Thank you, Robin
Yesterday, my favorite childhood player retired. Robin Ventura played 16 MLB seasons (along with a September call-up in '89), 10 of them for the Chicago White Sox. Ventura, when I was in junior high and most into baseball, was by far my favorite player. I'm not really sure why, but I really liked him. His career really mirrored my intense love for baseball; he came into the league around the same time I started going to more and more Sox games.
I'll never forget a few things about Robin. Of course, the infamous Nolan Ryan fight will be remain in everyone's mind, but I still defend Ventura about that. Ryan, despite his talent, was always a bit of a headhunter and I think it took a lot of guts to actually challenge him. Robin got clobbered, but it was brave.
His gruesome ankle injury in Spring Training '97 will also never be forgotten. His comeback was an excellent testament to long-time Sox trainer Herm Schneider (by the way, despite Frank Thomas, who's old, and Magglio Ordoñez' freak injury, the Sox are ALWAYS healthy. How many Tommy John surgeries have there been at the big-league level with the Sox since 2000? Right. One. Bobby Howry. Herm is an excellent trainer.)
Of course, I've seen a million games with him in them, and I've never seen anyone (maybe Scott Rolen) go in on a bunt better or start a 5-4-3 DP with a more crisply accurate throw. He's third all-time on the grand slams list, which is certainly luck, but a neat stat.
Ventura got treated very poorly by the White Sox. For much of the season before his free agency in '99, he had made overtures about wanting to stay, even at a discount. Management counted with multi-year deals, but eventually made the infamous "white flag" deal. Robin decided then that he wasn't going to stay.
This came after some tumultous early years. There were some reports of Ventura and Thomas getting into it behind closed doors (although, I think anyone who has been a teammate of Thomas has argued with him at one point) and the infamous 1997 Reinsdorf quote(of Ventura, he said “He’s kind of a laid-back guy... I think we need to get people with a little bit better personality.”) didn't help matters either. (Although, Ventura liked Chicago so much, he made some overtures that he wouldn't mind playing for the Cubs. Thank the lord that never happened.)
To his credit, Reinsdorf is trying to bring Robin back into the organization.
"I'm sure we'll be in contact with him,'' Reinsdorf said. "If Robin Ventura picked up the phone today and said he would like to return, there would a job for him. Whatever he wanted to do, there would be a job for him.''
Of course, Reinsdorf is pretty famous for taking care of ex-Sox. This has backfired recently with two ex-Sox in Kenny and Ozzeroo, both idiots. But, youneverknow. Ventura is certainly a guy you'd rather have in your organization than not.
I still have a signed ball by Robin and two copies of his rookie card (one signed and one not-signed). I guess he never lived up to the hype that followed him coming out of Oklahoma State (a 58-game hitting streak, the Golden Spikes award), but he was a fun player to watch. He never had superb power or OBP skills (a career line of 267/362/.444 with a peak season of
.301/.379/.529), but he was really easy to root for. Robin'll never been in the Hall of Fame, but he'd certainly be in (in the words of Baseball Prospectus)the Hall of the Really Very Good.
Thanks, Robin. Youd had a good run.
I'll never forget a few things about Robin. Of course, the infamous Nolan Ryan fight will be remain in everyone's mind, but I still defend Ventura about that. Ryan, despite his talent, was always a bit of a headhunter and I think it took a lot of guts to actually challenge him. Robin got clobbered, but it was brave.
His gruesome ankle injury in Spring Training '97 will also never be forgotten. His comeback was an excellent testament to long-time Sox trainer Herm Schneider (by the way, despite Frank Thomas, who's old, and Magglio Ordoñez' freak injury, the Sox are ALWAYS healthy. How many Tommy John surgeries have there been at the big-league level with the Sox since 2000? Right. One. Bobby Howry. Herm is an excellent trainer.)
Of course, I've seen a million games with him in them, and I've never seen anyone (maybe Scott Rolen) go in on a bunt better or start a 5-4-3 DP with a more crisply accurate throw. He's third all-time on the grand slams list, which is certainly luck, but a neat stat.
Ventura got treated very poorly by the White Sox. For much of the season before his free agency in '99, he had made overtures about wanting to stay, even at a discount. Management counted with multi-year deals, but eventually made the infamous "white flag" deal. Robin decided then that he wasn't going to stay.
This came after some tumultous early years. There were some reports of Ventura and Thomas getting into it behind closed doors (although, I think anyone who has been a teammate of Thomas has argued with him at one point) and the infamous 1997 Reinsdorf quote(of Ventura, he said “He’s kind of a laid-back guy... I think we need to get people with a little bit better personality.”) didn't help matters either. (Although, Ventura liked Chicago so much, he made some overtures that he wouldn't mind playing for the Cubs. Thank the lord that never happened.)
To his credit, Reinsdorf is trying to bring Robin back into the organization.
"I'm sure we'll be in contact with him,'' Reinsdorf said. "If Robin Ventura picked up the phone today and said he would like to return, there would a job for him. Whatever he wanted to do, there would be a job for him.''
Of course, Reinsdorf is pretty famous for taking care of ex-Sox. This has backfired recently with two ex-Sox in Kenny and Ozzeroo, both idiots. But, youneverknow. Ventura is certainly a guy you'd rather have in your organization than not.
I still have a signed ball by Robin and two copies of his rookie card (one signed and one not-signed). I guess he never lived up to the hype that followed him coming out of Oklahoma State (a 58-game hitting streak, the Golden Spikes award), but he was a fun player to watch. He never had superb power or OBP skills (a career line of 267/362/.444 with a peak season of
.301/.379/.529), but he was really easy to root for. Robin'll never been in the Hall of Fame, but he'd certainly be in (in the words of Baseball Prospectus)the Hall of the Really Very Good.
Thanks, Robin. Youd had a good run.
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