Latest / Foul Territory / Just How Good Were Ken Griffey Jr. and David Ortiz, Actually?

Transcript

Just How Good Were Ken Griffey Jr. and David Ortiz, Actually? · Foul Territory

0:09
Speaker 1: That's a fun one for us. How good was Ken
0:11
Speaker 1: Griffy Junior? I say fun because he was one of
0:14
Speaker 1: the most fun players to follow, both on and off
0:17
Speaker 1: the field in a variety of marketing ways. Krats, it's amazing.
0:22
Speaker 1: I've been around him. How he's more popular than just
0:26
Speaker 1: about anybody I've ever seen in our sport for a
0:29
Speaker 1: former player. Still, I've called athlete showcase games right where
0:34
Speaker 1: it's high schoolers and they're like, oh, Griffy's my favorite player.
0:39
Speaker 1: I'm like, we're even close to burn when his career
0:42
Speaker 1: ended and he's still that popular.
0:46
Speaker 2: Whatever the kids say. Aura, you know, the fit of
0:50
Speaker 2: his hat back in the day, like whatever it was
0:54
Speaker 2: he had that, we're not even gonna get into his
0:56
Speaker 2: stats yet. Yet he had all of that. And what's
1:01
Speaker 2: the last scandal that you heard with kN Griffy Junior.
1:03
Speaker 2: What's the last like tie to anything bad with kN
1:07
Speaker 2: Griffy Junior that you heard throughout his career? Like that's
1:11
Speaker 2: why I think, you know, he just gravitated the fact that,
1:15
Speaker 2: you know, the bubble gum, the big bubble. He was
1:18
Speaker 2: wearing a hat backwards during the home run derby. I'm
1:22
Speaker 2: sure he got a lot of flak for it. During
1:23
Speaker 2: that time, people are probably like, oh, man, you know
1:26
Speaker 2: he's too flashy. What's his problem? Why is he disrespecting
1:30
Speaker 2: the hat? He was just going out there and he
1:32
Speaker 2: had the sweetest, smoothest left handed swing. Everybody wanted to
1:36
Speaker 2: hit like him, and he went out and did it
1:40
Speaker 2: on the field. Like, once we get start getting into
1:43
Speaker 2: his stats for him, you're gonna sit there and go whoa,
1:46
Speaker 2: Like he was on a track to be the best
1:48
Speaker 2: player of all time.
1:50
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be seen to KP while you're chatting, if
1:54
Speaker 1: we don't mind, since we have mister centerfield or extraordinary
1:56
Speaker 1: to talk about him.
1:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I was just thinking about like his
2:01
Speaker 3: his upbringing being a one to one being, you know,
2:03
Speaker 3: legacy of a very successful having a very successful dad
2:07
Speaker 3: in the big leagues. And not to mention the fact
2:09
Speaker 3: he played with his dad, but to your point, as
2:12
Speaker 3: someone who you know, grew up kind of playing all
2:15
Speaker 3: over the diamond as a baseball player, but you know,
2:19
Speaker 3: was predominantly an outfielder. When I got a little bit older,
2:22
Speaker 3: I think a lot of I think about Ken Griffy
2:24
Speaker 3: Junior in the same regards to a lot of kids,
2:27
Speaker 3: maybe my age growing up to Randy Moss, like when
2:31
Speaker 3: you went out in your backyard where you were in
2:33
Speaker 3: your couch diving onto your bed, or to your in
2:35
Speaker 3: your living room, diving onto your parents' couch. You know,
2:38
Speaker 3: you talk about making a Ken Griffy Junior catch. You know,
2:40
Speaker 3: much like in the backyard, me and my brother would
2:43
Speaker 3: throw each other passes and try to keep our feet
2:46
Speaker 3: in bounds and talk about being Randy Moss, like he
2:49
Speaker 3: was just that cool. You know, everyone wanted to be him,
2:52
Speaker 3: whether you played the outfield or not. And I'm sure Cratsy,
2:55
Speaker 3: you're you know, we're around the same age. I'm sure
2:57
Speaker 3: you did a lot of that with your friends or
3:00
Speaker 3: your dad growing up. It's like if you went out
3:02
Speaker 3: and made a play, it was Ken Griffy Junior. If
3:04
Speaker 3: the ball went over your head and you had this
3:06
Speaker 3: basket catch, it was Ken Griffy Junior. If you wore
3:09
Speaker 3: your hat backwards, if you were just someone that was
3:12
Speaker 3: genuinely having fun on a baseball field, they would refer
3:15
Speaker 3: to you as Ken Griffy Junior, like his outreach and
3:19
Speaker 3: what he was as And like you said, we haven't
3:22
Speaker 3: even talked about his stats. We're just talking about his
3:24
Speaker 3: aura and for someone that played in the big leagues
3:26
Speaker 3: for a long time, Cratzy who played in the big leagues,
3:28
Speaker 3: you come across certain people that are just bigger than
3:32
Speaker 3: the game, you know. I think about the Derek Jeters,
3:35
Speaker 3: I think about Ken Griffy Junior. When you're just in
3:38
Speaker 3: their presence, it just feels different. And I've been able
3:41
Speaker 3: to get in a room or be next to a
3:43
Speaker 3: lot of great players in the game, but there's very
3:46
Speaker 3: few that have that aura, and Ken Griffy Junior is
3:49
Speaker 3: one of those guys. Kyle Ripton Junior was one of
3:51
Speaker 3: those guys for me. Derek Jeter was one of those
3:54
Speaker 3: guys for me. It's just there's just something different about him.
