Post by fjenkins on May 6, 2020 20:35:35 GMT
Consider it this way - if you're a pitcher and when you face the Angels, you know Mike Trout is the best hitter on the planet and you can't let him beat you....but do you fear him? I don't care who you are, how many ASGs you've been to, when you stand on the bump and Albert Belle digs in to the batter's box, your ass puckers up a little bit.
A Shreveport, Louisiana native, Belle excelled at LSU where he made 1st Team All-SEC in both 1986 and 1987. Across 184 games during those 2 years, Belle tormented the opposition with 194 hits, 30 doubles, 49 HRs, 172 RBI, 157 runs, a .332 average and a .670 slugging percentage. Take that, college pitchers.
Let's get right down to some bulletpoints because it's the only way to do Belle's career justice:
- From 1991 - 2000 (his only full-time years in the bigs), he averaged .298/.374/.571 (.945), 37 HRs, 120 RBI, 38 doubles, and 95 runs. He finished his career with 381 homers and 1,239 RBI. He had 8 straight years with 30 dingers and 100 RBI (only 9 others have done that).
- From 1993 - 2000, Belle ranks 1st in RBI, 1st in doubles, 2nd in hits, 4th in HR, 7th in runs, 5th in slugging and 7th in OPS+.
- Appeared in 5 All-Star Games and with all due respect to Mo Vaughn, Belle got jobbed in the 1995 MVP race. 50 homers and 50 doubles is a feat that has never been accomplished before or since, and he did it in a strike-shortened season. Belle had a higher average, OBP, slugging, hit more homers, scored more runs and led his team to the playoffs, as did Mo. His clutch stats weren't too shabby either and while Vaughn's were admittedly better, MVP voters didn't pay attention to those types of things back then. The press hated Belle (with good reason) and a large contingent of voters refused to vote for him in what ended up being a very close vote. Plain and simple.
- One of only 11 players to have 9-straight 100-RBI seasons, leading the league 3 times in that category.
- In 1996, he was awarded a 5-year, $55m contract, becoming the first player ever to break the $10m per year mark. Incredible to think of some of the shitheels that have crossed that mark since then.
- Won 5 Silver Slugger Awards, the most in Indians franchise history.
- Homered in his last career AB, a solo shot off of Denny Neagle.
It's no secret that Belle has had some legal troubles, he openly chastised the press, he chased trick-or-treaters with his car once, he had that crazy corked bat controversy where he tried to replace his corked bat with some souvenir bat during the game to avoid detection, but Buster Olney (then with the NYT) has a great quote that pretty much sums it up:
It was a taken in baseball circles that Albert Belle was nuts... The Indians billed him $10,000 a year for the damage he caused in clubhouses on the road and at home, and tolerated his behavior only because he was an awesome slugger... He slurped coffee constantly and seemed to be on a perpetual caffeinated frenzy. Few escaped his wrath: on some days he would destroy the postgame buffet...launching plates into the shower... after one poor at-bat against Boston, he retreated to the visitors' clubhouse and took a bat to teammate Kenny Lofton's boombox. Belle preferred to have the clubhouse cold, below 60 degrees, and when one chilly teammate turned up the heat, Belle walked over, turned down the thermostat and smashed it with his bat. His nickname, thereafter, was "Mr. Freeze."
Naturally, that shot comes against Mr. Unclutch himself, Armando Benitez.
I particularly love this clip below because I HATE Fernando Vina. The punch-and-judy hitter never saw a pitch he wouldn't lean right into and the umps never called him out on it, instead opting to award him first base because they took pity on him. Nice to see him get a little comeuppance here: