SAY IT AIN’T SO, VLADI
Ballplayer’s choice of cap just the latest among many letdowns in Expos history
Some local baseball fans were crushed to learn on Thursday that former great Vladimir Guerrero has chosen to have an Angels cap on his Hall of Fame plaque rather than an Expos one. Stu Cowan notes it’s the last in a long list full of heartbreak.
In a way, it’s fitting Vladimir Guerrero will enter the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., this summer wearing an Angels cap instead of an Expos cap.
Guerrero made that official Thursday, a day after being voted into the Hall of Fame in his second year of eligibility. His Angels cap is just another heartbreaking moment for Montreal baseball fans in a long list of them.
As former Gazette sports columnist Michael Farber put it in the MLB Network’s wonderful documentary The Colorful Montreal Expos: “The most remembered moment in the history of this franchise, Rick Monday’s home run — Blue Monday — is something that was bad for the Expos. And if it had been something good, there would have been something for the people to have held on to through dark times.”
Dark Times could be the title for a book about the Expos, and Guerrero entering the Hall of Fame in a Los Angeles Angels cap could be the final chapter.
There could also be a chapter on Blue Monday, when Rick Monday’s two-out homer in the ninth inning of Game 5 of the 1981 National League Championship Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers robbed the Expos of their best chance of advancing to the World Series. Another chapter could be about the 1994 strike that wiped out the season when the Expos had the best record in baseball. There could be chapters about trading away Rusty Staub, the Expos’ first star player, and Gary Carter, their first Hall of Famer.
“When Rusty left, it was just as heartbreaking as when Gary left,” French sportscaster Rodger Brulotte recalled in the MLB Network’s documentary about the Expos. “Those two trades hurt the Expos you can’t imagine how.”
There could be a chapter on all the fire sales and the players the Expos developed from raw talent who would then leave Montreal when they became too good and too expensive. That’s what happened with Guerrero.
Guerrero’s first contract with the Expos was for $1,500 when they signed him as a skinny 16-year-old at the team’s academy in the Dominican Republic. He broke into the majors as a 21-year-old at the end of the 1996 season and would play seven more seasons in Montreal before leaving for the Angels as a free agent, signing a five-year, US$70 million contract.
When Guerrero left the field at Olympic Stadium for the final time as an Expo in 2003, there were loud boos. They weren’t directed at Guerrero, but at Frank Robinson.
The Expos manager decided to pull Guerrero out of right field with one out in the top of the seventh inning of a 14-4 loss to the Atlanta Braves, replacing him with Ron Calloway. The manager’s plan was to give Guerrero a proper sendoff from Montreal, but the 17,256 in attendance were upset because they wanted to see Guerrero hit one last time in an Expos uniform.
“If they wanted to see him one more time, they should have come out to see him more times during the season,” Robinson told reporters after the game.
In his first season with the Angels, Guerrero won the American League MVP award.
Guerrero was probably the last hope for another player to enter the Hall of Fame wearing an Expos cap, joining Carter, Andre Dawson and Tim Raines, who was inducted last year. Larry Walker, who played with the Expos from 1989-94 before leaving for the Colorado Rockies as a free agent, received only 34.1 per cent of the votes in his eighth year on the Hall of Fame ballot. Players need 75 per cent for induction and Walker has only two more years of eligibility. He probably would have chosen to wear a Rockies cap, anyway.
Instead of becoming the last player to enter the Hall of Fame with an Expos cap, Guerrero will be the first to wear an Angels cap in Cooperstown.
There were a lot of good times during the glory days of the Expos, going back to Jarry Park with players like Staub, Mack Jones, Coco Laboy and John Bocc-a-bella! There was the Team of the ’80s that never won anything, but had fans packing the Big O while singing “Valde-ri! Valde-ra!”
But mostly there was heartbreak.
Jeff Blair, the baseball beat writer for the Gazette from 1987-2000, was hoping Guerrero would enter the Hall wearing an Expos cap.
“I still think of him as a member of the Expos,” said Blair, who works for Sportsnet and hosts a Toronto radio show weekdays from 9 a.m. until noon. “I still think that’s kind of where the legend of Vladimir Guerrero grew. I think you saw more of the true Vladimir Guerrero in an Expos jersey than you did in an Angels jersey.”
Blair is looking forward to watching Vladimir Guerrero Jr. play in the majors. The 18-yearold is ranked No. 3 on Baseball America’s list of Top 100 Prospects and the third-baseman is a member of the Toronto Blue Jays.
Maybe that will be the final chapter of Dark Times for Expos fans.