Last weekend was Derek Jeter Night in Yankee Stadium. The tears flowed, the celebrations seemed to go on and on...and it was a beautiful, made-for-TV moment. Hallmark could not have done any better.
If I'd had a ticket to the game I would have probably have shed a tear. Or two. Or three. That's because my favourite player of all time is Derek Jeter.
Jeter had everything. Poise. A short, slap-like swing which seemed to still eject power from the wood. The fact that he could seem to do anything, and even when he made a mistake - like all the greats - he seemed to rebound. Oh, and he was a winner. The five rings helped - including the back-to-back-to-back years of 1998, 1999 and 2000. He was also a brilliant performer in the postseason, posting a spot as clubhouse leader - or at least in the Top 10 - of most Batting categories (even strikeouts!).
But one thing there is one thing for certain that Derek Jeter wasn't at the golden time of shortstops in the late 1990s or all the way through his career was this. He wasn't the best.
That guy was Omar Vizquel.
Vizquel was a freak, playing in four decades of baseball - the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s. He was mostly remembered playing for the Cleveland Indians for a bulk of his career, and was the place where ground balls went to die. In games where he played a fielding role (2,709 of them), he had only 183 errors. In sport in which there is virtually no perfection, Vizquel's .985 fielding percentage is the best-ever.
Vizquel claimed honours, too. From 1993 to 2001 he was a given as a Gold Glove winner, winning the award for nine straight seasons. That's longer than the average MLB player's career by some margin. He also won two more as a San Francisco Giant in 2005 and 2006 when he was nearly in his 40s.
Yes, we know Vizquel's biggest problem was his batting. Apart from one golden season where he batted over .300 (in 1999, when he finished 16th in MVP voting), he was mostly sub-par. In an era where putting the ball into play or out of the yard is seemingly more valued than being one of the greatest fielders in history, it's going to hurt Vizquel.
The Cleveland Indians blog "Wait Til Next Year" wants people to notice that Vizquel had more home runs, RBIs and a better batting average than Cardinals legend - and HOF internee - Ozzie Smith, but still thinks it unlikely.
For me - bearing in mind what a genius he was between second and third base at making plays - the writers shouldn't think twice about giving him legendary status in Cooperstown when the 2018 Hall of Fame class is announced later this year.
And it's almost cooler hearing the tributes to Vizquel coming from not only the USA but also Venezuela, his home country.
