No, but that awesome laugh of his should give him tax exempt status.

MAYORBOB: What did he do with the money he owed in taxes? He eated it all up.


it was simultaneously hilarious, sad, and bizarre how forcefully he denied his weight gain affected his BA the last few years he played. i remember Peter "I'm On the $20 Bill" Gammons interviewing him during spring training and Gwynn esentially shouting P-Gammy down on that line of questioning.

and i'm not saying he would have legged out some infield hits to reach first, i just mean strength and conditioning in general. you go to the plate at 240, you have a whole lot of jelly in the belly affecting your hip rotation.

ultimately, WFC becuase he's in the HOF but still.

Nothing to say other than that I recently checked Petco off the list and holy shiat is that stadium nice.

rickythepenguin: it was simultaneously hilarious, sad, and bizarre how forcefully he denied his weight gain affected his BA the last few years he played. i remember Peter "I'm On the $20 Bill" Gammons interviewing him during spring training and Gwynn esentially shouting P-Gammy down on that line of questioning.

Well, sort of.

His style of hitting was never about legging out deep infield hits. He was a "put-em-where-they-ain't" type. His worst BA in his last 5 seasons was .321, so his average never really suffered -- he could still put the ball pretty much anywhere he wanted to, regardless of his weight. Yes, it dropped from the stratosphere of the mid-1990s, but his career average was .338, so it wasn't far off his historical average. How much of the dropoff can be attributed to weight is very debatable. I'd be much more inclined to chalk most of it up to age at that point.

That said, he missed TONS of games due to his knees disintegrating, and he constantly denied that his knee troubles were exacerbated by his weight, which is patently ridiculous. He started going on the DL with knee troubles every season starting in 1990 or so. Before his knee troubles, he was in 150-160 games and 600 ABs per season. After that, he was averaging ~435 or so ABs per season (I removed 1994 from the figures).

Figuring the missed ABs due to chronic injury in the last half of his career (roughly 1,800) against his .338 career average, he left about 600 hits on the table. That's mind-boggling, considering he still went over 3,000 for his career.

People also forget that he was a stolen base threat in the first half of his career. That was another aspect of his game that took a huge nosedive after he started getting fat. I wonder how many runs/wins got left on the table when he was no longer able to 1) credibly keep a pitcher off-balance after a single or a walk, and 2) get himself into scoring position more frequently.

BKITU: That said, he missed TONS of games due to his knees disintegrating, and he constantly denied that his knee troubles were exacerbated by his weight, which is patently ridiculous.

BKITU: Figuring the missed ABs due to chronic injury in the last half of his career (roughly 1,800) against his .338 career average, he left about 600 hits on the table. That's mind-boggling, considering he still went over 3,000 for his career.


that's what i'm saying....being in just decent shape would have given him some insane numbers.

and think about how the Padres would have fared. aside from his indvidual numbers, how many games per year did they lose because of plays (or hits) he should have had?

i'd put him in the Shaq / Charles Barkley / TO* category of, "as much as you accomplished, you didn't take care of yourself off the field/court and left a lot of talent unrealized" category.


*gaah, i'm not a racist, it just happens they're all black

m1ke: Wow, I didn't realize Tony Gwynn never had a sub .300 year besides his rookie year. These days I'm lucky if one of my Astros is above .200.

Yup. Never hit below .309 in any year other than his call-up year.

m1ke: These days I'm lucky if one of my Astros is above .200.

Welcome to the Post-Tony Gwynn era in San Diego. Petco Park is where offense goes to die.

Hitting Machine

rickythepenguin: TO* category of, "as much as you accomplished, you didn't take care of yourself off the field/court and left a lot of talent unrealized" category.

Ummm TO is a wholly different issue - definitely not a case of 'didn't take care of himself.'

IAmRight: Ummm TO is a wholly different issue - definitely not a case of 'didn't take care of himself.'


you're reading my comment as me saying "his body turned to shiat", which is what affected Shaq and Chuck, but TO's mental shortcomings are just as much to blame for him being radioactive for the past 2-3 years.

TO always kept himself in sick shape physically but also didn't take care of himself, but from the mental side. he knuckleheaded himself out of football and quite possibly out of Canton. i don't know how his numbers stack up (knowing there's a glut at WR for years to come, period, int eh pass happy modern era) for the HOF but for sheer "dislike-ability" alone, he won't get votes.

it is a much different scale because i don't think Milton Bradley ever set the MLB on fire, but he's an apt comparison. solid skill set, but just couldn't stay out of his own damn way.

rickythepenguin: he knuckleheaded himself out of football and quite possibly out of Canton.

Well, even after that, it was mostly the injury that kept him from getting back in - he continued to produce even for the Bengals, and hadn't really been a locker-room problem for the last several years of his career.