3:58
Speaker 1: Hall of Famer MVP, A thirteen time All Star, three
4:02
Speaker 1: time Home run Derby Champ, ten time Goal CLUBB, seven
4:06
Speaker 1: times Silver Slugger, also Game MVP. I mean, the accolades
4:12
Speaker 1: go on and on. Advanced stats is about an eighty
4:16
Speaker 1: four win player, one thirty six career OPS plus, and
4:22
Speaker 1: that includes him not looking the same towards the tail
4:24
Speaker 1: end of his career. There's no doubt about that. The numbers,
4:27
Speaker 1: if you take them from an earlier time period, and
4:29
Speaker 1: you look at his peak years are just next level.
4:32
Speaker 1: And you know what else I remember, KRATS is someone
4:35
Speaker 1: like Ken Griffy Junior being involved in a home run race, chase,
4:39
Speaker 1: whatever you want to call it, and we say whatever
4:43
Speaker 1: we want on this show. Sometimes I'd look and be like,
4:46
Speaker 1: one of these players does not look like the rest
4:50
Speaker 1: Ken Griffy. You know, the big guy built whatever, but
4:54
Speaker 1: it didn't look like a cartoon character during a time
4:57
Speaker 1: period where there were some cartoon characters.
5:00
Speaker 2: That was actually going to be my next point. Because
5:02
Speaker 2: you went through all those stats, we also look at
5:05
Speaker 2: his just near misses. He has one MVP. Okay, he
5:10
Speaker 2: placed in MVP voting nineteen nine, seventeen fifth, second, fourth, fourth, tenth,
5:18
Speaker 2: and then last year when he's thirty five, twenty fourth,
5:22
Speaker 2: So that's what his MVP voting was. This was during
5:26
Speaker 2: the nineteen ninety season till the nineteen ninety nine season,
5:31
Speaker 2: the peak of steroid usage. I'll let you do it
5:35
Speaker 2: so that I'm not the one being accusatory. But go
5:39
Speaker 2: and look a click on the Baseball Reference page to
5:42
Speaker 2: the voting for MVPs and see who finished above him,
5:46
Speaker 2: See why he missed out on a couple of MVPs,
5:50
Speaker 2: and I'll let you be the judge of somebody who
5:53
Speaker 2: did it clean and somebody who didn't necessarily do it clean.
5:57
Speaker 2: He was doing these numbers, he was he was this guy.
5:59
Speaker 2: He was that guy, as the kids say, in an
6:03
Speaker 2: era where everybody was making themselves into that guy. He
6:07
Speaker 2: was playing against some robots. He was hitting against pitchers,
6:10
Speaker 2: which everybody forgets steroids. The most abusive people for steroids
6:15
Speaker 2: were pitchers because they recovered. So you'd face them one
6:17
Speaker 2: night thrown ninety five. Three nights later, you face them
6:20
Speaker 2: for the third time, and he's still throwing ninety five.
6:22
Speaker 2: There's no regression because just because they didn't have these
6:25
Speaker 2: like massive hulking biceps like some of the hitters did,
6:30
Speaker 2: the pitchers were using that stuff and he was facing them.
6:33
Speaker 2: And I think probably the peak, the pinnacle of his
6:37
Speaker 2: awesomeness that the only scandal that Ken Griffy ever had
6:40
Speaker 2: was his stinking' Don Russ rookie card. It killed baseball cards.
