Tiger Woods backed into a fire hydrant yesterday and the whole world is intrigued by every detail.
For us baseball fans, this begs the question: Which baseball player makes that much of an impact on the world?
The answer? There is no one. The only person ever to matter as much to the world as Tiger was, of course, a Yankee. A guy named George Herman Ruth.
Tiger has to be the single most important person to his or her sport today. People who don’t know anything about golf still know who Tiger is. For baseball, that must-know guy varies depending on where you live.
| Big ADVANTAGE to having a Tiger in a sport: | Big DISADVANTAGE to having a Tiger in a sport: |
| Having such a popular figure around helps the popularity and growth of the sport. | If he quits or gets injured, the sport loses so much, and won’t have a replacement. |
The only baseball player I could single out would be – bias aside – Derek Jeter. But honestly, that’s probably just because of his looks. And, let’s say Jeter retired from baseball, there are still plenty of other players that are close to his popularity. Baseball does not need a Tiger.
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Peter · 805 weeks ago
When it comes to teams, I'd argue that a "Tiger" would be a team, such as the Yankees, which could be considered a powerhouse of the sport. This would make for a fairer comparison of one team versus the field of teams. I'm not saying there aren't influential players in baseball, but one player still can't win a game, the team does. Thus, the whole baseball team would be the equivalent of a golfer, tennis player, or curler in their respective sports.
Now, although completely unreasonable, imagine what impact losing the Yankees would have on baseball...
That, my friends, would be a problem.
Lenny Neslin 70p · 805 weeks ago