in the top 20.
So are noted grinders like Ichiro, Francoeur (ha!) and Jeter. And, yes, Juan Pierre is 21st. Betancourt had 959 games over the last 7 years -- amazing.
So here's a lesson for you kids -- if you suck at baseball, make sure you play the game the right way.
That, and his .435/.500/.652 (1.152 OPS) line in the NLCS, without which they probably would have been watching the brewers play in the World Series.
And the year he won the batting title and also led the NL in hits, doubles, RBI, and total bases, then drove in the tying run and scored the winning run in the bottom of the 13th of the one-game playoff for the NL Wild Card spot. Only drives in runs when it doesn't matter, indeed.
Holiday may be stoic, he may be a Bible thumper, but he's about as lazy and lacking in hustle as Rolen or Jeter. Half of his swings are downright hideous because he's trying to get an extra step out of the batter's box, and no one would mistake him for Manny on the bases or in the outfield. He's also probably the finest physical specimen in the game today (top five all-time).
This seems to imply that Bible thumpers are typically lazy and lacking in hustle....which would be a non-sequitur.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main