6:45
Speaker 2: So that's the only negative thing I have to say
6:47
Speaker 2: about Ken Griffy Junior. But everybody wanted that card that
6:51
Speaker 2: was baseball card like that was the peak of pinnacle.
6:54
Speaker 2: Of baseball cards, and it was like, whoa Ken Griffy Junior,
6:59
Speaker 2: Don Russ Roods. I have three of them, you have some,
7:03
Speaker 2: they're expensive, you have nine. Came out later they printed
7:07
Speaker 2: a few too many of them and kind of killed
7:09
Speaker 2: the baseball.
7:11
Speaker 3: And we're talking about how good this player is. We
7:14
Speaker 3: spend we like spending a lot of time on this
7:16
Speaker 3: show talking about the Hall of Fame. Rightfully, so we
7:18
Speaker 3: all have a difference of opinion, but we talk about
7:21
Speaker 3: the Hall of Fame. You know, I'm more of a
7:24
Speaker 3: medium size. There's a lot of people that believe in
7:26
Speaker 3: the small size. It is a very small collective group
7:29
Speaker 3: of players that get a chance to go to Cooperstown.
7:32
Speaker 3: There has been so many great players before Ken Griffy
7:36
Speaker 3: got into the Hall of Fame. And this man was
7:39
Speaker 3: three votes away from being the first unanimous Hall of Famer.
7:43
Speaker 3: That's how good Ken Griffy Junior is. My other point,
7:46
Speaker 3: in nineteen ninety eight on Nintendo sixty four, they came
7:50
Speaker 3: out with Ken Griffy Junior Baseball. He is so good
7:53
Speaker 3: that that is still the best baseball game to ever
7:56
Speaker 3: touch this earth.
8:01
Speaker 2: I mean, people talk about like when they played with him,
8:05
Speaker 2: or when they played it. I went to spring training
8:07
Speaker 2: in twenty sios two thousand through two thousand and two
8:13
Speaker 2: for my for my college we went down to Sarasota.
8:17
Speaker 2: Guess who was playing in Sarasota. The Reds were in
8:21
Speaker 2: Sarasota at that time. It's since been the Red Sox.
8:24
Speaker 2: Now it's the Orioles. I go to a game only
8:28
Speaker 2: only for the fact that we wanted to see Ken
8:31
Speaker 2: Griffy Junior play, and didn't Ken Griffy Junior come out
8:35
Speaker 2: and play, and didn't he hit a home run? Like
8:38
Speaker 2: if you wanted to solidify yourself as like as him
8:43
Speaker 2: as the guy that growing up, you watch this guy
8:47
Speaker 2: and then you go to the one spring training game
8:49
Speaker 2: that he plays in. Then one game that I go
8:52
Speaker 2: to he plays in and he hits a home run,
8:55
Speaker 2: like it's it just solidified it for me and for me,
8:59
Speaker 2: kN Griffy j was that guy. And I watched my
9:02
Speaker 2: oldest son, Brayden, who's now a freshman in college, watch
9:08
Speaker 2: Aaron Judge his rookie year and how everybody wore ninety
9:13
Speaker 2: nine and still wears ninety nine on Little League travel
9:17
Speaker 2: ball uniforms because of Aaron Judge. The backwards hat was
9:22
Speaker 2: Kang Griffy Junior.
9:24
Speaker 1: What was the phrase? Did he just say, Hey, this
9:27
Speaker 1: is King Grapy Junior. Was that it at the beginning
9:30
Speaker 1: of the game?
9:30
Speaker 3: K Yeah, something like that, Hey this is King Greepy
9:33
Speaker 3: Junior Baseball. And honestly, the only reason I still probably
9:37
Speaker 3: want to get at n sixty four we need to
9:39
Speaker 3: like find one, you know, secondhand, is I want my
9:42
Speaker 3: kids to play that game because it was so good.
9:44
Speaker 3: I have so many memories and honestly, it taught me
9:47
Speaker 3: so much about baseball when I was a kid because
9:49
Speaker 3: they had like franchise mode and you had to like
9:52
Speaker 3: go and acquire players and trade for players. I just
9:56
Speaker 3: have so many like good memories of my child hood
10:00
Speaker 3: surrounded by playing King Griffy Junior with my brother, with
10:04
Speaker 3: my cousins, with my friends. It just, you know, when
10:07
Speaker 3: a guy is you know, we're still talking about his
10:10
Speaker 3: greatness this many years later. And to my last point,
10:14
Speaker 3: he wasn't the same player at the back end of
10:16
Speaker 3: his career, but no one remembers that, you know, for
10:19
Speaker 3: a player that played on a couple other teams at
10:21
Speaker 3: the back end of his career, it's hard to think
10:23
Speaker 3: about a player we always think about a Derek Jeter
10:26
Speaker 3: who was only a Yankee and you know, never played
10:29
Speaker 3: anywhere else. He is mister Yankee. But you feel the
10:32
Speaker 3: same way about Kan Griffy Junior as a Seattle Mariner,
10:34
Speaker 3: even though he went other places, because he was just
10:38
Speaker 3: you know, as someone who grew up watching him play.
