Miller: Show me the titles, or the way home
The great football coach Barry Switzer once said some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple.
Jim in American Pie once said, "Guys, uh, what exactly does third base feel like?"
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| The Red Sox's Bill Mueller isn't a high-profile third baseman, but he does happen to be the defending batting champ.(AP) |
And somewhere in the midst of the baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and, well, American Pie, lies the answer to the more, uh, literal portion of Jim's question. What does third base feel like?
As Rodriguez finishes final preparations for his historic move from shortstop to third base, and as the baseball world eagerly anticipates the coming of another season, we can say only one thing with certainty:
Third base feels larger.
The sudden change of positions in New York Yankee pinstripes not only thrusts the great A-Rod squarely onto center stage, it swings the spotlight back to a position that, until this spring, was a 1970 Plymouth Duster in a world of Hummers.
Somewhere along about the 1980s, shortstop became the new third base. Players such as Robin Yount, Alan Trammell and Cal Ripken ushered in a shocking new era in which shortstops, gasp, actually contributed to offensive production.
And as they did, the last of the great third basemen, Mike Schmidt and George Brett, played out their careers, and the position became mostly an afterthought. Schmidt retired in 1989, and by the time Brett hung up his spikes after the 1993 season, the paparazzi had moved on to stake out the game's shortstops.
Rodriguez took his first steps into the big leagues in 1994; Derek Jeter debuted in 1995 and Nomar Garciaparra came along in 1996. Though clubs still preferred gaudy power numbers at the infield corner positions, it was no longer the necessity it once was.
This isn't to say third base has been a wasteland. Far from it. In recent years, great young talents such as Oakland's Eric Chavez, St. Louis' Scott Rolen, Anaheim's Troy Glaus, Florida's Mike Lowell and Texas' Hank Blalock have emerged and prospered.
They have simply been playing in the shadows of the giant oaks that are A-Rod, Jeter, Nomar and, lately, Miguel Tejada.
"Probably in the transition of the game over the last 20 years, with parks getting smaller and balls getting livelier, and as many great athletes as they've had playing up the middle, the shortstop position became power-laden," said Schmidt, who was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1995.
"It used to be third base. Shortstop was the little guy that got on base. The power was on the corners. Starting with Ripken, great athletes started playing shortstop, and it was an era of five or six of them. Great athletes can play shortstop, play it well and hit home runs."
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the average shortstop in 2003 batted .265 and averaged 12.5 home runs and 60.9 RBI (based on 500 at-bats).
The average third baseman batted .258 and averaged 17.9 home runs and 76.5 RBI.
Remarkably close numbers, considering the large gulf that once separated the two positions.
Long gone are the days of winning pennants with shortstops such as Ray Oyler (.135 batting average, one homer, 12 RBI for the 1968 Detroit Tigers) or division titles with shortstops such as Eddie Brinkman (.203, six homers, 49 RBI for the 1972 Tigers) and Freddie Patek (.248, two homers, 46 RBI for the 1978 AL West champion Kansas City Royals).
"If you were a shortstop, if you hit .250, you were happy," said Brett, who was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1999. "Just make the plays, and don't make any errors, and you were OK.
"We had Freddie Patek, Onix Concepcion, Buddy Biancalana, Greg Gagne and Rey Sanchez. You didn't expect much out of them. If you were a second baseman or shortstop, it didn't matter what you hit. Having Lou Whitaker and Alan Trammell up the middle in Detroit with their offense, that was a bonus. And they ended up winning (in 1984)."
Not that all third basemen were great glove men while they were flexing their offensive muscles. There were plenty of bangers who, if they didn't have iron gloves, didn't exactly carry gloves gilded in gold, either. Players such as Joe Torre, Tony Perez, Harmon Killebrew and Pedro Guerrero were of the have-bat, will-travel variety, and third base was as much landing spot to keep their sticks in the lineup as anything else.
"It's always been a position where you can put a guy," Schmidt said. "(Johnny) Bench moved over there. (Pete) Rose. (Joe) Torre. With Alex, it's almost a waste of time to think about it being an issue."
Given Rodriguez's combination of offense and defense -- some scouts think he's the best shortstop ever -- his move to third base is significant in and of itself. Because of who he is and where he's playing, Rodriguez immediately becomes the most high-profile third baseman in the game. "I'm looking forward to the challenge and, hopefully, becoming one of the best third basemen in the history of the Yankees," A-Rod said this spring.
There are only 11 third basemen enshrined in the Hall of Fame -- the fewest number of any position. Of those 11, only five played in baseball's post-World War II era: Brett, Schmidt, Brooks Robinson, Eddie Mathews and George Kell.
