Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Congratulations, Garret Anderson

I'm so pleased that Garret Anderson of the Angels had such a night tonight -- and against the Yankees! He got 10 RBIs, a team record for a single game and just one short of the AL record, in an 18-9 victory (A-Rod had two homers, what a player he is). I think most people appreciate Garret pretty thoroughly now -- he has been an All-Star MVP -- but he is so quiet and outwardly unemotional that earlier in his career a number of fans got the impression he just didn't care. Wrong.

People would comment that he hardly ever dived for a ball in the field, but my observation was that he almost always got such a good jump on a fly ball that he never had to dive for it; he just got there and he made it look easy. And such a steady hitter, for average and power. Never quite as spectacular as a power hitter as a Rodriguez or Guerrerro or Bonds or Griffey, but he always got more than his share of doubles and homers and was always right around .300. He had injury problems for much of last year, for the first time, and some health issues earlier this year, and I was concerned that he wouldn't come back to his full potential. But he seems to have done so.

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