But
that’s the guy that was Adam LaRoche, who was one of the major team
acquisitions of last year whose weak season was a big part of why the Chicago
White Sox fell short.
HE’S
ALSO THE guy who’s getting into the news across the nation because of his
willingness to walk away from the $13 million he’s supposed to be paid for
playing this season – all because White Sox management have problems with the
fact that LaRoche’s son, Drake, goes everywhere with him – and even has his own
locker in the team clubhouse at U.S. Cellular Field.
There
are those people willing to defend the White Sox because they honestly believe an
employer has a right to do what they want, while others find something noble in
the 36-year-old ballplayer wanting to spend time with his
just-becoming-a-teenaged son.
Personally,
I wonder about someone’s devotion to work if they’re spending that much time with
the kid. But that doesn’t mean I’m defending the ball club.
Because
I have no doubt that if LaRoche had somehow been able to hit with as much power
as well as he had in past seasons with other teams, somehow the White Sox would
have figured a way of getting over their hang-ups about the kid being
everywhere.
COULD
IT BE that there will now be a batting average at which point a ballplayer can
have his kid around? Perhaps similar to the “Mendoza line” of Mario Mendoza,
the 1970s-era shortstop of the Pittsburgh Pirates and Seattle Mariners.
He
was a lifetime .215 hitter, but managed to play regularly because of his quality
defense, and is now regarded as the example of how bad a hitter one can be yet
still play regularly.
Perhaps
yet another example could come from the White Sox themselves. Everybody thought
it was so cute back in 2005 and on their way to the World Series when manager
Ozzie Guillen’s fully-grown kids hung around the team and were a constant
presence.
Yet
by the time the White Sox let Guillen leave as manager in 2011, the kids were
often cited as part of the reason why Ozzie had become unbearable.
AS
FOR THE White Sox, they would benefit financially if LaRoche walks away from
the final year of his “big money” contract for 2016 – I’ve already read
speculation about how this move makes it possible for them to afford to make a
few roster moves if the team turns out to be in contention around mid-season.
Which
makes me wonder how much this issue was stirred up just to offend LaRoche, who
apparently suffers from ongoing back pains that may be a large part of why he
didn’t play ball so well in ’15. Personally, the one White Sox game I made it
out to last season was one in which the New York Yankees were walloping the White Sox so
badly that LaRoche was called upon to pitch for an inning!
Not
exactly a stellar moment in White Sox team history.
Although
it also makes me wonder how Adam LaRoche sympathizes with his kid, on account
of the fact that he, too, is the son of a major league ballplayer – Dave LaRoche,
whose own athletic career of the 1970s and early 1980s included a couple-year
stint with the Chicago Cubs.
FOR
THE RECORD, Dave LaRoche had a record of 65 wins (9 of them for the Cubs) and
58 losses with a 3.53 earned run average during 14 seasons pitching in the
major leagues. Good enough that he's been able to remain in professional baseball, coaching most recently for the New York Mets' minor league affiliate in Brooklyn.
Was
that a good-enough record for Adam or his brother Andy (who also played major league baseball) to have been permitted on the premises of
a major league locker room?
-30-
No comments:
Post a Comment