Brady, Phil, Helio: Who’s MLB’s 2021 old-timer hero?

Albert Pujols/Justin Turner

Let’s start with the obvious. In a year in which Brady, Mickelson and Castroneves all emerge as old-timer champions, what’s more logical than Pujols delivering the big hit for the Dodgers in the Fall Classic?

Pujols is MLB’s oldest position player, he’s a future Hall of Famer, a two-time World Series winner already, and a three-time most Valuable Player.

Beyond that, if Pujols were to deliver the decisive hit at a critical Game 7 World Series moment, he’d only be fulfilling the hopes and expectations of Dodger fans when the team signed him a few weeks ago.

What in the name of Tommy Lasorda could possibly be more logical than a Pujols walk-off World Series winner?

The Dodgers actually have two legit chances for an old-timer hero. Justin Turner isn’t quite as gold-plated as Pujols, but at age 36 he’s a 13-year MLB veteran who hit .307 for the champs in 2020.

He batted .320 in last season’s World Series, and since he’s the starting third baseman unlike Pujols he’s guaranteed – barring injury – to be prominent on the World Series stage assuming the Dodgers can get there.

In 2021, Turner is positioning himself for a senior celebrity role. He’s off to a solid .271 start with nine home runs and an .819 OPS.

Given that the Dodgers are probably the favorites to actually get to the World Series, Pujols and/or Turner may be the two most likely old-timer heroes.

Yadier Molina/Adam Wainwright

Molina, 38, is enjoying one of the finest offensive seasons of his 18-year MLB career. He’s batting a team-leading .292, and he has an .847 OPS. That plus his unparalleled defensive reputation makes him the consummate old-timer.

Wainwright, 39, has ceded rotation leadership to Jack Flaherty, but he makes an excellent elder statesman. He’s started 10 games, worked 60 innings, and while his 3-4 record and 4.22 ERA are not eye-popping he’s kept his team in the game.

All that makes it totally plausible that if the Cardinals can fight their way to the World Series, their old-timer battery of Wainwright and Molina will have a lot to do with it.

At this stage, the big challenge is getting there. The Cards are locked in a daily scramble with the Cubs for first place in the NL Central while simultaneously trying to hold off the Milwaukee Brewers.

Assuming they reach postseason play, the Cardinals have a decent tradition of advancing. Of their 11 post-season appearances since Molina’s arrival in 2004, they’ve reached the World Series four times, winning twice. No team in baseball has made more World Series appearances since then.

There’s one other reason to expect Molina and/or Wainwright to play the role of old-timer hero. That reason is simple: At this stage of their careers, it’s what they both live for.

Rich Hill

At age 41, Hill has emerged as a leader of the staff of the defending American League champion Tampa Bay Rays. Standing on the mound as the key player in a World Series title run would be the capstone to a truly singular career.

Although he debuted with the Chicago Cubs back in 2005, Hill’s career has been a virtual hegira. Since that debut he’s worked 144 games at Triple-A, one at Double-A, a dozen at High A, two at Class A, two in an independent league, nine games in foreign leagues, and – incongruously – two games of Rookie ball. As a result, although he has played during 17 different seasons, 2021 is only his fifth full MLB season.

Hill is enjoying the renaissance. He’s 4-2 through 11 starts with a 3.32 ERA and challenging that whippersnapper, Tyler Glasnow, for the status of staff ace. He is on pace to work about 150 innings, which would be a personal best since 2007 when he was with the Cubs.

The Rays obviously have the team to get to the World Series; it’s basically the same bunch that got them to Game 6 just last season. Their 35-20 record is just off the 40-20 pace they set in 2020.

So it’s not hard to imagine old-timer Hill out there on the mound this fall as the Rays try to wrap up the first World Series title in franchise history. The tougher part, actually, may be envisioning Rays manager Kevin Cash actually letting Hill work deep enough into the game to attain hero status.

Charlie Morton

In his age 37 season, the man they call Ground Chuck for his preponderance of ground balls has become a bit of a postseason talisman. He joined the Astros in 2017 and they won the World Series. He signed with the Ray in 2019 and one season later they went to the World Series.

Now Morton plays a prominent role on the staff of the Atlanta Braves, who have pronounced World Series hopes of their own.

If Morton is losing much, it doesn’t show. Through 11 starts he’s 4-2 with a 4.11 ERA. He leads the Braves staff in both innings pitched and strikeouts.

