Style or antics?
Some players are put off by showmanship; others say, “It’s entertainment,”
Hall of Fame slugger Reggie Jackson had the swagger, the strut and all of the gaudy statistics to back up his act.
Yet he watches baseball games today at the age of 66 and bemoans how the velvet ropes of flamboyance are being trampled by almost anyone wearing a uniform.
“If you had talent,” Jackson told USA TODAY Sports, “you could have style. There’s nothing wrong with style. I had style when I hit (563) home runs. But you’ve got to build up some history.
“What I’m seeing these days, and some of the arrogance, I feel like walking up, and saying, ‘What’s wrong with you? You can’t play. That’s not style. It’s a goofy act.’
“I know it’s entertainment, but if you have style and can’t play, then you’re nothing more than a fool. I see a lot of fools out there.”
What Jackson might be witnessing is a shift in mentality when it comes to self-expression. Yes, the more accomplished players still tend to get more leeway in their antics.
But the era in baseball when talent was enough to draw attention might have passed.
“This is a sport. It’s entertainment,” says Los Angeles Angels starter C.J. Wilson, who owns an auto racing team, portrayed himself in a FunnyorDie.com sketch and discusses it all with his 132,000 Twitter followers. “It’s not nuclear fission. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it as long as you’re not taunting people.”
While Wilson is an All-Star who earned a five-year, $78 million deal with the Angels, those with far more modest credentials don’t shy away from self-promotion — on the field or in multiple media platforms.
The Miami Marlins’ Logan Morrison, the Hank
Aaron of baseball’s Twitter world, is a career .254 batter with 10,863 more tweets than hits. Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Nyjer Morgan, who has one extra-base hit this year, goes by his self-proclaimed alter ego, Tony Plush. Atlanta Braves infielder Juan Francisco flipped his bat and sauntered around the bases 10 days ago in a loss against the Cincinnati Reds.
“If some of these guys were as concerned with getting base hits and winning games as they were Twitter,” Jackson says, “maybe they could perform better and earn some style.”
Veterans shaking heads
Some current players share Jackson’s sentiment. Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Juan Pierre feels like he’s 94, and not 34, watching antics these days.
“I wouldn’t even think about doing some of the stuff these young guys are doing,” Pierre says. “It’s just so different. I think MLB.TV is the main culprit. You’re always on camera, and there’s so much more exposure. These younger guys coming up, they’ve already got their own swag.”
Cleveland Indians closer Chris Perez did a “You can’t see me” impersonation of World Wrestling Entertainment’s John Cena to cap a save Monday vs. the Kansas City Royals. The Los Angeles Dodgers’ Matt Kemp did the “Cooking Dance” by rapper Lil B to celebrate a walk-off homer in April. And who can forget the Brewers’ bowling pin antics when Prince Fielder landed on home plate after a 2009 walk-off homer?
“Hey, it’s just different times,” Perez said Wednesday in a telephone interview. “You used to see it when (Dennis Eckersley) was in his heyday and Carlos Perez was dancing off the mound after every strikeout in Montreal. They just didn’t have two or three sports stations, 24 hours a day. When something happens now, it’s on MLB Network, and they’ve got a lot of time to fill.
“This is the digital era, and it’s here to stay. I’m not saying that you can do anything. I think there’s a line you can’t cross, and I toe that sometimes.”
Spotlight on Harper
The game’s newest potential super- star is well aware of that line.
Washington Nationals rookie Bryce Harper finds himself already facing resentment. He was on the cover of Sports Illustrated at age 16, gained notoriety for blowing a kiss at a pitcher in his first year of pro ball and was in the big leagues at 19. He wore an eccentric hairstyle when he got called up in April, only to get a haircut and shave two weeks later. He still wears eye black in day games, but it no longer runs from his eye to his mouth as it did when he was an amateur.
Still, in his eighth major league game, he was hit by a pitch from Phillies ace Cole Hamels, who admitted he plunked Harper intentionally “to see what he was made of.” Hamels was impressed.
“I know I’ve got a lot to learn,” Harper told USA TODAY Sports, “and there are veteran guys that want to put me in my place, settle me down a little bit and think about where I’m going. That’s OK. I understand.
