We are fast approaching 2015, and with it, the announcement
of who will be added to the Hall of Fame. January 6th is the big
day, and already
we’re starting to get an idea on who might be in and who might not. I’ll be
posting my ballot in a few days, but there’s one specific player that I want to
focus on for the time being. Someone who probably won’t get a second thought
from most voters, let alone a vote: Brian Giles.
I suppose you could say that part of my reason for wanting
to write about Giles is personal. I lived in Pittsburgh for a while when I was
younger. It wasn’t enough to make me a Pirates fan (really, given the awfulness
of those early-2000s Pirates teams, it’s a minor miracle I didn’t develop a
burning hatred for the entire sport), but it gave me a soft spot for the team
and the stars from that era. I’ve written about Jason Kendall and Jack Wilson
already (here
and here,
respectively), but Brian hung up his cleats a little earlier than either of
them. So I’ll take this temporary return to relevance as an excuse to reflect
on all that he did, since most people probably won’t be.
To start with, a personal story. At least, this isn’t really
relevant to the rest of the article, so I’ll just say it here. Back when I played
Little League, I used to look forward each year to seeing what jersey number I
would get and who had that number in the Majors. I remember the year that I got
24 specifically because it was Brian Giles’s number. I don’t remember if I ever
got 8 for Cal Ripken, or 17 or 27 for Scott Rolen, or any of my other favorite
players from back then, but 24 sticks out in my mind.
As a young child in Pittsburgh, I remember thinking the
Pirates would be good soon. Even after the chances of me actually being a fan of
the Pirates were basically zero, you still sort of overestimate the hometown
team. So when 2003 came around, I figured that the Pirates would be competing
that year. After all, they had Kendall and Giles and Wilson and Aramis Ramirez
and Kenny Lofton and Reggie Sanders and Matt Stairs and Kip Wells and Kris
Benson and Jeff Suppan and Josh Fogg and Randall Simon…
No really, I actually remember being excited about Randall
Simon and Josh Fogg. It’s easy for a small child to get caught up in the
newness of acquisitions and the blind optimism of local fans and so on. That
team would disappoint, going 75 and 87 for their eleventh straight losing
season (officially halfway done with the streak, though!), with Giles and
several of the other players being shipped out midseason.
