Robinson Cano reawakens the steroids/ Baseball Hall of Fame debate
By Cory Claus
Going, Going…
The Seattle Mariners window for winning is closing. Oh, I’m sorry: Closed.
That’s what happens when your best and the highest paid player decides to take himself out of the lineup for the middle HALF of the season. New York Yankees fans remember when Alex Rodriguez missed an entire year.
Unlike Yankees fans, however, Seattle Mariners fans have been waiting a long time to get a chance to fight for a championship, to qualify for the postseason tournament and bathe in even the briefest warm glow of playoff heat.
They deserve that, don’t they? After all their years of supporting this team–of starting spring with the hope that lies eternal within the baseball fan’s breast only to see those hopes and dreams come crashing down– just once to have a successful season and watch meaningful October games?
To sit in the stands and watch the sun go down over Puget Sound, and feel a nip as the cool of Autumn takes over from the late heat of an Indian Summer, while home runs and high fives resound throughout the stadium.
That beautiful baseball dream has been stolen by Robinson Cano. New York Yankees fans get plenty of eventful Octobers; why should the Seattle Mariners fans be robbed of one of their few?
I grew up there, and I know how much they’re hurting. And they’re hurting because a player they believed in to lead them to the promised land, a guy they thought they could count on to play 160 games and be their best offensive and defensive player, will now play in maybe 80 games. By choice.
And when he comes back, the damage might already be done.
Too Little, Too Late for Robinson Cano
When he’s not there to hit in those big series against Anaheim, the Astros and the Yankees; or the team has to decide how much to spend to replace a player coming back in the same season instead of adding to another area of weakness; when a lesser defensive player fails to cut down a runner at first in the top of the ninth of a tied game; that’s when he’ll be hurting the organization, his teammates, and the fans.
But when it comes time to decide if he is one of the best players of the era and deserving of eternal praise for the way he conducted himself as a representative of the game, none of this will seemingly matter to some.