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http://0rz.tw/fOz9Z

By Joe Posnanski (NBC名作家)

Appreciating the free-swinging excellence of Vlad Guerrero

回顧Vladimir Guerrero他自由奔放的打擊

the ground — it was a project to explore why we still love sports. Here we are
 surrounded by the horror of concussions and NCAA hypocrisy and PED use and
countless other unsavory things … but we still love the games. In a weird way,
 we love the games now more than we ever did.




在那本書中，我原本打算用一整章描寫Guerrero的一個打席

Now, I’m not referring to how good they were or how valuable they were …
simply how much joy they gave us. Some of the all-time greats were great fun,
of course: Magic Johnson was fun, Barry Sanders of course, Muhammad Ali.
Pistol Pete Maravich.



Browns used to have this amazing kick returner named Eric Metcalf (son of the
great Terry Metcalf) — he was widely viewed as a massive disappointment
because he could never quite translate his punt returning genius to his life
as a running back or a receiver. But, MAN was he fun — anytime he touched
the ball, he might just do something that would blow your mind. Actually quite
a few punt returners were like that. White Shoes Johnson was like that.
Dante Hall was like that. Devin Hester.

(這段是講一個美足球員，專接踢發球後第一次進攻的，因和MLB無關就不解釋了)

always fun. Jim Zorn was fun — scrambling quarterbacks are wonderful.
These days: Bubba Watson is fun. Joe Flacco is oddly fun*. Victor Cruz is fun.
 Andrelton Simmons is fun — great defensive shortstop are fantastic.
Lionel Messi. Man, nobody’s as much fun as Steph Curry — you can’t watch
him play basketball without, at some point, just breaking out in a big smile.



football as hard or as far as Joe Flacco, I would overthrow receivers by
40 yards again and again just to entertain myself. Maybe that’s why he
does it.

*Flacco好看的原因是因為他很扯：如果我有辦法把橄欖球丟得和他一樣遠，我大概每次
都會丟在接球員前面40碼來讓我自己覺得爽。或許這是為什麼他也這樣丟的原因。

watching Vlad Guerrero hit a baseball. He was one-of-a-kind. He grew up in
the Dominican Republic, and when he signed with the Montreal Expos he was
this big (6-foot-3), strong, fast, power-armed force of nature. I’ve heard
people compare Yasiel Puig to him, and that’s not a bad comparison — but



— no matter how fast or slow, no matter how high or low, how far outside or
inside. If you bounced a pitch in front of the plate, he might hit it. If
you threw it over his head, he might hit it. He would definitely try.

從他踏入職業棒球的第一天，Vlady就沒有打不到的球。不管快或慢，高或低，多外角或內
角。如果你本壘板彈一顆星，他也有可能打到。丟比他頭還高，他也有可能打到。但
他一定會試著打看看。

ball hitter. Yogi was a famous bad ball hitter. Manny Sanguillen proudly would
swing at anything. But there was something wonderful about Vlady’s free
swinging. Every at bat, it was like he was just trying to prove a point. From
2007 to 2011, by the Fangraphs numbers, Vlad Guerrero swung at more than
FORTY-FIVE PERCENT of the pitches out of the strike zone.



not strikes. Of course, other players swing at bad pitches — and there’s not
a thing fun about that when you’re talking about Jeff Francoeur. What’s fun
about Guerrero is that even from 2007 to 2011 — though Guerrero was aged and
beat up and no longer the hitting genius he had been as a young man — he STILL
hit .303 and slugged .490.



Five feet outside? He’d reach. In the dirt? He’d golf. Behind him? He’d
switch-hit. Close your eyes, you can just see the ridiculous movements Vlady
would make just to hit a baseball. Man did he love hitting baseballs. His eyes
just lit up when he was at the plate.



years, they never could find that place outside his hitting zone. They never
figured out how to take advantage of his non-selective ways. Guerrero led the
league in intentional walks five times, and I don’t think it was only because
of his great hitting. I think it was also because pitchers didn’t know how
else to walk him.