“I just play the game in a different way. I play the game hard and run out everything. That’s the only way I know how to play the game, and I’m going to play it that way my whole career.”
Still, Harper’s unbridled enthusiasm raises eyebrows. He’s already being compared to Pete Rose, which Fox broadcaster and former St. Louis Cardinals catcher Tim McCarver says is nonsense. He wonders when someone will talk to Harper about slowing down.
“When the ball is 15 feet foul, and he’s on second base,” McCarver says, “it’s time to talk. I understand enthusi- asm, but it’s unbridled enthusiasm.”
Says former manager Tony La Russa, a special assistant in the commissioner’s office, “If that’s what he is, it’s great for the game. If he starts drawing attention to himself, that won’t be so great. You don’t want to take emotions away, but you want to mix in some good sense, too. So I’m hoping. We all are.”
The line between right and wrong is fuzzy these days, but Harper says he can represent the “new school” era in a traditional way.
“I may be young, but I have an old soul,” he says. “This is who I am. It’s who I’ll always be.”
Drawing distinctions
Former Cardinals closer Al Hrabosky, known as the “Mad Hungarian” for his antics, says there’s nothing wrong with a little showmanship. He stood behind the mound, pounded his fist into his glove and stared down the hitter.
“When I did it, there were a lot of hitters that didn’t like it,” Hrabosky says. “But when you see some of the guys now that show up people, they realize I did that before I threw a pitch. I never went showing people up.
“In my time, as great as this game is, I thought it still needed color.”
Dave Parker, a two-time batting champion and 1978 National League MVP, was the first player to wear earrings in a game. Ken “Hawk” Harrelson popularized the batting glove in the 1960s. Five-time All-Star catcher Benito Santiago wore sunglasses while behind the plate. Ken Griffey Jr. wore his baseball cap backward in batting practice.
Yet that’s simply their own style, not an act to show anyone up.
Eckersley perhaps set the trend for closer’s reactions with his primal screams and gestures after saves. It was just an eruption of emotion, Eckersley insists. Phillies closer Jonathan Papelbon and the Detroit Tigers’ Jose Valverde are the same. Not everyone can act as cool as all-time saves leader Mariano Rivera.
“I don’t know if emotions go into flair,” Papelbon says, “but when you play with intensity, that emotion comes out. To me, flair is a beard. Flair is when you’ve got to have your spikes all nice and neat with your name on it.
“I mix flair with emotion. There ain’t nothing wrong with it. If that makes you good, bro, the more flair to you.”
Yet these days, La Russa says, it’s a little much.
“I think there’s much more flamboyance now, and I don’t think it’s for all of the better,” La Russa said in a telephone interview. “As far as style, what was more fluid than seeing Henry Aaron swinging or Willie Mays chasing a ball?
“But there are so many more theat- rics now. I think emotion is good, when it’s a legitimate and sincere emotion.
“But when it’s staged and there’s some sort of premeditated or orchestrated celebration, that’s not a spontaneous emotion. That’s inconsistent with the team sport. And that’s wrong.”
When Fielder hit a walk-off homer against the San Francisco Giants on Sept. 6, 2009, the Brewers collapsed like bowling pins when Fielder stomped on home plate. The Giants remembered. Barry Zito hit him with a pitch in the first inning of their spring training game the following season.
“If it were (Bob) Gibson on the mound, I promise you that would never have happened,” McCarver says. “That payback isn’t something you want to even think about.”
Get used to it
That’s not likely to happen today. Morrison’s Twitter handle @LoMoMarlins, an occasionally blue mix of humor, played a role in a 2011 demotion to the minors. He says he worries his predecessors might lose sight of the fact that baseball is intended to be fun.
As for on-field retribution? That’s not likely to happen. Pitchers tweet, too.
If baseball’s old guard doesn’t like it, Phillies manager Charlie Manuel, 68, will gladly pass along the advice he received 30 years ago from Hall of Famer Al Lopez.
“He said, ‘ Charlie, the game hasn’t changed, but the players have changed,’ ” Manuel says. “The way they go about things and do things sure isn’t the way we grew up doing things. I may not like it, and you may not like it.
“But if you like this game and want to keep managing a long time, I suggest you better change with them.”