Detroit Tigers’ Miguel Cabrera hits 3,000 hits

The best players make the manager want to change the rules of the game. In particular, one rule: fiddling with a formation, forcing each hitter to take his or her turn. When Miguel Cabrera is on your team, the wait is the hardest part.

Jack McKeon, 91, spoke on the phone this week from his home in North Carolina. “He hit a sacrificial fly, he hit a home run, he gets a basic hit, even to the point where he hits the dirt ball his name kicked off in Bartman game. He is the catalyst. Something good happened to this guy. “

Cabrera, 20, was playing for the Florida Marlins when his player defeated Chicago Cubs amputee Alex Gonzalez in the fateful Friday game of the 2003 National Championships. The error helped turn Steve Bartman – a fan who had cleared the ball to the left-hand line earlier in the game – from the footnote into the spotlight as the Marlins headed into the World Series with wins in games 6 and 7. .

At the time, Cabrera had only collected 84 career hits in the regular season. On Saturday, with a game against the Colorado Rockies at Comerica Park, he became the 33rd player in major league history with 3,000.

After he collected three hits on Wednesday to reach 2,999, Cabrera’s pursuit of 3,000 hits was delayed by a 0 for 3 performance on Thursday (and a late walk in the game. play raised some eyebrows), as did the rain that delayed Friday’s game against Colorado. The feat finally came in the first inning of Saturday’s game, which will be official after topping the fifth inning.

Cabrera’s first strike was fitting: a two-leg home win at the end of the 11th inning on June 20, 2003, in Miami Gardens, Fla. He hit 502 home players in Saturday’s game, making him one of the rare players to appear on two of baseball’s most prestigious lists.

Only six others have accumulated 3,000 hits and 500 home runs: Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Eddie Murray, Rafael Palmeiro, Albert Pujols and Alex Rodriguez. Within that group, Cabrera had the best batting average (0.310) and percentage-on-base (0.387) ahead of Saturday’s games.

Cabrera’s stats will change, and most likely decline, before he retires; he’s signed with Detroit until 2023. But for now, they’re emphasizing Cabrera’s skills as a pure smasher. He is not a freestyle athlete, but his aim is to hit his way on the grounds. Only two players with 500 hosts (Sammy Sosa and Ernie Banks) have had fewer walks in their careers.

Cabrera won four batting titles over a five-year period, from 2011 to 2015. Only two other right-handed players in the major league majors, Roberto Clemente and Bill Madlock, have won four titles. Polish. As great as they are, neither Clemente nor Madlock have ever scored 30 goals in a single season. Cabrera did it 10 times.

Cabrera was 16 years old when the Marlins signed him from Venezuela for $1.9 million in 1999. Four years later, with the Carolina Mudcats, he passed the Class AA Southern League with a .365 GPA and a billion slip rate 0.609 in 69 games – yet he mostly plays at third base, and Mike Lowell was founded in Miami.

That shouldn’t worry McKeon, who took over as manager in May. His side has some promising young pitchers but needs more emphasis on the squad. McKeon will find a place for a bat like Cabrera’s.

“I know he can’t play third because we have Mike Lowell, but I’ll take him out – don’t worry about it, we’ll find out,” McKeon said. “And he left the field as someone’s business.”

Cabrera played only three youth league games on the left court, but he started there every day during his first week in the major. In October 2003, McKeon moved Cabrera to the right wing. He never played in that position, but started there for seven of the Marlins’ final 10 games of the season, en route to a World Series victory over the Yankees.

Cabrera’s knockdown on the first turn of Game 4, in Florida, heralded greatness to come. Roger Clemens fired the first fast orb at 94 mph, at high altitude and within, a classic backstroke from a self-proclaimed gunner. Cabrera stared at Clemens, hung the ball for seven throws, and drilled another 94 mph fast ball – up and down the disc – over the fence in the center right area.

“It didn’t scare him off,” McKeon said. “He was not threatened. This guy was confident and knew he was capable of it.”

Over the next 13 seasons, Cabrera will demonstrate it with remarkable consistency and persistence. He played more than any other major jumper from 2004 to 2016 – and also produced at top speed. Of the 104 players who made at least 5,000 appearances during those seasons, Cabrera had the best slippage rate plus: 0.968.

He did most of his damage with the Tigers, who traded six players for him and left-handed pitcher Dontrelle Willis in December 2007. Two of the players – midfielder Cameron Maybin and left-thrower Andrew Miller – will have long careers. long. But the deal was a coup for the Tigers, which would win four straight championships and an American League pennant during Cabrera’s peak.

In the glory of his 2012 triple crown season, Many tigers awarding Cabrera an eight-year, $240 million deal that won’t begin until 2016. The deal is an over-the-top approach; Cabrera’s production is definitely down, and he’s been pretty much an average player for the league over the past five seasons. The Tigers have been relegated and are still rebuilding.

But the contract, if nothing else, ensures that Cabrera’s key moments happen for the Tigers, the team that benefited most from the promise he made at the age of 20. Of course, McKeon never changed the basic rules of baseball, but he was certainly right. about Cabrera.

Something good, actually, happened to that guy.