"That's pretty amazing," Oakland's Chavez said. "To me, I think it's the toughest position in the field, I really do. You really think of a third baseman as an oafy kind of ogre who just hits. But you've got to have a lot of ability with guys bunting, having to throw on the run ...
"Obviously, you could stick anybody there, but to play it, you're going to have to make a lot of plays, make a lot of different throws, field hot shots and put up the numbers."
Says Buddy Bell, a six-time Gold Glover at third who was part of the Brett-Schmidt generation during the position's most recent glory days: "I get a little sensitive about the way people view third base. Moving from third base to shortstop was easier for me than going the other way. I think it's harder for a shortstop to move to third base, than to go from third base to shortstop, because it's so much faster. It's a tough position to play.
"At third base, positioning is so important. Knowing hitters and knowing pitches. With A-Rod, it's not going to be easy for him, but he's obviously going to be able to do it. But there will be a transition period that probably will be a little more difficult than he ever thought."
Rodriguez has been tutored this spring by everyone from former Yankees third baseman Graig Nettles to Yankees infield coach Luis Sojo to manager Torre to Jeter. He impressed many by his regular attendance at early morning third-base sessions this spring.
But while the best way to learn what third base feels like -- to answer Jim's silver-screen question -- is to simply go out there and experience it, it also is important to remember baseball is a mental game, too.
"Nobody taught me how to play third base," Hall of Fame third baseman Pie Traynor once said. "The way I learned was simply to tackle each situation as it arose and master it before moving on to something else. I think I learned more about playing third base in the morning bull sessions in the hotel lobby, than I did out on the field."
Few in the game doubt Rodriguez will continue to put up his meaty offensive numbers in his year of defensive transition. And if he does, those, too, will raise the profile of the position.
In the not-too-distant old days, third basemen routinely won home-run titles. Schmidt won three NL home-run titles in the 1970s. In the AL, Nettles and Bill Melton won one each. In the 1980s, Schmidt won five NL home-run crowns, and in the 1990s, Howard Johnson and Matt Williams won one each.
Shortstops? Rodriguez's three consecutive AL home-run titles over the past three seasons represent the first time(s) a shortstop has won a home-run title since the Chicago Cubs' Ernie Banks in 1958 and 1960.
Meanwhile, where third basemen once regularly popped up atop the RBI leaders charts -- Torre won an RBI title in the 1970s, Schmidt won four in the '80s and Williams and Johnson won one each in the '90s -- none of the current top 30 active RBI men in baseball are third basemen.
"Give some of these kids a chance," Minnesota general manager Terry Ryan said. "I think you start with Scott Rolen, and you start with Eric Chavez. In Rolen, you're talking about a guy who's a cookie-cutter third baseman in the Mike Schmidt mold. Size, strength, ability ... when the Lord started talking about third basemen in this era, I think you start talking about Scott Rolen."
Where Wade Boggs, Carney Lansford, Bill Madlock and Brett once kept third basemen regularly atop the batting title lists, the last full-time third baseman to win one was Atlanta's Terry Pendleton in 1991 (Boston's Bill Mueller won the AL crown last season, but he split time between second and third base early in the campaign).
"These guys are so young, five years from now you're going to start talking about guys like Rolen and Chavez, they're going to start accumulating numbers," Ryan said. "Bill Mueller won a batting crown. Joe Crede (of the White Sox) is an up-and-comer. Blalock is a good-looking kid. Eric Munson (in Detroit) if he hadn't gotten hurt. Aramis Ramirez (Chicago Cubs). Mike Lowell (Florida). Corey Koskie (Minnesota). Aaron Boone (formerly of the Yankees, now injured). We've been hearing about (San Diego's) Sean Burroughs for a couple of years.
Says Schmidt: "Scott Rolen, he's probably the future. He's got Hall of Fame potential, 30 homers, 100 RBI power. I don't want to put him ahead of Brooks (Robinson), but he's surely ahead of me and Brett defensively. He's got years to play to get (longevity), but among the peers, I'd probably rank him ahead of everybody but Brooks. He's got the strongest arm; he's flexible; he's durable; he's got good, soft hands."
So does Rodriguez, and how quickly he adapts to third base undoubtedly will be one of the most intriguing stories of the summer. Meanwhile, over in the shadows, there already are some very, very good third basemen. And they're going to get better.
Rodriguez's landing simply gives the position a higher profile.
"It will be tough for me to make the All-Star team now," Oakland's Chavez said. "With A-Rod, he's pretty much a lock.
"He's still going to have to steal the Gold Glove from me, though. He's going to have to earn that one."
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