當然，投手也知道他球來就打。但是花了16年，他們還是投不出他的好球帶。他們從來沒
有因為他這樣的通通揮佔到便宜。Guerrero是五次的聯盟故意保送王，而我想這不只是因為
他是個好打者，而是投手們找不到投壞球保送他的辦法。

doubles, 9 triples. Everything he did was BIG. He made big plays. He made big
mistakes. He swung big. He missed big. Guerrero flashed one of the great arms
you’ve ever seen — Jonah Keri brings up the excellent point that Montreal,
for a team that only played 36 seasons, had some spectacular outfield arms in
its history. Guerrero’s arm was ridiculous. Larry Walker’s arm was fantastic.
Andre Dawson had a breathtaking arm. And, most of all, there was Ellis
Valentine. What an arm that guy had.


Andre Dawson很強，更別說Ellis Valentine。哇操咧。

going. The guy airmailed so many cutoff men that at some point you just wanted
him to get it over with and wear an American Postal Service uniform. He stole
bases — as many as 40 in a season — but he got thrown out a lot (the year he
stole 40 he led the league by being caught 20 times). He was fast and reckless
on the bases, often hurting his team as much as he helped them.

雖然Guerrero能傳得很遠，但他通常也不知道球會飛去哪裡。他在咖斗時傳過頭的次數


with crazy ferocity. And yet, against all logic, he didn’t strike out much. He
never struck out 100 times in a season and only came close once. Eleven times,
Vlady hit 25-plus homers while striking out fewer than 90 times. Since the
strike — when strikeouts began to skyrocket — only Albert Pujols has pulled
off that feat as often.



hit the baseball. And so he simply crushed the first thing he saw. In his
career, he put about 20% of the first pitches he faced into play. He was the
quintessential first ball fastball hitter. If it looked kind of straight, and
looked within his reach (and weren’t they ALL within his reach), he swung at
that first pitch.



had a pitcher down 3-1, forced to throw something resembling a strike,
Guerrero was extra-lethal. But, truth is, he hardly ever faced a 3-1 count.
He hit a 3-1 pitch in play less than 4% of the time. The at-bat was usually
long over before a 3-1 count was possible.



told, again and again, “don’t give him anything good to hit on the first
pitch.” But that’s part of what made Guerrero so fun. His idea of “good”
 was different from everyone else’s idea of good. On the first pitch, he hit
363 and slugged.660. The guy would swing at anything. The guy would swing at
pitches in OTHER GAMES. And still pitchers could not throw a first pitch bad
enough to hold him off.




336. Then .330. Then .337. Batting average isn’t much of a statistic for
determining the overall offensive contribution of a player, but in Guerrero’s
case those batting averages are little markers of his artistry. Everything
about him was moving parts, legs flying all over the place, heavy slides,
overthrows, aggression, vicious swings, joyous intensity, but at the end of
the year it always ended same. He hit the ball harder than just about
anyone ever. And he always hit around .330.



baseball. He got his last big league at-bat at 36 — by then he was just an
oversized version of the oversized player he had always been. He still hit
290. But the power was gone. And he was walked unintentionally just 14 times
in 590 plate appearances. The superhuman reflexes necessary to do the
impossible things Vlady did had dulled just enough. He tried in various ways
to get back, but he could not.



Todd Helton, who also retired. It’s kind of weird. They were absolutely
nothing alike. But by the numbers, their careers mirrored almost exactly.
Helton hit .317. Guerrero hit .318. Helton had 2,505 hits. Guerrero had 2,590.
Helton had 2,791 runs-plus-RBIs. Guerrero had 2,824. Helton had 61.2 WAR.
Guerrero had 59.1 WAR. You could make a strong Hall of Fame case for both.



want to remember Guerrero walking to the the plate, the pitcher sweating, the
crowd ready to see something awesome. He wore no batting gloves. Then Guerrero
would stand there, his body surprisingly upright, his bat high over his
shoulder and waving back and forth, and you could just tell he was itching to
swing at something, anything that came his way — moths, popcorn, air
molecules— and then the pitch would come, and if it was anywhere close,
anywhere in thestadium, he would lift that left leg, and turn his back toward
the pitcher, andhe would swing with purpose, and he would keep both hands on
the bat all theway through the swing and — as often as anyone of his
generation — he wouldcrush the ball. It was so much fun. Somewhere in all o
f it, I think, is why we keep watching.



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