It seemed like it took him forever to do it, but in relative terms, A-Rod is the fastest player and youngest player to reach 600 homeruns, to me, that makes him untouchable as far as criticism is concerned.
Truly, I don’t think we’ve ever seen a baseball player of A-Rod’s caliber that has experienced so much negative criticism concerning a game in which he clearly, and absolutely dominates, in other sports, we see it all the time, Kobe Bryant knows a thing or two about unfounded criticism, not surprisingly those critics are awfully quiet these days.
It’s only now that his critics are starting to bite their tongues, and it’s not because of his play, it’s because the Yankees won the World Series last year.
Sure, the argument can be made, that everyone loves a winner, and A-Rod received so much criticism because he didn’t meet expectations during previous post-seasons, and I hear that argument, but Griffey never won a World Series and his status is god-like in the MLB, so the winning argument doesn’t hold weight with me.
Either way, it’s quite an accomplishment for A-Rod, who has silenced his critics perhaps now for good. He’s got a World Series Ring, and now he’s got 600 homeruns, you can’t really hate on him now, though, I’m sure some hater will find something to use to try and bring him down. I wonder if they’ll suggest putting an asterisk beside his homerun count, seeing how he admitted to using performance enhancement drugs.
Oh wait, I forgot, as long as you admit to using PEDs then you’re good with baseball. It shouldn’t matter, A-Rod’s sheer numbers officially make him untouchable. Of course, his character on the other hand, well, that will always leave him open to some ribbing, I mean come on, the man is a swinger on and off the field.
Now that everyone can get back to playing baseball, the Yankees will have to get back to winning if they want to catch the Rays in AL East. While A-Rod was chasing 600, the Rays chased down the Yankees and passed them in the standings. It looked like all of the attention and focus on homer # 600 seemed to distract not just A-Rod who couldn’t hit water if he fell out of a boat, but the entire Yankee team. The Yankees lost three straight games for the first time since June and the Rays capitalized.
Now with the pressure off, you have to expect A-Rod to get hot and the Yankees to start steam-rolling down the stretch. Look for a serious win streak for the Yanks and for A-Rod to start having those multiple homerun games.
It’s going to sound weird to say this about a man who has 600 homers, but, statistically speaking, he’s overdue.
