Fat cats fall from grace
Yeah, we lost the Ryder Cup again. We are no longer a Davis Cup power. The U.S. men’s and women’s basketball teams lost in the world competition. That was certainly our game, invented and perfected here. If memory serves me, we don’t do well in international baseball, either.
What? Will you be reporting in 2007 that NFL Europe beat up on our Super Bowl champs? (At least most of those players are American.)
I believe the reason for this decline comes from one feeling shared by most high-profile athletes: complacency. Perhaps the amount of money available to most athletes has replaced their drive to be part of a team, excel and win.
Robert Bamford, Aurora
Hurdle taken to task
Clint Hurdle is a terrible manager. The owners believe he is the best cheap manager in baseball because they keep renewing his contract, but you could find 5,000 fans to take that job for half the money and could not do any worse than last place.
He cannot evaluate talent, he destroys confidence in young players and he cannot handle pitchers. In spite of an ownership that refuses to pay for quality, the Rockies somehow managed to assemble a team that should have challenged for the division lead but ended in the basement once again. Clint does not value defense, which prevents runs, but insists every player produce runs.
It is teamwork and attitude that make the difference, and Clint can’t get the players to do the job. And there are all those lost games where the mastermind takes out the hot pitcher to bring in a stone-cold one who couldn’t find the plate with a flashlight or leaves in an obviously tired pitcher to load the bases before sending in help.
Steve Fox, Broomfield
Castilla deserved better
I have endured quite a bit as a Rockies fan, but nothing made me as sick as Clint Hurdle’s decision to start a Double-A pitcher on “Vinny Castilla Day.”
This shows that this guy has no respect for his players, no respect for the fans and no respect for the game. Vinny led the way for other Mexican-born ballplayers to make their way into the major leagues, and will be inducted into the Hall of Fame as one of the best third basemen of all time (not to mention the first Mexican player to be inducted). At first I thought the Rockies’ woes were due to a lack of a hitting coach, and positioning coach, but it is obvious that the fish stinks from the head, and that Hurdle doesn’t truly know how to manage, or is Dan O’Dowd’s yes man.
As long as Hurdle and his staff are running this ship, I refuse to watch the Rockies, on television or at the stadium.
Jeffery Noakes, Aurora
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