With the loss of 2020 batting star Marcell Ozuna, first to dislocated fingers and then to a domestic violence arrest, responsibility for the Braves’ fate in the NL East race will increasingly fall on the team’s pitchers, and that means Morton.

The Braves trail the NL East-leading Mets by six games in the loss column, so there’s work to be done. But the Mets’ injury problems may be the worst in MLB, so their continued success is no sure thing.

Beyond that, as three-time defending divisional champions, the Braves have history on their side. If they can get to the post-season, they have the experience to win it.

Old-timer Morton is a large part of that experience.

Jon Lester

The Washington Nationals signed Lester to a one-year, $10 million deal precisely because they respected the maturity he brings to contention and post-seasons situations.

Now 37, Lester has obviously lost something off his heater. He’s 0-2 in a half dozen starts that have lasted just 29 innings.

Beyond that, the Nats also are struggling. They’re 21-29 through 50 games and their offense – led by Juan Soto – is misfiring.

But, as Nats fans know, their team has been in this spot before. In 2019 they were two games worse, 19-31, through 50 games, only to rally and win the World Series.

Lester also has a habit of picking things up. He’s only an 18-19 pitcher with a 3.58 ERA in April, climbing to 3.82 in May. But get him to June and his ERA drops to 3.12 with a 38-14 career record. His second best month is September, with a 3.19 ERA and 44-19 record.

Beyond that, he has a 2.51 post-season ERA with three World Series appearances: Boston in 2007 and 2013 and the Cubs in 2016. All three netted rings. Lester was 4-1 in those three World Series.

If the Nats can merely get an old-timer like Lester to the World Series, anything could happen.

Yuli Gurriel and Zack Greinke

Like the Cardinals and Dodgers, the Houston Astros are two-deep in MLB old-timer leadership.

Gurriel, of course, doesn’t feel like the 37-year-old he is because he did not emerge from stardom in the Cuban League until he was 32. Since then he’s averaged .290, topping out at 31 home runs in 2019.

Greinke is another and far more familiar persona. A rookie with Kansas City in 2004, he won the Cy Young Award in 2009, made a half dozen All Star Game appearances, and has rolled up 213 victories in 18 seasons.

The one thing he hasn’t done is enjoy post-season success. He’s 4-6 with a 4.22 ERA in 19 postseason starts, and his only two World Series starts – for the Astros in 2019 – both resulted in no-decisions. In that year’s Game 7, Greinke left the mound leading 2-1 in the seventh inning only to see his successor, Will Harris, give up a game-turning two-run home run to Howie Kendrick.

There is, then, absolutely nothing this old-timer would like better than to get one more shot at a Game 7 start, and this time to change the outcome. A complete game performance with Gurriel driving the winning run across would be very much to Greinke’s liking, and would also very much fit into the old-timer fabric of 2021.

Longshots

As a lifetime achievement award, a World Series winning hit by Reds first baseman Joey Votto would beat all.

The odds on that are long, given that the Reds are in fourth place in the NL Central with a 24-28 record. But hey, stranger things have happened…like the Nats in 2019.

As for Votto, his team’s very brief 2020 postseason appearance was Cincinnati’s first since 2013, when their first baseman was in his prime. He’s 37 now, and off to a .226 start.

Still, Cincinnati’s big problem is probably its pitching, an area Votto can do nothing about. The Reds are 14th in the league in both ERA and runs allowed per game. And no, that’s not all due to the Great American Ballpark. Even in park adjusted ERA, the Reds only rank 10th in the NL.

Proclaiming Jed Lowrie as a World Series hero would be almost as surprising, although given the competitiveness of the A’s team Lowrie may have a better chance.

After sitting out most of the past two seasons, Lowrie has returned to stabilize Oakland’s second base situation. He’s batting only .245, but the A’s don’t have Lowrie for his bat. At 37, he’s become a leadership and clubhouse guy.

The A’s, of course, are notorious for collapsing in post-season. But for the moment, at least, they are in first place in the AL West, a step or two in front of the Astros. If, somehow, they can get to the World Series, there’s no real reason to expect Lowrie to emerge as their offensive leader.

Well, there is one reason: This is 2021, the year of Tom Brady, Phil Mickelson, and Helio Castroneves. In other words, the year of the old-timer. Perhaps, just perhaps, Jed Lowrie is that MLB old-timer.