Ivan Rodriguez Waving Goodbye

Call this a reluctant retirement. Ivan Rodriguez, the great catcher, would still love to play if if he thought his 40-year-old body could fake being 25 again. You know, I know, every baseball fan knows, that Rodriguez would love to be the first catcher to get 3,000 hits. We all know that Rodriguez would like to be considered the greatest catcher of all time, though hanging around for one more year wouldn’t prove it.

So Rodriguez plans to retire next Monday. The man without a team will be a Texas Ranger again for one day. It will be the official end of one of baseball’s great careers. Certainly if there is a group picture of the best catchers of all time Rodriguez is invited to the photo shoot. Johnny Bench is ranked as the finest fielding catcher of all and he wielded a pretty mean bat. Rodriguez has surpassed Bench’s hitting marks and longevity, but just who is the best fielder in a debate is somewhat in the eye of the beholder and Bench supporters will probably never yield to anyone.

Men who made their living straining knee tendons in a squat and maintained sustained excellence for a long period stand out. Compared to other positions there are a finite number of catchers who get mentioned when it comes to listing greats doing the job. The Hall of Fame is not bursting at the seams from catchers. Some were innovators, some were hardy, all spent a decade-plus accumulating battle scars from tipped balls and runners sliding into their shins. Yogi Berra, Roy Campanella, Mickey Cochrane, Bill Dickey, Josh Gibson, and Bench, of course, are among the most famous enshrined there. And Carlton Fisk, who had the same nickname, “Pudge,” as Rodriguez, and had it first.

Catchers are the warriors of the game, the immovable objects of the defense protecting the plate against trespassers. They are trusted enough to remind the other fielders how many outs, how many strikes, how many balls there are. And they are relied upon to gun down brash runners trying to haughtily catch their team napping and steal a base. The best of the best do all of this and hit well, too, carrying a load of responsibility on their shoulders by wearing the so-called “tools of ignorance” protective gear and also carrying lumber up to the plate.

In his 21 Major League seasons Rodriguez did it all superbly. He was a 13-time Gold Glove winner, a 14-time All-Star, and the 1999 American League Most Valuable player. He brought excitement and credibility to the Detroit Tigers and Florida Marlins (with whom he won a World Series) when those franchises needed it. He batted .300 10 times.

When Jose Conseco was repeatedly making statements about drug use in baseball he at one point said that he injected steroids into Rodriguez. There aroused suspicsion, but no evidence has been presented that such an incident took place.

Rodriguez will retire with 2,844 hits, a .296 batting average, 311 home runs and 1,332 RBIs. No catcher played in more games at the position (2,427), scored more runs (1,354), or collected more hits. It would have been sweet to be the first catcher to reach 3,000 hits, but last year in minimal action with the Washington Nationals Rodriguez batted .218 with two home runs and 19 RBIs. He was used only often enough to record 124 official at-bats.

The signs were on the wall and that’s probably why Rodriguez said no to the Kansas City Royals when they offered him a deal for 2012. He wouldn’t have played much and he probably recognized he couldn’t play much anymore, either, or do enough to satisfy himself when he got in. Despite success with those other teams, Rodriguez is most closely identified with the Rangers, the team he broke in with, and the team he starred for longest. That’s why he’s going home to say goodbye Monday.

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