GreggysBlog

The End of an ERA

It happens in every sport, time passes even the great ones by, and they become a mere footnote, an oh by the way. As it was with Johnny Unitas playing on the Chargers, Joe Namath playing QB for the Rams, Joe Montana on the Chiefs... and with that one more is added to the list. Al Leiter.

OK so maybe not a hall of fame guy. Yesterday Leiter ended his career, fittingly with the same team he started it with, my beloved NY Yankees. (yup die hard Yankee fan, I even remeber the day we traded Leiter to the Jays for Jessie Barfield - during the awful awful 80s when the Yanks front office seemed to be only good at finding good young talent and trading it for washed up over the hill GARBAGE - sure Barfield could hit 20 or 30 home runs, but he was much more prolific striking out, yeah I remember trading a promising young lefty for a free swining mediocre right fielder and once again puking all over my pinstripes -- but enough of the past - that was what 5 World Series championships ago right!?!)

While Leiter was more like the other former front runners hanging around the last few years. I was onto a little trend with Leiter both while he was at Florida last year and then still with the Yankees. Leiter was an over machine last year... didn't have to know anything else about baseball, just take action on TOTALS for any Al Leiter start and go with the OVER... it hit like 80-90% IN THE PAST 2 YEARS. It was such a money play - a practical sure thing. (like 3 years ago when the Yanks had Jeff Weaver) Whenever I needed a big bounce back play or a sure fire lock to roll into a parlay... Leiter was the ticket - when the line was like 6 he could usually bust that up before the 2nd inning. Even as vegas caught on and it was like 8.5 - 10 pts later in the year, with Yanks it was still MONEY! Many games thanks to the Yanks big bats and late inning heroics, against most teams mince-meat middle men relievers. Don't get me wrong I loved Leiter, and always rooted for him to pitch well. But lets face it the 39 year old could get lit up, and NY was thin on front line pitching, so he would have to give NY innings, which of course led to runs - 3, 4, 5 runs by the 5th or 6th inning, making the AL LEITER over one of my best plays all last Summer.

Al, we're all gonna miss you, some of us WAY MORE THAN OTHERS - baseball won't be the same this year. Thanks for all the great memories Al, enjoy retirement.

DISCUSS THIS STORY IN Greggys Forum