Not a Lot of “What ifs” for the Captain

Life is full of “what ifs,” but if you can manage to keep most of them in the realm of sports you’re doing OK.  My big “what ifs” of sports tend to revolve around baseball in general and the Yankees specifically.

OK, so “we” (like I’m on the team or something) won the World Series in 1996, 1998, 1999, and 2000.  What if Mo had closed out the Diamondbacks in the bottom of the ninth in game seven of the 2001 series?  We win in 2001.  What if we get a few timely hits in game two of the 2003 series and go up 2-0 on the Marlins?  We win in 2003.  What if Mo closes out the Red Sox in game four of the ALCS in 2004, or we just win one more game?  We probably beat the Cardinals for the World Series in 2004.  And then we won again in 2009.  That’s eight championships in thirteen years, instead of just one this century.  (No, 2000 was the LAST year of the 20^th Century).

My wife is usually knitting and ignoring me when I rattle off these “what ifs.”  So, for todays “what if,” I’m going to play it smart and just write about it.

Derek Jeter

Labeled for Reuse

I’ve been watching Jeter play shortstop for the Yankees since that glorious Rookie of the Year season of 1996.  (I’ll admit that I don’t remember the 15 games he played in 1995.  It was before the Twitterificaion of everything remotely related to sports).  It was also the first World Series win for the Yankees in 18 years, since I was 12 in 1978.  Over the years, Jeter has grown to be what I imagine my father thought of Mickey Mantle and my grandfather before him must have thought of Joe DiMaggio or even Lou Gehrig, as being the epitome of what it means to be a Yankee. 

So, yesterday, Jeter collected his 3319^th and 3320^th base hits of his career, passing Paul Molitor on the all-time hits list to stand alone in eighth place.  He needs 100 more to pass Carl Yastrzemski and then another one to pass Honus Wagner and then 16 more to pass Tris Speaker for fifth place all time.  I think he should get there.  I hope he gets there.  He’ll need to stay healthy.

But, what if he had been able to play a full season last year, instead of just 17 games?  I think it’s reasonable to assume he’d have started this year, his final year, already in fifth place, with fewer than 100 hits to catch Stan Musial at 3630.  Could he also have gotten to Hank Aaron at 3771?  There was an outside shot, but probably not.  And then there’s Ty Cobb at 4189 and Pete Rose at 4256 that given Jeter’s desire to play every day and play at shortstop, he probably never would have reached anyway. 

Still pretty darned good.  Five World Series rings.  Fifth on the all-time hits list (if he stays healthy).  And an argument to be made that he’s the greatest offensive shortstop of all time.  There aren’t a lot of “what ifs” when you’re the Captain.