The Cardinals announced they were bringing back the Big Mac. Not the burger but the man, with his two all beef biceps, special juice, cheese, pickles, onions, on a controversial bun. Mark McGwire is back as the Cardinals hitting coach for the 2010 season. A huge surprise since McGwire has been in utter seclusion since the steroid issue surfaced in 2005. McGwire decided to not respond to the Senate’s questions about alleged steroid use. We have since forgotten about Big Mac until this recent menu change by the Cardinals. McGwire may not want to talk about the past but what’s not in the past is his shaky hitting numbers. Yes, McGwire hit a lot of homeruns but is he good enough to be a hitting coach?
The only way we can determine McGwire’s true numbers is by putting them against other perennial all-stars and bringing the facts. I have chosen Willie McGee and Larry Walker, two great hitters that ended their careers with the Cardinals.
At first glance, McGwire looks like a great candidate for Hitting Coach. He hails a career total of 583 HR’s and 1414 RBI’s. While Larry Walker had 383 HR’s with 1311 RBI’s. McGee bringing up the rear with a career total of 79 HR’s and 856 RBI’s (I will explain his low numbers later). While this paints McGwire in a favorable light it would also send red flags to a seasoned baseball enthusiast. You see, McGwire’s RBI’s are like his arms, falsely inflated because of his 583 homeruns. If you subtract his homeruns from his RBI’s Big Mac comes out a small fry at only 831 RBI’s, placing Larry Walker in the lead at 928 RBI’s and McGee still pushing third with 777. Your probably saying “How the hell did Willie McGee have such low numbers”? One of the reasons that Willie McGee has lower numbers than McGwire and Walker is because he hit in the number 2 or 1 spot which means less opportunities to drive in runs. I’m sure that changes your perception about Willie and his “low” numbers. All this shows is that McGwire is a good power hitter which is something that can’t be taught. Either you have it or you don’t and being a good power hitter does not qualify one to be a hitting coach.
Nevertheless let’s move on to their at bats to strikeouts ratio. Willie McGee struck out every 10 at bats (.1015), Larry Walker struck out every 6 at bats (.1782), and Mark McGwire struck out at a horrible every 4 at bats (.2579). WOW and that’s gonna be the hitting coach. What the worst part is Mark McGwire played in fewer games than McGee and Walker and struck out more than they did. McGwire’s job will be to teach hitting and fundamentals of the swing. I have come to find that the best teachers are the best students and know the task inside and out. How can McGwire be an effective teacher with stats like that?
He can’t be an effective teacher because McGwire is not a good candidate for Hitting Coach. Out of the three players that I have talked about I see Larry Walker being the best candidate because of his great hitting stats and swinging technique. The only reason I didn’t pick McGee is that his swing is a tab bit unorthodox and it might be harder for him to instruct others. I don’t think that McGwire coming back to STL is about helping the Cardinals but about getting his good name back. More specifically, this is about McGwire dredging up some votes for the Hall of Fame which he has been unable to obtain since he has been up for voting. He knows that Cardinals fans are the best in baseball and it would be great for his image to use them as his personal PR firm. We shall see this season when the Big Mac turns into a Big Trouble!
No comments:
Post a Comment