My perspective on Craig Biggio
We all knew it was coming, from the moment he signed the contract for this season. We all knew that eventually one of the good guys would be calling it a career. No. Craig Biggio is not quitting baseball, he is retiring from baseball. There is a huge difference between the two, at least from my point of view. People who play the game right, and play for the right reasons, retire. Those who show that money, glory, and attention are the reasons for their playing quit, for one reason or another. The city of Houston, and the Houston Astros in particular, have been blessed with two players who were role models on the field and for the most part good citizens off it: Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio. These two men played baseball the right way. They gave it 100 percent effort every time they stepped on the field, and when their bodies finally failed as was the case with Bagwell, or when they realized that despite that effort they really had nothing more to give to the game, they both retired from the game, and did so with the same level of professionalism that they showed on the field for over fifteen years together.
"I get to go out on top. The 3,000th hit night was the best. I'll never forget that,'' Biggio said today. "I'm in a good place. I think I've done everything I could on a baseball field.'' .
It is the second line in that quote that shows me that Biggio is ready to move on to the next phase of his life. He is satisfied with his performance, and is content with where is leaving the game. Just look at his career highlights: He was on the disabled list only once, and that partial season probably kept him from reaching 3000 hits last year. He played in at least 130 games a year every year except for two: one was the strike-shortened year; and the other was when he was injured and on the DL for the only time in twenty seasons.
Only time will tell if Biggio makes it into the baseball Hall of Fame, but I will let you all decide. Here are his career numbers as of the game yesterday:
20 years with Houston Astros
2799 Games played
3016 Hits
661 Doubles ( #6 all time #1 for right handed hitters)
287 HR (top 5 for second basemen second in HR to leadoff a game behind Ricky Henderson)
413 SB
1827 Runs scored
1160 RBI
.282 Batting Average
1 50 SB - 50 2B seasons
4 more 30 SB - 30 2B seasons
4 Gold Goves @ second Base
Voted starter in All-Star game at both Catcher and Second Base
All of this, and I have not even covered what he has done off of the field with the sunshine kids and other charities.
Posted by bweldon @ 07/25/07 11:35 AM | Print | Comments (0)
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