There's really a lot wrong with this article by one John Delcos.
Mechanically, it's a fucking nightmare. It uses 3 paragraphs to make the very basic point of "No one should care about the Mets' Jordany Valdespin." Two of its first 5 paragraphs are, in their entirety, as follows: "Answer: There is no reason." and "Bottom line: They can lose with or without Valdespin."
Which brings me to another very weird and incredibly dumb piece of this article. Delcos keeps making this argument that the Mets are really bad, so Valdespin doesn't matter because they are bad with him or without him. But this argument obviously would apply the same to David Wright or Matt Harvey? "They can lose with or without [Harvey/Wright]."
Anyway, so Delcos really doesn't like Valdespin, who appears to be a pretty talented, toolsy youngster on the Mets. So what makes him not worth caring about? Well, his attitude. His attitude is "me-first." And, we all know that players with that type of attitude have never had successful major league careers, or contributed to good teams. (Except for Barry Bonds, and Reggie Jackson, and Wade Boggs, and Pete Rose.)
How do we know his attitude is so me-first-y? Well he preened and watched a home run in a game his team was losing badly. Once again, we need look no further than baseball history to learn that hot-doggish, me-first-y guys have never been great players - except for the fact that the biggest hot dog of all time, Ricky Henderson, was an absolutely dominant force on a baseball field and won like 3 World Series.
I've seen the play. It was hardly egregious but it was moderately dick-ish. I mean, Valdespin's a young player who hit an upper deck blast and wanted to have some fun admiring it. Not good etiquette. But hardly the end of the world. In fact, I seem to recall Ken Griffey Jr. (a forgettable nobody who never contributed anything) leisurely walking out of the box every single time he jacked one out.
Back to Valdespin, veterans and coaches should pull him aside and tell him to knock it off. Again, no biggie. I'd venture a conservative guess that 50% of players, early in their careers, crossed the invisible lines of baseball etiquette and had to be set straight.
Valdespin was indeed set straight, by his opponents. As the author of this hit-piece rushes to inform us, Valdespin was plunked by the Pirates as retaliation. But oh his reaction to getting hit!? It was horrible. He got mad and spiked his helmet. He could have injured a teammate! It could have "ricocheted and hit somebody in the eye!" This is unacceptable of course. You know this is so because Paul O'Neil who threw tantrums to rival a 3 year old girl , was widely decried and criticized and called awful names such as a ... "gamer" and "great competitor" and "true class act."
Now, if you are still not convinced that we should all maintain a posture of something hovering between indifference and dislike towards a talented young prospect, then John Delcos still has one more- oh wait, no. Nope, that's the whole thing. That's his entire case.
To recap: this young, talented player should be forgotten, written off and made to sit on the bench while some washed-up has been (like, who's the worst player you can think of, let's say Rick Ankiel! Remember him!? Just awful! Oh wait) gets his ABs, because he.. wait for it... watched a homer and got mad when he got plunked. Boom! Case closed!
This article is garbage on so many levels but it's also a kind of dog-whistle-y with the "NBA diva" comment and its overall tone.
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