10:40
Speaker 3: He just you know, he just he's that good where
10:44
Speaker 3: you forget about all the other things that happened at
10:46
Speaker 3: the end of his career playing on other teams, and
10:47
Speaker 3: you just remember him as being a Seattle Mariner.
10:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the thing in baseball that you just don't
10:54
Speaker 1: see very often in football and basketball from legends. Almost
10:58
Speaker 1: every legend in those two sports, and even hockey gets
11:02
Speaker 1: to play in some serious postseason competition when they have
11:06
Speaker 1: a lengthy career in their superstar. Baseball gets shafted the
11:10
Speaker 1: most in that regard. Hey, we saw it with Mike Trout,
11:14
Speaker 1: who was the next Mickey Mantle for a long period
11:16
Speaker 1: of time, right and he essentially didn't touch the playoffs.
11:20
Speaker 1: He's had one playoff series for five minutes. They got bounced.
11:24
Speaker 1: We saw it with Shoeo Tani until he moved out
11:26
Speaker 1: to the Dodgers. So it's a great point. Grippy had
11:27
Speaker 1: some playoff time, but not a lot, right, You wish
11:30
Speaker 1: you saw him more on a national stage. And KP,
11:33
Speaker 1: I think your point about him being mortal, like he
11:36
Speaker 1: felt immortal for a while, but also was mortal. He
11:39
Speaker 1: played a super demanding position that you can speak to
11:42
Speaker 1: and he's not connected to anything in terms of the
11:45
Speaker 1: ped world. Right, we can't speak for anybody fully, but
11:49
Speaker 1: we can just speak from what we've seen reports. There's
11:51
Speaker 1: no court cases or no any of that. It's called
11:54
Speaker 1: a human being looking like a g for a long
11:57
Speaker 1: period of time and then age catching up to you.
12:00
Speaker 1: After playing a demanding position and being the guy on
12:03
Speaker 1: a team for a long period of time.
12:05
Speaker 3: You knew who else got the shaft and missed the playoffs,
12:08
Speaker 3: and that was the Minnesota Twins and Lou Collins when
12:11
Speaker 3: Ken Griffy Junior went up the wall in Little Big
12:13
Speaker 3: Leagues and robbed that home run. But ultimately, but ultimately,
12:18
Speaker 3: Lou Collins got the ultimate prize and he you know,
12:20
Speaker 3: found himself a wife. But shame on you Griffy from
12:23
Speaker 3: taking that away from the Minnesota Twins and Billy Billy Hayward.
12:28
Speaker 3: Billy Hayward.
12:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, shame on you, dude. I mean that was Griffy, right.
12:33
Speaker 1: If you're making a baseball movie in the nineties, you
12:36
Speaker 1: gotta have Griffy in there, and if you can tie
12:38
Speaker 1: into the storyline, that alone would even overcome a bad movie.
12:43
Speaker 1: It was that big of a deal in the baseball space.
12:46
Speaker 1: And also it was a different time for the sport.
12:48
Speaker 1: I think that's important to remember too. The sport's super popular.
12:51
Speaker 1: I would say it's more global now, but the competition
12:56
Speaker 1: from other sports was less fierce at the time, and
13:00
Speaker 1: it made Griffy much more of a household name around
13:04
Speaker 1: the country. You know, you'd get stopped left and right.
13:07
Speaker 1: He still does, but in a different way. Right. I
13:10
Speaker 1: always remember hearing when we did our Mark McGuire interview.
13:13
Speaker 1: I think it was how like he got one time
13:15
Speaker 1: stuck in a traffic jam and people are like coming
13:17
Speaker 1: up to his car. That's like Beatles shit. You know,
13:21
Speaker 1: that's another level of celebrity that we don't have too
13:26
Speaker 1: much of in today's baseball show. Hey, Otani in Japan
13:30
Speaker 1: might hit that level. That's about it. So Griffy had
13:34
Speaker 1: it all going. We can go on and on if
13:36
Speaker 1: we missed anything. Please share stories on this. We love
13:39
Speaker 1: doing these segments. We have plenty of others we've done
13:42
Speaker 1: over the years, including Ichi Ro, We've done Barry Bonds.
