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Hank Greenberg was a man of many talents, known for a wide range of accomplishments.
He was a driving force in two of the four championships in Tigers’ history. He swatted 58 home runs in 1938, then the second highest total next to Babe Ruth’s 60. During World War II, he attained the rank of Captain in the United States Air Force. And he once missed a critical late season game in the thick of a pennant race to observe Yom Kippur.
But Hank did not lie awake at night dreaming about the World Series, or bashing homers, or flying planes, or day-long fasts.
From the iconic baseball book, "The Glory of Their Times," Greenberg goes into detail about his most pure passion:
I’ve always believed that the most important aspect of hitting is driving in runs. Runs batted in are more important than batting average, more important than home runs, more important than anything. That’s what wins ball games: driving runs across the plate.
Charlie Gehringer used to bat ahead of me, and if we had a man on first base and Charlie was up, I’d yell, ‘Get him to third Charlie, just get him to third. I’ll get him in.’
That was my goal: get that man in. It got to be a standing joke. Once Charlie said to me, ‘I suppose if I hit a double with a man on first, you’d probably trip him if he tried to go past third base.’
Runs batted in were my obsession.
The Tigers in the here and now are struggling mightily to put a dent in the scoreboard. The pitching staff keeps posting zeros, but the offense matches them step for step. Just two losses from permanent exile, the Tigers look to their most potent of bats to put a charge into the lineup.
Cleanup Hitter, But . . .
The spotlight shines directly on the man currently occupying Greenberg’s former terrain at first base. Prince Fielder is the Tigers’ cleanup hitter, yet he lacks an RBI in the playoffs. Something needs to change...and fast.
The climax of Tuesday's pivotal Game 3 came in the bottom of the eighth. With the Tigers trailing by just a run, they had men on the corners with their version of the Bash Brothers due up.
Miguel Cabrera, recently showing signs of a returning power stroke, got overeager and struck out on a slew of balls destined for the left handed batter’s box. Here was Fielder’s chance for redemption -- to put all the critics and naysayers to bed with one vicious swing of the lumber.
But it was not to be. The struggling All-Star struggled once more and struck out on three pitches.
To be fair, let’s remember that this was a semi-rare RBI opportunity for Prince. The top of the Tigers’ order has been nothing short of brutal. Austin Jackson is making contact at a Dave Kingman-esque rate (18 Ks in 33 at-bats!), and Torii Hunter is looking every bit of his 38 years of age.
Without men on base, there is nobody to bring home. This is understood. We aren’t laying some type of all-encompassing blame on Fielder.
But this is your clean up hitter; your first baseman; a guy that once amassed 141 ribbies in a season for Milwaukee. Yes, there are nine men in the order, but a greater weight is placed on Fielder’s broad shoulders. It comes with the territory.
Each team relies on two or three players more than the rest. They are the run-producers. The Big Red Machine had Morgan, Rose, Griffey...but it was Johnny Bench and Tony Perez that were the irreplaceable cogs in the middle of the order. Same goes for Mays and McCovey, or Ramirez and Ortiz. The Tigers have Cabrera and Fielder.
You can talk about the vanishing act of Jackson/Hunter, the continued struggle to find an answer in left field, Omar Infante’s scuffling -- they are all valid. But none are as vital to the team’s success as Fielder once again becoming a destructive force in the meat of the Tigers’ lineup.
Sometimes the outside voices, as much as Prince might try to ignore them, can creep into the subconscious. People grumble about his 1 for 14 performance in last year’s World Series. They mention the career-low 25 home runs this season.
Chances are if you stumble upon a conversation regarding Detroit’s squat first sacker, the overall sentiment is going to be one of criticism and/or scorn.
Each Day, A Clean Slate
There is a bright side to this tale for Prince.
He lives and plays in a world dominated by instant reaction and fleeting emotion. Giant mistakes are made, marvelous wins are had . . . it’s all forgotten in less than 24 hours.
One massive game in a showcase setting could wash away all the faults and failings of the past two weeks.
He will stand in tonight against Jake Peavy, a bulldog former Cy Young winner who Prince has found some success against: 36 tries resulting in ten hits, four of which went for extra bases. The track record is not half-bad here.
The old adage says that pitching and defense wins championships. That’s all well and good, but without a nightly diet of green vegetables and three runs or more, that champagne remains on ice forever.
The fourth spot in the order will be critical in the fourth game of the American League Championship Series on Wednesday night.
But Prince Fielder doesn’t have to hit a ball out of the stadium.
He doesn’t need to be Hank Greenberg.
He just needs to produce a run. That would be good enough for now.
