Welcome to Wittenmyer & Williams – a point/counterpoint column on the Reds and baseball from the Enquirer Reds reporter Gordon Wittenmyer and sports columnist Jason Williams. Here, the longtime friends, reunited after covering baseball together in Minnesota earlier in their careers, pick out some hot baseball — or sometimes, non-baseball – subject and discuss it.
Williams: Well, I thought I was done with you after we split up to cover the Twins back in the day. But here we are. Together again. I guess we weren’t done arguing.
Wittenmyer: A bit like me and my ex-wife. I can’t get rid of you.
Williams: Thank goodness at least you can cover baseball. Speaking of which, your team. What a race. A bunch of young people having fun.
Wittenmyer: Dude. In all my years covering baseball, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything like it. All these rookies and second-year guys with all this athleticism and talent. Most people hadn’t heard of these guys until last month. Now I’m starting to think a few of these starters should be All-Stars. Mad.
Williams: Well, obviously Alexis Diaz.
Wittenmyer: No man. I’m talking about Elly De La Cruz.
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Williams: You’re kidding, right? He’s been in the big leagues for less than a month.
Wittenmyer: Have you watched it last month? The guy did things in a few weeks that most guys don’t do in a career. The guy won Player of the Week in his third week in the big leagues.
Williams: That’s my point. Three weeks. You know it better than anyone: baseball is a long game. That’s not what a man does in a few weeks. You’ve seen a lot of flash-in-the-pan players. I am in no way saying that De La Cruz is that. But it takes more than three weeks to evaluate whether a guy is a true All-Star.
Wittenmyer: Look, if Rob Manfred can have a place on the list of lifetime achievements for old guys, baseball can certainly find room for the game’s most exciting young talents no matter how many weeks have passed.
Williams: It seems like it would be a desperate move on baseball’s part if it put De La Cruz in the All-Star Game. Maybe your argument would be a little stronger if he had been superhuman in almost every game since day one. He is not Shohei Ohtani. Not yet anyway. De La Cruz had 3 hits and 10 strikeouts in the five games after hitting during the cycle. By my calculations, that’s a batting average of .136. He went hitless with five strikeouts in the Kansas City series. Please understand that I’m not picking on this guy. No one expects him to be superhuman on a daily basis. He’s been phenomenal overall, but we just haven’t seen enough to name him an All-Star.
Wittenmyer: Ultimately, this is a showcase event for Major League Baseball, an exhibition. And no one currently puts on a show in the National League like De La Cruz does. By the way, in that Kansas City no-hitter, he also drove in at least two runs in two one-run wins because of his best speed in baseball. And don’t be so sure about this Ohtani thing. De La Cruz hits the ball that far and he throws it almost as hard at first as Ohtani did at the plate.
Williams: Hell, if you look at deserving guys who haven’t been in the big leagues for a long time, what about Matt McLain? He arrived on May 15. He did well enough to finish fourth in fan voting at shortstop – and that’s ahead of highly-priced veterans Trea Turner and Dansby Swanson.
Wittenmyer: I have no argument with McLain. Put it in there too. He deserves it. I’m just saying, if you want the most exciting All-Star show possible in Seattle, I don’t know how you can leave out the most exciting player in the National League.
Williams: Is the All-Star selection about the most exciting player? Or is it about who was the best, or among the best, in the first half of the season?
Wittenmyer: All the foregoing. Why even bother with this event if we don’t want to be open to all the great possibilities it can offer?
Williams: Like the good old times. We will never agree on anything. Never mind. How about being open to the possibility of De La Cruz competing in the Home Run Derby?
Wittenmyer: Now that’s something we can agree on.
Williams: This would be a way to bring De La Cruz to Seattle to show off his talents. In fact, it might be a better show if he competed in the derby rather than playing a few innings in the All-Star Game.
Wittenmyer: It would definitely be noisy. Are you talking about a Puget? Her.
Williams: Looks like we finally agree on something after all these years.
Wittenmyer: Not so fast, JDubs. It should be in both.
An idea for a topic for debate? Contact Gordon by email at [email protected] or on Twitter @GDubMLB. Contact Jason at [email protected] or @jwilliamscincy.