13:45
Speaker 1: We've talked about many others, So make sure you go
13:47
Speaker 1: backtrack and check those out and suggest any more that
13:50
Speaker 1: we should do. How good was Big Poppy one of
14:02
Speaker 1: the best dhs of all time? Scotty Brown, Aircrats and
14:05
Speaker 1: Jason Kipnis. We're gonna talk about a Hall of Famer
14:08
Speaker 1: who was a winner, a clutch player, and Kip By
14:12
Speaker 1: the time he retired, he was still at his peak.
14:15
Speaker 1: And I was like, are you sure? You sure you're done?
14:17
Speaker 1: He looked pretty good. You're making the league look like
14:19
Speaker 1: it's not that difficult.
14:21
Speaker 4: Wasn't his last season? Wasn't he forty plus home runs,
14:23
Speaker 4: forty plus doubles? I'm sorry, and at his rate that
14:27
Speaker 4: he was being paid, I'm not going out. I'm continuing
14:31
Speaker 4: my career. That I think he kind of told people
14:34
Speaker 4: though that he was already retiring and he was starting
14:36
Speaker 4: to get all those kind of like gifts going around,
14:39
Speaker 4: and I think he was kind of paw committed to
14:41
Speaker 4: retiring so he couldn't come back. But I'm sure he
14:44
Speaker 4: clearly had a lot left in the tank, but he
14:45
Speaker 4: was one of the guys who was very few are
14:51
Speaker 4: I don't want to use in terms bigger than the game,
14:53
Speaker 4: but like their personalities are just bigger and there It's
14:56
Speaker 4: like when you meet him for the first time, you're
14:58
Speaker 4: not just meeting someone you're playing again, you're meeting a buddy,
15:01
Speaker 4: not like that, it's your meeting like a star. And
15:03
Speaker 4: he was absolutely a star in this game, so good
15:07
Speaker 4: for the game of baseball, and to me, probably the
15:12
Speaker 4: most clutch hitter. Yeah, I think I've ever seen an
15:19
Speaker 4: heroics that he came through In the moments, I thought, yeah.
15:24
Speaker 2: No, I definitely it was thirty eight home. I thought
15:26
Speaker 2: he was just fell just fell short. But if our
15:29
Speaker 2: but of our generation, I mean, I don't know who
15:31
Speaker 2: would have been more who would have been more clutch
15:34
Speaker 2: than Big Poppy. I mean, when you when you lead
15:36
Speaker 2: the league and RBIs your last season, I think that's
15:40
Speaker 2: that's pretty legit. But I played against him that year
15:43
Speaker 2: and we definitely we said the reason that he he
15:46
Speaker 2: didn't want all those gifts because half of that stuff
15:48
Speaker 2: is probably just stuck in his garage somewhere. Whether here
15:51
Speaker 2: or in the Dominican wherever it is. He just wanted
15:54
Speaker 2: the strike zone. I remember playing against him that year
15:56
Speaker 2: and it was like the tiniest strike zone ever was
15:59
Speaker 2: just ball ball, and he would he would back out
16:03
Speaker 2: of the batter's box and he would spit in both
16:06
Speaker 2: gloves and he'd slap his hands together and then he'd
16:09
Speaker 2: hit a dinger. But no, like what you're talking about,
16:12
Speaker 2: like that like bigger than the game thing. It's what
16:15
Speaker 2: the kids call aura. Yeah, Poppy had that aura, big
16:19
Speaker 2: Poppy had. He smelled delicious when he came into the box.
16:23
Speaker 2: You knew he was gonna do damage. Even for a
16:26
Speaker 2: guy that had five hundred and forty one home runs,
16:31
Speaker 2: he didn't strike out that much. I think one hundred
16:33
Speaker 2: and forty eight, no, I'm sorry, one hundred and forty
16:37
Speaker 2: five was the most strikeouts he'd ever had. And I
16:39
Speaker 2: think he had five seasons over one hundred strikeouts. Like
16:44
Speaker 2: in the era that he played, the strikeout was completely
16:48
Speaker 2: fine when you're pumping out five hundred and forty one homers.
16:52
Speaker 2: And he didn't strike out that much compared to everybody
16:56
Speaker 2: else but just his club, I mean thirty I'm sorry,
17:01
Speaker 2: twenty walk off hits in the regular season, countless walk
17:05
Speaker 2: off hits in the postseason, huge home runs, left on left,
17:11
Speaker 2: right on left, like it closers starters. He was to me.
17:17
Speaker 2: He was the left handed version of Miguel Cabrera for
17:22
Speaker 2: me in the sense that like you knew where the
17:25
Speaker 2: you knew where the holes to get him out were.
17:28
Speaker 2: But he wasn't just boom or bust. It wasn't just
17:31
Speaker 2: all or nothing. So he'd still be able to get
17:33
Speaker 2: those hits in that situation in Boston, playing in Fenway,
17:38
Speaker 2: the fact that the monster was right there if you
17:41
Speaker 2: made if you made your pitch in your location, he'd
17:45
Speaker 2: just go and flick it off the wall. That's why
17:47
Speaker 2: he had forty eight doubles in his last season in
17:50
Speaker 2: the big leagues.
17:52
Speaker 1: Kip, when you faced him, what did pitching teammates say?
17:58
Speaker 1: What did the pitchers on Cleveland say? And was he
18:01
Speaker 1: the focal point in those meetings that go down? Right? Hey,
18:06
Speaker 1: who are we circling? And what are we doing about this?
18:09
Speaker 2: Sure?
18:10
Speaker 4: Krats hinted on it. He was the focal point of
18:13
Speaker 4: just you you know, maybe the zones where to pitch him,
18:17
Speaker 4: but you better not miss because he's one of those
18:19
Speaker 4: guys will immediately make you pay for that. But he
18:22
Speaker 4: played him with good teams obviously with Padroyas and Bogarts
18:25
Speaker 4: when he was young, and Rake and Mookie was on
18:30
Speaker 4: Boss and so I mean there it was a full lineup,
18:32
Speaker 4: but he you knew where he was and you knew
18:33
Speaker 4: when he was coming around in that order. Kratz commented
18:38
Speaker 4: on it a little bit earlier, he had he had
18:40
Speaker 4: a small zone earned it, but because and I don't
18:43
Speaker 4: think pitchers ever really complained too much, because they sure
18:46
Speaker 4: they might have wanted to strike, but if they're if
18:48
Speaker 4: it ends up into a walk, they're just like, okay, whatever,
18:51
Speaker 4: that's not the end of the world versus him or
18:52
Speaker 4: something like that. Sometimes you just take it.
18:53
Speaker 2: He was.
18:56
Speaker 4: A tough one. I think I faced him his his
18:59
Speaker 4: We knocked him out to end his career at Cleveland
19:01
Speaker 4: versus Boston in twenty sixteen. I think it was we
19:03
Speaker 4: played in the first round, so I was against him
19:06
Speaker 4: his last game. They were down two or something like that,
19:09
Speaker 4: or two or three, and he drew a walk in
19:12
Speaker 4: his last set bat and got a pinch runner and
19:16
Speaker 4: stood on first base for a while. And that might
19:18
Speaker 4: have been one of the loudest ovations I've ever heard,
19:20
Speaker 4: and I was just like, this guy's straight ball, Fourd's
19:25
Speaker 4: basewalk is about to rally these guys just because this
19:27
Speaker 4: crowd is on their feet and absolutely going nuts right now.
19:31
Speaker 4: So he was beloved everywhere, but his bat, he just
19:37
Speaker 4: he just got things moving every time, whether someone was
19:40
Speaker 4: on base or not, something was about to happen when
19:42
Speaker 4: he comes up to the plate.
19:44
Speaker 2: The story I always tell about Big Poppy was in
19:47
Speaker 2: twenty fourteen, we were going in Casey Jansen was our
19:51
Speaker 2: closer for the Blue Jays. Didn't throw real hard. It
19:54
Speaker 2: was a cutter curveball, just got ahead and then finished
19:57
Speaker 2: it with the back door, front door cutter, whatever or
20:00
Speaker 2: whatever was his. He was very good at scattered reports
20:03
Speaker 2: and he goes, hey, he goes we're talking in the outfit.
20:05
Speaker 2: He goes, hey, if we pace face Big Poppy late
20:09
Speaker 2: in the game, this is how I want to face him.
20:11
Speaker 2: If it's you know, if they have a chance to
20:15
Speaker 2: if he has a chance to win the game, not
20:17
Speaker 2: tie it up, but win the game. This is how
20:19
Speaker 2: I want to face him. Because he expands his zone.
20:23
Speaker 2: And it was so it's twenty fourteen, they had just
20:26
Speaker 2: won the World Series in thirteen. It was beginning of
20:29
Speaker 2: the season, probably June, you know, anywhere from April to June,
20:33
Speaker 2: and he goes, I want to throw a cutter up
20:35
Speaker 2: and into him. Once we land the first bitch, curveball,
20:38
Speaker 2: cut her up and in. He's gonna hit the ball
20:42
Speaker 2: eight miles but it's gonna be foul. And then I
20:44
Speaker 2: want to throw a backdoor cutter to him. I'm like,
20:47
Speaker 2: all right, well we'll see. You know, I'm in the
20:49
Speaker 2: mindset like Big Poppy's not beating us on the pool
20:52
Speaker 2: side for a homer, Like, no way, I'm going in.
20:55
Speaker 2: Sure enough, Big Poppy comes up. Everybody in the stands
20:59
Speaker 2: a stand, there's two outs, were up by two runs,
21:03
Speaker 2: there's two runners on. He throws lands the first pitch
21:07
Speaker 2: curveball Casey Jansen did. Next pitch was a cutter up
21:10
Speaker 2: and and Big Poppy I swore he hit it off
21:13
Speaker 2: of Yazz's number in right field, off of the upper
21:18
Speaker 2: deck up there, and it was just found. If the
21:21
Speaker 2: umpire had called it fair, I don't know that I
21:24
Speaker 2: could have argued it was so far and so high
21:28
Speaker 2: and he hit it so far foul. But you knew
21:30
Speaker 2: that moment in the stadium, everybody was just the different energy.
21:36
Speaker 2: I'll never forget that feeling playoffs anything. It was the
21:40
Speaker 2: greatest feeling in the stadium because he was up. Just
21:43
Speaker 2: the culmination of him walking to the plate, him hitting
21:46
Speaker 2: that ball, place went berserk. He dropped his bat. It
21:50
Speaker 2: was a foul ball. The next pitch was a back
21:52
Speaker 2: door cutter and he walked off. He didn't swing at it,
21:56
Speaker 2: but in and out. To remember the hitter that I
22:00
Speaker 2: was up there, I don't like, there's no other at
22:02
Speaker 2: bat that I remember more than that because of the
22:05
Speaker 2: atmosphere he created in Boston, and this was towards the
22:09
Speaker 2: end of his career when the team wasn't that season,
22:11
Speaker 2: they weren't doing very well.
22:15
Speaker 4: Most most of my sorry Scotty, most of my views
22:19
Speaker 4: of his at bats were obviously from short right field
22:22
Speaker 4: because of the shift, where I was always out back
22:24
Speaker 4: in the grass, so I was back a little bit.
22:26
Speaker 4: But one of my favorite things to watch was early
22:29
Speaker 4: on versus Boston when Padoya was there too. If Pedroita
22:31
Speaker 4: was on first base Boston people probably know about this.
22:34
Speaker 4: His leadoffs would be a hop, a hop and then
22:38
Speaker 4: like a turn and kind of like duck away almost
22:41
Speaker 4: because that's that's how hard Big Poppy could pull that
22:43
Speaker 4: ball right down the line at you. And every time
22:46
Speaker 4: you could even ask p d about it, where it's
22:48
Speaker 4: just like, go watch some videos if you could pull
22:50
Speaker 4: it up where he's like, this is the only guy
22:52
Speaker 4: that I've seen to have a base runner be like
22:54
Speaker 4: scared of every time a ball gets pitched or something
22:56
Speaker 4: like that, or knows it's gonna be a curveball because
22:58
Speaker 4: he's probably gonna pull it. So was always freaking out
23:01
Speaker 4: every time he was on first base. It was it
23:03
Speaker 4: was fun to watch, though, But uh an incredible player,
23:07
Speaker 4: a star of the game for many, many years, and
23:09
Speaker 4: he's one of those guys who when you meet him
23:11
Speaker 4: as a young player, you're hoping he's as cool as
23:13
Speaker 4: he looks on TV, and he is even better.
23:17
Speaker 2: He was my room, he was my teammate for like
23:20
Speaker 2: two and a half days when I was with Boston
23:22
Speaker 2: and then got fired on the third day that I
23:24
Speaker 2: was there. But in those two and a half days,
23:27
Speaker 2: I found out why they call him Big Poppy. Everyone's like,
23:30
Speaker 2: he's a good I'm big Poppy, you know. I just
23:33
Speaker 2: it's because he doesn't know anybody's name. He calls everybody Poppy,
23:36
Speaker 2: and so he ends up getting the name Big Poppy.
23:41
Speaker 1: Here's a lot of names to memorize. Think about how
23:44
Speaker 1: many people have been around Big Poppy over the years.
23:47
Speaker 1: What you're gonna tell me the whole Oh, he's just
23:49
Speaker 1: a player on another team like everyone else. Yeah, I
23:51
Speaker 1: get it, But I don't know. I mean, he's all
23:54
Speaker 1: over the place. He still is now right, he is
23:57
Speaker 1: everywhere he is. You know, he's on TV, he does
24:00
Speaker 1: speaking engagements, he's you know, at camps like he's non stop. So, yes,
24:07
Speaker 1: I know you're crafs A. You're gonna say on a team,
24:10
Speaker 1: everyone has to know about the same amount of people.
24:12
Speaker 1: I get that part. I don't want to give him
24:14
Speaker 1: too much credit for not knowing anyone's name.
24:18
Speaker 2: No, no, no, I was just gonna say he only
24:19
Speaker 2: played for two teams in the Big League, so it's
24:21
Speaker 2: less less people. But my thing is, is there a
24:25
Speaker 2: bigger star in Red Sox history? A bigger successful star?
24:32
Speaker 2: I know some people you know your age will tell
24:35
Speaker 2: you who you know. I loved Jim Rice, I loved
24:37
Speaker 2: this guy. Is there a bigger star in Red Sox history?
24:43
Speaker 1: Think about it?
24:44
Speaker 4: If you're I would say, I would say Ted Williams
24:47
Speaker 4: might have him as a player and stuff like that.
24:49
Speaker 4: But no, that's but star wise where you say, like
24:53
Speaker 4: the aura that you're talking about earlier, I don't think
24:55
Speaker 4: anybody has him.
24:56
Speaker 1: Be think about it. If you're in Boston, you're not
25:00
Speaker 1: even that much of a baseball fan. You know who
25:03
Speaker 1: he is, right, Name one person connected to the Red Sox,
25:06
Speaker 1: and I guarantee you that the name that pops up
25:10
Speaker 1: the most, that would win that percentage vote would be
25:13
Speaker 1: Big Poppy David Ortiz. Yes, because of the presence, because
25:15
Speaker 1: of the success, because of the clutch moments, because of
25:18
Speaker 1: the historic moments within franchise history. I mean part of
25:22
Speaker 1: breaking up a very very long world series Drought slash Curse,
25:27
Speaker 1: and then if you fast forward the awful tragedy at
25:31
Speaker 1: the Boston Marathon that occurred, and then Big Poppy is
25:36
Speaker 1: the voice with the speech here. It is an iconic
25:39
Speaker 1: photo and an iconic speech that people still think about
25:44
Speaker 1: and gets reference to all the time. He just nailed it.
25:49
Speaker 1: And knowing how he is Kratz, he probably just was
25:54
Speaker 1: given the microphone and started riffing from the heart and
25:58
Speaker 1: he nailed it.
26:00
Speaker 2: It nailed it, And everyone says, oh, you know this team,
26:03
Speaker 2: You know, there's no way that a tragedy brings a
26:07
Speaker 2: team together and helps him win a World Series. Come on,
26:13
Speaker 2: it definitely. It galvanizes a fan base. It makes you
26:17
Speaker 2: come to the park with a different kind of energy,
26:20
Speaker 2: a different kind of like fervor, like a point to
26:24
Speaker 2: coming to the park to win and to work and
26:28
Speaker 2: to do all the things that everybody else has to do.
26:31
Speaker 2: But man, that team, that team could bang too, and
26:34
Speaker 2: that you know, Mike Napoli, Shane Victorino stopped hitting left handed,
26:38
Speaker 2: he only hit right handed that year, Like they had
26:41
Speaker 2: they had a lot going on, and that that speech,
26:45
Speaker 2: that speech is is definitely iconic forever.
26:51
Speaker 1: Last thing to cap this with his career began with
26:54
Speaker 1: the Twins kids, and he wasn't that good and he
26:57
Speaker 1: didn't get that much playing time, and the Twins let
27:00
Speaker 1: him go and he made them pay. So life didn't
27:04
Speaker 1: come easy for him at all times. It eventually did,
27:08
Speaker 1: but it didn't at the front end. So David Ortiz
27:11
Speaker 1: is one of the big success stories in the modern
27:14
Speaker 1: game of Major League baseball. And how good was he
27:17
Speaker 1: both on and off the field? Pretty damn good. If
27:20
Speaker 1: you like these, we've done many more of them, so
27:22
Speaker 1: you can find them in a little playlist on our
27:24
Speaker 1: FT YouTube channel.